The preservation of historic districts—is it worth it?

Sevrin Waights

Journal of Economic Geography, 2019, vol. 19, issue 2, 433-464

Abstract: I investigate the welfare effect of conservation areas that preserve historic districts by regulating development. Such regulation may improve the quality of life but does so by reducing housing productivity—that is, the efficiency with which inputs (land and non-land) are converted into housing services. Using a unique panel dataset for English cities and an instrumental variable approach, I find that conservation areas lead to higher house prices for given land values and building costs (lower housing productivity) and higher house prices for given wages (higher quality of life). The overall welfare impact is found to be negative.

Keywords: Housing; planning; regulation; historic preservation; construction; land (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D62 H89 L51 L74 R21 R31 R38 R52 R58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Working Paper: The preservation of historic districts—is it worth it? (2019)
Working Paper: The Preservation of Historic Districts - Is it Worth it? (2016)
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