NPNA Yard Sale tomorrow in Ypsilanti's Normal Park

 

The Normal Park Neighborhood Association annual multi-family yard sale is tomorrow. There will be close to 100 homes selling things in what many consider to be the nation's premier yard sale. Stop by and say hi. 

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: May 19, 2025

 

Gentle readers, it's #a2Council Night in Ann Arbor. Here's the agenda. 

The evening kicks off with a scant, 2-item consent agenda. CA-1 is for the YMCA Community Block Party and CA-2 is to accept a $200k Shared Streets grant for improvements around the Transit Center. 

There is one public hearing on the docket this evening, PH-1/DB-1 is for a routine township island annexation at 1155 Arlington Blvd.

There is one ordinance first reading on tonight's agenda. C-1 is an update to the UDC rules on land divisions. 

What this meeting lacks in ordinances and consent items, it makes up for in resolutions. DC-1 through DC-5 are appointments and I'm going to skip them. 

The next batch are fund allocations. DC-6 is for Substance Use Disorder Treatment and Intervention Programs. DC-7 is for Expanding Food Access and Supporting Local Food Distribution. DC-8 is for Shelter Diversion, Eviction Prevention, and Programming in Under-Resourced Communities. 

DC-9 directs the administrator to explore a replacement records management system for the city. 

DS-1 is allocating some of Ann Arbor's Marijuana Excise money to the Home of New Vision.

DS-2 and DS-3 are resolutions to accept sewer and water main easements from Midtown Ann Arbor. 

DS-4, DS-5, DS-6, and DS-7 are fee adjustments for the AAFD, AAPD, Public Service Area and Airport, and CSA, respectively. 

DS-8 is the big one. This is the resolution to adopt the city budget and property tax millage for FY26. 

Dad Arbor: YPT presents: Shrek the Musical this weekend at the Power Center

 

Ex-Damn Arbor editor, and current my spouse, Erika Jost, choreographed Young People's Theater's production of Shrek the Musical. The show runs Friday through Sunday at the Power Center. Tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for students and children. 

Jost is known for her dynamic ensemble work and Berkeley-esque showmanship. Shrek, will, no doubt, deliver. This is her second time choreographing a production of this outstanding show. The first was almost a decade ago so it will be exciting to see how Jost has grown as an artist in the intervening years. 

When I asked "how has your approach to choreography evolved since the last time your worked on Shrek?" Jost responded "I've been in the theater to 11 every night this week. Please, just tell people to see the show."  

All kidding aside, if you are looking for a fun show to see with the kids this weekend, take them to Shrek. The musical is tremendously fun, with rousing numbers like Who I'd Be and Story of my Life. It's hard to beat a nice spring show at the Power Center and YPT always delivers. 

Die-in tonight at City Hall

 

On Monday night, a pedestrian who was crossing Huron at 4th Ave was killed by a driver in a hit and run crash. This is the 4th pedestrian to be killed by a driver this year in Ann Arbor. 

In response, activists are organizing die-in tonight at Ann Arbor City Hall at 6:50 pm. Here are the demands:

1. To City Council and MDOT, hurry up the takeover of MDOT roads within the city
2. To MDOT, allow safety improvements and signal adjustments now
3. To City Council, turn on the GridSmart camera features that automatically create longer crossing times for pedestrians needing extra time
4. Allocate money for Stadium safety improvements to make changes on streets the city controls right now
5. Turn off all flashing yellow left turn signals that don't yet have a pedestrian walk button override

It is imperative that Ann Arbor improve the safety for all road users, especially pedestrians and cyclists.  MDOT is not just an obstacle to this, they are actively working against it. Please show your support for a safer Ann Arbor by participating in the die-in tonight. 

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: May 5, 2025

 

Gentle readers, tonight is the first #A2Council meeting of May. Here's your agenda. 

The evening kicks off with a modest, 13-item consent agenda. Strangely, no street closures. Of note we do have CA-1 the design agreement for 1209 South University. This will be a 19-story building and use a 30% sustainability bonus. 

There are 9, count them, 9 public hearings on the docket this evening. PH-1/B-1 is the second reading of an ordinance that makes some minor changes to the city's alarm code. PH-2/B-2, PH-3/B-3, and PH-4/B-4 are the second readings to ordinances that update the city's water, stormwater, and sewer rates, respectively. PH-5, PH-6, PH-7, and PH-8 are all public hearings and resolutions on updated fees for the Fire Department, Police Department, Airport, and Community Service Area. PH-9 is a resolution to adopt the city budget and update the property tax millage rates for FY26. 

