Got round to readng @AntBreach report on zoning for @CentreforCities ...it is interesting but something of a curate's egg. Would have liked to see more depth to international comparators beyond 2/3 US cities and Japan.

Firstly the analysis is sound - the "...problem at the heart of the housing crisis is the discretionary element in the planning system..." - and the use of a shortage economy model welcome

The planning system limits land supply, builds in uncertainty and this promotes shortage, speculation and inefficiency. Breach is also right to focus on land supply not housing numbers

That "...only 4% of all suburban neighbourhoods in England and Wales...provided 45% of new suburban homes..." is shocking and revealing. The system is broken

The argument about empty homes is new and interesting (perhaps the most new and interesting bit of the report). For years we've had strategy to reduce empty homes and void rates are still a core measure for social housing companies. @AntBreach says this is mistaken

Again the argument uses Japan as the sole comparator and we should be careful where populations are declining (we see similar evidence of depopulation and high voids across much of rural sounthern Europe)

The solution @AntBreach proposes is the Japanese system (he dismisses the US approach for a centralised top down method, because Seattle - no mention of Houston, Atlanta or Nashville, cities with more affordable housing, or Ile de France to use a European example)

The flexible zoning system sounds good on paper but would need to be set up to provide the hierarchical approach Breach wants without, in effect, simply recreating the existing land supply constraint under different rules.

We're told this isn't deregulation but "correct regulation" - a slightly statist approach give the evidence @AntBreach summons to show how statist approaches don't work. It still assmes that government determines the proper use for land rather than the owner and the market

The mistake, for me, is that having identified how a system without any form of planning rigidity is the most efficient system and most likely to meet need, Breach then simply proposes a different set of market distorting rigidities. An improvement but not the best solution

Finally - and this may be simply a consequence of focus and brevity - Breach doesn't really address the (increasingly dominant) non-market justifcations for planning and especially environmental concerns. This will be one of the main fronts of resistence to any planning reform.

I'll stop now because I guess no-one really gives a toss was I think.