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you mean the real estate investors and speculators want high barriers to entry. of course, this generally only occurs in the largest and most sclerotic of cities (e.g. los angeles and new york) whose existing footprints are effectively too geographically large for their new greenfield burbs to be tolerable.

the mainstream builders, e.g. toll bros, KB, d.r. horton, etc. have the cash and want an ever-increasing amount of greenfield land. the various owners of urban periphery land want to turn it into subdivisions.

both parties want to elevate their own selfish goals, often at the expense of the greater good. having the nimby/speculator inspired housing shortages only works to hurt the younger residents.

it sucks that people take jane jacobs out of context, and equate all urban planners with the idiot likes of robert moses. thus we'll protest any attempts at urban planning, only to accept the development industry's goals. thus you'll get continued sprawl and the occasional historically themed leisure center billed as urbanism. yet density and public transit aren't on the radar.

it's a moot point though. at least on this continent, we know which faction eventually wins out. thus you'll continue to see even more sprawl. yet most people will just blame it on bad government or a freedom loving culture, yet fail to identify the financial beneficiaries of sprawl.