Can the Bay Area Kick the Sprawl Habit?

https://www.citylab.com/design/2017/04/can-silicon-valley-kick-the-sprawl-habit/524262/

by atsneed • 9 years ago

36 62 9 years ago

citylab.com

cletus• 9 years ago

No.

valuearb• 9 years ago

It's easy. Just ban individual homes, make everyone live in small apartments along rail routes.

What would we lose?

devopsproject• 9 years ago

people who don't want to live in small apartments next to busy rail lines

hkmurakami5• 9 years ago

Well for starters that's probably illegal and would get challenged in court by various jurisdictions.

TJ-14• 9 years ago

Municipalities could easily accomplish that with zoning restrictions.

agitator2• 9 years ago

Also, a large portion of the voters are home owners in those districts.

eru• 9 years ago

The better plan would be to remove zoning restrictions (and while you are at it, institute a land value tax).

epistasis2• 9 years ago

This is such an odd joke.

I say joke, but I feel that many people feel it is true. In that if the Bay Area builds any of that housing, that in a few years they will be forced into living in it against their will.

For existing property owners, this is not a problem. They have their single family separate household. And yet it's those people that put up the most opposition to people who want to live in a different way. To me, an apartment on a rail line is far more valuable than a house that's only accessible by car. That's what I want, yet the market is not allowed to meet that demand because of zoning restrictions and NIMBY actions.

CalRobert2• 9 years ago

I'm guessing you're trying to get at the fact that we did exactly this, but the opposite. The results have been less than stellar.

Animats2• 9 years ago

With electric cars coming along, and already here in many Silicon Valley parking lots, is this really a problem?

Downtown Redwood City has suddenly become very urban. The city is well over a century old, but until five years ago, had few tall buildings. Now, 5 to 10 story buildings are filling up downtown blocks. The downtown redevelopment plan actually worked.

hkmurakami5• 9 years ago

I hadn't been there in 10 years until last weekend and was shocked at how transformed it had become. It has definitely kept up with the times. (I was also a fan of the weekend parking at Box Inc. Parking with validation at stores.

Animats2• 9 years ago

Redwood City has had that parking system for over a decade, with several large parking garages and lots. The city insisted Box be part of it.

e40• 9 years ago

Electric cars don't do anything to reduce the # of cars on the freeways, which is the main problem discussed in the article.

closeparen2• 9 years ago

The number of cars on freeways is only a problem that needs to be addressed when they are causing significant negative externalities.

nostrademons• 9 years ago

The same thing is happening to downtown Sunnyvale (4-5 story condos going up on top of street-level retail) and Mountain View (10 story towers going up around San Antonio, with the giant strip mall being converted into mixed-use condos + shops). The same may happen with North Bayshore - Google's building its new tent campus, and the plan includes up to 10-story residential buildings on street-level retail. There's still a lot of resistance from local residents, but the development tide seems to have turned.

With everybody complaining about how expensive SF is and how terrible the commute is, it seems to me like a more likely solution is to bring the city to Mountain View rather than bring all the workers from the city to Mountain View.

hkmurakami5• 9 years ago

Thank goodness they finally developed San Antonio shopping center. Been going there since I was a child when there was a Payless drugs store (I think?) where the Safeway now is, and it had been basically dead for a decade between 2003-2013 or thereabouts.

Of course there are many many more places like this along El Camino, and Vallco is probably never getting redeveloped due to resident opposition against mixed use develeopment including high density housing.

davidw• 9 years ago

Not looking that way:

http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/04/28/cupertino-adopts-proce...

agitator2• 9 years ago

It wouldn't all be so bad if the transportation infrastructure in the bay area wasn't such a joke. When I first moved here I was surprised that a region known for it's innovation, had roads and public transportation systems that looked like people just gave up trying in the 80s.

squiguy72• 9 years ago

At least you have public transit like rail or BART. There is nothing like that down in LA and OC. My commute is only 11 miles one way and it takes me 45 minutes to 1 hour thanks to the traffic. The trains here have enough stops that it would be just as long as if I had driven.

ng125• 9 years ago

"Better than LA" is an incredibly low bar though.

acchow2• 9 years ago

Do you ride a bicycle? Tho I guess it would be too hot in LA for that most days.

