Oregon's Growth Boundaries: Myth and Reality

Michael Lewyn

The author is an Associate Professor at John Marshall Law School, Atlanta, Georgia.

Introduction: The Portland Miracle

The most stringent¹ anti-sprawl measure adopted by any American state is Oregon's urban growth boundary (UGB) program.² A UGB is a line designating "areas already marked by 'urban-type' development, within which that type of development is to be channeled and encouraged, and beyond which such development is to be discouraged or forbidden."³ Thus, a UGB discourages development of new suburbs, and encourages development in older cities and suburbs.

Growth boundaries have been good for Oregon's cities. While many older American cities have been eviscerated by middle-class flight to suburbia,⁴ Portland (Oregon's largest city)⁵ has grown and prospered. From 1980 (when the Portland UGB was created)⁶ to 2000, the city of Portland's population grew by over 40%,⁷ after declining for several decades.⁸ Portland's population growth compared favorably to that of the central cities of the most comparable western metropolitan areas without UGBs. The metropolitan areas of Denver, Salt Lake City, and Seattle grew as fast as the Portland metropolitan area⁹ — yet their central cities' populations [32 ELR 10161] increased at only a 10% to 15% rate in recent decades.¹⁰ All three regions have lacked UGBs for most or all of the past two decades.¹¹

While other central cities have become dumping grounds for the poor, central Portland has not. Between 1979 and 1997, poverty increased in Denver, Salt Lake City, and Seattle, but actually decreased in the city of Portland.¹²

As Portland's population has grown, its economy has grown as well. The number of private sector jobs increased by 21.4% in the city of Portland between 1992 and 1997,¹³ while jobs in Denver, Salt Lake City, and Seattle increased by only 6% to 9%.¹⁴ This disparity is not due solely to changes in regionwide job growth: the suburbs of Denver and Seattle actually experienced faster job growth than those of Portland.¹⁵

Ever since the UGB was created, the city of Portland has blossomed, maintaining its share of regionwide population and narrowing the city/suburb economic gap that plagues other cities. Thus, the UGB has arguably enhanced consumer choice, by making the city of Portland a viable option for businesses and middle-class households.

Four Myths About Portland

Nevertheless, the UGB has met with a firestorm of criticism. For example, the Almanac of American Politics, an authoritative guide¹⁶ to American politics, asserts that the Portland area is "the fourth-least affordable place in the nation to purchase a new home,"¹⁷ and that its policies "guarantee greater traffic congestion [because] its population growth will be much larger than the number of people who can be persuaded to use mass transit."¹⁸ The Almanac even suggests that the UGB, by increasing population density, will increase air pollution.¹⁹ Other commentators assert that the UGB reduces housing quality by increasing density.²⁰

In sum, UGB critics argue that by limiting suburban development and encouraging development in densely populated cities and inner suburbs, Portland's UGB (1) reduces housing affordability, (2) creates traffic congestion, (3) increases air pollution, and (4) reduces the quality of the housing stock. This Article responds to each of these arguments.

The Affordability Myth

By most measures, Portland is not one of America's most expensive metropolitan areas. According to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), Portland's median home sale price in early 2001 was $ 168,000, far less than Denver ($ 192,000), San Francisco ($ 550,000), Seattle ($ 220,000), and literally dozens of other metropolitan areas.²¹ It could be argued that even though Portland is not incredibly expensive, the UGB has nevertheless triggered an affordability crisis by creating a rapid increase in home prices. For example, one commentator asserts that the UGB has induced an "artificial diminution of suburban housing development [which] has led to sharply escalating prices."²²

[32 ELR 10162]

Table 1 tests this theory by comparing Portland's housing prices to those of comparable²³ western metropolitan areas:

Table 1: Housing Price Increases in the Urban West, 1991-2000²⁴

1991 median 2001 median

price (in price (in

thousands thousands

of $ $ s) of $ $ s)

(1st quarter) (1st quarter) % increase

Denver 84 192 128

Portland 80 168 110

Salt Lake City 76 154 102

Seattle 130 220 69

Table 1 shows that home prices in Portland have increased more slowly than home prices in Denver, and that Portland-area housing price appreciation has been only slightly more rapid than price appreciation in other western regions.

It could be argued that despite its perfectly ordinary rates of housing appreciation, Portland's houses are nevertheless more expensive than houses in other regions because wages are lower in Portland. Table 2 sets forth the ratio between median income and median home price for Portland and comparable metropolitan areas.

Table 2: Median Incomes and Median Home Prices as of 2001 (in thousands of dollars)²⁵

Median Median Income as

family home % of home

income price price

Denver 64.4 192 33.5

Portland 55.9 168 33.2

Salt Lake City 54.3 154 35.2

Seattle 72.2 220 32.8

Table 2 shows that even after Portland's lower wages are accounted for, Portland is more affordable than Seattle and only slightly less so than Denver or Salt Lake City. In all four areas, the median home price exceeds median income by about a 3-1 margin.

If Portland's housing appreciation rate has been lower than that of Denver and its overall prices are lower than those of Seattle, why is it so often argued that Portland is unaffordable? UGB critics rely on the NAHB Housing Opportunity Index (HOI)²⁶ which, in recent years, has consistently labeled Portland as one of the nation's most expensive metropolitan areas.²⁷

The HOI, however, yields preposterous results: for example, metropolitan Los Angeles' median family income is lower than that of Portland ($ 54,500 as opposed to Portland's $ 55,900), and its median home price is $ 45,000 higher ($ 213,000 as opposed to Portland's $ 168,000), yet the NAHB considers Los Angeles more affordable than Portland²⁸—obviously an absurd result.

