The mayor is also backing smaller changes to the citywide zoning code that would make it easier to build housing and don’t require the approval of individual Council members. One of those changes, for example, would remove caps on the building of studio apartments. Another would eliminate rules requiring a certain number of parking spaces to be built with housing units. Dan Garodnick, chair of the City Planning Commission, told me his team had found dozens of such regulations that create needless barriers to housing production.
This change in New York politics is part of a nascent but promising movement. As rents rise, the anti-development sentiment that once dominated Democratic politics is giving way to calls to build more housing, fast. Lately, even politicians who count themselves among the most skeptical regarding for-profit developers have thrown their support behind building units to ease the crisis.
Councilwoman Tiffany Cabán, a proudly far-left Democrat, surprised many recently when she voted to site 1,400 new units of housing in her district in Queens. “Listen, I’m not anti-development,” she told me. “We desperately need more housing.” Ms. Cabán said she had come to believe the city should embrace every possible way to build more housing, from allowing responsible building by for-profit developers to using whatever city-owned land remains to put up apartments.
But solving the housing crisis in New York City will require a regional approach. The city and its suburbs are connected by extensive rail lines allowing residents of Long Island and Westchester to commute to Manhattan. The system is an enormous strength. But for the better part of a century, zoning laws in Westchester and especially Long Island have severely limited the construction of higher-density housing developments.
The zoning laws have their roots in the Jim Crow era of segregation, when they were used to keep Black Americans and others from buying homes in certain areas. The problem is especially acute on Long Island, where the biggest growth took place in the years after World War II, when the federal government backed housing discrimination through preferential treatment in government loans.
Over time, these laws have contributed not only to racial and economic segregation in New York, but also to the affordability crisis by constraining the region’s housing supply. Gov. Kathy Hochul and the State Legislature need to challenge suburban zoning laws that make it difficult or virtually impossible to build the multifamily housing the state needs.
Eliminating these restrictions doesn’t have to mean the end of suburban life. Indeed, higher-density development in suburban downtowns can invigorate them. It won’t be easy. A proposal in the State Legislature that would have allowed for multifamily housing to be built around transit centers on Long Island failed this year after Ms. Hochul backed down in the face of local opposition. If she is re-elected this November, resurrecting that effort would be a worthy priority.