There are 6 ordinance first readings on the agenda tonight. C-1 and C-2 are for township island rezonings on Stone School. C-3 is rezoning ~10 acres from R4A to Public Land to expand Hickory Nature Area. C-4 is the downtown library rezoning to D1. C-5 makes changes to Ann Arbor's rules around Planned Unit Developments (PUDs). C-6 would add green rental housing rules to the city code. 

On to the resolutions. There is only 1! DC-1 makes appointments to the Building Authority Board. 

If you want to follow the blow by blow tonight, make sure you check out the #a2Council hashtag on Bluesky. 

Call to Action: Tell Council what you think about the new Comprehensive Land Use Plan

Gentle readers, this is a call to action. If you don’t regularly engage with #a2Council or the City Planning Commission (CPC), it is imperative you share your thoughts on the new Comprehensive Land Use Plan (CLUP) draft with them. If you are one of the sickos who regularly engages with these groups, you have a different job: you need to reach out to your friends and neighbors, and make sure that they too are sharing their thoughts on the CLUP with Council and Planning Commission. The City is hosting feedback sessions on April 30th (today) and May 7th from 3-7 pm at the Mallets Creek and Traverwood Libraries, respectively.

However you choose to engage, it is imperative that you share your thoughts on the new CLUP. Council will be voting on this in the fall of this year and it is imperative they hear sustained support for this. This effort won’t stop once the plan is adopted. You need to keep advocating for this as the city adopts new zoning based on the new plan.  Make sure to tell all your friends.

Hyde Park, Chicago, IL. Some people are trying to make sure that this stays illegal in most Ann Arbor Neighborhoods

Ann Arbor is in the middle of revising the city’s Comprehensive Land Use Plan (CLUP). This document serves as a template for the city’s land use going forward. Hopefully it will usher in major zoning updates. Ultimately, Planning Commission will create the new CLUP. Council passed a resolution instructing the commission to generate a plan that will increase affordability, sustainability, and equity. This is a great direction. CPC answered the call and generated a great plan. Full disclosure, I was on the CLUP Steering Committee, a group that helped advise CPC on the direction of the plan. 

The draft plan is very good. It allows more housing to be built throughout Ann Arbor. This is the single most important thing that the city can do for affordability, sustainability, and equity. Over the last decade, Ann Arbor has seen housing costs rise dramatically. The city’s current zoning dramatically restricts housing supply which causes price increases. Study after study shows that when cities allow more housing to be built, it dampens price increases across all market segments. Cities that have built lots of housing, like Seattle, Austin, and Minneapolis, have even seen rents decrease. 

The new CLUP is also a huge step towards making Ann Arbor more sustainable. Allowing more people to live on the same amount of land reduces sprawl and preserves important ecosystems outside of the city. By allowing more people to live in Ann Arbor, it will allow people to commute shorter distances. It also makes transit, biking, and walking more feasible. Shorter commutes and more transit/walking/biking lessens the environemntal impact of the city’s residents and workers. Studies show that allowing people to live more densely is one of the most important ways that we can reduce GHG emissions and other pollution. 

The new plan also helps equity. By allowing gentle density throughout the city, it makes things like neighborhood grocery stores more viable. The new plan also liberalizes rules for businesses in neighborhoods. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every neighborhood had a Jefferson Market or a Washtenaw Dairy? Beyond the fact that these are forbidden in most of the city's neighborhoods, many areas of the city don’t have the density to support these neighborhood businesses. Restrictive zoning is also associated with decreased racial diversity in neighborhoods and increased wealthy residents. 

I also think something like this is totally fine for most residential areas. But I guess it really freaks a bunch of people out. This is also in Hyde Park.

This is a call to action: Ann Arbor has a once in a generation opportunity to dramatically improve affordability, sustainability, and equity. Please take a moment and engage with Council and CPC on the CLUP. Drop them an email (City Council, CPC) or call in to the next meeting and share your thoughts on the plan. Since the plan’s release, the usual cast of anti-housing activists have been working hard to foment opposition. Ann Arbor has the chance to make the city a more equitable, safer, and vibrant city that more people can call home. We need to do this not just for the city’s current residents, but also for our children and grandchildren. It is important for the city to hear your voice. 

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: April 21, 2025

 

Gentle readers, it's that time again. That's right: #a2Council night. Here's the agenda. 

