The nation’s largest cities are at the forefront of the battle against high housing costs. In efforts described in our latest State of the Nation’s Housing report and in previous blogs, several big cities have come forward to revise zoning and land use regulations to open up land and allow higher densities of housing development. Some have also made permitting procedures faster or less cumbersome, others have reduced requirements such as those for allocated parking to lower development costs, and a few have legalized less costly housing options such as accessory dwelling units. Many have also dedicated local funds to build and preserve affordable housing.
But how far can these big-city actions go to alleviate large-scale, regionwide challenges of high housing costs? A quick look at the Census Bureau’s latest population estimates suggests that cities can only go so far in solving affordability issues because even the largest cities are home to just a fraction of their metro area populations.
As shown in Figure 1, cities in the US make up just a small portion of the population within their overall metropolitan areas. Some cities make up a surprisingly low share. The cities of Miami and Atlanta, for example, are each home to just 8 percent of the populations in their respective metro areas. Washington, DC, despite its relatively high population density, is also home to just 11 percent of its metro area population. The city of Boston, which is part of a particularly fractured metropolitan area that includes dozens of small New England cities and towns, is home to just 14 percent of the population in the Boston-Cambridge-Newton metropolitan area...............Read More
FIGURE 1: EVEN THE LARGEST CITIES MAKE UP JUST A SMALL PORTION OF THEIR METRO AREA POPULATIONS
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