Quote from: Surly1 on Nov 16, 2023, 06:44 PM

Quote from: RE on Nov 15, 2023, 06:32 AMSince private developers won't build affordable housing, a Goobermint home building company like the WPA should be assigned the resposibility for building single and double occupancy units in every major city equal to or greater than the number of immigrants that city is expected to accept each year.

While I applaud the image of banksters and developers either reduced to penury and/or swinging from lampposts, don't overlook the NIMBY factor. Every time a municipality down here tries to create "affordable" housing, the local civic leagues mount a hue and cry about how such a project would mean The End of the World as we Know It: not in my back yard. After all, it might house "those" people.

Some things never change. In America. the only unforgivable crime is to be poor.

Indeed, NIMBY is a big problem, which is why the Hooverville in NYC was plopped down on Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn.  It's an old airstrip all the way out on Jamaica bay which might be like 2 feet above sea level so as soon as you get a decent storm and a King Tide, all the migrants there will be washed out to sea.  lol.

The Homeless Migrants are so low on the NIMBY scale, not even the people who live in the crime infested project housing in Brooklyn want them next door.  There is no public transportation out there, no subway or bus service for miles.  No stores, no schools, nada.  You might as well be putting them in the middle of the sahara desert.

As you indicate, even for normal low income housing,  "middle class" neighborhoods such as they exist anymore don't want them because their precious property value would decrease, because of course the next buyer doesn't want to live next to poor people.  That's WHY people moved out of the cities to the suburbs, once you got rich enough to afford one of the tract houses built on Long Island after WWII, you left your apartment in Brooklyn for new poor immigrants to move into.

Now of course nobody currently in those apts can afford to move out of them to new  McMansions out in the burbs, both because theey are unaffordable and because there is almost no room left for new subdivisions.  All the farmland that had been on LI before WWII has been completely gobbled up, all the way out to Montauk.

So the only real solution here is to increase the density of the buildings, which means taking the single family homes still in parts of Brooklyn and Queens, razing them and putting up multi story buildings.  Nobody who owns a house in such a neighborhood wants that now, because no matter how much a developer pays for their plot of land, it's not going to be enough to buy anything close to what they would be selling.

NYC itself has had the same 8M or so population size my whole life.  The only increase in population has been in the "Greater NY Area", which is about a 25 mile radius around Manhattan and includes all the "Bridge & Tunnel" people from NJ, LI and Westchester County.The only way to increase the population housing capacity would be to raze the single family homes in places like Nassau County and Hoboken and on Staten Island.  The Boomers who own those homes won't sell them, they'll leave them in their wills for their favorite Gen Z Great Grandchild.

Too many people want to move in to NY from around the world, just like they always have.  The difference today is the people who have been living there no longer have better places to move to as they become richer.  Everywhere else is too expensive to replace what they have, and there aren't great new high paying job opportunities elsewhere to attract most of them, particularly retired Boomers.

Basically, some other city should be picked to send all these folks to after they cross the border.  Maybe some old Rust Belt cities like Cleveland or Buffalo have room to build some new low income housing.  Any job opportunities in those place?  Well, no, that's why they are rust belt cities!  lol.

Since this is only the beginning of the Collapse of Industrial Civilization, things will be getting worse before they get better.  Much worse.  Enjoy this moment.  10 years from now these will be the Good Old Days.


RE

Quote from: Nearings Fault on Nov 16, 2023, 05:16 PMI won't argue that too much. So basically the dorm room model would be the most efficient.

It is definitely the best model in an idealized world where everybody gets along well and does their share.  Unfortunately in the real world those last two caveats aren't necessarily true unless all the people in such a housing model have some commonality, like they are all members of the same religious cult. lol.

Taking your example of Dormitory style living, at Columbia one of the dorms actually built by Barnard (the sister college for women back before they went coed) Plimpton Hall had 4 suites with 2 shared bedrooms each all surrounding a central kitchen/dining are.  The problem for all my friends who lived there was that all 16 people sharing the kitchen were not equally good about washing their dishes and cleaning the fridge of old leftovers, or picking up the beer cans from the last party.  It follows the 80-20 rule, where 80% of the work gets done by 20% of the people, who eventually tire of cleaning up after the slobs.  Same problem with cleaning the shared bathrooms, though there only 4 people shared each of the 4 bathrooms.