The evening kicks off with a healthy, 16-item, consent agenda. Of note we have CA-1, the road closing for Taste of Ann Arbor. We also have CA-2, street closures for the African-American Festival. 

There are three public hearings on the agenda tonight. PH-1/B-1 is an update to the UDC to legalize pinball parlors downtown. PH-2/B-2 is an update to the rules regarding the Design Review Board. PH-3/B-3 is an update to the city's gas franchise agreement with DTE. 

There are 4 ordinance fist readings on the docket this evening. C-1 is an update to the rules around Alarm Systems. C-2 is an update to water rates. From the looks of it, it seems like they are updating for inflation. Here's some background reading on water rates: Revisiting Water Rates in Ann Arbor. C-3 and C-4 are similar updates to stormwater and sewer rates, respectively.

On to the resolutions. DC-1 is a resolution to appoint Molly Rowan to the Downtown Development Authority as a Non-registered Elector. DC-2 is a resolution to adopt the council's legislative policy agenda. DC-3 is a resolution to authorize the City Administrator to negotiate sale of air rights over Library Lane with the AADL, if voters pass the AADL charter amendments. DC-4 is a resolution to finalize the evaluation report and amend the employment agreement for the city Attorney. DS-1 and DS-2 are resolutions authorizing publication of the changes from B-1 and B-2. 

If you want to follow the blow by blow tonight, make sure you check out the #a2Council hashtag on Bluesky. 

Ann Arbor City Council Preview: April 7, 2025

 

Gentle readers, it's #a2Council night in Ann Arbor. Here's the agenda. 

The evening kicks off with a substantial, 24-item consent agenda. The first 4 items are street closures. CA-1 is for the Glacier Area Memorial Day Parade. CA-2 is for the Dexter-Ann Arbor Run. CA-3 is for Sonic Lunch. CA-4 is for Top of the Park. Elsewhere in the consent agenda, with CA-24, the city is selling air rights over 616 S Forest for no less than $1.2 million. Nice. 

There are three public hearings on the docket this evening. PH-1/B-1 is for the second reading of a ordinance that will make some minor changes to the rules around non-conforming structures in the UDC. These changes make it so that non-conforming structures don't have to go back before the Zoning Board of Appeals for renovations that don't increase the non-conformity. PH-2/B-2 is the second reading of some minor changes to the Fire Prevention Ordinance. PH-3/B-3 is the second reading of the sustainable energy utility. 

There is one ordinance reading on the agenda this evening. C-1 is an ordinance to amend the city's Gas Franchise rules. 

On to the resolutions. DC-1 is a resolution to authorize the city administrator to negotiate city participation in the south arbor project. DC-2 is a resolution to approve amendments to city council rules. DC-3 is a resolution to align city operations with Vision Zero and 2030 VMT reduction targets. DC-4 is a resolution to return $2.0 million to the general fund from the Rainy Day fund. DC-5 is a resolution regarding low-rise residential in the comprehensive plan update. As written, it would direct Planning Commission to limit low-rise residential in the new Comprehensive Plan to be limited to 35 ft. This feels like something overly specific for the Comprehensive Plan. 

If you want to follow the blow by blow tonight, make sure you check out the #a2Council hashtag on Bluesky. 

Opinion: Ann Arbor has failed its Vision Zero goal. Now what?

A coalition of residents and advocates are calling upon City Council to take a bold step and commit to a level of action and urgency that's commensurate with our goal to end traffic deaths, starting with Stadium Boulevard: Safety for Stadium NOW! Sign the petition at https://safetyforstadium.org.

Ann Arbor Crash Data, 2019-2023

Ten years ago, Ann Arbor set a goal to achieve Vision Zero by 2025. Vision Zero is a traffic safety framework that aims to eliminate all traffic fatalities and serious injuries by recognizing that humans make mistakes and designing streets to ensure those mistakes are not deadly. A core principle is that wherever cars and people not in cars interact, speeds must be low enough that human errors do not result in severe injury or death. This requires a shift in road design, policy, and enforcement to prioritize safety over vehicle speed and throughput.

We have now, officially, failed to achieve this goal — and 2025 is off to a pretty awful start. In mid-March, a woman was killed while attempting to walk across Plymouth Road. Three more pedestrians were seriously injured in crashes in January and February. Also in February, a driver died after crashing into a tree on Jackson Rd.

This is not a fluke. According to official counts, 2023 was the worst year since 2014 for deaths and serious injuries; we don't have official data yet for 2024, but based on some citizen journalism on crashesinannarbor.org, we can be pretty sure that it's not going to be much better.