And even if Portland's housing prices have exploded in recent years, its overall cost of living has not Between 1995 and 1999, Portland's consumer price index for all items increased by 12.6%—no more than in Denver, and less than in Seattle (13.5%).²⁹ Thus, there is no reason to believe that Portland consumers are being impoverished by high housing prices.

In sum, Portland's property values have indeed gone up over the past decade—but its price increases and home values are in line with those of comparable metropolitan areas. The UGB may have had a marginal effect on Portland's housing costs—but has hardly been the disaster that some claim it to be.³⁰

The Congestion Myth

UGB critics argue that anti-sprawl policies such as UGBs increase traffic congestion by forcing a constant or growing number of automobiles into the same amount of land.³¹ It follows, according to UGB critics, that Portland's UGB, by increasing density, has increased traffic congestion.³²

[32 ELR 10163]

This argument lacks merit for several reasons. First, congestion has increased as rapidly in comparable metropolitan areas without UGBs as in Portland. The Texas Transportation Institute (TTI), a state research agency affiliated with Texas A&M University,³³ regularly conducts "urban mobility studies" that evaluate the extent of congestion in America's largest metropolitan areas. Its 2001 study³⁴ contains numerous measures of congestion trends, including increases in annual delay per person.³⁵ The TTI ranked Portland number 11 (out of 68 metropolitan areas ranked) in the 1982-1999 increase in delay caused by traffic congestion—that is, the TTI found that congestion increased at a more rapid rate in Portland than in all but 10 metropolitan areas. But 2 of those 10 were comparable western regions which lacked UGBs for some or all of the relevant period—Seattle (No. 5) and Denver (No. 8).³⁶ In other words, traffic congestion increased in Portland—but also increased dramatically in comparable regions without UGBs.

Second, there is no reason to believe that Portland's congestion increase was the result of increased density. According to the TTI, Portland's population density actually decreased slightly from 1982 to 1999, from 3,230 people per square mile to 3,040.³⁷

Third, Seattle's brief experience with UGBs supports the view that UGBs do not cause congestion. Seattle instituted UGBs in 1994³⁸—so if UGBs caused congestion, congestion in Seattle would have risen more dramatically in recent years than in earlier years. Instead, Seattle's congestion-related delay per person exploded from 19 hours in 1982 to 55 hours in 1992, and then decreased to 53 hours in 1999.³⁹ Thus, the Seattle UGB apparently has not increased traffic congestion.

Finally, population density in other regions does not correlate strongly with traffic congestion. Table 3 lists the urbanized areas with more congestion than Portland, and compares their density to that of Portland.

Table 3: Density and Delay Per Driver⁴⁰

Delay per Population per

person

(hours) square mile

Los Angeles 56 5575

Atlanta 53 1585

Seattle 53 2295

Houston 50 1830

Dallas 46 1455

Washington 46 3420

Austin 45 1585

Denver 45 2240

St. Louis 44 1775

Orlando 42 1780

Miami 42 3785

Boston 42 2605

San Jose 42 4340

Nashville 42 1085

San Francisco 42 3205

San Bernardino 38 2600

Minneapolis 38 1900

San Diego 38 3575

Indianapolis 37 2050

Louisville 37 2060

Tampa 35 1530

Portland 34 3040

Table 3 shows no link between density and congestion: of 21 areas with more congestion than Portland, 15 (including Portland and Seattle) are less densely populated. Thus, density either (1) does not cause traffic congestion or (2) increases traffic congestion so minutely that the congestion-causing effect of density is overwhelmed by other relevant factors. Thus, it appears unlikely that Oregon's UGB will increase traffic congestion even if it does cause increases in urban population density.

In sum, traffic congestion in metropolitan Portland has grown about as fast as in comparable regions without UGBs—a fact that suggests that UGBs neither cause nor cure traffic congestion to a significant extent. And if the UGB increases regionwide density in the future, traffic congestion might not increase as a result, because there is no clear correlation between regionwide population density and regionwide traffic congestion.

The Pollution Myth

Air quality is widely acknowledged to be linked in some way to density, suburban development, and UGBs—but there is no consensus as to how these problems are linked Environmentalists assert that suburban development creates pollution by increasing auto use,⁴¹ and that Oregon's land use policies might therefore limit pollution by shifting development from auto-oriented suburbs to more transit-friendly cities.⁴² UGB critics argue, however, that UGB-induced increases in density will lead to increases in pollution. One commentator argues as follows: "As density [32 ELR 10164] rises, so does congestion . . . . Given the fact that air pollution rises as automobile speeds decline and as 'stop and start' operation increases, the result is greater air pollution."⁴³

This argument has not been borne out by events; as noted above,⁴⁴ Portland's traffic congestion is no worse than that of less densely populated metropolitan areas (including otherwise comparable regions such as Seattle and Denver).⁴⁵ If UGBs have not caused increased traffic congestion, they obviously have not caused congestion-related pollution.

Moreover, air pollution in Portland is comparable to that of nearby metropolitan areas. Table 4 lists trends in carbon monoxide (CO) emissions for Portland and comparable western metropolitan areas:

Table 4: Carbon Monoxide Emissions in Parts Per Million, 1989-1998⁴⁶

1989 1998 % Reduction

Denver 7.8 3.9 50.0

Portland 8.2 5.1 37.8

Salt Lake City 7.7 4.9 36.3

Seattle 8.5 4.5 47.0

Table 4 reveals that all four metro areas reduced CO pollution by roughly similar amounts. Thus, it appears that Oregon's land use policies, to the extent that those policies differ from those of other western states, have not significantly affected air quality.⁴⁷

It could be argued that even if the UGB has not yet increased pollution, it will do so in the future by encouraging higher density (which will in turn allegedly increase pollution by increasing traffic congestion).⁴⁸ To be sure, a scintilla of evidence supports this theory: Los Angeles has higher population density than any other urbanized area⁴⁹ and has more CO pollution than any other large urbanized areas.⁵⁰ But Los Angeles is unusual in that it combines high density with high auto dependency,⁵¹ perhaps because its central core is not very dense; the central city of Los Angeles had only 7,426 people per square mile in 1990.⁵² By contrast, each of the eight large metropolitan areas where over 10% of commuters used public transit in 1990⁵³ included or was near a central city with 9,500 persons or more per square mile.⁵⁴

Metropolitan areas with high transit use tend to have relatively clean air. Table 5 lists the five metropolitan areas with the highest transit ridership and their pollutant levels, and compares them to Portland and comparable metropolitan areas.

