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California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

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Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#51

Post by unabridged »

dsr_ wrote: post #41
louithethrid wrote: post #25

Is there no way, to just take a normal residential building, tear everything down inside except for the exterior walls and fill it with japanese sleep coffins? Even if zoning laws would forbid this- life should find a way as they say.

Let's estimate it out. http://www.loopnet.com/california/san-francisco_apartment-bu... 2950 21st Street is 4900 square feet and costs $3M. Right now it's 4 x 1200 square foot apartments, which go for about $45/square foot. Yowzers, that's $4500/month. Let's say you take each of the two floors and remodel them: two full bathrooms designed for shared tenancy, each coffin takes up 8 feet by 5 feet by 4 feet and you stac…

I don't think fire safety is much of an issue anymore if you put in modern sprinkler systems.

Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#52

Post by marnett »

baron816 wrote: post #46

I recently moved out to Silicon Valley and it’s shocking to me how depressed the area looks. All the housing is cheap, ugly 70s/80s era architecture. Much of that is poorly maintained. Most retail storefronts are about the same. Add in all the poverty and homeless and I’m betting it would be impossible for any visitor to tell there was an economic boom unrivaled in all of civilization happening. Consider Venice in th…

Very well said. This city drains me of what little energy I have left.

Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#53

Post by wellboy »

LyalinDotCom wrote: post #49

This can't be the America we want for our children and fellow citizens, but until we can get normal people into elected office the tailspin of our country will continue. If you feel helpless about situations like this two pieces of advice of how YOU can help: 1) Get educated on your local politicians and newcomers during elections 2) Vote You'll make a huge difference.

This isn't Trumps fault, but money concentrating in the Valley.

Spinning things with little substance towards Trump is also harmful, it makes the conservatives less and less willing to listen to reason.

Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#55

Post by louithethrid »

dsr_ wrote: post #41
louithethrid wrote: post #25

Is there no way, to just take a normal residential building, tear everything down inside except for the exterior walls and fill it with japanese sleep coffins? Even if zoning laws would forbid this- life should find a way as they say.

Let's estimate it out. http://www.loopnet.com/california/san-francisco_apartment-bu... 2950 21st Street is 4900 square feet and costs $3M. Right now it's 4 x 1200 square foot apartments, which go for about $45/square foot. Yowzers, that's $4500/month. Let's say you take each of the two floors and remodel them: two full bathrooms designed for shared tenancy, each coffin takes up 8 feet by 5 feet by 4 feet and you stac…

If you design it in such a way, that people can evacuate similar to airplanes? Basically every floor becomes a slide to safety outside?

Also it doesent have to become slumy if its well organized. See the various capsule hotels in japan. If you up it to 300 $ you could have comon "living rooms".

More interesting is, how would hide this from the neighbours?

My suggestion: Have somebody drive a big truck into a garage regularly and basically be the shuttle service. Provide a set of two rooms near the front door - and a concierge actor using racism to provide a cover. Finally, a faked daily lightshow, behind the windows to provide the ilusion of ongoing normal life.

This stealth hotel really would be a "hacking" -challenge: Next problems would be water and sewer system.

Power supply and noiseless ventilation.

My suggestion- create many false positives, to desensitize residents eveywhere to loud air conditioning.

So for the hacked hostel to exist, one would need neighbours nearby who for money would allow a loudly humming installation (wifi-antenna) on there roof to exist.

Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#56

Post by mmmBacon »

LyalinDotCom wrote: post #49

This can't be the America we want for our children and fellow citizens, but until we can get normal people into elected office the tailspin of our country will continue. If you feel helpless about situations like this two pieces of advice of how YOU can help: 1) Get educated on your local politicians and newcomers during elections 2) Vote You'll make a huge difference.

I think that for things to truly change we need to do more than just vote. Most local elections in SV are a joke. We need some of the smart people that we all know to start running for public offices.

Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#57

Post by jakelarkin »

JustAnotherPat wrote: post #20

I've come to the sad realization that Holywood/Silicon Valley liberal ideology is a significant enabler of inequality and wealth stratification. They'd rather have people living out of cars and tents than being paid reasonable wages or having affordable housing. Can't wait until their latest amendment passes[0] in California. [0] https://ballotpedia.org/California_No_Taxes_After_Age_55_Ini...

starting to believe that homeless camps are our a logical outcome of the legal/governance system. If cities build housing for the homeless they become responsible (assume civil liability) for their health, well-being, property, safety and civil rights to a much greater degree. In addition to the actual service costs they have to deal with nitpicky lawsuits. Suddenly every 1000 homeless you house is 100m/year budget item. No voters/donors want the city budget slashed or to build a lot of poverty-level housing. So whats the rational thing for local politicians to do ... given nobody dies from exposure in California, easier and cheaper to let the homeless fester on some side streets or little-visited skid row neighborhoods, provide some token services without taking responsibility. sad truth.

Re: California's hidden homeless: workers living in cars due to property prices

#60

Post by nasredin »

tzahola wrote: post #31
JustAnotherPat wrote: post #20

I've come to the sad realization that Holywood/Silicon Valley liberal ideology is a significant enabler of inequality and wealth stratification. They'd rather have people living out of cars and tents than being paid reasonable wages or having affordable housing. Can't wait until their latest amendment passes[0] in California. [0] https://ballotpedia.org/California_No_Taxes_After_Age_55_Ini...

>No taxes above the age of 55. Lol, is this a joke?

It's in the gathering-signatures stage.

There's a quiet a lot of, ehm, "interesting" ballot initiatives here.

Legalized psilocybin anyone?

http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/ballot-measures/initiative-a...

As they saying goes, democracy is perfect but it has one fatal flaw... the people.

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