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Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

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Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#81

Post by gozo »

sampo wrote: post #60
gozo wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think people are quite aware of that line of thinking. Most people who live in slightly unpopular areas live there because they couldn't afford other places and now when the area has become more desirable they fear being pushed out. This is an especially legitimate concern if you are renting, since building might very well rise demand more than it does supply.

So they live in an old, bad quality building in a relatively good location. And they oppose replacing the old bad buildings with modern, well build buildings, because then they could not afford them anymore?

It could be, but more commonly it's just a quiet area with fewer amenities for people with more money.

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#82

Post by moultano »

megablast wrote: post #77
ChuckMcM wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was coming to say the same thing. I think this is a good question to ask of the folks who object to building homes, "What if the people who lived in this town before you moved here had blocked the building of the home you are living in?" You wouldn't have had that wonderful experience you are trying to preserve because you would never have lived here." It is very sobering.

Ok, all good points. The other side is that they moved into a neighborhood that has a certain number of houses in it, and parks. And they of course want it the same as what they paid for.

I was born into a world with a certain number of people (4.5 billion) and now there are a whole lot more. (7 billion.) I didn't want any more people. Those people are violating my rights. /s

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#83

Post by simoncion »

refurb wrote: post #75
zyxley wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back. SF-style widepsread rent control seems like part of the problem to me, in the sense that it hides the true extent of market distortions from many people living in the area (especially the demographics most likely to vote), while incentivizing weird and unethical behavior to circumvent it by developers who could proba…

SF-style widepsread rent control seems like part of the problem to me You raise a good question. What would rent in SF look like without rent control? Thinking through the process, I imagine something like: 1. Rent for everyone would have gone up over time 2. Renters would have been slowly forced out as rent increases exceeded their incomes 3. However, it's likely that there would have been a lot more units opening u…

> I'm certainly not saying that a "no rent control" situation would be ideal, but I'm wondering if it's just made the rent situation in SF much worse than it would have been otherwise.

I feel that a good proxy for a world without rent stabilization is the condo market. Figure out how much the monthly payment for the low-end and the average condo is, and I suspect that that's where a city full of unstablized rental units would be.

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#84

Post by simoncion »

musesum wrote: post #67
simoncion wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...rent control seems like part of the problem to me, in the sense that it hides the true extent of market distortions from many people living in the area... musesum mentions: > Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back. Everyone I speak to in my building [0] is very aware of the current ludicrously high rents in the city and how it limits their ability to ke…

Wow, I didn't realize there was a 1979 cutoff. Glad to know there's a perk to this oven/icebox victorian.

> Wow, I didn't realize there was a 1979 cutoff.

Frankly, it seems that that most folks who speak in public forums (landlords and developers included) don't understand this. It drives me batshit. (No offence intended. :) )

> Glad to know there's a perk to this oven/icebox victorian.

From what I've seen and heard about those things, I bet it's just about the only perk, eh? :(

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#85

Post by simoncion »

fche wrote: post #17
musesum wrote: post #4

Here's Scott Wiener's post about meeting 2040 housing growth plans: https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/want-to-know-why-the-bay-ar... Looks like East bay is falling behind schedule. Here's housing prices since crash peek: http://west.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/hugolefebvre-ch... I live several doors down from the old KFC. I miss the old Sugoi Sushi that was there - but am fine with the new construction. Am lucky…

"Am lucky to have rent control." You are (party to) using the state to withhold justly earned economic value from your landlord.

> You are (party to) using the state to withhold justly earned economic value from your landlord.

And anyone who benefits from the zoning laws in their district benefits from influential parties using the power of the state to -in many cases- artificially restrict the supply of one type of building or another. [0] Frankly, we can play the "No, you're using the power of the state to..." game all night long. :/

> "justly earned economic value"

My previous landlords did nothing to improve the value of their property. Indeed, my most recent landlord not-infrequently neglects even the bare minimum legally required maintenance and upkeep. They earned nothing. Force of law created a situation where progressively increasing housing pressure inflated the "market value" of their "asset".

[0] Note: I am not railing against zoning laws in general. Segregating heavy industry from residential zones is an obvious good.

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#86

Post by simoncion »

epistasis wrote: post #55
spiralpolitik wrote: post #53

Good luck to her. Although unless you also fix the Bay Area transport infrastructure then building more housing in the suburbs isn't going to solve anything. BART is already at capacity, Buses are constrained by the lack of bus lanes on the major freeway interchanges leading to the bridges. Congestion inside the city is choking things. So yes we need more housing, but that is merely the first step.

