SUPPLY AND DEMAND
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James Joyner | Monday, September 15, 2003 |
WaPo reports a strange trend in D.C. Metro area housing:
The proposed Giles Glenn subdivision fits together with the precision, if not the logic, of a jigsaw puzzle.The 10-acre site in southern Fairfax County has been carved up carefully to accommodate eight single-family homes. But because not all of the land is developable, and because planners wanted to make the most of what they had while meeting suburban standards for lot size and width, a peculiar geometry has taken shape.
The front yards of Giles Glenn are in one place, while the back yards lie 200 feet or more away, connected to the former by a thread of land in some cases. Similarly, some of the side yards are another 200 feet or so to the west.
The three-headed lots have raised eyebrows in some quarters and, in others, admiration over the planners’ creativity.
“To be honest, this is probably the worst example I’ve ever seen,” said Lorrie E. Kirst, a deputy zoning administrator for the county.
But strange as they seem, the lots do operate under a certain suburban-style common sense: With land scarce and prices continuing to soar — a single acre can fetch $250,000 or more — developers are going to unusual lengths to squeeze the most they can out of any given parcel while still complying with the thicket of local rules governing acreage, street frontage and lot widths.
Giles Glenn’s planners could have settled for one or two fewer lots to reduce, if not eliminate, the scattershot appearance, but economically that made no sense.
“Why would you give away a quarter of a million dollars?” asked Matt Marshall of Land Design Consultants in Manassas, which drew the plan. “We’re not dummies. We’re trying to maximize dollars.”
One has to admire the creativity, if nothing else.
About the Author: James Joyner is the publisher of Outside the Beltway and the managing editor of the Atlantic Council. He's a former Army officer, Desert Storm vet, and college professor with a PhD in political science from The University of Alabama. He lives just outside the Beltway in Alexandria, Virginia with his wife and infant daughter.
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