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Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

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Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#3

"Anti-everything activist writer in opposition to everything shocker"

The busses make San Francisco into Silicon Valley's bedroom community. So what? Is it too good for that? This article is arrogant SF-resident bull.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#4
I feel like, as far as this topic goes, everything that needs to be said has already been said. There's been a lot of talk about "class warfare" in San Francisco, and nothing new has developed. Until then, we're stuck with speculation from a handful of writers that (in my opinion) are dredging up news where none exists.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#5

I feel like, as far as this topic goes, everything that needs to be said has already been said. There's been a lot of talk about "class warfare" in San Francisco, and nothing new has developed. Until then, we're stuck with speculation from a handful of writers that (in my opinion) are dredging up news where none exists.

That, and the term 'Techno Riche' is hipster jerkfood and needs to die today.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#6
The people that gentrified the neighborhood 20 years ago, are upset that younger, richer people are moving in on their territory.

The NIMBYs are responsible for the complete lack of new market housing in SF, and have hilariously priced themselves out of the market.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#7
> Caltrain does run down there. We could have beefed up that system and had a tremendously efficient train system, with trains leaving every 15 minutes or so for the peninsula

The problem is that Caltrain (and BART outside SF proper) has its stations along the periphery instead of the heart of town. You can't jump on Caltrain in the Mission or Noe Valley or even Market St, and on the southern end, it's not going to drop you off anywhere near anything.

This is because California, and the Bay Area in particular, follows a policy of "The needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many", and when previous generations were deciding where to put stations, they didn't use eminent domain like most municipalities would; instead, they built them either in the few parcels of vacant land off on the periphery, or along the freeway land they already owned, which is perhaps the most pedestrian-hostile arrangement possible.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#8
In nature, when a single-celled organism grows large, it divides. Silicon Valley--or more accurately the tech companies located there--needs to diversify geographically. It has gone beyond a critical mass and is starting to hurt itself and the surrounding communities from the excess.

The problem is that there are few other nucleation sites that a viable tech community can condense around. The major tech employers are not spreading out to lower their impact. There's no reason why 2000 employees all need to be on the same campus. There is no way in Hades you are cross-pollinating your divisions to that extent.

Spread out and invest in connectivity technologies that make talking across the continent as easy as over a cubicle wall.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#9
"I met a guy who lives at 24th and Valencia [Street]. He says the Wi-Fi signal on the buses is so powerful that when the Google bus pulls up in front of his house, it uses all the broadband and his Wi-Fi signal crashes."

That's not really how WiFi works. Chances are his router is on the same frequency as the buses and he can fix this by changing to a different frequency. Even more likely (since one SSID shouldn't make too much of a difference) is that his WiFi router crashes at random and there's some amount of false causation there.

I know this isn't the beef of the article, but this sort of magical thinking that insists on forcing every little thing into a framework of a class war between the upper middle class and the lower/lower middle class is.

Re: Are The Techno Riche Really Ruining San Francisco? Yes, Says Rebecca Solnit

#10
post #7

> Caltrain does run down there. We could have beefed up that system and had a tremendously efficient train system, with trains leaving every 15 minutes or so for the peninsula The problem is that Caltrain (and BART outside SF proper) has its stations along the periphery instead of the heart of town. You can't jump on Caltrain in the Mission or Noe Valley or even Market St, and on the southern end, it's not going to d…

Outside of SF proper, Oakland, Berkeley and at least a few other stations...
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