High density more cost effective for cities than urban sprawl

Emily Badger, in The Simple Math That Can Save Cities From Bankruptcy, looks at how some cities in the US are finding that regenerating their downtown areas can be financially advantageous.

We tend to think that broke cities have two options: raise taxes, or cut services. Minicozzi, though, is trying to point to the basic but long-buried math of our tax system that cities should be exploiting instead: Per-acre, our downtowns have the potential to generate so much more public wealth than low-density subdivisions or massive malls by the highway. And for all that revenue they bring in, downtowns cost considerably less to maintain in public services and infrastructure.