CalRobert2• 9 years ago

Maybe change jobs, or homes. Make employers know that you won't put up with subsidizing their cheap land with your gas and time (the latter is also known as "life"). Make builders know that we don't all want to live a zillion miles away from everything.

My LA commute was 12 miles one way (SM to El Segundo) and a pretty nice 50 minute bike ride. But it was nearly all along the beach, and even then I nearly got killed multiple times.

atarian• 9 years ago

It really bums me out to see Silicon Valley in the state it is today. I got a chance to visit Korea, and one of the things that really impressed me was the rate and scale they were building high-rise apartments:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/09/17/asia-pacific/soc...

In addition, public trans is extensive and incredibly well-planned and executed.

Unfortunately, I realize this can only happen when the government has sufficient power to make these kind of changes. This will never happen in Silicon Valley as far as I can tell since local homeowners have the upper-hand.

JustAnotherPat• 9 years ago

those apartment blocks look like something you'd see out of the USSR.

pound• 9 years ago

is it good or bad thing?

mmanfrin• 9 years ago

The Bay Area is not the same as Silicon Valley. The East Bay (bay side of the hills) and SF have been building upwards. The South Bay and the past-the-hills East Bay are ruining things with sprawl. San Jose/SC/MV/etc are horrendous in terms of upward building and it comes down to an extremist form of NIMBYism passing laws preventing proper upward development.

tzs• 9 years ago

The San Jose urbanized area is the third most densely populated in the country, at 5820 people per square mile. That's only slightly behind the San Francisco-Oakland urbanized area, which is #2 at 6266 people per square mile. (#1 is Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim at almost 7000 per square mile).

Source: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/2010_censu...

sid-kap2• 9 years ago

These are looking at the densities of entire metropolitan areas, which doesn't mean much.

In the NY-NJ metro area there are lots of high-density cities, like Manhattan at 70,000/sq. mi.; Brooklyn, Union City, Hoboken, at 40,000/sq. mi.; Queens at 20,000/sq. mi. There is empty space between these cities, which lowers the density of the metro area, but that doesn't really matter.

On the other hand, SV cities (Mountain View, Sunnyvale, San Jose), actually are at densities of 5,000-6,000/sq. mi.

The figure we should actually be looking at is weighted population density, not population density.

mmagin• 9 years ago

Not as bad as many other metro areas in the US. It's just that in the upper parts of a bubble (e.g. now), the infrastructure can't cope with the traffic.

dopeboy• 9 years ago

For those in SF want to get organized around this issue, this is a good place to start: https://www.eventbrite.com/o/sf-yimby-13476049611

shriphani2• 9 years ago

Another solid example of regulatory capture. The nouveau riche in the bay area have begun piling on the poor.

Feels quite horrible to look at people who work retail jobs commuting 1hr each way to work. Just because soccer-moms who have no business organizing cities are now in charge of exactly that.

I mean just look at Cupertino - world capital of the soccer mom. So much money and they have managed to make it look like a giant walmart.

We need a Robert Hooke type to come in and take a good look at the problem. And deliver to us a London or a Rome.

hkmurakami5• 9 years ago

Apparently Cupertino uses overcapacity at schools as a reason to limit housing development, especially high density.

It certainly has a good intent ring to it, though i suspect there are additional reasons for using that party line.

ng125• 9 years ago

The overwhelming response you'd receive is "we don't want to be Rome". At this point I'm rooting for the tech industry to declare bankruptcy and found a new city somewhere ala NYC and the transatlantic trade.

shriphani2• 9 years ago

Nobody ever says "When in Cupertino" do they?

It is surprising to me how in one dimension one can take so much pride in their work (tech etc) and in another way be so satisfied and desire such mediocrity (civilization, architecture, quality of life for all).

closeparen2• 9 years ago

Uh, 1hr each way to work is entirely standard for $150k tech professionals when they have families (my senior colleagues, manager, and his manager), and for entry-level engineers when they want their own 1-bedroom apartments and cars (me).

