The Missing Middle Podcast How Cities Keep Screwing up Multiplex Housing
Jul 2, 2025
Cities face surprising roadblocks in implementing multiplex housing reforms despite zoning changes. Local councils push back against multi-unit buildings, with bizarre bedroom caps shrinking family housing options. Height restrictions make larger multiplexes impractical, resulting in poor architectural designs. Infill development is complicated further by hefty charges that treat it like greenfield. The hosts argue for provincial intervention to ensure effective housing policies are upheld and not diluted at the municipal level.
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Legalization Undermined By Hidden Rules
- Cities often legalize multiplexes on paper but add rules that make them impractical to build.
- Layered restrictions like parking, setbacks, and bedroom caps erode the value of zoning reforms.
Bedroom Caps Destroy Family Housing
- Bedroom caps convert family-sized potential into tiny one-bedroom units.
- Planners impose caps to avoid rooming houses, yet this chases families away instead of solving supply problems.
Provide Targeted Supply, Don't Ban Multiplexes
- Solve perceived rooming-house demand by building targeted supply like student residences and social housing.
- Say yes to missing middle housing and provide alternative housing types rather than forbidding multiplexes.