Project design for 78 Olive St.
(Opinion) Our affordable housing crisis is a complex issue, with many factors both local and national contributing to the rising rents and lower relative incomes behind it. And just as the causes are many, to help solve this crisis we need a multifaceted approach.
While it’s harder for us to locally address things like income inequality and an ever eroding social contract, we can still have a huge impact in making things better, especially in the shorter term.
As a resident of Wooster Square and co-owner of Elm City Games, a small business in the Ninth Square, I’m particularly interested in the proposed project at 78 Olive St. and the conversations surrounding it.
Taking a parking lot and putting a dense building there does a few things to help; more housing stock, more economic activity, and adding to the local tax base.
One of the most direct ways we can help the housing crisis locally is to promote and enable more housing development in the city. If we want more affordable housing in New Haven, we need more housing. Full stop.
Demand drives prices, and New Haven is in the midst of a population boom. These people are going to live somewhere, and as we’ve seen, many of these people are more than willing to pay luxury rents. More housing stock alleviates demand, and helps keep the demand for luxury prices from impacting existing properties. If we don’t want people being pushed out of where they live by people willing to pay more, we need to provide new housing to serve this need.
In addition, 14 units being set aside as affordable is 14 more than the zero found in the parking lot that currently occupies the space.
Another benefit is that in the short term, construction provides a significant number of well paying jobs, and in the long term, more residents mean more money being spent at our local businesses.
Having owned businesses just across the train tracks on Chapel Street and now Orange Street, I’ve seen first hand how much of an impact more people living nearby can have. The influx of new residents within walking distance is huge for us. Adding another building close by along with the few already nearing completion is only going to help even further.
We also have to deal with a limited amount of physical space in New Haven and an enormous amount of that space being tax exempt. Not only does more economic activity in the area help us financially, adding a significant amount of taxable property to the city rolls gives us more money to spend on our schools, social programs, and the other things that make New Haven a great place to live.
In addition to helping with the housing crisis and an improved local economy, there are even more benefits to a denser urban center.
People can walk places rather than take cars, more activity makes an area safer, and it encourages further development and support of the surrounding public spaces.
As to the aesthetic arguments I’ve heard, even setting aside that taste is subjective and zoning doesn’t have any authority over how things look, this property is currently a dumpy parking lot next to a train station and a block away from the 30-story apartment building at 360 State St.
To suggest that building over this parking lot is somehow “destroying the character of Wooster Square” is absurd.
Besides which, the neighborhood is a lot more than just the cute block of Court Street or the park and houses around it.
Walk the blocks and you’ll see plenty of boring aluminum sided boxes, a mishmash of design aesthetics and eras, and old properties in a wide variety of conditions.
We have a lovely, charming neighborhood, but ugly parking lots next to the train tracks aren’t exactly part of that charm.
I live a few blocks from 78 Olive St., and walk or ride a bike past it almost every day on my way to work.
I’ve happily watched as other dilapidated buildings and empty lots have been turning into something more than a vacant eyesore and I’d like to see that continue.
Is PMC among the best big landlords in the city? No. Is this building an architectural beauty? Not even close. Is this the most perfect project possible? Of course not. But I’d much rather have a less-than-perfect building that has a meaningful positive impact than the parking lot that currently exists.
Matt Fantastic Loter is the co-owner of Elm City Games and the creative director at the Forever Stoked Collective.
The above op-ed was submitted in support of developer PMC Property Group’s proposed rezoning of 78 Olive St. to allow for the construction of a 13-story, 136-unit apartment building. The Board of Alders is slated to take a final vote on that rezoning proposal Monday night during their regular bimonthly meeting at City Hall.