I agree with you but the how is pretty hard to imagine. Especially with how housing speculation is so deeply tied to people's retirements and life plans.
I'll give that book a gander. Based on the reviews I think I'll like it given my context of growing in Florida and now living in Amsterdam and wondering how things can be so different.
Yeah, living in the Netherlands for a few months (Haarlem) and traveling some there really shifted my perspective. The Dutch have demonstrated that you can have your cake and earth it too. They actually transformed some car first cities to human scale - forget the name.