Table 5: Transit Ridership and Carbon Monoxide

% of commuters 1998 Carbon monoxide

using public transit⁵⁵ emissions (in parts per

million)⁵⁶

New York City 47.3 3.7

San Francisco 19.5 3.5

Chicago 17.2 3.4

Boston 14.2 2.9

Washington 13.7 3.3

Denver 4.4 3.9

Portland 6.0 5.1

Salt Lake City 3.0 4.9

Seattle 7.4 4.5

The most transit-friendly metropolitan areas are all less polluted than Denver, Portland, Salt Lake City, or Seattle; evidence that if Portland can ever densify its central core and reduce auto dependency to the extent that those metropolitan areas have done, air pollution is unlikely to increase.

The Housing Quality Myth

UGB opponents argue that even if the Portland UGB does not increase housing costs, traffic congestion, or air pollution, it has reduced the quality of the housing stock by reducing the amount of buildable land, thus reducing home and lot [32 ELR 10165] sizes. For example, one anti-UGB article is titled: Squeezed Out: No Swingset, No Sandbox, No Space Left for the American Dream.⁵⁷ The article asserts that because of the UGB, "the American Dream is dead in Portland."⁵⁸ Similarly, one anti-UGB activist asserts that if the UGB is not expanded or eliminated, "people will be crowded together, living in small lots."⁵⁹

But in fact, the specter of a hyper-dense Portland is imaginary; Portlanders' homes and lots are as large as ever. Between 1986 and 1995, the average owner-occupied home in Portland grew from 1,674 square feet⁶⁰ to 1,764 square feet.⁶¹ The median lot size grew slightly, from .22 acre⁶² to .23 acre.⁶³ The number of houses sitting on over one-half an acre of land grew from 74,000⁶⁴ to 98,700.⁶⁵ And during the 1990s, nearly 800,000 of the 1.4 million people living in the Portland area saw no change in the density of their neighborhoods.⁶⁶ As a result, only 5% of the region's residents live in areas with population density greater than 10,000 people per square mile.⁶⁷ In Portland, as in other areas, more people are building bigger houses on more land.

It could be argued that even if Portland has no density crisis today, a refusal to expand the UGB could eventually make Portland overcrowded.⁶⁸ But in fact, Portland has plenty of room to grow. The city of Portland has just over 529,000 people living within its 124.7 square miles.⁶⁹ If the city's population tripled, it would have about 1.587 million people living within those 124.7 square miles, thus creating a density of 12,726 people per square mile—a lower density than that of San Francisco,⁷⁰ a city that has become more rather than less desirable in recent years.⁷¹ In other words, if a million people moved to Portland in the next few decades, every single one of them could, in theory, be placed in the city of Portland without either making Portland inordinately dense or increasing suburban densities by one iota.

The Libertarian Argument Against UGBs

It could be argued that regardless of its utilitarian benefits, Portland's UGB should not be imitated because restricting landowners' use of their land violates their property rights.⁷² This argument makes sense in principle: in a society that truly valued minimal government, any form of land use regulation would obviously be inappropriate.⁷³

On the other hand, the United States is not such a society: even in Colonial times, states and cities enacted planning statutes similar to UGBs. For example, the Massachusetts Bay Colony prohibited dwellings more than one-half mile from town meeting houses without court permission.⁷⁴ And today, as UGB critic Clint Bolick admits, "minimum lot sizes and restrictions on multiple uses, often popular tactics among suburban governments to keep their communities pristine and exclusive, definitely contribute to 'sprawling' suburbs."⁷⁵ A typical zoning ordinance has separate zones for single-family large lot, single-family medium, single-family standard, multi-family low density, multi-family medium density, multi-family high density, general office, neighborhood commercial, community commercial, service commercial, central business district, limited industrial and heavy industrial.⁷⁶ These regulations force Americans to drive to reach jobs and shops by artificially separating residential and commercial land uses.⁷⁷ Zoning laws also reduce housing supplies and force Americans to drive by mandating minimum lot sizes and house sizes within zones.⁷⁸ These regulations were frequently enacted for the purpose [32 ELR 10166] of increasing housing prices⁷⁹; they also inadvertently reduce transit use, because as residences are spread farther apart, fewer people can conveniently walk to bus and train stops.⁸⁰ If land use restrictions such as separation of land uses, minimum house sizes, and minimum lot sizes do not unduly infringe landowners' rights, neither do UGBs.

Even UGB critics often support anti-urban government transportation policies. For decades, government has built new roads into suburbia, thus encouraging development to shift from cities to suburbs.⁸¹ But many critics of UGBs and other anti-sprawl measures are less than critical of road spending. For example, the Independence Institute, which purports to address "public policy issues from a free-market, pro-freedom perspective"⁸² published an anti-UGB paper asserting that "for traffic congestion to be mitigated . . . . Roadway expansions will be necessary."⁸³ Steven Hayward of the Heritage Foundation complained in a 1998 article that "Portland's planners . . . are substituting political decisions for marketplace decisions"⁸⁴ yet claimed in the same piece that Portland will suffer increased traffic congestion because "the region deliberately avoids road-building."⁸⁵ And Grant Gulibon, a policy analyst for Pennsylvania's conservative Commonwealth Foundation, contends that the UGB "created an artificial scarcity of land. . . . Whenever a commodity becomes scarce the price goes up,"⁸⁶ yet asserts that "the reason [new roads] fill up right away is that you didn't build enough in the first place."⁸⁷

UGBs undeniably increase government's voice in land use decisions—but so do a variety of well-established government policies, some of which are supported even by prominent UGB critics. Thus, UGBs are not uniquely intrusive.