Commute times for the actual poor are going to far exceed that.

RangerScience• 9 years ago

It feels like the other major issue is that the housing isn't on those hubs. Everyone wants to live in the same three parts of SF - the parts near Caltrain.

Like LA, it seems like there needs to be another train line. For us it's Hollywood/Beverly Hills. For the Bay, it'd be, maybe Sunset down the 101.

But maybe I'm wrong, and two options just mean you're more likely to be incorrect on either side?

ng125• 9 years ago

Another train line would be a waste -- take the window seat on Caltrain and look how utterly empty it is the second you leave SF. The whole way down the peninsula the train is flanked by flat, low-density construction spotted with breaks of wide open space. You don't see any real high-density housing until you get to San Jose.

kylec5• 9 years ago

I do not like living in high-density areas. I like being able to drive and park wherever I need to go - work, the grocery store, restaurants, etc. One of the things I like about being in the South Bay is that it allows me to live this way.

I welcome additional investment in our transportation infrastructure - both rail, bus, and road - but I take issue with the idea that everyone would prefer to live and work in a high-density environment. I don't see why we can't accommodate both preferred lifestyles.

ng125• 9 years ago

Because that lifestyle conflicts with being an economic powerhouse and if you fight against it lower income people foot the bill. If that's the lifestyle you want, why not move to the midwest?

kylec5• 9 years ago

This is an extremist position - that I should either live somewhere as dense as NYC or as sparse as the midwest. Moderate density has some of the benefits and drawbacks of both.

However, given that the Bay Area is an "economic powerhouse" the way it is today, I don't accept the argument that it can't continue to be one without drastically increasing its population density.

revelation• 9 years ago

But you don't. You live in a low-density area, then drive your car to the high-density area to get to work. The high-density inhabitants end up paying for your car habit.

kylec5• 9 years ago

I would not call Cupertino, Santa Clara, or pretty much anywhere in the South Bay "high-density" except downtown San Jose, and there are a lot of employers and employees getting along just fine in this area. Could transit be better? Absolutely. For one, 85 could use a few more lanes and a rail line. But instead of trying to convince employers to move their office to denser areas that are currently better served by public transit, I would suggest that we invest in improving the infrastructure in the whole area.

mtalantikite3• 9 years ago

The reality is that the majority of the areas of the United States are like the environments that you prefer -- low-density environments built around the car. Personally, I prefer a high density, walkable city, yet really my only option in the United States is NYC (where I live), as other cities that come close (SF, Chicago, Boston, DC, etc) don't run their transit 24 hours, or require some use of a car as neighborhoods aren't well connected by that transit.

I think it's completely reasonable to want to have a second city in the United States that can compare to NYC and all the benefits that come with a high density, multi-zoned, well connected city. Whenever I think about where else I could find this if I were to leave NYC I end up finding it really would mean moving abroad.

kylec5• 9 years ago

I think at this point it's useful to disentangle the city of San Francisco and the much less dense surrounding Bay Area. If you want to live in a high-density city, in this area that would be San Francisco. Its employers and residents (and prospective residents) should certainly push for 24 hour transit, more complete transit coverage, and whatever else is necessary for living in such an environment.

However, the rest of the Bay Area isn't really city-like. Much of the existing infrastructure has been built around cars as the mode of transportation. Building a second high-density city out of nothing somewhere in this area and convincing employers and employees to move there doesn't seem like it would be well received. If the employers and employees in this area wanted to be located in a high-density city they'd already be in San Francisco. Many are - but many are not.

thesmallestcat• 9 years ago

You're showing NYC bias. 24-hour transit is not a requirement for living car-free at all. And you can get around the cities you listed pretty easily without a car. A bicycle helps in any city. Chicago's transit is good enough to do without a bike, too. Either way, you're not going to be able to bring home large furniture or a cartload of stuff from Target any more easily in New York than in Boston or Chicago. So access to a car (in the form of a taxi, Uber/Lyft, or ZipCar) is useful no matter what. I've lived in cities that only have a skeletal light rail and bus service without a car, and was just fine. If you're willing to bicycle, most major US cities without severe winter weather are quite doable without a car. You'll find many, many people in the cities you listed living carless and doing quite fine. Boston and Chicago in particular are cities where having a car is considered more of a liability than an asset. I wonder if you've actually lived carless in a city other than NYC (college campuses don't count).