Once you get to the size of a really big commune like my SNIF for 102 people, you have to have paid staff for the Housekeeping aspect, and that would be true even if the place wasn't populated by old folks and cripples who can't mop floors and scrub toilets.  If it was a cult commune with a really strong David Koresh running the place, he might be able to assign work details and threaten lazy culties with going to hell if they didn't keep the toilets clean on their turn in the rotation, but without some type of enforcement you can never get this sort of scut work done in a large group of unrelated people.  In the military, if you don't get your job on KP done, you'll get some time in the brig.  Screw up enough, you'll get a dishonorable discharge, a nasty thing to have on your record on a par with being a convicted felon even after you serve your prison sentence.

I do think in an area like yours with houses of 4 or 5 bedrooms, it would be a good idea to develop friendships with neighbors of similar age, and when the kids have all grown up, pick one of the bigger nicer houses with good common areas and share it with 2 or 3 other retired couples or singles, since some spouses will die off and there are divorces etc.  You could help each other with less need for old age homes and paid PCAs.  Could you envision making friends around there you could do that with?

RE

Quote from: RE on Nov 17, 2023, 12:51 AM

Quote from: Nearings Fault on Nov 16, 2023, 05:16 PMI won't argue that too much. So basically the dorm room model would be the most efficient.

It is definitely the best model in an idealized world where everybody gets along well and does their share.  Unfortunately in the real world those last two caveats aren't necessarily true unless all the people in such a housing model have some commonality, like they are all members of the same religious cult. lol.

Taking your example of Dormitory style living, at Columbia one of the dorms actually built by Barnard (the sister college for women back before they went coed) Plimpton Hall had 4 suites with 2 shared bedrooms each all surrounding a central kitchen/dining are.  The problem for all my friends who lived there was that all 16 people sharing the kitchen were not equally good about washing their dishes and cleaning the fridge of old leftovers, or picking up the beer cans from the last party.  It follows the 80-20 rule, where 80% of the work gets done by 20% of the people, who eventually tire of cleaning up after the slobs.  Same problem with cleaning the shared bathrooms, though there only 4 people shared each of the 4 bathrooms.

Once you get to the size of a really big commune like my SNIF for 102 people, you have to have paid staff for the Housekeeping aspect, and that would be true even if the place wasn't populated by old folks and cripples who can't mop floors and scrub toilets.  If it was a cult commune with a really strong David Koresh running the place, he might be able to assign work details and threaten lazy culties with going to hell if they didn't keep the toilets clean on their turn in the rotation, but without some type of enforcement you can never get this sort of scut work done in a large group of unrelated people.  In the military, if you don't get your job on KP done, you'll get some time in the brig.  Screw up enough, you'll get a dishonorable discharge, a nasty thing to have on your record on a par with being a convicted felon even after you serve your prison sentence.

I do think in an area like yours with houses of 4 or 5 bedrooms, it would be a good idea to develop friendships with neighbors of similar age, and when the kids have all grown up, pick one of the bigger nicer houses with good common areas and share it with 2 or 3 other retired couples or singles, since some spouses will die off and there are divorces etc.  You could help each other with less need for old age homes and paid PCAs.  Could you envision making friends around there you could do that with?

RE

The golden girls model is actively being discussed by 3 women in their 60-70's who all live in their own homes up the road a bit. All 3 are older farmhouses with land all just leased out for hay. It's a collosal holding of resources country style. Each property when originally constructed about 100 years ago housed large farm families and produced enough food to feed them all which a surplus. Now they grow hay for cows and horses, trees, and house widows who due to much better economic times have the money to hold onto these places. Meanwhile all the kids moved because there was no place to live and no jobs (ag jobs could exist but they are very demanding in terms of time and labour). It's the rural reality I have observed brought on by cheap energy.

