I know we'd all love to fix the bay area housing problem here. The most obvious answer is to increase the supply. But, fixing the zoning laws and allowing developers to build isn't the only thing that's standing in the way. The problems are too numerous to fix: NIMBYs sueing developers, CEQA, Proposition 13, AND don't forget about the underlying labor cost (all our middle class people's aren't going to come back, aft…
High-rise construction is expensive, but high-rises aren't necessary for density. Wood-built low- and mid-rise is far more cost efficient, especially when you don't require 1-2 parking spaces per unit. The reason why we get too many high-rises and too few low-rises is because of regulatory burden. In particular, the long, drawn-out, and capricious manner in which the laws are administered and challenged. In that kind…
And also tends to be drastically worse build quality and sound isolation. Given a mid-rise or a high-rise built in the same year, you definitely want to live in the high-rise, all else being equal.
Higher quality multi-family buildings that middle-class people could see themselves living in would go a long way towards changing public opinion. Unfortunately, our multifamily housing stock is bifurcated between shoddily built crap for the poor, and ultra-luxury high-rises for oligarchical investors. If people don't want to live in a building themselves, it's harder to accept its externalities for the benefit of others. Most people do live in apartments as students and young adults, and they'd never go back.