Land Use Law Commons^™

Pandemics And Housing Insecurity: A Blueprint For Land Use Law Reform, John R. Nolon

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

COVID-19, racial inequity, housing insecurity, and climate change have come together to create widespread, large-scale crises. This Article introduces these four pandemics and describes in detail what local governments are doing to combat one of them: housing insecurity. It reviews recent progress with traditional inclusionary zoning requirements, discusses the move toward greater density in single-family zoning, lists strategies being used to remediate distressed housing, and notes the importance of affordable housing as a necessary strategy for preventing lower-income household displacement caused by gentrification. The reciprocal impacts of these four pandemics are clear; local land use leaders should examine how mitigating …

The Road To Affordable Housing: How To Replace Highways With Homes In New York City, Chad Hughes

Pace Law Review

Urban highways cause significant air, water, and soil pollution that disproportionately harm low-income and nonwhite residents. Many urban highways are reaching the end of their useful life and would be extremely expensive to repair or replace. Cities around the world have removed urban highways to improve environmental outcomes and to avoid wasteful spending.

While these teardowns have improved local and regional environmental quality and local traffic congestion, they have also led to increased land values near the retired rights of way. Without anti-displacement efforts, there is a risk that the very people who have been most harmed by urban highways …

Death Of Dillon’S Rule: Local Autonomy To Control Land Use, John R. Nolon

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

In order for municipal governments to promote sustainable and green development, create safe densities and open spaces in response to the pandemic, protect lives and property in areas vulnerable to natural disasters, and to manage climate change, they must be able to influence the development and preservation of privately owned land. For them to control the negative impacts of oil and gas facilities, they must find power to regulate matters that are typically the prerogative of state agencies. To legalize emerging renewable energy technologies, they must have authority to make them permitted uses in their zoning ordinances, and to innovate …

Resilience And Raisins: Partial Takings And Coastal Climate Change Adaptation, Joshua Ulan Galperin, Zaheer Tajani

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The increased need for government-driven coastal resilience projects will lead to a growing number of claims for “partial takings” of coastal property. Much attention has been paid to what actions constitute a partial taking, but there is less clarity about how to calculate just compensation for such takings, and when compensation should be offset by the value of benefits conferred to the property owner. While the U.S. Supreme Court has an analytically consistent line of cases on compensation for partial takings, it has repeatedly failed (most recently in Horne v. U.S. Department of Agriculture) to articulate a clear rule. The …

A Warning To States — Accepting This Invitation May Be Hazardous To Your Health (Safety, And Public Welfare): An Analysis Of Post-Kelo, Joshua Ulan Galperin

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Focusing on Delaware, this article will argue that the United States Supreme Court's decision in Kelo v. New London gave state legislatures an open invitation to shape their public use frameworks, but their responses must be measured and well-reasoned because the consequences of reactionary legislation may put a stranglehold on state and local governments trying to exercise eminent domain for unanimously accepted public uses. Part I will trace the most pertinent federal jurisprudence through Kelo. Part II will survey Delaware’s public use jurisprudence. Part III will introduce the Delaware General Assembly’s legislative response to Kelo. Part IV will serve as …