New Jersey faces major challenges with the dual threat of climate change and housing unaffordability. While at face value, these two issues seem to pertain to natural or built environments, respectively, the two are inseparably linked and must be addressed in tandem.
Housing and Equity
The Risk to Our Roofs: Considering and Harnessing the Climate-Housing Nexus
Monday, July 11th, 2022The State of New Jersey’s Housing Market: We Need More
Monday, July 11th, 2022New Jersey is facing an acute housing shortage. Nationally, we are millions of housing units short of meeting demand, and the situation is proportionally worse in New Jersey. That was the big-picture message delivered by Debra Tantleff, founding principal of Tantum Real Estate, to kick off the session on The State of Housing in New Jersey at the New Jersey Planning and Redevelopment Conference on June 16, hosted jointly by New Jersey Future and the New Jersey chapter of the American Planning Association.
Young People are Leaving New Jersey: Exploring Potential Explanatory Variables
Wednesday, June 22nd, 2022With the youngest members of the demographically large Millennial generation (roughly, those born between 1981 and 1996) aging into young adulthood, the number of people between the ages of 25 and 44 increased nationwide by 3.5% between 2015 and 2019. In New Jersey, however, the population in this age range declined by 1.2% over the same time period, with high housing costs appearing as a major motivating factor.
New Jersey Needs More “Missing Middle” Housing
Monday, July 19th, 2021New Jersey’s housing costs are among the highest in the country. The state ranks seventh in median home value and fourth in median rent. The state is losing younger households to other states, and evidence points to high housing costs as one of the reasons. To create more of the kinds of homes that younger households are looking for—in the neighborhoods they want to live in—New Jersey should consider revising the zoning and parking requirements that determine what kind of housing gets built and where.
Filling the Missing Middle: Context-Sensitive Design and Development Innovations for Diverse, Sustainable, Walkable Neighborhoods
Friday, June 25th, 2021Increasing the housing stock in the most densely populated state in the country may seem like a daunting task, but it doesn’t have to be. Panelists shared how they resolve the tension between municipalities’ need to grow and residents’ fear of change at the 2021 Planning and Redevelopment Conference’s Filling the Missing Middle: Context-Sensitive Design and Development Innovations for Diverse, Sustainable, Walkable Neighborhoods panel.
Web Mapping to Support Smart Equitable Cities in Community Planning
Friday, June 25th, 2021“Web mapping is a supertool for planners,” according to Rowan University Geography Professor John Hasse. The Web Mapping to Support Smart Equitable Cities in Community Planning session at the 2021 Planning and Redevelopment Conference demonstrated just that with several case studies highlighting new web mapping initiatives in New Jersey.
Where Do New Jersey’s Property Tax Bills Hit the Hardest?
Monday, February 15th, 2021Recently-released property tax data from the Department of Community Affairs have reminded us once again that New Jerseyans pay a lot in property taxes. Indeed, New Jersey residents pay the highest property tax bills in the country.
The Geography of Poverty and Race in New Jersey
Wednesday, October 14th, 2020Despite New Jersey’s urban resurgence in the years since the Great Recession, and despite concerns about gentrification expressed in popular media, high-poverty neighborhoods have not gone away.
The Black-White Homeownership Gap in New Jersey
Wednesday, September 16th, 2020Where we build our housing, the type of housing we build, and for whom we build it affects our environment, our quality of life, and how segregated a state we will live in.