Conclusion

In a truly libertarian society, land use controls such as Oregon's UGB would of course be impermissible—as would the zoning laws that presently dot American cities and suburbs. But on utilitarian grounds, the UGB is clearly defensible: it has revitalized central Portland, and has been far less harmful to other societal goals than UGB opponents claim.

1. See WILLIAM B. STOEBUCK & DALE A. WHITMAN, THE LAW OF PROPERTY § 9.31, at 673 (3d ed. 2000) ("Oregon and Washington statutes have created the most complete [growth control] systems"). Washington's growth control statute is so new that its effects cannot yet be studied. See also R. Gregory Nokes, Others See the Roses, Miss the Thorns, PORTLAND OREGONIAN, Sept. 28, 1996, at D1, 1996 WL 11388575 (Washington cities' growth boundaries not established until 1994). Minnesota has designated a metropolitan urban service area (MUSA) to limit the provision of urban services to already-developed areas near Minneapolis and St. Paul. However, the Minnesota program is toothless because the MUSA encompasses far more suburban land than does the growth boundary of Oregon's largest metropolitan area (Portland). See Keith W. Dearborn & Ann M. Gygi, Planner's Panacea or Pandora's Box?: A Realistic Assessment of the Role of Urban Growth Areas in Achieving Growth Management Goals, 16 PUGET SOUND L. REV. 975, 979-82 (1993) (Minnesota service area encompasses 576,000 acres, more than twice as much land as the Portland urban growth boundary (UGB)); Dana Tims, Standing in the Way of Suburbia, PORTLAND OREGONIAN, NOV. 2, 2000, at O1, 2000 WL 27105083 (Portland UGB encompasses 236,000 acres); CENSUS BUREAU, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE (DOC), STATISTICAL ABSTRACT OF THE UNITED STATES: 2000, at 33-35 (120th ed.) (the Portland region is Oregon's largest metropolitan area) [hereinafter 2000 ABSTRACT]. And the gap between Minneapolis and Portland will grow over time, because the Minneapolis/St. Paul regional government (the Metropolitan Council) plans to add over 200,000 acres to the MUSA, an area almost equivalent to the amount of land within the Portland growth boundary. See James Poradek, Putting the Use Back in Metropolitan Land-Use Planning: Private Enforcement of Urban Sprawl Control Laws, 81 MINN. L. REV. 1343, 1359 (1997) (discussing Metropolitan Council plans). In addition, numerous cities and counties have their own growth boundaries. See Robert Liberty, Where Would We Be Without It? SB 100 in '73 Changed the Face of Oregon, PORTLAND OREGONIAN, May 29, 1998, at E13, 1998 WL 4209867 (12 California cities have UGBs). However, municipal UGBs are far more easily leapfrogged than a statewide program: if developers prefer not to build within a municipal UGB, they can move to another nearby municipality. See Theodore C. Taub & Melissa C. Thorn, Update on Initiative and Referenda, SE11 ALI-ABA 505, 530 (1999) (boundaries may create "leapfrog development or leakage outside the growth boundaries where jurisdictions unilaterally institute [UGBs] without any regional or state mandate"); Neal Pierce, The Latest From the Growth Wars, NATION'S CITIES WKLY., NOV. 1, 1999, at 2, 1999 WL 9722325 (growth boundaries surrounding several California cities "thwarted by leapfrog development"); Anthony Downs, The Big Picture: How America's Cities Are Growing, BROOKINGS REV., Oct. 1, 1998 at 8, 1998 WL 16868710 ("if there are no constraints on development in counties lying just outside the growth boundary, developers will leapfrog into those counties").

2. See STOEBUCK & WHITMAN, supra note 1, § 9.31, at 673-74 (using term). The UGB is not, however, a new concept. The first recorded UGB is in the Bible, which limited the Levite tribe to specified amounts of land for cities and pastureland. Numbers 35:1-5. The first municipal UGB was established in Fayette County, Kentucky, in 1958. See Chris Poynter, Study Finds Rapid Growth Threatens Rural Landscapes, COURIER-J., Dec. 1, 2000, at 1A, 2000 WL 7045271.

3. STOEBUCK & WHITMAN, supra note 1, § 9.31, at 673-74. See also City of Salem v. Families for Responsible Gov't, 298 Or. 574, 577 n.3, 668 P.2d 965, 966 (Or. 1985) (under Oregon law, "an '[UGB]' is a boundary established to separate urbanizable land from rural land"); 1000 Friends of Oregon v. Land Conservation & Dev. Comm'n, 292 Or. 735, 737, 642 P.2d 1158, 1160 (Or. 1982) ("[UGBs] are planning devices which bound areas composed of urban and urbanizable land, separating them from rural land"). A complete description of Oregon law is contained in Robert L. Liberty, Oregon's Comprehensive Growth Management Program: An Implementation Review and Lessons for Other States, 22 ELR 10367 (June 1992). See also 1000 Friends of Oregon v. Land Conservation & Dev. Comm'n, 301 Or. 447, 450-53, 724 P.2d 268, 273-76 (Or. 1986) (discussing Oregon planning law and procedure in detail).

