Bedrooms (300): ‘Yes’ for climate action

By Ryan Schuchard. Also published as a letter to the editor in the Daily Camera on October 29, 2021.

"Boulder has a shortage of housing and a surplus of sprawl. The combination equals traffic and gives us two choices:

The first choice is do nothing and thereby continue to encourage suburban development outside of town — a factor that is responsible for 60,000 daily in-commuters pre-pandemic times and a big source of climate pollution and traffic already. Boulder’s sprawl, which comes largely from an inadequate supply of housing in town, is keeping out families, young people, valuable service workers, and other diverse and creative people that we need to build a climate resilient-future.

The second choice is to do what experts call 'infill.' That means using living space more efficiently in places that are already urban. Infill is a pillar in the fight against climate change because it can help to both eliminate the need for commuting between cities and allow people to live more 'car-lite' locally. With infill, we get a more compact matrix of people who can support the productive use of more frequent transit and more extensive infrastructure to separate bikes from cars, which benefits us all.

As someone who wants to live in a place really trying for climate action, I’ll take number 2. Which is why I like Bedrooms Are For People, a policy that, by doing nothing more than relaxing an outdated prohibition, will give people security to live in the places already zoned and built for people to live. Please join me in voting yes on Boulder ballot measure 300."