By 2025, Planners See a Million New Stories in the Crowded City

The New York Times ^ | February 19, 2006 | Sam Roberts

[HostileTerritory]

With higher birth rates among Hispanic and Asian New Yorkers, immigrants continuing to gravitate to New York City and a housing boom transforming all five boroughs, the city is struggling to cope with a phenomenon that few other cities in the Northeast or Midwest now face: a growing population. It is expected to pass nine million by 2020.

New York might need an extra million or so slices of cake for its 400th birthday party in 2025.

Estimated today at a record 8.2 million, the population is expected to reach nearly 9.4 million in 2025. But that projected growth poses potential problems that New York is just starting to grapple with: ensuring that there are enough places in which to live, work, attend school and play and that transportation and energy are adequate.

Elaborating on Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's disclosure last month that city planners were drafting a strategy to cope with this expected growth, Daniel L. Doctoroff, the deputy mayor for economic development, said the city could accommodate a million additional people or more, but only if it began planning for their needs now.

[HostileTerritory]

Unlike other northern cities, New York will continue to add population in the next 20 years. People will be crowding in to an already jam-packed city.

[proxy_user]

Hmmm.... maybe I will be able to sell my apartment for a fat price and retire, leaving the newcomers with the tax and debt burden.

[Ostlandr]

Generous welfare benefits and lax immigration enforcement will tend to increase a city's population.
And us po' folk upstate get taxed to pay for it.

[mtbopfuyn]

Heck, you could divide your apartment up into a half dozen little closets for rent and make a fortune.

[denydenydeny]

Daniel L. Doctoroff, the deputy mayor for economic development, said the city could accommodate a million additional people or more, but only if it began planning for their needs now.

Such BS. The only things that central planners "accomodate" are their own fat salaries. Cities grow and contract on their own regardless of what the planners do.

[proxy_user]

This is not allowed in my building. The Board is very strict...absolutely no sublets. You move out, you sell.

[NativeNewYorker]

If zoning/landmarking is altered to allow more dense housing near existing transit, this is quite doable.

As the article notes, teeming Manhattan, already the US county with the greatest population density, now has 25% FEWER residents than it did early in the last century.

[fieldmarshaldj]

[HostileTerritory]

I have a friend who has a fairly small studio in Soho. The "living room" is reasonably large, but the sleeping area is an alcove with a mattress on the floor with a view of an airshaft, and the toilet and shower are in the kitchen which doubles as the foyer. Pretty shocking to anyone who has never lived in New York.

He lives there alone. In the 1870s, his studio would have been three separate tenement apartments, each one with multiple adults living there. Scary.

[NativeNewYorker]

Lots of this is a function of what one is accustomed to, yes. I grew up in a flat that had about 900 square feet and one bathroom and never felt deprived (except when the bathroom was occupied and I had to GO).

If we had a true housing free market, Harlem would be peppered with high rise condos convenient to shopping and mass transit, and commanding prices that would make most Americans swear the decimal was in the wrong place.

[SWAMPSNIPER]

NOOYAWK has been alien territory for decades, to Hell with them!

[Sarastro]

Such BS. The only things that central planners "accomodate" are their own fat salaries. Cities grow and contract on their own regardless of what the planners do.

Not quite. A city's infrastructure requires long-range planning and wise investment. A million more people would need water, sewers, transit, schooling, and medical care. These things don't expand and contract automatically with the population the way shopping and entertainment do. New Yorkers today are living off the long-term vision of the planners who built the water system, bridges, tunnels, highways, harbors, airports, schools, and public parks. Planning may not always get it right, but lack of planning always gets it wrong.

[itslex71]

"Hmmm.... maybe I will be able to sell my apartment for a fat price and retire, leaving the newcomers with the tax and debt burden."

Agreed. And just in time for our retirement in 25 years.

[oceanview]

not eexactly sure where they plan on living.

[oceanview]

not new york city, development here has for decades, been the result of private development coupled with government planning.

[Clemenza]

Remember that most of the growth will be in Queens, the Bronx, and even Staten Island. Manhattan and northern Brooklyn are largely inhabited by the childless, with the exception of some rather wealthy people. A century ago, much of the island was inhabited by the working class, which is why you see so many Catholic Churches, many of which are now practically empty on a Sunday.

If you look at the areas where population growth has been the strongest, they are places like Jackson Heights, Flushing, Sunset Park/Bay Ridge, University Heights, Norwood, and Staten Island's North Shore. The reason is immigration.

[Clemenza]

So, are they finally building more rentals and condos in Nassau to take care of the overflow? Even places like Rosedale and Cambria Heights on the Nassau border are getting overcrowded and pricey.

[oceanview]

some. the rockaways is also getting alot of new housing.

[Clemenza]

About time. I always found it amazing that some of the best beaches in New York were bordered by abandoned lots and shi-tty neighborhoods, bordering the Five Towns no less.

[oceanview]

http://www.arvernebythesea.com/

the ride on the A train is long however, if you want to get to manhattan.