What the BRA learned from China
Mar 03, 2008 14:17
A few weeks
ago, the Boston Globe reported that the Boston
delegation recently visiting Shanghai were alarmed
to hear government officials, accompanied by loud
martial music, talk about deciding on a
development plan for an area and saying that "the
plan is law." They don't need to go to
Shanghai to hear such talk. The BRA
(together with the perma-mayor) decides to make
developers' proposals the law all the time.
The BRA has four mechanisms to do it
that provide no legal recourse for the
public: Institutional Master Plans, Urban Renewal
Areas, Planned Development Areas, Chapter 121A
agreements (which also waives taxes). If
none of those apply to specific projects, it
simply changes existing laws to match the
proposals. The BRA writes our zoning law,
and takes the liberty of rearranging or dispensing
with it as it wishes. It calls this
approach "dynamic zoning."
The BRA's director of planning is quoted as commenting that Boston could take a lesson from China's "quick and decisive action." On the contrary, the Chinese should come here for autocracy lessons. The main difference is that we don't play music.
The BRA's director of planning is quoted as commenting that Boston could take a lesson from China's "quick and decisive action." On the contrary, the Chinese should come here for autocracy lessons. The main difference is that we don't play music.
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