Allowing mixed-use and higher-density development is a common municipal policy response to pressing urban challenges, including housing affordability and climate change. Yet, comparatively little is known about the effects of density-enabling plans and policies. We study how a major 2011 planning initiative, the designation of “urban villages,” affected real estate development in San Jose, California. We track several outcome measures – permits for residential and commercial development, large development projects, parcel transactions, and parcel assessed values – before and after the urban village initiative. We find the initiative’s effects to be quite limited. The estimated treatment effects are generally not distinguishable from zero across specifications that vary by parcel land use, treatment period, and identification strategy. Potential explanations include a lack of actual zoning changes; urban village requirements that make development more complicated; and a mismatch between the development types envisioned in municipal plans and real estate market conditions.

允许混合用途和更高密度的发展是市政的共同政策，以应对紧迫的城市挑战，包括住房负担能力和气候变化。但是，对于启用密度的计划和政策的效果知之甚少。我们研究了2011年的一项重大计划举措，即“城市村庄”的名称如何影响加利福尼亚州圣何塞的房地产开发。在城市村计划启动之前和之后，我们跟踪几种结果度量标准-住宅和商业开发许可，大型开发项目，宗地交易和宗地评估价值。我们发现该倡议的影响是非常有限的。估计的处理效果通常在整个规格中无法与零区分开，该规格因地块土地使用，处理时间和识别策略而异。可能的解释包括缺乏实际的分区更改；使发展变得更加复杂的城市乡村要求；以及市政计划中设想的开发类型与房地产市场状况之间的不匹配。