Fatal and Serious-Injury Crashes by Year

(Source: City Of Ann Arbor Traffic Crashes Dashboard)

Now, there's some nuance here; Ann Arbor has done some good things. The rate of severe pedestrian and bike crashes has risen dramatically across the US, while in our city it's remained mostly flat. That's a positive sign; we're doing less badly than most. And to be clear, this is almost certainly a result of some very successful safety projects — for example, the downtown protected bikeways, which have dramatically improved safety outcomes on those corridors for all users, including drivers. But what we've done is not enough. Not even close.

Plans upon Plans upon Plans…

At this point it's worth asking: what have we actually done in the last 10 years? Well, we've certainly set up a lot of committees and made a lot of plans:

• The effort that led to our Vision Zero declaration started in 2013, when City Council empaneled a Pedestrian Safety & Access Task Force. That task force met and worked for two years.
• In late 2015 the task force delivered its final report and recommendations including a 2025 Vision Zero target, and City Council formally adopted it.
• In 2016, City Council passed an ordinance establishing the Transportation Commission, a permanent advisory commission with no formal powers and charged with considering and making recommendations around all modes of transportation within the city.
• In 2017, after a Huron High School student was killed by a driver while he was crossing Fuller Road in a crosswalk, City Council passed another resolution reaffirming vision zero and demanding that the city administration actually take some specific actions toward this goal, including developing "a work plan to implement Vision Zero."
• In response to that directive, the city administration proposed initiating a major update to the citywide transportation plan. In late 2018 the city awarded a contract ($351,670.00) to kick off this new comprehensive transportation planning effort.
• Developing this update took until 2021, when the plan was finalized and adopted. So now we're six years into our 10-year goal. Time to start implementing? Well, no, not really…
• Next, we had to set up a vision zero implementation planning effort. The city awarded another contract ($362,739.30) and empaneled another committee in 2021, which met until mid-2023, with their eventual output being … mainly some tweaks in the city's Capital Improvements Plan.
• In 2023 the city was awarded a $3.8 Million Safe Streets For All grant from the Federal Highway Administration, which was technically … a planning grant. So in 2024 we awarded yet another contract ($1,073,636.22) to a consultant firm to help us administer the grant and develop more plans on … I'm not even sure how to put it. To develop a plan for how to implement our implementation plan for our vision zero comprehensive plan?
• Meanwhile, the city also launched a couple transportation studies for specific areas of the city, including a Lowertown Mobility Study ($579,478.00) starting in 2019 and completed in 2022, and a Downtown Circulation Study ($209,674.00) in starting in 2023 that's still ongoing.
• Also in 2023, Transportation Commission recommended, and City Council passed, a resolution instructing city staff to prioritize reconfiguring Ann Arbor's multi-lane roads, recognizing those corridors are disproportionately dangerous — streets with four or more lanes account for 40% of severe crashes but only comprise 7% of all streets within the City. In response to that resolution, City Council will be voting on a contract ($280,000.00) at their April 7, 2025 meeting next week to hire a consultant to study possible reconfigurations with a final report due sometime in 2026.

Ann Arbor's Comprehensive Transportation Plan

So now it's 2025. We've spent millions of dollars and 10 years developing a series of plans. Most of them are indeed good plans — but plans are of little use if we're not going to actually implement them. We're seemingly stuck in an endless cycle of plans and more plans, with … not a lot of on-the-ground improvements to show for it. It's past time to ask: when do we get to stop planning, and start doing?

For better or worse, this slow and exhaustive approach to planning is far from unique to Ann Arbor. In the USA, the deck is stacked at every level of government toward these kinds of drawn-out and exhaustive planning efforts that often produce few tangible results. Though well-intentioned, federal / state laws and regulations around environmental protection, public participation, etc. are impeding efforts to solve the urgent problems our society now faces — and too often, government's solution isn't to eliminate these barriers, but instead to invest even more time and resources into making more and more-detailed plans.

For example, why did Ann Arbor receive a planning grant from the Federal Safe Streets For All (SS4A) program, when we already had all these plans? Well, the city actually did apply for an implementation grant! However, Congress — when it created SS4A in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs act — included a requirement that 40% of program funds be spent on planning. The implementation funds were all awarded to cities and regions viewed as having more critical needs than Ann Arbor (e.g. the City of Detroit); Ann Arbor received its planning grant essentially as a consolation prize.

