Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#101

Post by _delirium » Sun, Apr 22, 2018, 11:56 PM UTC

closeparen wrote: post #89

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

Is Manhattan considered a mistake? I ask because, despite being one of the most desirable residences and tourist destinations in the world, everyone is deathly allergic to even the slightest hint that someone might want to replicate it elsewhere. Am I missing an unspoken “never again” moment? Is everyone who travels to New York doing it to revel in their hatred of the place? There’s not nearly enough Manhattan to mee…

I don't think NYC is seen as a bad model everywhere. There are plenty of medium-sized cities that are trying to conjure up a high-rise downtown with condo buildings and office towers through various kinds of development incentives. Some because they see that as key to attracting certain demographics and businesses, others because they feel it'll subjectively make them be perceived as a "real city". But in SF specifically, "Manhattanification" has been a kind of bogeyman for a while now.

My amateur hypothesis is that a certain portion of SF residents have a local self-identity in part defined by being not-LA and not-NYC. So a planning proposal can be attacked by claiming it would make SF either more like LA, or more like NYC.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#102

Post by justherefortart » Sun, Apr 22, 2018, 11:57 PM UTC

twblalock wrote: post #36

mysterypie wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You won't be compensated at the same rates that you would be in California, but the cost of living would make up for it. No, it generally doesn't. It depends on the specific numbers of course (how much of a salary cut, how much cheaper is the housing costs), but a lot of people make that blanket statement because of a mathematical fallacy: The fallacy is if I make half as much, but my expenses are half as much, the…

Plus, cost of living doesn't account for everything. Most consumer products, e.g. cars, computers, shoes, and clothing, cost about the same everywhere. Living in San Francisco with a higher salary and paying a high rent, your spending on such products will be a smaller percentage of your income than if you lived somewhere with cheaper housing and made less money.

Lmfao, nothing cost about the same living in San Francisco.

Not to mention taxes are significantly higher as you earn more (progressive) and there are tons of things that nickel and dime you every day.

For example, a bottle of 200 ibuprofen in SF runs about $12-14. I buy it for $3-4. It was so surprising I started filling a bag full of non perishable items every time I'd visit family in the midwest. You add this across hundreds of things you use and it adds up quickly.

And that's nothing compared to the rent.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#103

Post by rcpt » Sun, Apr 22, 2018, 11:59 PM UTC

ryanworl wrote: post #86

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

People who are worried about turning San Francisco into Manhattan also don't know what Manhattan is even like! The Upper West & Upper East Side as well as Harlem do not look anything like e.g. the Financial District. Even within Manhattan there is a huge variety of building heights. I used to live in Yorkville in a six story building in an area filled with other six story (and smaller) buildings. We had a nice park w…

John Jay park is so nice. I miss being able to take the kids there anytime of day and have tons of friends to play with. Here on the West Coast the playgrounds are all dry, hot, boring, and empty.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#104

Post by anabis » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:02 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #43

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

Tokyo is also not particularly congested.

Most people commute by train. We are improving, but the morning commute is something foreigners consider particularly wacky, and not something that they want to repeat everyday. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7kor5nHtZQ

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#105

Post by dmode » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:03 AM UTC

The fundamental problem with American cities is that Americans failed to recognize them the core engine of growth and prosperity as they are. Instead cities are viewed through a political lens. This NYC's problems are to be solved by the city/county and San Francisco's are to be solved by their local city/county politicians. The Federal government, which takes in 30% of income, chips in a very limited manner. Investing in cities such as these are often viewed as "helping a blue city" and this Fed infrastructure money is spent on building Army bases in rural areas that doesn't provide any return for that investment. Similarly many city dwellers do not recognize the economic importance of the city they live in and the role of the cities in driving growth, reducing poverty etc. Thus they hang on to things like "neighborhood character" and height limits to reduce growth. This is very different in many other countries, and especially Asian countries. There Central governments realize the value cities bring to the national economy and thus investments are prioritized. Look at China and how much investment the Chinese government puts in their big cities. Same with Japan, Korea, Taiwan, UAE, India etc. Indian government prioritized building expressway link between it's megacities. They also funded the Delhi Metro project.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#106

