Generations of scholarship on the political economy of land use have tried to
explain a world in which tony suburbs use zoningto keep out development but big cities allow
untrammeled growth because of the political influence of developers. But as demand to live in
them has increased, many of the nation’s biggestcities have substantially limited development.
Although developers remain important players in city politics, we have not seen enough growth
in the housing supply in many cities to keep prices from skyrocketing. This Article seeks to
explain this change with a story about big-city land use that places the legal regime governing
land-use decisions at its center. In the absence of strong local political parties, land-use laws that
set the voting procedure in local legislatures determine policy results between cycling
preferences. Specifically, the Standard Zoning Enabling Act (SZEA) creates a peculiar procedure
that privileges the intense preferences of localresidents opposed to new building. Amendments
to zoning maps are considered one-by-one, making deals across projects and neighborhoods
difficult. Legislators may prefer to allow some building rather to stopping it everywhere, but are
most concerned that their districts not bear the brunt of the negative externalities associated with
new development. Absent deals that link zoning changes in different neighborhoods, all
legislators will work to stop the zoning amendmentsthat effect their districts. Without a strong
party leadership to whip votes into line, the preferences of legislators about projects in their
districts dominate and building isrestricted everywhere. Further,the seriatim nature of local
land-use procedure results in frequent downzonings, as big developers do not have an incentive
to fight reductions in the ability of landowners to build incremental additions to the housing
stock as of right. The cost of moving amendments through the land-use process means that
small developers cannot overcome the burdens imposed by downzonings. The Article concludes
by considering several forms of legislative process reform that mimic procedural changes
Congress adopted in order to pass international trade treaties.