"Quick Build"

But if these problems aren't unique to Ann Arbor, then Ann Arbor can look to other cities for solutions. While all cities generally (and understandably) see a need to carefully plan major capital projects, many have managed to augment this approach by also deploying Quick Build infrastructure. Quick Build is an approach that's supposed to help cities break out of this endless planning cycle, where they can use temporary inexpensive materials (paint, plastic flex-posts, etc.) to try out new configurations in the real world, evaluate them, and tweak them as needed — before eventually making them permanent with concrete and asphalt. Indeed, one of the "Key Mobility Strategies" proposed in Ann Arbor's Comprehensive Transportation Plan is to "Establish a quick-build improvement program."

Quick-Build Examples from Ann Arbor's Comprehensive Transportation Plan

There's actually a precedent for this, even in Ann Arbor: the pandemic-era 4-to-3-lane reconfiguration of South Main. This was a project conceived and executed in a period of months, not years. It was positioned as a pilot project, and made permanent with some tweaks only after an evaluation period, including careful analysis of safety outcomes as well as public surveys. Notably, the data showed a significant reduction in speeding along the corridor, while adding a negligible amount of delay for drivers. This reconfiguration was an unqualified success.

In 2021, City Council appropriated some initial funding for further Quick Build projects in Ann Arbor. However, with the spectre of a global pandemic receding, our approach to Quick Build seems to have gotten stuck in the same mentality that we have to exhaustively plan everything for multiple years before actually doing even a tiny bit of work, and this is just for some paint and plastic flex-posts. It took years to complete a handful of minor improvements, and a second phase of similarly-minor, unambitious projects has been delayed until at least the summer of 2026.

What are the reasons we, as a city, cannot simply keep doing cheap, life-saving changes to our roads?

Safety for Stadium NOW!

This kind of business-as-usual, plans upon plans upon plans approach was never going to be sufficient to meet an ambitious goal like "no more traffic deaths by 2025." We need to do something fundamentally different; we need to behave in a fundamentally different way, and with a lot more urgency.

Therefore, a coalition of residents and advocates are calling upon City Council to take a bold step and commit to a level of action and urgency that's commensurate with our goal to end traffic deaths. We have data to prove that our multilane roads are by far the most dangerous in the city, and City Council has even already expressed an intent toward reconfiguring all of them. But the way things are going, this ambition is again going to get stuck in a years-long planning process — as mentioned earlier, City Council will be voting next week on a contract to engage in a year-long study of potential multi-lane road reconfigurations across 10 corridors in the city. While we do not oppose this contract, we propose that — on at least one corridor — we turn this slow, endless planning approach on its head: that we actually make the change and then evaluate how it works.

Reconfiguration Area

We believe that the Stadium / Maple corridor — basically, from Trader Joe's to Aldi — is the best candidate for such a pilot project. It passes three major schools, is a designated "focus corridor" in our transportation plan, is not currently planned as a signature transit corridor for the AAATA (that would require dedicated bus lanes), and is fully under city jurisdiction. Further, creating a more pleasant environment for walking and biking along Stadium / Maple would help encourage walkable, mixed-use development within multiple TC-1 zoning district areas. Finally, it's worth noting that parts of Stadium and Maple have already been successfully reconfigured — we just need to finish the job.

We call on the Ann Arbor City Council to urgently appropriate funds to reconfigure (“road diet”) all remaining multilane segments of Stadium Boulevard and Maple Road — as well as the adjoining section of West Liberty Street — by August 2025 for a 2-year pilot. This conversion must include protected bicycle facilities and speed management devices to ensure that drivers do not endanger pedestrians, cyclists, or other drivers.

If you support this effort, then we encourage you to sign the petition at https://safetyforstadium.org, and stay tuned for further updates and actions!

Call to Action: It's Go Time for the Comprehensive Land Use Plan Revision

Gentle readers, below is an email from Kirk Westphal. I agree with the sentiment. If you care about making Ann Arbor more affordable, equitable, and sustainable, it is imperative that you engage with Planning Commission and #a2Council in the coming weeks. I'll have more on this later. 

Friends!

The next 6 weeks is GO TIME to help the planning commission write the forward-looking, nation-leading Comprehensive Plan that we desperately need — and that so many of you have been advocating for!   Thank you for all your energy and showing up when it counts!

I also want to remind you of the monthly Blue Tractor Happy Hour happening tomorrow (Weds) from 5pm onward!  (I am always available for phone/coffee/beer chats if you can't make the bimonthly get-togethers, just shoot me a note!), and save the date for a Town/Gown Urbanism Forum on Thursday, April 24 at 6pm on Central Campus.

