Incidentally, these sorts of things (deed restrictions/covenants) are also what preceded zoning as we know it today. They're just more difficult to enforce beca

Incidentally, these sorts of things (deed restrictions/covenants) are also what preceded zoning as we know it today. They're just more difficult to enforce because you can't control what happens on the edge of your covenant-protected neighborhood. This paper has a really good summary of the history here: https://www.dartmouth.edu/~wfischel/Papers/02-03.pdf https://www.dartmouth.edu/~wfischel/Papers/02-03.pdf > While it would be kinda neat -- as an experiment -- to see how a city would develop without zoning, Houston sure as heck isn't that example. If you're counting covenants as "zoning", I'm not really sure that such a thing is possible without a major change in property right law (except for the parking and height restrictions, which obviously have a big influence on structures everywhere and should go away IMO).