I think that those that are proposing more development would heartily welcome simultaneously expanding the infrastructure. Those who oppose such infrastructure improvements typically oppose them because they want to stop growth entirely.

> I think that those that are proposing more development would heartily welcome simultaneously expanding the infrastructure.

Hear, hear!

I would heartily welcome infrastructure improvement programs that brought the state of the SFBA's public transit within shooting distance of the quality of public transit in and around NYC.

I would happily have my personal not-really-that-much-higher-than-Alabama tax burden increased to help pay for such a program.

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#87

Post by hugh4 »

bsder wrote: post #38
wahsd wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you don't see to realize is that what you describe will be only a momentary and fleeing improvement. The problem is the irrational and unnecessary concentration of opportunities in that area. So you build more buildings, create a housing glut even ... so now even more people move to the area because it's the only place where opportunities exist because it's where the wealthy sprinkle crumbs to their pest scurryi…

> The problem is the irrational and unnecessary concentration of opportunities in that area. The concentration is not irrational. That's the problem. The concentration is driven by the fact that you will , not might, get laid off at some point if your job is in the tech sector. So, what happens is that everybody thinks about where their next job is going to be while getting hired for their current job. If I somehow m…

Trouble is that San Francisco is a terrible place, geographically, for a large and ever-expanding industry. It's a tiny sliver of land on the end of a peninsula. There's only three roads out of town and no room to expand. Austin is much more suitable, it's surrounded by nothing on all sides.

Sooner or later the global hub of the computer industry has to shift away from San Francisco to somewhere there's actually some goddamn space. That time is now, as evidenced by the ridiculous prices, which are pushing people out. This is a good and natural stage of the process.

The only question is whether we destroy one of the few genuinely pleasant cities in North America trying to hold on for another decade.

Sigh. It seems that every time I say something counter-circlejerklical, I take a karma hit which prevents me from posting for hours. "You're submitting too fast. Please slow down."

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#88

Post by [deleted] »

jinushaun wrote: post #3

Love this quote: “Most people would be very uncomfortable tearing down 315 houses. But they don’t have a similar objection to never building them in the first place, even though I feel they’re morally equivalent. Those people show up anyway. They get born anyway. They get a job in the area anyway. What do they do? They live in an overcrowded situation, they pay too much rent, they have a commute that’s too long. Or m…

[deleted]

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#89

Post by mc32 »

myblake wrote: post #73
mc32 wrote: post #6

I hope she wins. I hope other people see her insight. I have not seen this kind of attitude against development in other countries. Sure, some speculators will make out on some locations near transit,and some will lose out a bit. Who cares, what we need are more units, in SF, down the Camino corridor from SF to san Jose. Build up, have BART go all the way down the el cam, and have local Surface-bahns. I'm tired of th…

I do too but I wonder if Lafeyette is as much to blame as say Mountain View. While they're almost certainly not building new housing as fast as the area population grows, it's not clear that they're building office space instead, whereas many of the communities in the South Bay are doing just that. Still, it sounds like this is meant to be a more general attempt at proving the concept.

If you ask me, I'd say the bay area needs a regional government, something not too dissimilar from NYC with a mayor and boropresidents of in this case, countyptesidents for each county.

What I mean is in a way it could be argued we need to annex counties or the cities and make them into more integrated governing bodies with improved policies and coordination to serve the needs of this region's population and economy.

It made sense to have separate towns and cities when the economy was less interconnected in the region, but now we need better regional planning for growth, housing, transit, economic development. I think it would be better served by a more regional government.

Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

#90

Post by [deleted] »

rodgerd wrote: post #76
mc32 wrote: post #6

I hope she wins. I hope other people see her insight. I have not seen this kind of attitude against development in other countries. Sure, some speculators will make out on some locations near transit,and some will lose out a bit. Who cares, what we need are more units, in SF, down the Camino corridor from SF to san Jose. Build up, have BART go all the way down the el cam, and have local Surface-bahns. I'm tired of th…

> From communist china to capitalist Korea, when housing is in short supply, buildings go up. That's great if it results in housing becoming more affordable. People are putting up housing to sell/rent at newer, higher prices. This achieves nothing for anyone except the person turning a profit.

[deleted]
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