*          *          *

On to the Plan!  If you want a quick primer as to what the plan is (and is not) and what priorities you and city council have expressed, the planning staff put together this 4-minute video. There are also councilmembers who put together very good posts on the current status of the plan. Also, don't miss the excerpts of public comments and a zoning backgrounder at the end of this email.

Here's what you can do... you don't have to be up to speed on all the details to make a difference!

TONIGHT!

 Go to City Hall in person at 7pm, and give a comment at the open mic comment period at the beginning of the meeting (up to 3 minutes, no sign-up required) — or just be there in solidarity with folks speaking up for more housing.  Several of us will be there!  There have been misleading and alarmist flyers being stuffed into thousands of homeowner mailboxes in the past few weeks, so recent planning commission meetings and online discourse have been quite the spectacle (see excerpts at the end of this email).

 Zoom/dial into the meeting at 7pm, give a comment or just watch! 

Zoom: https://a2gov.zoom.us/j/97766341226?pwd=akdzTVllcnBBaGJNSlZJdFpDdGUrdz09 

Passcode: 882985

Dial-in: 206-337-9723 or 213-338-8477 or Toll Free 877-853-5247 or 888-788-0099 

Meeting ID: 977 6634 1226

NOW OR ANYTIME!

 Send an email to planning@a2gov.org and copy citycouncil@a2gov.org (this morning/afternoon if you want to be included in tonight's packet, otherwise anytime is great). Even if you think you might speak or show up to future events, it is always advisable to document your thoughts in a short email!  Some ideas for what to say are later in this email.  It's helpful to put "support for new housing," "tackle the housing shortage" or something to that effect in the subject line.

LATER THIS MONTH!

This is going to be difficult or impossible for many of you to do, but there will be additional meetings in City Hall as well as public engagement events held at libraries around the city in the coming 6 weeks, according to a new proposal from planning staff last night.  The original proposal was to review the draft plan in private among city staff, but they are now suggesting that it be an open process, with the public, planning commission, and city staff reviewing it concurrently.  This is better, but, given the delays in the process, it is unfortunate that the draft revisions will be taking place when a key constituency (i.e., half the residents of the city!) will be in exams or away for the summer.  

Watch for future emails about these meetings, but if you want to be emailed directly about these and other city processes right as they are scheduled, there is a city-run mailing list that will alert you here.  

OK, SO WHAT IS HELPFUL PUBLIC FEEDBACK?

Here are some things that pro-housing activists are emphasizing in their comments to the planning commission and council:

• supporting the process and thanking planning commission and council for how seriously they are taking the housing shortage and trying to undo the harms of exclusionary zoning
  
• describing your own housing journey, the stress and cost of finding housing, and your living conditions relative to what you pay (this is also important for those of you who are priced out of Ann Arbor and forced to commute)
  
• if you're not able to come to this and future meetings, pointing out why, and your hope that this and past feedback will be weighed appropriately despite the current surge in misinformation
  
• responding to any of the feedback that has been received about the process (see excerpts below)
• pushing back on the false narratives that "more housing doesn't mean affordability" — it is well-documented that more market-rate housing does lower rents and creates vacancies in affordable units because it immediately soaks up the demand of wealthier people who can afford to pay for them and stops them from outbidding everyone else for the existing housing. Also, as these buildings age, the rents get lower (study, TikTok). Finally, in Ann Arbor, all new buildings pay into the affordable housing fund through their property taxes, and this fund builds subsidized units. 
  
• pointing out the irony that many commenters are living in luxury-priced $600K+ older low-density housing stock... as they are arguing against allowing smaller, denser, more walkable "luxury" housing opportunities for others
  
• highlighting any of the (unanimously-agreed-upon) City Council directives for the Comprehensive Plan, and talking about why a particular one is important to you: 
  

• Carefully consider and implement those portions of the A2Zero Living Carbon Neutrality Plan applicable to land use and development activity in the City.
• In the context of a largely developed city, make recommendations for adding new homes and densification in single-family zoned areas, and other areas and zoning districts.
• Develop recommendations and policies that promote fewer zoning districts or categories, that contain more flexibility for re-use and adaptability over time.
• A proposed land use framework that seeks to emphasize values over specified land use limitations where possible.
• Recommendations and policies that undo and/or seek to repair past land use policies and regulations that resulted in exclusion of people based on race, income or other characteristics and other inequities.