Quote from: AlanTah on Dec 09, 2023, 12:09 AMallopurinol 500 mg tablet

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RE

Quote from: RE on Dec 09, 2023, 01:04 AM

Quote from: AlanTah on Dec 09, 2023, 12:09 AMallopurinol 500 mg tablet

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RE

You mean was.

No hotel rooms at the ports.

https://apnews.com/article/homelessness-increase-rent-hud-covid-60bd88687e1aef1b02d25425798bd3b1

US homelessness up 12% to highest reported level as rents soar and coronavirus pandemic aid lapses

RE

QuoteAs long as the capitalist mode of production continues to exist, it is folly to hope for an isolated solution to the housing question or of any other social question affecting the fate of the workers.

— Friedrich Engels, 1872

QuoteHomelessness exists not because the system is not working but because this is the way it works.

— Peter Marcuse

The way the system works, people have to be kept afraid.  Very afraid.  Behave and stay in line or feel the wrath.


The wrath of MONEY. You prevent the accumulation of large piles by those whom MONEY has made their servant and bad shit shall happen to you.  Suffer and facilitate the accumulation of large piles by those who have them and your meaningless life will be more pleasant.  Dissent and you can sleep in a car.

Quote from: K-Dog on Dec 18, 2023, 08:21 AMDissent and you can sleep in a car.

If only that were true!  Unfortunately, in most places sleeping in your car is illegal.  The issue here is that there are NO free places to sleep legally in cities besides the perpetually too few "shelters" which rarely offer a safe storage place for personal possessions.  So you ALWAYS have to have enough money to have a place to live.  Given that half the population lives paycheck to paycheck, it's guaranteed you will always have a percentage of people who are out of work, followed swiftly by out of money, followed then by out on the street.

It used to be every city had ghettos/slums/favelas where you could find a dilapidated building to squat on.  In cities like NY though, even slums are rented out by somebody, like Trump's dad. The Big Apple has a massive shelter system, however even that is overwhelmed by the fact refugees flock there because of that system.  So that also is overwhelmed.

The reality is even with the anti-vagrancy laws on the books, there's no way you could imprison all the people in need of housing either.  So cities give out bus tickets to another town.  At least you get to sleep on the bus.

RE

My son has a small homeless tent city next to the biggest shopping centre in the southern hemisphere... Just started last 12 months as interest rates are biting...
Not coincidentally, ABC headline: Australian migrant population growth hits all-time high as borders reopen

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-29/australian-migrant-population-growth-hits-all-time-record-high/102281798

Gee, I wonder why people cant find a rental let alone a house they can afford....
Need to grow to keep the ponzi scheme going.
Need more taxes.
Need more cheap labour.
Need to prop up asset prices.
Fuck society and the environment.

JOW

 

Quote from: John of Wallan on Dec 18, 2023, 06:27 PMMy son has a small homeless tent city next to the biggest shopping centre in the southern hemisphere...

Not surprisingly. malls and shopping districts are always where the homeless set up their tents.  Since they mostly do not own cars, they need to live somewhere close to where they can acquire food.  Which then makes you wonder why NYC, which has decades of experience with the homeless, would try and set up a big homeless encampment on Floyd Bennett airfield, miles from the nearest shopping?  I suppose they must bring in food each day to feed the residents, but it's hard to imagine just how awful that stuff is.  Then they also plug in a no alcohol rule.  So you can't get a beer, or cigarettes either.  They can't really expect this to succeed, can they?

QuoteJust started last 12 months as interest rates are biting...
Not coincidentally, ABC headline: Australian migrant population growth hits all-time high as borders reopen

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-29/australian-migrant-population-growth-hits-all-time-record-high/102281798

Gee, I wonder why people cant find a rental let alone a house they can afford....
Need to grow to keep the ponzi scheme going.
Need more taxes.
Need more cheap labour.
Need to prop up asset prices.
Fuck society and the environment.

All the standard reasons why Economic Growth is required, except no matter how much you grow, the problems never go away, they just get bigger.  Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

So what we have here repeated thousands of times over is people leaving one place which is failing for one reason or another and piling in somewhere else until it gets overwhelmed.  There's no planning at all,  I suppose under the assumption the Wisdom of the Market will take care of it.  Except it never does take care of it.