4. See WORLD ALMANAC AND BOOK OF FACTS 2001, at 376 (William A. McGeveran Jr. ed., 2000) (St. Louis has lost over one-half of its 1950 population, and several other cities, including Buffalo, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh, have lost over 40% of their 1950 populations) [hereinafter WORLD ALMANAC].

5. Id. at 407.

6. See Metro, Background: What Is an Urban Growth Boundary?, at http://www.metro.dst.or.us/growth/gms.html (last visited Nov. 26, 2001).

7. See 2000 ABSTRACT, supra note 1, at 41 (Portland had 368,000 residents in 1980); CENSUS BUREAU, U.S. DOC, POPULATION AND HOUSING TABLES, available at http://www.census.gov/population/www/cen2000/tablist.html (last visited Oct. 31, 2001), tbl. PHC-T-5 (Portland grew to 529,121 people in 2000) [hereinafter CENSUS TABLE T-5].

8. See WORLD ALMANAC, supra note 4, at 376 (between 1950 and 1980, Portland's population declined from 373,628 to 368,148, while Seattle and Denver gained population).

9. All three areas, like Portland, grew at a 43% to 48% rate between 1980 and 2000. See 2000 ABSTRACT, supra note 1, at 33, 35; CENSUS BUREAU, U.S. DOC, POPULATION AND HOUSING TABLES, available at http://www.census.gov/population/www/cen2000/tablist.html (last visited Oct. 31, 2001), Table PHC-T-3 [hereinafter CENSUS TABLE T-3] (Seattle grew from 1.652 million residents to 2.416 million; Salt Lake City from 0.91 million to 1.334 million; and Denver grew from 1.429 million to 2.109 million while Portland was growing from 1.334 million to 1.918 million). These areas are comparable for two other reasons. First, all four areas are of comparable size, each has between 1.3 million and 2.5 million residents. Id. Second, all four areas are in America's western half. Western cities, as a group, are more comparable to each other than to eastern cities because "mountains and other natural barriers and limited supplies of water have prevented many Western cities from sprawling [while] flat lands and plentiful water have allowed most Eastern cities to grow as they please." Haya El Nasser & Paul Overberg, What You Don't Know About Sprawl, USA TODAY, Feb. 22, 2001, at 1A, 2001 WL 5456035. The West's natural barriers to sprawl may at least partially explain why even western cities without growth boundaries have gained some population, while some eastern cities in high-growth areas have been bled dry by their suburbs. See, e.g., 2000 ABSTRACT, supra note 1, at 35, 41; CENSUS TABLE T-3, supra; CENSUS TABLE T-5, supra note 7 (Washington, D.C., lost population in the 1980s and 1990s, even though metropolitan area population increased by over 40%).

10. See 2000 ABSTRACT, supra note 1, at 39, 41 (listing 1980 city populations as follows: Denver 493,000; Portland 368,000; Salt Lake City 163,000; and Seattle 494,000); CENSUS TABLE T-5, supra note 7 (listing 2000 city populations as follows: Denver 554,636; Portland 529,121; and Salt Lake City 181,743; and Seattle 563,374).

11. See Nokes, supra note 1 (Seattle had no UGB until 1994); Justin Phillips & Eban Goodstein, Growth Management and Housing Prices: The Case of Portland, Oregon, CONTEMP. ECON. POL'Y, July 1, 2000, at 33444, 2000 WL 12922273 (Salt Lake City has no UGB); Alan Katz, Building the Future, DENV. POST, Feb. 9, 1997, at A1, 1997 WL 6064597 (Denver has no UGB). Denver's regional planning agency, the Denver Regional Council of Governments, recently drafted a regional growth managment plan with voluntary UGBs; however, two suburban counties (Arapahoc and Adams counties) have already repudiated the plan. See Bob Ewegen, Home, Home, Quite Deranged, DENV. POST, Jan. 15, 2001, at B6, 2001 WL 6741055. See also M.E. Sprengelmeyer, Metro Growth Pact to Be Signed, ROCKY MTN. NEWS, Aug. 5, 2000, at 5A, 2000 WL 6603062 (quoting statement by Rich McClintock, executive director of environmentalist lobby CoPIRG, that proposal "lacks the tools or teeth to effectively limit sprawl outside of the proposed [UGBs]").

12. See STATE OF THE CITIES DATA SYSTEMS, CENSUS DATA OUTPUT, DENVER, CO, PORTLAND, OR, SEATTLE, WA, AND SALT LAKE CITY, UT, available at http://SOCDS.HUDUSER.ORG||| (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (city of Portland's poverty rate decreased from 13% in 1979 to 12.6% in 1997; during the same period, the city of Denver's poverty rate increased from 13.7% to 16.4% of population, Seattle's poverty rate increased from 11.2% to 12.9%, and Salt Lake City's poverty rate increased from 14.2% to 16.2%) [hereinafter POVERTY DATA]; CENSUS BUREAU, U.S. DOC, POVERTY, available at http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty.html||| (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (linking to various explanations of "poverty rate" and other poverty-rated statistics). Portland's improvement was not solely due to regionwide prosperity; during the same period, suburban Portland's poverty rate increased slightly, from 7.2% to 7.8%. POVERTY DATA, supra. Thus, in metropolitan Portland, the economic gap between city and suburb actually narrowed. Portland's city/suburb poverty ratio (that is, the ratio of city poverty to suburban poverty) decreased from 1.8 in 1979 to 1.61 in 1997, while the city/suburb poverty ratio increased in Salt Lake City (from 2.25 to 2.43) and Seattle (from 1.89 to 2.18), and stayed the same in Denver (decreasing minutely from 2.53 to 2.52). Id.

13. See STATE OF THE CITIES DATA SYSTEMS, STATE OF THE CITIES 2000 FAST LOOK: PORTLAND, OR, available at http://SOCDS.HUDUSER.ORG (last visited Nov. 26, 2001).

