We are often admonished by the politicians, bureaucrats, and social planners, that unless we have zoning and planning in urban areas, factories, stockyards, pig farms, and the like will be built in residential districts, ruining property values and defiling the neighborhoods.

Historically, the opposite is true - although there are of course occasional exceptions which tend to be held up as the general rule.

Generally, the reality is that the price of land within an urban area is so high that it discourages its use for more industrial purposes.  Instead, cheaper undeveloped land outside the city limits is generally sought for a new factory.

Once such an industry is established however, it quickly attracts workers and shopkeepers who settle and build close to the source of employment and wages, ultimately often resulting at a later date in residents who complain about the factory (or country farm) that was the prime reason for their coming to the area in the first place!

There was little if any zoning or land-use planning during the years of the Industrial Revolution.  If there had been, it is possible if not likely that the revolution, with all its resulting benefits, would never have occurred - or if it had, would have been severely retarded and hampered.

Go to next lesson ...>>