Family Living Act of 2003: Difference between revisions

The legislation had wide-reaching aims, including impeding the growth of {{wp|suburban}} sprawl throughout the country, reintegrating families and estates, preserving greenspace, and building durable "small urban" communities now known as the [[Housing_in_Urcea#Urban_town_and_country|Urban Town and Country (UTC)]] model.

==Background==

Urcea's relatively large population began to explode with the rise of modern medicine and industrial agriculture in the early 20th century, necessitating a rapid need to expand housing. This took various forms until the [[Second Great War]], when public subsidies and incentives led to the creation of vast suburbs throughout [[Urcea]] and in [[The Valley (Urcea)|the Valley]] specifically. From [[1950]] through around [[1990]], major new subdivisions were being constructed everywhere, and land area in Urcea was rapidly converted to suburban {{wp|sprawl}} as the late 20th century progressed. Despite the growing population, supply eventually exceeded demand. The housing boom had fueled a major construction industry bubble which burst in the 1990s, ending the expansion of sprawl. While the economics of sprawl slowed, social reformers and academics alike began to call into question the benefit of suburban lifestyles, citing social alienation and the destruction of Urcea's natural environment. The [[2000 Urcean elections|2000]] platform of the [[Commonwealth Union (Urcea)|Commonwealth Union]] under [[Michael Witte]] promised to stop the spread of sprawl under a platform item called "Rebuild Our Communities", which vaguely elucidated a plan to restore kinship living arrangements, end sprawl, and build durable communities not susceptible to economic exploitation or significant government welfare support. The housing and sprawl issue proved to be a popular one, with 14% of voters in the 2000 election citing it as their top issue that year. Witte and the Commonwealth Union won the election, beginning work in earnest on introducing comprehensive housing and development reform. These reforms would take root from ideas developed during the negotiations surrounding what would become the Family Living Act, but would also take language and ideas from development-reform legislation which had existed since the late 1980s.

The Family Living Act created a new planning apparatus known as a "preservation zone", distinct from preexistant environmental conservation areas. Preservation zones were defined broadly to include any areas that the public interest demanded be free of urban sprawl, and that all preservation zones would be identified by resolution of the provincial governments and approved by the [[Concilium Daoni]]. Preservation zones, as established under the FLA, did not prohibit construction on individual pieces of property by individual owners or firms, nor did it affect the overall pre-extant planning and zoning systems. Instead, it provided that construction of multiple residences and subdivision thereof on property by a single individual, firm, or group of firms would be prohibited within a preservation zone. The FLA provided for a specific exemption process approved by the [[Ministry_of_the_Environment_and_Energy_(Urcea)#Agency_for_Environmental_Conservation|Agency for Environmental Conservation]], which was given additional funding and resources under the Act to ensure compliance. The exemption process was stated to have a specific preference for UTCs and other, very-low-density types of construction. The FLA identified all pre-extant environmental conservation areas as preservation zones, and subsequent legislation passed between [[2004]] and [[2012]] expanded the zones to cover much of the non-sprawl parts of [[The Valley (Urcea)|the Valley]]. The intention of the preservation zone model was to ensure the end of new suburban sprawl throughout the Valley and rest of Urcea; though market forces had already slowed their growth by [[2003]], advocates sought additional legal means to slow the growth of sprawl.

===Housing construction limits===

===Incentives for UTCs===

==Legislative history==

===2001===

===2002===

===2003===

==Impact==

With significant areas of [[The Valley (Urcea)|the Valley]] marked as preservation zones, construction of housing had to shift to further afield. The various provisions of the FLA inaugurated a new era of home construction in Urcea, as new, very-low-density exurban developments began to be planned in compliance with the building code changes under the FLA. A second wave of subdivision construction occurred beginning in 2005 and ending in 2014, bringing a large number of new subdivisions to the outer portions of the Valley and parts of the [[Urcean frontier]]. Unlike the previous century's developments, special care was taken in the construction of these subdivisions to be compliant with the FLA's intent to preserve greenspace, a provision that also necessarily led to larger average property sizes for homeowners in 2025 as compared to 1985. The more traditional exurban street model combined with the rapid construction of urban-town-and-country style developments to move many Urceans out of the suburbs and into more cohesive, if further, residential communities.

===Death of suburban development===

===Rise of the UTCs===

===Sociological improvements===

Throughout the 2010s, various studies were conducted to measure if the changes in neighborhood composition had made an impact on feelings of social isolation and estate cohesion.

==Criticism and opposition==

The primary argument made by the National Pact and its political allies was that the mandates placed on home construction would dramatically increase the cost of buying a house, potentially putting homeownership out of reach to middle class Urceans.

===Government overreach===

In addition to objections to the content of the legislation, opponents of the Family Living Act also argued that such a sweeping mandate related to housing and planning violated {{wp|Home rule in the United States|municipal home rule}}. This argument contended that zoning and planning had traditionally been the domain of local and provincial governments, and for the first time the Concilium Daoni was infringing on their traditional rights.

[[Category: Urcea]]

[[Category: Laws of Urcea]]

[[Category: Legislation]]

[[Category:IXWB]]

[[Category:20th Anniversary Contest]]