14. See STATE OF THE CITIES DATA SYSTEMS, STATE OF THE CITIES 2000 FAST LOOK: DENVER, CO, SALT LAKE CITY, UT, AND SEATTLE, WA, available at http://SOCDS.HUDUSER.ORG (last visited Nov. 26, 2001).

15. Id.

16. See MICHAEL BARONE & GRANT UJIFUSA, ALMANAC OF AMERICAN POLITICS 2000 (back cover) (quoting Washington Post's description of Almanac of America as "indispensable" and the Economist's description of the Almanac of America as "a legendary standby").

17. Id. at 1340.

18. Id.

19. Id.

20. See section The Housing Quality Myth, infra note 57 and accompanying text.

21. See NATIONAL ASS'N OF HOMEBUILDERS (NAHB), HOUSING OPPORTUNITY INDEX (HOI), FIRST QUARTER 2001, available at http://www.nahb.com/facts/hoi/2001_1Q/complete_alpha.htm (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) [hereinafter 2001 NAHB RANKING].

22. Clint Bolick, Subverting the American Dream: Government-Dictated "Smart Growth" Is Unwise and Unconstitutional, 148 U. PA. L. REV. 859, 861 (2001) (asserting that UGB-induced "artificial diminution of suburban housing development has led to sharply escalating prices"); Phillips & Goodstein, supra note 11, at 33444 ("articles in the local daily paper, the Oregonian, also appear to accept as a fact of life that the UGB is partially if not largely responsible for the runup in housing prices") (citations omitted). See also Randal O'Toole, The Folly of "Smart Growth," REGULATION, Fall 2001, at 20.

23. See supra note 9 (explaining why Denver, Salt Lake City, and Seattle are comparable to Portland).

24. Statistics supplied by the NAHB (on file with author) [hereinafter NAHB Statistics]. See also 2000 ABSTRACT, supra note 1, at 716 (Denver-area median home prices increased by over 20% between 1997 and 1999, from $ 140,600 to $ 171,300; by contrast, Portland-area median home prices increased by under 9% during the same period, from $ 152,400 to $ 165,000). Even UGB critics admit that Portland-area housing prices did not increase during the first decade of the UGB. See SAMUEL R. STALEY & GERARD C.S. MILDNER, URBAN-GROWTH BOUNDARIES AND HOUSING AFFORDABILITY: LESSONS FROM PORTLAND, available at http://www.rppi.org/urban/pb11.html (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (Reason Public Policy Institute report criticizing UGBs, but admitting that "from 1985 to 1990 . . . the Portland area experienced a housing recession" after which prices increased).

25. See 2001 NAHB RANKING, supra note 21 (listing income and price figures).

26. See, e.g., Editorial, Affording a House, VANCOUVER COLUMBIAN, Feb. 11, 2001, at C8 (Portland area "is the 25th least affordable housing market among 192 ranked by the [NAHB]"); Steve Stephens, Cheap Homes in the Burbs Are a Casualty of Zoning Law, COLUMBUS DISPATCH, Mar. 19, 2000, at 1D, 2000 WL 15474146 ("according to the [NAHB], Portland has one of the least-affordable housing markets in the country"); Bob Young, Portland's Housing Myth, WILLAMETTE WK., at http://www.wweek.com/html/politics011399.html (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (quoting Doug Porter of the Growth Management Institute as follows: "The home builders really did a job on Portland . . . . They've really been successful in selling the line that the UGB is driving up housing prices."). The HOI purports to measure the percentage of homes "affordable" to a family earning the median income. See 2001 NAHB RANKING, supra note 21.

27. 2001 NAHB RANKING, supra note 21.

28. Id.

29. See STATE OF THE CITIES 2000 FAST LOOK, supra notes 13-14.

30. And even if the UGB has significantly increased home prices, eliminating or diluting the UGB is not the only plausible remedy. Portland-area municipalities, like those in other metropolitan areas, have other land use restrictions that make it more difficult to build affordable housing within the UGB. See Editorial, supra note 26 (most Portland-area municipalities prohibit inexpensive "manufactured homes" that apply principles of factory production to homes). If such restrictions were eliminated, the Portland market could become more affordable without any additional policy changes.

31. See Will Jones, Road to Where? More People, More Cars, More Asphalt, RICH. TIMES-DISPATCH, Sept. 12, 2000, at A1, 2000 WL 5047368 (citing transportation consultant Wendell Cox's assertion that traffic congestion increases as development densities increase); Wendell Cox, How "Smart Growth" Intensifies Traffic Congestion and Air Pollution (Independence Inst. 2000), available at http://www.i2i.org/SuptDocs/Enviro/AirPollutionSmartGrowth.htm (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (setting forth theory in more detail).

32. Cox, supra note 31 (in Portland, "traffic congestion has intensified rapidly"). In fact, one UGB critic asserts that Portland policymakers seek to "deliberately increase traffic congestion over the next 40 years." Steven Hayward, Legends of the Sprawl, POL'Y REV., Sept./Oct. 1998, at 26, 1998 WL 15013991. This assertion appears to misconstrue Portland's land use plans. In fact, Portland's planning agency asserts that although congestion will increase under any foreseeable policy, congestion may grow even faster if the UGB is watered down. See Metro, 2040 Growth Concept Report, at 41, 47 (summary), at http://www.metro.dst.or.us/growth/tfplan/gcondoc.html at (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) ("Concept A" which would dilute the UGB by expanding its land area by 25%, "would have the worst overall congestion of any growth concept" although it would have "the lowest daily transit ridership [] of the three growth concepts"), at 53,65 (by contrast, Concepts B and C would add little or no land to UGB), at 88 (listing congestion projections under several possible regional plans).