I wonder how long before the homeless situation reaches Critical Mass?  At some point riots will break out.  I wonder if an AI program can model that?

RE

 
[/quote]

122,100 people in the Homeless Shelter system in NYC!  That is 4X the population of Fairbanks, and half the population of Anchorage.  Then, how many people don't even bother to try and find a shelter bed?  How many people currently couch surfing?  How many riding the subway 24/7?

This seems awfully close to critical mass to me.  What would they do if all 122K people Occupied Park Avenue?  Or better yet since it's indoors, Grand Central Station?  Then the stockbrokers wouldn't be able to commute in from Westchester and Greenwich.

Anyhow, this situation can't last long without something going off the rails.

https://www.thecity.nyc/2023/12/18/nyc-right-to-shelter-no-longer-exists/

New York's 'Right to Shelter' No Longer Exists for Thousands of Migrants

RE

QuoteFor months, Mayor Adams has argued the city's "right to shelter" is an antiquated rule that was more than New Yorker's could afford to maintain on behalf of an unprecedented number of new arrivals.

Don't worry about it K-Dog.  Leave the karma to me.



There is too much pain to tolerate being called antiquated.  I'll take care of it.

Come Christmas the dude is going to have the 'bit o beef' indigestion treatment.  Ebenzerer Scrooge style.     He will have dreams.

Now they know why the property was so cheap.

Jerry Shuster, who is an immigrant from the former Yugoslavia, said the newcomers had cut down all his trees and dismantled his fence to use as firewood to keep warm at night.

"The migrants have more rights than we do," said Maria Shuster, claiming that federal authorities and the local sheriff's department have told her they are unable to remove the hordes of strangers from their property.


https://nypost.com/2023/12/29/news/san-diego-area-residents-say-migrants-camping-in-yards-piling-trash-nightly/

San Diego-area residents say migrants camping in yards, piling trash nightly: 'This is ridiculous'

RE

At least it's providing steady work for bus drivers from Texas to Chicago.

Until and unless they get deported, that's an additional 300K Homeless people each month, 3.6M/year.  That's more than twice the population of Phoenix. By the time of the POTUS election, there will be easy 1M refugees in Concentration Camps or 1M begging on the streets of NYC, Chicago, Boston, SF & LA,neither alternative of which bodes well for Uncle Joe's reelection campaign.

2024 is shaping up to be an exciting year in collapse.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/us-mexico-border-migrants-processed-december-record/

U.S. border officials on track to process over 300,000 migrants in December, the highest monthly tally on record

RE

Love the Hunter Thompson title.     Dr. Gonzo would have had a field day with this.

As mentioned in prior posts, the NYC Solution to their burgeoning migrant and homeless crisis, the state run Tent City they set up at Floyd Bennett Airfield is turning into a complete clusterfuck.  They recently had to evacuate all the residents to a Brooklyn HS during a storm which threatened to blow down all the tents.  Classes had to be cancelled, pissing off the local residents who depend on this for babysitting.  The refugees complained about the food, lack of services and anything to do.  Now, petty crime is on thee increase and the runway smells like reefer.  The prohibition of drugs and alcohol apparently is being ignored.  Big surprise there.

What is really sad is despite the fact it's a failure on just about every level, nobody has even hinted at shutting it down or what they are doing to create something at least marginally better.  What are they going to do with the next 2000 refugees?  The airfield I believe is now at it's designed capacity.  Buses are still arriving from TX every day.

Clearly thee folks need to be spread out and directed to other cities.  Yet all you hear about are NY, Chicago and LA as "sanctuary cities".  Basically, every city with a population over about 200K should have to take a few.  Subuutbs also should have to take some.  There are whole countries like Venezuela evacuating people.  You can't jam them all into a couple of big shities here.

Amazing how fast dominoes can start to fall in a collapse.

https://nypost.com/2024/01/13/metro/brooklyn-residents-fuming-over-migrants-lawlessness/

Fear and loathing at Brooklyn's Floyd Bennett Field: Neighbors fuming over migrants' 'lawlessness'

RE