Alex Maiassi

We walk past bare concrete pillars, exposed pipes, wires dangling from the ceiling.

What's that?

Jacob was pointing out a charming little neighborhood right next to the towers.

It's called Kitts Point.

And when the Squamish first announced their plans to cram 11 huge towers onto this land, some of those neighbors were not happy.

They were like, not in my backyard, you know, NIMBY.

This is why, even when cities know that zoning is making it harder to build housing, they still have all of these very restrictive zoning laws—

Because zoning laws give people a say in what happens in their own neighborhoods, which sounds really great in theory.

But in practice, most people generally don't want big new disruptive construction projects in their own neighborhood.

And so they complain about it to planning boards and city politicians.

They complain very loudly.

This all leads to a classic problem in politics, one that a lot of economists have studied, where a project that might benefit lots of people gets stalled because it would hurt a small minority of extremely vocal, extremely motivated people.

There's an asymmetry here.

Economists call it the problem of concentrated costs versus diffuse benefits.

And as this project moved forward, the Squamish eventually started to find allies.

Like when they approached the city of Vancouver about connecting the towers to the local roads and sewage system and power grid.

The city was supportive.

They signed an agreement.

And sure, most of these Sanhok apartments are going to be expensive and high-end.

But when there's a housing shortage, every additional unit helps.