Post by nshelly » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:04 AM UTC

closeparen wrote: post #89

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

Is Manhattan considered a mistake? I ask because, despite being one of the most desirable residences and tourist destinations in the world, everyone is deathly allergic to even the slightest hint that someone might want to replicate it elsewhere. Am I missing an unspoken “never again” moment? Is everyone who travels to New York doing it to revel in their hatred of the place? There’s not nearly enough Manhattan to mee…

It's just that many of the stakeholders in these areas such as long-time property owners in the westside of San Francisco and residents with rent control fearing gentrification would not benefit directly from new development. Their incentives simply aren't aligned with younger generations who want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs. To break this quandary we simply to need intervention at the higher level. Congestion, long commutes and sprawl is hurting the U.S. (and Californian) economy so when change comes it will come at the higher level than the city.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#107

Post by closeparen » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:08 AM UTC

nshelly wrote: post #106

closeparen wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Manhattan considered a mistake? I ask because, despite being one of the most desirable residences and tourist destinations in the world, everyone is deathly allergic to even the slightest hint that someone might want to replicate it elsewhere. Am I missing an unspoken “never again” moment? Is everyone who travels to New York doing it to revel in their hatred of the place? There’s not nearly enough Manhattan to mee…

It's just that many of the stakeholders in these areas such as long-time property owners in the westside of San Francisco and residents with rent control fearing gentrification would not benefit directly from new development. Their incentives simply aren't aligned with younger generations who want to live and raise families in a city with reasonable housing costs. To break this quandary we simply to need intervention…

Oh sure, there are plenty of objections to the process of change. I'm more interested in why Manhattan is a boogeyman for the end result.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#108

Post by chrisdhoover » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:08 AM UTC

niftich wrote: post #46

The article's point is that the churn of spillover-boomtowns will continue: once the current crop of towns starts getting built out and accumulating problems like unaffordable housing, nightmarish traffic, lack of easy greenfield land to develop with cookie-cutter houses on tiny lots and giant office parks, the developers will find the next wave of towns to exploit, probably long before most of the human misery mater…

please shut yo mauff about Hickory. Us old folks need a place to go once we cash in on our SF flats and fully vest.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#109

Post by closeparen » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:11 AM UTC

bilbo0s wrote: post #60

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #31

I wonder if this trend will result in further stratification of American society. I mean, we've always had enclaves where rich people lived and poorer people lived, but they generally used to be at least nearby each other in large metros. Now, though, this city stratification feels like a multi-layer sieve. E.g. San Francisco is still a super-desirable city to live, if you can afford it, so the people who can't get p…

By the time the "GENT-rification" reaches Chattanooga and Pittsburgh though, it's become something more akin to "SQUIRE-ification". The people moving in are not nearly as wealthy, so people are not really being pushed out in the numbers that they are pushed out in places like Manhattan or San Fran. It's the difference between a few thousand hundred-thousandaires moving in, as opposed to a few thousand millionaires an…

>"The people moving in are not nearly as wealthy, so people are not really being pushed out in the numbers that they are pushed out in places like Manhattan or San Fran."

Backwards! Third-tier cities have contracted from their 20th-century peaks, so easily commutable lots and even homes are simply vacant. They're affordable to mere hundred-thousandaires because they're drowning in supply (though it might need some work). Displacement doesn't happen as much because abundance means you can get your own spot without taking someone else's.

The crappiest apartments in the San Francisco neighborhoods that time forgot are still insanely expensive next to national norms. No development is necessary for sufficiently high migration (against sufficiently low housing stock) to create a capacity crunch, and you're just as evicted when you're outbid by $500 vs. $5000.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#110

Post by _delirium » Mon, Apr 23, 2018, 12:13 AM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #79

WillPostForFood wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Housing isn’t twice as expensive in San Francisco, it is 10x. Median price per square foot is $129 in Boise, vs $1550 for Palo Alto, or $993 in SF, $1220 SOMA.

How about to rent? Still 10X? A lot more people are looking to rent than to buy (at least straight off anyway).

Looks like around 3-4x. RentCafe gives average SF prices of: studio $2.5k, 1bd $3.2k, 2bd $4.3k. Versus Boise: studio $0.7k, 1bd $0.9k, 2bd $1k.

https://www.rentcafe.com/average-rent-market-trends/us/ca/sa... https://www.rentcafe.com/average-rent-market-trends/us/id/ad...