But the victor, for now, has shifted. The urban lifestyle is now glamorized nightly on television, affecting the attitudes of both the baby boom and echo generations. Everything comes with a price tag. While network television is molding consumer taste to urban living, and achieving the urbanizing goal of the Growth Management Act along the way, it comes at a cost. The GMA also had affordability goals.
Urban housing is denser, more complex to build, and therefore more expensive.
The fact that demand for higher density urban living is increasing at the same time the GMA encourages land use policies that support higher density housing is a fortunate coincidence. But it does not prove GMA right. These convergent forces suggest new opportunities at the policy development level to find new approaches to capitalize on these evolutions. A factor driving the increase in demand for urban housing is a growing number of childless households, in large part due to baby boomers reaching the empty-nester phase of life. Convenience to work and adult amenities take on a much greater significance for these households.