Rest assured, the planning commission has taken your feedback very seriously!  But right now, the meetings appear very one-sided because again, some anti-change activists and neighborhood associations are manufacturing outrage.  This happens in literally every community that presents a vision for how to include more housing — especially when it comes to envisioning how lower-density neighborhoods could look when homes get replaced decades into the future.  These neighborhoods are often the "power base" of cities, as the people living there are categorically wealthier and have time to engage and navigate city processes (there are books written about the "neighborhood defenders" phenomena).

That said, community concern is understandable, as city staff and others have superimposed images of very large Ann Arbor apartment buildings as they would appear plopped down in the wealthiest low-density neighborhoods.  This is unfortunate, because 1) if this were allowed, it would be impossible or extremely unlikely, and 2) planning commission has NOT contemplated rules like how far ("setback"), tall, or wide a new house, quadplex, or apartment building could be when it's right next to another property line.  This is a conversation that will happen later this year or next year, when specific numerical rules are put into place (zoning).  This is not the role of the Comprehensive Plan! 

FEEDBACK ABOUT THE PLAN

There have been many excellent comments in support of the plan so far!  Thank you!  Some people have asked what the skeptics are saying, so here's a sampling:

Short term renters are in no way as important as homeowners and long term renters. We (homeowners and long term residents) are here for the long haul. The motivation and interests of student renters versus homeowners and long term renters/residents are completely different. We should in no way pander to the needs of student renters.

I am 800 million percent opposed to any plan that ends single family zoning in the city of Ann Arbor. I specifically chose to live in my current home and neighborhood because it is a city neighborhood, close to city "stuff", in an actual home, with other actual houses next to me. The idea of a "low rise multi story" building next to my two story home is absolutely abhorrent... My neighborhood is already suffering from encroachment from U-M student renters. To be clear, I have nothing against renters, but I am against student renters, who are generally noisy (loud parties late into the night), messy (red cups, trash, unkept yards), and disrespectful (I have personally visited the home of an elderly woman who was terrified (her words) to go in her backyard because of the profanity and noise of her student neighbors)... I will not have the property value of the home that I LOVE, and my quality of life in a city that I love, destroyed.

How does this plan keep any neighborhood with owner occupied single family homes from being purchased by developers and eliminating ALL single family homes, replacing them with multi-unit buildings? This will result in the total loss of "neighborhoods" - where you develop long term, productive and caring relationships, where people know and care for each other, you can call on a neighbor for help, you can assist those trying to age in place in their homes, and the list goes on.

The influx of new housing units could lead to a glut in the housing market, driving down prices.

The sounds of birds and children playing are what I expect to hear—not increased traffic, construction, or commercial activity. This will not only degrade property values but quality-of-life.

I am fine with more development on busy streets and toward areas like Briarwood. But they do NOT belong in our residential neighborhoods.

[This is] your ongoing agenda of what appears to be your Project 2025.

It’s bad enough that our downtown is being destroyed with high rises, please don’t destroy our neighborhoods.

I would also like to reiterate the overwhelming sentiment that you heard tonight from RESIDENTS ... As someone so eloquently stated, WE ARE THE CITY.

The story is about an elderly woman that I had a chance to meet who lived on Dewey. I met her because she was fearful in her own home because there were numerous college parties going on two houses down from her home, a long-term home that she had lived in. She was afraid to go in the backyard because of noise and profanity from her neighbors. I still remember her face and the fear on her face in her home… there are no guard rails to ensure that I will not end up like that elderly woman trapped in my home.

I am not a NIMBY. I am not against increased density in our neighborhoods, but I am against losing the personalities and characteristics of our long established neighborhoods.

Our planning commission would shepherd us in the opposite direction, toward Hell, by instituting changes that would destroy our existing neighborhoods.

Increasing density should not mean forcing families out of neighborhoods.

There are plenty of opportunities for development on the outskirts of the neighborhoods that make this city great.  There is no need for upzoning.

The Ann Arbor overlords seem bent on remaking this sleepy college town into an over-crowded polluted mess. 

I encourage you to read this and to contact your council member and the planning commission REPEATEDLY.  Let your voice be heard, this is extremely scary.