33. See Brock Read, The Confederacy Writhes Again, CHRON. OF HIGHER EDUC., June 30, 2000, at A8, 2000 WL 8882190.

34. TEXAS TRANSPORTATION INST. (TTI). THE 2001 URBAN MOBILITY REPORT, available at http://mobility.tamu.edu/study (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) [hereinafter TTI STUDY].

35. Id. app. B (describing measure in detail).

36. Id. tbl. A-5. See also supra note 11 (noting that Denver has no UGB, and that the Seattle UGB was only recently instituted).

(NEWLINE)n37 Id. ABRIDGED TABLES: URBAN AREA INFORMATION, THE MOBILITY DATA FOR PORTLAND-VANCOUVER OR-WA 1-2 (2000) [hereinafter PORTLAND MOBILITY DATA].

38. See Nokes, supra note 1.

39. See TTI STUDY, supra note 34, tbl. A-5.

40. Id. tbls. A-1, A-5.

41. See F. KAID BENFIELD ET AL., ONCE THERE WERE GREENFIELDS 55-62 (1999).

42. Id. at 45-47, 153-54 (describing study showing that if Portland-area development was redirected toward areas within UGBs, energy consumption and air pollution would be reduced).

43. See Cox, supra note 31.

44. See infra notes 31-40 and accompanying text.

45. See TTI STUDY, supra note 34, tbl. 3 (table reproduced in text) (Seattle drivers experienced 53 hours of delay per person, Denver drivers 45 hours of delay per person, and Portland drivers only 34 hours of delay per person).

46. I use CO emissions as a measurement of air pollution because CO is the pollution most closely related to auto use; 62% of CO is emitted from motor vehicles, as opposed to less than 1/3 of other major pollutants. See Roberta F. Mann, The (Not So) Little House on the Prairie: The Hidden Costs of the Home Mortgage Deduction, 32 ARIZ. ST. L.J. 1347, 1375 (2000). For statistics on pollution in individual metropolitan areas, see U.S. EPA, NATIONAL AIR QUALITY AND EMISSIONS TRENDS REPORT 1998, at tbl. A-14, available at http://www.epa.gov/oar/aqtrnd98/appenda.pdf (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) [hereinafter 1998 AIR QUALITY].

47. Portland's failure to make extraordinary air quality gains should not be surprising, in view of Portland's apparent failure to reduce auto use during the 1990s. See FEDERAL HIGHWAY ADMIN. (FHWA), U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSP. (DOT), HIGHWAY STATISTICS 1989, at 179 (1990) (in 1989, region's vehicle miles traveled totaled 18.9 miles per person); FHWA, U.S. DOT, FEDERAL. HIGHWAY STATISTICS 1999, at tbl. HM-72 (2000), available at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/hs99/tables/ (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (in 1999, region's vehicle miles traveled totaled 20.8 miles per person).

48. See Cox, supra note 31 (asserting that density, congestion and pollution go together).

49. See TTI STUDY, supra note 34, tbl. A-1.

50. See 1998 AIR QUALITY, supra note 46, tbl. A-14 (Los Angeles has 6.1 parts per million (ppm) of CO, second only to Las Vegas). One small metropolitan area, Huntingdon, West Virginia, has 7.2 ppm of CO. Id.

51. See CENSUS BUREAU, U.S. DOC, TRAVEL TO WORK CHARACTERISTICS FOR THE 50 LARGEST METROPOLITAN AREAS BY POPULATION IN THE UNITED STATES: 1990 CENSUS, available at http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/journey/msa50.txt (last visited Oct. 31, 2001) (in Los Angeles, public transit's 6.5% market share of commuters equal to that of average metropolitan area) [hereinafter METRO AREA TRAVEL].

52. See NEW YORK TIMES ALMANAC 2001, at 230 (John W. Wright ed., 2000). Typically, "public transit is less feasible in low-density areas; as residences are spread farther apart, fewer people can walk short distances to bus and train stops." Michael Lewyn, "Thou Shalt Not Put a Stumbling Block Before the Blind," The Americans With Disabilities Act and Public Transit for the Disabled, 52 HASTINGS L.J. 1037, 1056 (2001).

53. In order of metropolitan population, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, Boston, Nassau-Suffolk, Newark, and San Francisco. See METRO AREA TRAVEL, supra note 51.

54. See NEW YORK TIMES ALMANAC, supra note 52, at 229-31. Because Nassau-Suffolk is near New York City. I count New York City as Nassau-Suffolk's central city. See 2000ABSTRACT, supra note 1, at 34 (according to a broad definition of "metropolitan area" Nassau-Suffolk is part of New York metro area).

55. See METRO AREA TRAVEL, supra note 51.

56. See 1998 AIR QUALITY, supra note 46.

57. See John A. Charles, Squeezed Out: No Swingset, No Sandbox, No Space Left for the American Dream (Cascade Policy Inst., Policy Perspective No. 1014, 2000), available at http://www.CascadePolicy.org/pdf/env/P_1014.pdf (last visited Oct. 31, 2001).

58. Id. (quoting would-be homebuyer Julie Riggs).

59. See Alan R. Katz, Developing the Future, DENV. POST, Feb. 10, 1997, at A1, 1997 WL 6064660 (quoting anti-UGB activist Bill Moshofsky).

60. See U.S. DOC & DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING & URBAN DEV. (HUD), AMERICAN HOUSING SURVEY FOR THE PORTLAND METROPOLITAN AREA IN 1986, at 3 (1990) [hereinafter 1986 PORTLAND SURVEY].

61. See U.S. DOC & HUD, AMERICAN HOUSING SURVEY FOR THE PORTLAND METROPOLITAN AREA IN 1995, at 3 (1997) [hereinafter 1995 PORTLAND SURVEY].

