The Zoning Dilemma
Exploring the Tensions Between Stability and Flexibility
Hey everyone, welcome back.
One thing I’ve thought a lot about over the past year is zoning. Zoning is a system of rules that governs land use in a given area. Originating in the early 20th century, zoning divides cities and towns into districts designated for specific purposes, such as residential, commercial, or industrial use. It also prescribes the density or intensity of those uses in each district. Effectively, zoning is the context that shapes the content of our communities.
Zoning was born out of a desire for stability. When early zoning maps were created, the goal was to set clear expectations for how the land would be used, ensuring a sense of permanence and predictability in community planning. Planners envisioned these maps as static blueprints—once a parcel of land was designated for single-family homes, factories, or commercial buildings, it was assumed that those uses would remain unchanged. It was recognized that the maps might need to be updated occasionally, but the idea was that experts could figure out the right mixes of uses and set us on a great path forward. Effectively, we trade part of the rights to do what we want on our property for the stability of knowing that everyone around us will be constrained and that an unbiased arbitrator will decide what’s appropriate.
This dynamic is rooted in an idea central to the Progressive Era: the belief in the power of the “unbiased expert.” Zoning assumes that a planner can determine the best use for every parcel of land, regardless of the complex, subjective needs of the people who live there.
There’s a core tension here: humans are bad at predicting the future. We are subject to all sorts of biases in our thinking, and while we can employ tools to help us compensate for those biases, they are never perfect. The reality of zoning bears this out. In Greenville County, for example, rezoning is routine, with requests constantly reshaping the map to reflect changing economic and community needs. This dynamic creates even more tension:
Existing property owners view their zoning as a promise that this is how their community will always be, and many build their lives around that promise.
Prospective property owners or even existing ones who want to do something different with their property see the reality of the ever-changing zoning map and believe that with appropriate resources and political maneuvering, they can change the zoning to meet their desires.
This intent vs. reality divide leads nowhere pretty, as you can imagine. Those who bought into the promise feel betrayed, and those who have watched the map be changed so frequently in other places don’t understand the fuss.
Zoning makes the promise of stability explicit, but we buy into unspoken promises in other domains frequently:
We believe our car is working great until the day it goes into the shop.
We believe jobs are safe and secure until they are not.
We believe our health can be counted on until one day, it can’t.
These promises, either spoken or unspoken, will eventually come face to face with reality. The question for us is, when faced with these realities, how do we respond? Some contexts will call for a fight, while some will call for us to concede, but regardless, it’s essential to think through what our expectations are ahead of time to ensure they align with the reality we are facing.
If you’re interested in learning more about zoning, there’s a lot of content out there. I’ve recently finished Arbitrary Lines by M. Nolan Gray, and I think the way he talks about it is very understandable. He is very much on the “we should abolish all this” side of the argument and doesn’t pretend to be unbiased, but I think he offers one of the best explanations of zoning for a layman I’ve encountered.
With that, thanks for reading, and see you again next time.