Considering the paltry number of units, and their ~0% effect on average citywide housing prices, if the overriding concern is more affordable housing, the bottom line question should be: does Fane’s proposal prevent affordable housing being built?

And the answer is, no. The real estate itself is too valuable (location and eventually taxed by Providence at their high valuation/rates) to build housing that is less than market rate. It’s not Fane driving that equation (it’s us).

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We do all agree we want fewer unhoused people, and more affordable housing so we should be looking for solutions.

And noted here, it’s difficult to prove any particular hypothesis on housing costs with the number of variables (salaries, populations, construction costs, taxes, incomes per unit propensity, square footage expectations, economy, inflation, etc) and the inability to identify a control to measure against. But, there are some glimmers.

https://streets.mn/2020/06/28/new-housing-lowers-rents-in-minneapolis-st-paul-not-so-much/