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$1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

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Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#431

Post by greglindahl »

alexhutcheson wrote: post #406
greglindahl wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... and the area we're talking about is both building better transportation and agreed to prioritize building dense at train stations. It's certainly the case that more can be done for both of these.

Yes, 100% agreed. I'm just saying it's kind of pointless to invest a lot in more train systems without already having an agreement to densify those areas, because there just wouldn't be enough riders to justify frequent service at current levels of density.

Uh, ok. The Bay Area has an excessive number of riders on Caltrain already, without more building. We need the building for the planned upgrades.

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#433

Post by optimuspaul »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #388
dgzl wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a solution: have tech companies settle in other regions. I know the benefits for being in the bay are substantial, but this problem is entirely brought about by tech companies, not the resident. Employers need to setup shop in less populated places and grow there.

Jesus Christ, what is it with people acting like companies having lots of high-paying jobs is some kind of economic pox? Don't we want companies to be successful and pay their employees well? Why get in the way of that, instead of supporting that and helping as many people share in the success as possible?

wow, that is super uninformed and sad. The problem isn't high paying jobs, the problem is only a portion of the community has high paying jobs and the people that do critical jobs like cleaning and service jobs can't afford to live anywhere near where they are required. It's fantastic that people have high paying jobs. But if we are being honest those high paying jobs are only high paying when compared to jobs outside of the region. For example I live is a less saturated and less high paying market and make maybe 2/3 of what I'd make in the bay but I have twice the buying power. Concentrating all those jobs in such a small area is throwing money away.

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#434

Post by m463 »

ryanianian wrote: post #153
bcp2384 wrote: post #79

It's sad how many times I walk around in SF and see basically crumbling buildings or empty parking lots and wonder why new housing has not been built there yet? And more importantly who would actually oppose development on crumbling or wasted land?

It's pretty easy to understand locals' opposition. More people => more congestion. More housing supply => lower property values (at least at first). It doesn't matter if the housing is on what used to be a parking lot it's still more people and housing supply. (You can argue that NIMBYism is selfish and short-sighted but that doesn't mean it's irrational in the economist sense.)

Maybe someone could bore tunnels underground to alleviate traffic problems.

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#435

Post by bcheung »

caymanjim wrote: post #75

It's great that Google wants to increase housing, but is this really going to work? The housing shortage in the Bay Area is not a money problem. If it were possible to build 20,000 houses in the next 20 years, it would absolutely happen without Google's help. The problem with housing there has one simple cause: NIMBYism. SF doesn't want to allow taller buildings and denser housing complexes. It's vastly worse in the…

What about traffic? Adding this many new homes without an increase in transportation infrastructure is going to make things much worse for people already living in the bay area.

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#436

Post by slavapestov »

erik_seaberg wrote: post #249
hindsightbias wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did IBM, HP, DEC, Dell, etc build back in the day? For IBM, it was the boonies of Austin, SJ, Boulder, Rochester, Burlington, Poughkeepsie, Hursley, Toronto, Somers, White Plains... companies, services and people moved to them. Do FAANGs have no gravitas? They can’t do better? Yes, in 20 years, you end up with sprawl, but thats better than crashing someone elses hood and wanting it to morph into Manhattan.

There are people who spent their entire career at IBM. If you're willing and able to do that, it doesn't matter so much how many competing employers are nearby. But when today's tenures are under two years, you're going to need to land twenty jobs, not just one.

I can certainly understand spending less than two years at a job if things don't work out. But jumping from job to job with an average tenure of under two years? It's not really enough time to learn the technology and build relationships in the company. What the hell are these people actually doing?

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#437

Post by gruez »

aiisjustanif wrote: post #357
taurath wrote: post #254

As a thought experiment, lets say Google owns a significant percentage of the housing market in the areas they operate in. They thereby receive both rent from their own employees, and others in the area. Lets see how this gives them leverage: * Want to fully choke out competition on salaries, while leveraged against it by taking in the rent money those salaries provide for? * Why not invest in housing, when you're th…

Welcome to the less extreme version of Seoul.

Explain?

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#438

Post by danans »

CiPHPerCoder wrote: post #430
danans wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm arguing that "only $12,000" is dismissive of how impactful a difference that makes to the lives of people who don't live in a big city. But the $12k in question isn't a fungible $12k. It's specifically the difference in housing costs between urban and rural in the example given earlier. If the point is that many people in rural areas are economically struggling, then yes we agree, just as many poorer urban dwel…

I don't understand. Is your entire point in this discussion to somehow justify talking down to other people? > If the point is that many people in rural areas are economically struggling, then yes we agree, just as many poorer urban dwellers are (and to whom a random $12k received would also be hugely impactful), but that has nothing to do with example proposed. My point was that the OP's use of the phrase "only $12,…

> I don't understand. Is your entire point in this discussion to somehow justify talking down to other people? > My point was that the OP's use of the phrase "only $12,000" is offensive, classist language

OP wasn't talking down. They used "only" to compare the difference in housing cost to the much higher difference in wages between rural and urban areas, as in $12K housing cost increase $12K out of most people's pockets is a lot of money (including if it were out of mine), but the OP wasn't implying that it isn't.

They were making a simple observation that:

big city salary - big city housing costs > rural salary - rural housing costs

Looks like they even responded below stating precisely that.

There's real classism out there, often expressed across the rural/urban divide, but this isn't an example of it.

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#439

Post by slavapestov »

avocado4 wrote: post #338
thorwasdfasdf wrote: post #56

Bay area voters have made their intentions abundantly clear, in numerous elections and voting: they don't want growth. So much so, that local politicians even brag about how much housing developments they've stopped. Why fight such a huge uphill battle in trying to get housing in the Bay area? Wouldn't it be easier to start from a city or town outside of CA? or at least outside the bay area? Maybe somewhere in the mi…

The problem is the weather sucks everywhere else.

Bay area weather is not that great. The air quality suffers from smog or worse, forest fires (last year was quite bad). Infrequent rain means everything outside is covered in a thin layer of dust, and nothing grows except those silly geometrical 'xeriscaped' succulent gardens. For some people, low humidity is not great for their skin or hair. Longer term, increasing severity of drought will impact water supply (already PSA campaigns shame you for flushing the toilet), and ruin the surrounding natural environment.

Re: $1B for 20,000 Bay Area homes

#440

Post by abeppu »

derekdahmer wrote: post #429
abeppu wrote: post #309

They're pitching this as being a benevolent gesture, but (a) It sounds like they're just becoming a larger real-estate developer? They didn't say "we're donating all this land plus some capital to a housing non-profit"; they're going to receive revenue from their investments. Are we supposed to say thanks? (b) How does 20k units compare to their impact on Bay Area housing to date? This is not my area, and I'm not awa…

You have the right idea but the wrong enemy here. Local governments love adding corporations. They pay taxes while using few resources. So corporate campuses get approved super easily - sometimes even with tax breaks! New housing on the other hand is fought against tooth and nail because it brings new residents that require roads, services, and schools. Worse, if all the land has been used up, it requires larger buil…

That makes it sound like local governments should just fight harder against companies growing more?

At present, companies adopt strategies which require them to undergo rapid growth, including headcount, without planning for or making affordances for the other effects of bringing those people to the area.

Why is unreasonable to suggest that companies should be required to plan for and mitigate those effects at the outset, rather than one or two companies making feeble gestures several years later?

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