The traffic was unpleasant. The honking/shouting/generally trumpy signs were just antisocial.

What a bunch of arseholes.

I'd support public housing but we don't have the tax system that existed post-war to fund it, and raising taxes enough to do so would be nearly politically impossible.

I don't think the idea that private developers are capable of lowering housing prices is actually discredited. New construction tends to be very expensive, but places that allow lots of building are overall cheaper than comparable places that don't. Upzoning slows rent growth in adjacent areas, and in some cases where it's done on a huge scale (like Sydney and Minneapolis) it actually has decreased overall rents.

Was unaware. Thanks for informing me.

The answer is actually increased domestic spending on things that really create value for the people who live in this country. Large scale public housing being top on that list. The myth that private developers will resolve our housing crisis is a myth that has been so utterly discredit that one has to be borderline brain dead to continue to buy into it.

The entire sub-urban housing stock built in the post war building boom was heavily subsidized by the federal govt. But for those subsidies, the so called boomers would be just as broke as the melenials. No one talks about it in those terms today because the beneficiaries of those subsidies were almost exclusively white and today form the core of the neo liberal establishment.

The so-called progressives that are supposed to be challenging the establishment are now squarely co-opted; voting for war, increased military spending while ignoring the domestic crisis that plague their constituents.

Bolsonaro is a war criminal

They've been driving down Ferry honking their horns for the past half hour and I'm home sick with a cold and a splitting headache. FML

It was very real! Great place along with Art Kitchen.

A city needs a prominent middle class in order for it to have a flourishing economy.

New developments attract this middle class.

The displacement of people is real and the rent increases aren't good, but we can't be a poor city just for the hell of it. Mars doesn't want to hire our citizens as they are now.

In order to stave off gentrification, Newarks school system must be stellar. A city with a good school system is a city that prepares its kids to graduate college and be able to work and play in the city.

Haha I’d love to have that spot back again

Definitely had an unlicensed Corona there once. In a paper coffee cup.

Thanks. This is awesome. That Coffee Cave space was so unique tho. Loved it. Even the way the two floors looked.

Yes it was great. But the guy who ran it is back and opening up a spot on Clinton avenue called BlkBoxNwk https://patch.com/new-jersey/newarknj/converted-building-gives-newark-artists-place-live-work

Next time! Shit, that reminds me that I have a chocolate croissant sitting on the counter to eat! :-D

Why?

Such a great mural on that one too.

I'm fine with those other things if theres actually enough money behind any of them to actually get them built. Price caps usually have really bad second order effects. I don't think a vacancy tax would be useful because less than 6% of units in Newark are vacant which usually just means that landlords wait a month or two between tenants; things aren't sitting empty long term. (Especially in a city that has a lot of structures that aren't habitable but would count as vacant because they have walls and a roof). I'd rather just have a universal higher property tax that goes to a public housing developer that builds apartments to rent slightly above the cost of maintenance.

There are other types of housing though the city can encourage. Things like renter co-ops, low income units, non-profit housing. They can put caps on rent if they wanted. The recent push to put extra tax on vacant properties is good as well if it can prevent landlords from sitting on a unit to wait to replace it with a higher rent tenant.

Owning houses you don't own only makes sense if property taxes are relatively low and you expect the price to keep going up forever. Prices are rising because despite the surge of construction, there isn't actually enough housing near jobs and transit for everyone who wants it. The empty luxury housing thing is mostly a myth but the solution is higher taxes and more constructuon.

This country has freedom of movement. You have no choice but to let as many in as want to move in. What you can control is whether enough new housing gets built to accommodate newcomers or if they have to compete with residents for existing homes.

Even it if were, what’s wrong with that? You take a building with 4 units down and replace it with 40 units, that’s a 1000% increase in available rental units. The 20% affordable quota creates 8 affordable units. Assuming the 4 units lost were housing low income residents, those units have grown by 100%. How is this not a win all around.

People still went in there to eat? The building still up in the photo had to pre date the restaurant by a few decades. Sucks there will be a parking lot but would still prob be cheaper and environmentally friendly to knock down that old building with prob asbestos and lead in it then try rehab it.

I miss driving by the mirrored building that was where the parking lot is now,,,,was TAP airlines,iirc.

Awful

You're right that there's no limit for the temporary use, but I really think that with the push for redevelopment in the city and how well located this site is, it won't be too long before a new developer comes in. Perhaps I'm naive, but I don't see the parking lot remaining for another 10 years.

It’s not gentrification if a building with a restaurant and apartments upstairs gets torn down to become commuter parking lot.

It won’t. There is no limit in the length of time of a temporary use” and it will be a parking lot as long as we have cars that don’t fly.