( 
Why be concerned about the future? 
There are a number of reasons why State governments should be 
concerned about acquiring and/or controlling land that will not be 
immediately affected by the present development of anew community. 
Perhaps the most important of these is to capture increments in value 
created by public investment. The Birtish Government recognized 
this when Parliament enacted the recommendations of the Uthwaitt 
Commission report, which called for the acquisition of the develop- 
ment rights for all the land in England. This, in effect, entitled the 
government to receive any increases in private land that are due to 
the efforts of government and not the landowner. 
The problem with an idle landowner gaining is not so aggravating 
when the nearby industrious landowner is richly rewarded for his 
efforts. But when the relative value increases in favor of the “do 
nothing” landowner, the pill becomes harder to swallow. This con- 
dition has become increasingly prevalent in our country’s history, 
particularly with respect to our public expenditures on capital im- 
provements. The most notable recent example can be found in the 
Federal interstate highway program, where in some cases, public 
investments have been exceeded by unearned private increments, 
sometimes at a factor of 5. That is, for example, a 10-mile stretch of 
highway may cost $20 million of public funds and yet when its con- 
struction is completed, the privately owned land on the highway’s 
flanks will sometimes have increased in value by as much as $100 
million. 
There are reasons for allowing this system to continue, but their 
validity should not be allowed to pass unchecked. For example, 
although it is frequently asserted that there is no substance to the 
“do nothing” label, that in fact the landowner is doing something by 
risking his capital, there is some empirical evidence to suggest that in 
many areas of the United States that risk is in fact minimal.”° 
The law of future use 
Consider for a moment the distinction between the legality of the 
two following hypothetical conditions: (1), acquiring a tract of land 
and within 1 or 2 years constructing a densely populated, mixed 
income new community on the entire site, and (2), acquiring the same 
tract of land and building the same community in the same place, 
but at a much slower pace, perhaps staging it over 20-year period. 
Needless to say, the second condition is the more realistic one, given 
the nature of the development process. Yet, as pointed out earlier, 
most of the legal studies in this area have tended to assume (either 
consciously or unconsciously on the part of the writers) that develop- 
ment is an act in the present tense. 
Assuming that the distinction between the two conditions is a 
valid one, why is it significant? To begin with, it points up two sep- 
arate, but related, legal issues that must both be overcome if new 
communities are to be built in this country’s rapidly expanding urban- 
izing areas. Both of these issues are dimensions of the concept of 
“public purpose,” the doctrine discussed in the previous section. 
Thus far, the present use dimension of public purpose has been em- 
phasized, as the analysis has tended to address the following question: 
7 Dyckman, ‘The Control of Land Development and Urbanization in California,” in the 
California Governor’s Commisison on Housing, “Housing in California,” app. p. 29 (1963). 
