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The Register-Guard http://www.registerguard.com/ GUEST VIEWPOINT: Yesterday’s housing mix won’t prepare Eugene for future BY MIA NELSON Sunday Published: ,Jul 17, 2011 03:38PM In his July 3 guest viewpoint, Ed McMahon urged Eugene to plan 60 percent of its new housing as detached single-family homes, to “kick-start the recovery.” Because this is the least dense form of housing, such a plan would lead to a larger urban expansion. But does the raw land supply have anything to do with the housing crisis? Nationwide, some of the most troubled areas have the fewest land use controls. Over the next 20 years, a ratio of 60 percent detached single-family would require planning for roughly 9,000 new units. Eugene already has room for more than 4,000 single-family homes on its vacant lands alone; preliminary work indicates partially vacant lands could accommodate up to 3,000 more. Clearly, there is no emergency on the land supply end of things. What is the problem, then? William Lucy, professor of urban and environmental planning at the University of Virginia, places most of the blame not on dysfunctional lending and speculative overbuilding, but on something more long-lasting and harder to solve: demographic changes that have greatly increased the number of older sellers while decreasing the number of younger purchasers. “These changes have created more than five homeowners 55 and over who are potential sellers for each household age 30 through 44 which is not a home owner but might like to buy,” Lucy says. This imbalance will only grow worse as the baby boomer generation ages, and increasing numbers of older homeowners try to sell. At the same time, younger potential homebuyers — facing persistent unemployment and tightened credit markets — may be less able to buy costly detached single-family homes from downsizing retirees than in the past. Despite these demographic changes, population will continue to rise, albeit at reduced rates. Over the last 20 years, Eugene added an average of 1,100 new dwelling units a year; growth over the next 20 years is projected to slow to just 750 units per year. As McMahon correctly observed, even if detached single-family were given 60 percent of the growth pie, the slice would still be much smaller than in past years. However, if Eugene focuses on delivering the lion’s share of the growth-planning pie to detached single-family homes, other housing types will be shorted, and this could leave our community unprepared to serve tomorrow’s evolving markets. During the recent housing boom, a great deal of Eugene’s new construction was traditional detached single-family on lots 7,000 square feet and larger. Planning for a continuation of this pattern may be unwise. According to Arthur Nelson, director of the Metropolitan Research Center at the University of Utah, in the long term this housing type is severely oversupplied, with about 20 million more units existing now, nationwide, than will be needed in 2030. He predicts that 88 percent of our country’s growth through 2030 will be households without children, and that demand will be strongest for higher density housing in close-in, walkable neighborhoods served by good transit. Planning for these housing types can pay big dividends. The construction phase yields high-paying jobs, while added foot traffic in mixed-use developments can revive deteriorating commercial areas. Live-work options encourage entrepreneurism. Less car-reliant developments reward residents with transportation cost savings, better health and improved quality of life. While the housing mix determines the amount of land provided for each housing type, it also directs Eugene’s planning program. Much work is needed to create a thriving local housing market and affordable, livable choices for all residents.