Early December 2022

Ticketmaster has been in the news a lot recently, and a lot of people blame them for how hard it is to get tickets to highly-desired shows, most notably Taylor Swift's new tour. And while Ticketmaster is awful, they're not the reason it's hard to see Taylor Swift. It's hard to to see Taylor Swift because hundreds of thousands of people want to attend her shows, and there are only a few thousand tickets a night. In other words, the root of the problem is scarcity.

The same is true of housing. People like to blame developers and landlords and rental agents and pricing algorithms and realtors for the high cost of housing. Those things all have problems, but the cost of housing around here is high mostly because millions of people want to live near Boston, and there aren't that many homes.

It's awfully hard to create more Taylor Swift tickets. There's only one Taylor Swift, after all. But it's not

nearly

as difficult to create more housing. All you have to do is legalize it.

News

• The long-term bike network plan was released this week. Find it at SomerVoice and provide feedback! It looks like a good network but we'd like to see it rolled out in less than thirty years.

• Mayor Ballantyne has an op-ed in the Globe this week about the need for state action on transit, which is well worth a read.

• Writing in The Atlantic, Annie Lowrey calls for truly abundant housing nationwide, and Jerusalem Demsas explains why housing breaks people's brains.

• If you need an academic citation for new housing, check out the most recent issue of the Journal of Economic Geography. Or try the more reader-friendly 2019 working paper.

Upcoming Events

• December 10: Union Square Holiday Stroll, noon to 6:00 pm. It's fun!

• December 12: Community meeting #2 for 51 Prospect Street, the electrical substation, at 6:30.

• December 14: 299 Broadway (the blighted Star Market) goes to the ZBA at 6:00 pm. Check out the new project website at 299BroadwaySomerville.com, as well.