About me

Hi, I’m Andrea Herrera, an Economic Geography PhD candidate specializing in Urban Economics. I am studying the effects of urban planning and transport infrastructure on housing outcomes and the spatial distribution of economic activity and people using Quantitative Spatial Models. I am interested in learning about the spatial determinants of intergenerational mobility, spatial inequalities, segregation, and gender inequalities.

This is my CV.

Contact me at a.herrera5@lse.ac.uk

My research

Work in progress

The effects of transport infrastructure on housing supply: the role of land-use regulation. Co-authored with Kenzo Asahi and Hugo Silva. [Working Paper].

We study the impact of new transportation infrastructure on housing supply using historical and micro data from Santiago and exploiting instrumental variables. We find that subway and highway expansions increase residential floor space substantially, but when we account for land-use regulation, we see two contrasting dynamics in the city. In the wealthiest quintile, the effect is negligible for more than 95% of the blocks due to their initial stringent regulation. However, in blocks in the first four quintiles of wealth, the impact on housing supply is substantial and homogeneous concerning the initial regulation. We provide evidence that the transport infrastructure triggers regulation to become more permissive everywhere but in the wealthiest neighborhoods. We quantify how land-use regulation limits housing supply, thus restraining welfare gains from transport infrastructure improvements.

The Social Divide of Urban Land Use Regulatory Changes: Evidence from Chile. Co-authored with Diego Gil, Hugo Silva and Kenzo Asahi. [Working Paper].

This paper investigates the drivers of land-use regulatory changes in Santiago, Chile, over a 20-year period, focusing on downzoning (stricter regulations) and upzoning (more flexible regulations). Leveraging an original dataset covering 15 urban municipalities, we examine how neighborhood characteristics, including homeownership rates, income levels, and proximity to transportation networks—influence these zoning decisions. Our findings reveal that high-income neighborhoods are more likely to experience downzoning, especially where homeownership is less prevalent, reflecting a “social divide” in land-use policy. Contrary to expectations, high-density areas favor stricter regulations, while large-scale zoning changes dilute the influence of affluent residents, arguably due to competing interests such as those of the real estate industry. These results contribute to the debate between the “growth machine” theory, where real estate interests dominate, and the “homevoter” theory, where residents hold sway, suggesting that both frameworks may apply depending on the city’s level of social segmentation. Methodologically, we introduce a novel dataset of municipal land-use regulations, offering new insights into the political economy of urban development.

The effects of local urban regulation on residential outcomes: Evidence from Santiago, Chile.

This paper examines the local effects of floor-to-area ratio (FAR) regulation on residential supply and prices in Santiago, Chile, using a staggered difference-in-difference approach with a block-year dataset from 2011 to 2018. Around 20% of blocks experienced a change in FAR, where 80% had a decrease in their FAR, a downzoning, and the rest had an upzoning. There are 16 changes to the regulation, which happen at different times and places, as each of the 14 municipalities in the sample decides its regulation independently, providing this research with a dynamic and unique setting. This study considers downzoning and upzoning as different treatments; their control groups will be the not-yet-treated blocks of each one. Preliminary results show that both treatments do not have statistically significant effects on prices and dwellings.