62. See 1986 PORTLAND SURVEY, supra note 60, at 3.

63. See 1995 PORTLAND SURVEY, supra note 61, at 3.

64. See 1986 PORTLAND SURVEY, supra note 60, at 3.

65. See 1995 PORTLAND SURVEY, supra note 61, at 3.

66. Bill Graves & Steve Suo, A Decade of Orderly Growth, PORTLAND OREGONIAN, Apr. 8, 2001, at A1, 2001 WL 3594268.

67. Id.

68. See Bolick, supra note 22, at 864 (if UGB is not diluted, "residents will be forced to live in more crowded cities, smaller houses, and more congested neighborhoods") (citation omitted).

69. See CENSUS TABLE T-5, supra note 7 (population figure); WORLD ALMANAC, supra note 4, at 440 (land area figure).

70. See NEW YORK TIMES ALMANAC, supra note 52, at 231 (San Francisco had 15,502 people per square mile in 1990).

71. See WORLD ALMANAC, supra note 4, at 434-41 (San Francisco gained population during 1990s while lower density cities like Baltimore, Buffalo, and Cleveland continued to shrink); Heidi Elliott, A Tale of 60 High-Tech Cities, ELEC. NEWS, Dec. 11, 2000 at 2, 2000 WL 9581732 (according to an American Electronics Association/NASDAQ report, San Francisco is one of America's five "most desirable places to live based on six quality of life factors: air pollution, crime, unemployment, commute times, arts and culture[,] and climate").

72. See Bolick, supra note 22, at 867 (attacking UGBs and other anti-sprawl policies as product of "social engineers" who "indulge the conceit that they are better able to plan efficaciously on a grand scale than the market"); Katz, supra note 59 (quoting assertion by anti-UGB activist that "property rights have been swept under the rug"); Rex Springston, Regional Sprawl Rules Encouraged, RICH. TIMES-DISPATCH, Jan. 21, 2001, at C1, 2001 WL 5313346 ("growth boundaries are unpopular with Virginia lawmakers, who fear they impinge on property rights"); Michael Pena, Urban Sprawl's a Big Issue, S.F. CHRON., Oct. 21, 2000, at A17, 2000 WL 6494750 (in response to proposals to slow proliferation of new suburban homes, "landowners retort that growth boundaries unfairly rob them of their property rights").

73. To phrase the point another way: "Government by definition is coercive." Ruth Eckdish Knack. PLANNING, Dec. 1, 2000, at 20, 2000 WL 21630924 (quoting planning commissioner Sam Staley of Bellbrook, Ohio).

74. See Timothy J. Dowling, Reflections on Urban Sprawl, Smart Growth, and the Fifth Amendment, 148 U. PA. L. REV. 873, 881 (2000).

75. Bolick, supra note 22, at 865.

76. See DANIEL R. MANDELKER, LAND USE LAW § 5.01, at 137 (4th ed. 1997).

77. See Oliver A. Pollard, Smart Growth: The Promise, Politics, and Potential Pitfalls of Emerging Growth Management Strategies, 19 VA. ENVTL. L.J. 247, 261 (2000) ("segregation of residential and commercial uses into different geographical areas . . . requires people to use automobiles to get to work or to shopping areas, to reach a park or a school, and to conduct most other activities"); JAMES HOWARD KUNSTLER, HOME FROM NOWHERE 111 (1996).

78. See Pollard, supra note 77, at 261-62 ("less land-intensive forms of development that typified American cities and towns prior to World War II . . . would be illegal to build under many current zoning codes"); MANDELKER, supra note 76, §§ 5.23-26.

79. MANDELKER, supra note 76, § 5.24, at 157 ("Proponents of minimum house size restrictions also argue that they implement the statutory purposes of zoning by conserving property values.").

80. See Lewyn, supra note 52, at 1056 (transit use is highest where population is most dense).

81. See Michael Lewyn, Suburban Sprawl: Not Just an Environmental Issue, 84 MARQ. L. REV. 301, 312-22 (2000) (describing effects of government spending on roads, and noting that according to an NAHB survey, 55% of Americans would consider moving to a new neighborhood or suburb if highway access to that area improved); Sierra Club, Illinois Chapter v. Department of Transp., 962 F. Supp. 1037, 1043 (N.D. Ill. 1997) ("highways create demand for travel and [suburban] expansion by their very existence") (citing Swain v. Brinegar, 517 F.2d 766, 5 ELR 20354 (7th Cir. 1975)); Knack, supra note 73 (quoting suburban planning board chair's statement that his hometown was "a small bedroom community [until] in the mid-80's [sic], the beltway came through").

82. Independence Inst., What Is the Independence Institute?, at http://www.i2i.org/Wholsll.htm (last visited Oct. 31, 2001).

83. See Cox, supra note 31.

84. See Hayward, supra note 32.

85. Id. Incidentally, the claim that Portland policymakers "deliberately avoid [] road-building" is highly questionable given the substantial increase in Portland-area road miles in recent decades. See PORTLAND MOBILITY DATA, supra note 37, at 1-2 (region's roadway mileage increased from 3,810 miles to 5,540 miles between 1982 and 1999).

86. Jon Rutter, Progress Is in the Eye of the Beholder, LANCASTER NEW ERA, Jan. 16, 2000, at A1, 2000 WL 3789524.

87. Id. The validity of Gulibon's claim that roads actually reduce congestion is beyond the scope of this Article; however, I have discussed the issue else where. See Lewyn, supra note 81, at 368-70 (describing studies showing that new road capacity does not increase congestion, because development and traffic quickly shift to areas served by roads; as a result, there was little correlation in 1980s and 1990s between metro areas' rate of roadway expansions and changes in congestion patterns).