I feel a bit like I'm on a LifeBoat and the Captain of the Ship wants to throw me overboard in favor of folks who are NOT already in the LifeBoat... and there ARE NOT OTHER lifeboats I can go to…

For some reason City Council feels that it has a higher responsibility to people who have yet to move to Ann Arbor, than to the taxpayers who are currently living here. Cramming more and more people into this city is only going to help the affordability problem once you destroy its feel and less people actually want to live here. There are lots of places to grow both in and around Ann Arbor without resorting to this building/cramming/density frenzy the Council seems too happy to promote.

BACKGROUND ON ZONING'S RACIST PAST AND LEGACY

Here are two powerful book excerpts:

“[F]ew American cities recognize the fact that their zoning codes were drafted with the express intention of instituting strict racial and economic segregation. To this day, 'the wrong side of the tracks' is not merely a saying but a place that is written into law as a zoning district drawn on a zoning map. To the extent that zoning can prohibit apartments in this neighborhood, or require homes to sit on a half-acre lot in that suburb, zoning is perhaps the most successful segregation mechanism ever devised."

“This state of affairs is as true in the conservative suburbs of southern cities like Nashville and Atlanta as it is in progressive midwestern college towns like Ann Arbor and Madison. Tucked away behind a veil of 'protecting community character,' zoning has been used to determine who gets to live where since its inception. In practice, this has been used toward the end of rigid economic segregation, which in the American context often means racial segregation. In virtually every suburb in America, zoning maintains a kind of technocratic apartheid, preserving those areas most suitable to housing for the wealthy while locking less privileged Americans into neglected areas far from good jobs and quality public services.”

Nolan Gray, "Arbitrary Lines: How Zoning Broke the American City and How to Fix It" (Island Press, 2022)

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     In the wake of the 1917 Buchanan decision [which struck down the practice of prohibiting home sales to African Americans in majority White neighborhoods], the enthusiasm of federal officials for economic zoning that could also accomplish racial segregation grew rapidly. In 1921 President Warren G. Harding’s secretary of commerce, Herbert Hoover, organized an Advisory Committee on Zoning to develop a manual explaining why every municipality should develop a zoning ordinance. The advisory committee distributed thousands of copies to officials nationwide. A few months later the committee published a model zoning law. The manual did not give the creation of racially homogenous neighborhoods as the reason why zoning should become such an important priority for cities, but the advisory committee was composed of outspoken segregationists whose speeches and writings demonstrated that race was one basis of their zoning advocacy.

    One influential member was Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., a former president of the American City Planning Institute and of the American Society of Landscape Architects. During World War I, Olmsted Jr. directed the Town Planning Division of the federal government’s housing agency that managed or built more than 100,000 units of segregated housing for workers in defense plants. In 1918, he told the National Conference on City Planning that good zoning policy had to be distinguished from “the legal and constitutional question” (meaning the Buchanan rule), with which he wasn’t concerned. So far as policy went, Olmsted stated that “in any housing developments which are to succeed, . . . racial divisions . . . have to be taken into account. . . . [If] you try to force the mingling of people who are not yet ready to mingle, and don’t want to mingle,” a development cannot succeed economically.

    Another member of the advisory committee was Alfred Bettman, the director of the National Conference on City Planning. In 1933 President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him to a National Land Use Planning Committee that helped to establish planning commissions in cities and states throughout the country. Planning (i.e., zoning) was necessary, Bettman and his colleagues explained, to “maintain the nation and the race.”

    The segregationist consensus of the Hoover committee was reinforced by members who held positions of leadership in the National Association of Real Estate Boards, including its president, Irving B. Hiett. In 1924, two years after the advisory committee had published its first manual and model zoning ordinance, the association followed up by adopting a code of ethics that included this warning: “a realtor should never be instrumental in introducing into a neighborhood . . . members of any race or nationality... whose presence will clearly be detrimental to property values in that neighborhood.”

    Other influential zoning experts made no effort to conceal their expectation that zoning was an effective means of racial exclusion. Columbia Law School professor Ernst Freund, the nation’s leading authority on administrative law in the 1920s, observed that preventing “the coming of colored people into a district” was actually a “more powerful” reason for the spread of zoning during the previous decade than creation of single-family districts, the stated justification for zoning. Because the Buchanan decision had made it “impossible to find an appropriate legal formula” for segregation, Freund said that zoning masquerading as an economic measure was the most reasonable means of accomplishing the same end.

    Secretary Hoover, his committee members, and city planners across the nation believed that zoning rules that made no open reference to race would be legally sustainable—and they were right.

Richard Rothstein, "The Color of Law" (W. W. Norton & Company, 2017)

Thanks for reading!  I hope to see you soon!

Kirk