The Influence of Public Improvements on Land Values

Abstract

T HE people of the United States have spent some seven billion dollars in the past decade upon public improvements in the form of streets, highways, parks, and reclamation and irrigation projects-public works of a scope and magnitude which make the Appian Way and the Great Wall of China look like small projects indeed. Of the total cost of these improvements, approximately two and one-half billions were levied in the form of special assessments upon the land affected. The cities of the United States, of thirty thousand population or over, have spent over two billion dollars in this period on highway construction alone; and of this total cost, somewhat less than half has been paid for out of general taxes, the remainder being levied in the form of special assessments upon the land affected. We say affected rather than benefited, because our problem will be to inquire just how land values in these cases have been