sid-kap2• 9 years ago

It's really hard to accommodate both in one place. Quality high-frequency, low-cost (to ticket-payers and taxpayers) transit requires a certain amount of density. Otherwise you won't have frequent bus service within walking distance of every residence. Also, the infrastructure that is necessary for low-density living—parking lots (especially setbacks), wide (6-lane) roads with high (40-45mph) speed limits and few crosswalks, long (1/2 mile) blocks, highways—hurts walkability. Part of this is subjective but still legitimate imo (pedestrians prefer businesses on the street with no setback), and part of this is objective (long blocks makes crossing hard, lots of parking means places become farther apart and therefore less amenable to walking).

I'm curious what you think about this as someone who presumably lives in South Bay. Do you consider South Bay a place where people can get around just walking and using transit? What changes do you think could be made there that increases support for walking/transit without impeding car travel or increasing density?

bcheung• 9 years ago

Not everyone wants that lifestyle.

Being a photographer and also someone who tends to do a lot of Maker and gardening projects I find SF near impossible to live for my lifestyle. It's really hard to load and unload photo gear when you have to make 4 trips to the truck that is a 5 minute walk away and go up 10 stories each time. Not to mention paying $40 for parking. I couldn't do what I do without a truck and SF is extremely unfriendly towards cars.

I do like being able to walk to lunch from an office though. When I was working in downtown Sunnyvale I found it really convenient. The parking back then was decent but now it is overcrowded and you're lucky if you can find a spot. You have to wait in long lines for lunch now too. It's gotten much worse IMO.

When I worked in Redwood City I tried to take Caltrain but it adds another 2 hours to your commute every day and the train schedules are extremely limited the further south you live. Ended up getting a motorcycle just for commuting.

kevinburke• 9 years ago

You don't have to be a bystander in this process... the incentives might be for cities to listen to their current homeowners and to add more parking and prefer office parks, but we can organize for change and more density.

Here are some steps you can take:

- The Brisbane City Council is deciding whether to build 4400 units of housing on 600 acres south of San Francisco, about the same number of units SF built in total last year. The Brisbane Planning Commission recommended building an office park instead. Contact them and ask them to build the housing version of the project.

- The Mountain View City Council is deciding whether to build 2000 units or 8000 units of housing next to Google. They are leaning toward the low end - 2000 units would be tough to support a grocery store or frequent transit. Contact them (or show up to their board meeting - tonight!) and ask them to build the high-housing version of the plan.

- The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering a plan to require 28% of all new developments to be below market rate. When you consider the unit costs to build in SF, that would make it _extremely_ difficult to justify new housing starts here. Please contact your Supervisor and ask them to oppose the Peskin/Kim Prop C plan.

- Call your CA State Assemblymember and ask them to oppose AB 915 (makes it harder to build affordable units)

- Call your CA State Assemblymember and ask them to support AB 71 (higher property taxes on second homes, money goes to affordable housing)

- Call your CA State Senator and ask them to support SB 167, which would put teeth in the state's Housing Accountability Act. (for more on this see carlaef.org)

- Call your CA State Senator and ask them to support SB 35 (would remove the ability of local government to block projects that meet certain criteria - near transit, have a high % of affordable units, use union construction labor)

- Email your VC's and C-level executives and tell them how hard it is to find housing in the area and how ridiculous the parking requirements are. Tell them about your awful commutes and the difficulty of finding good school districts for your kids. Ask them to get more involved politically in pro-housing causes. Ron Conway is a good example here.

NIMBY's are really well organized and things don't change unless we do something about them. All of these changes listed above will go a long way to support the development of housing in the Bay Area, which should help lower prices, and help keep families here and teachers in our neighborhoods. https://kev.inburke.com/kevin/sf-housing-politics/

Can the Bay Area Kick the Sprawl Habit?

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