Just too many burnt out brainless hippies/commies in California.
Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
121–130 of 141 posts
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#122On "why can't those people move to___?" https://medium.com/b-copy-com-longform-content/why-can-t-tho...
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sorry, that's nonsense. The problem not only in the bay area is the irrational and unnecessary concentration of people. It is quite unsettling to me that just because some people don't like what you do on or with your private property that you feel entitled to impose yourself and your will upon them. It's really a kind of liberal tyranny that is not only sweeping this country but it seems at least the western world.…
The downvotes here are really inappropriate. I disagree with most of this comment, but it's well up to the standards of political discourse on HN.
"It's really a kind of liberal tyranny that is not only sweeping this country but it seems at least the western world. It strikes me as a kind of lower class hacking order / squabbling and anger"
Yeah..No. It's just rantings of someone steeped deeply in one extreme of a the political spectrum.
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Wow, I didn't realize there was a 1979 cutoff. Frankly, it seems that that most folks who speak in public forums (landlords and developers included) don't understand this. It drives me batshit . (No offence intended. :) ) > Glad to know there's a perk to this oven/icebox victorian. From what I've seen and heard about those things, I bet it's just about the only perk, eh? :(
Other perks include plunger-assisted-plumbing and laser-guided-kitties.
One of those two perks sounds immensely adorable! =)
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The problem is the irrational and unnecessary concentration of opportunities in that area. The concentration is not irrational. That's the problem. The concentration is driven by the fact that you will , not might, get laid off at some point if your job is in the tech sector. So, what happens is that everybody thinks about where their next job is going to be while getting hired for their current job. If I somehow m…
Trouble is that San Francisco is a terrible place, geographically, for a large and ever-expanding industry. It's a tiny sliver of land on the end of a peninsula. There's only three roads out of town and no room to expand. Austin is much more suitable, it's surrounded by nothing on all sides. Sooner or later the global hub of the computer industry has to shift away from San Francisco to somewhere there's actually some…
> Sooner or later the global hub of the computer industry has to shift away from San Francisco to somewhere there's actually some goddamn space. That time is now, as evidenced by the ridiculous prices, which are pushing people out. This is a good and natural stage of the process.
They've tried. Several times. It never works. As soon as the economy donwnturns, all the non-SV sites get shuttered. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. And now, people have been through enough iterations to know that non-SV satellite sites are full of crap.
The consolidation in the semiconductor industry isn't helping, either.
However, the solution is rather simple: sustained Series A investment in an area. This is the key point that drives Silicon Valley--as bad as the Series A situation is in the Valley, it's orders of magnitude better than anywhere else. So, if you funded 50 Series A's each year at about $5 million each, you wind up with about 5,000 employees and 500 companies for about $2.5 billion invested over 10 years.
Given the lack of Series A in the valley right now, THAT would create a new Silicon Valley.
Of course, at that point, the VC's in Silicon Valley would finally get off their asses and start funding Series A's, so now you are competing with them as they attempt to short circuit your ability to get another Silicon Valley off the ground.
So, is someone going to cough up a check for $2.5 billion to be contrary and make the next Silicon Valley? Or, instead, are they just going to go join the rest in the valley?
I know what I would do if I had that kind of money.
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're missing the point. If you "found another house", you would displace someone else. Restricting housing below demand is playing musical chairs with homes.
Why is musical chairs with a finite resource a problem? We do this with most finite things right, oil, gas, water, food, etc? The supply is usually slightly less than needed, pegging prices such that it's available (not free) at a profitable rate. The problem here seems like people feel entitled toward something they cannot afford and will sue in light of their inability to pay.
What if the people who currently have food were able to get together and decide no one was allowed to grow any more food. They would also declare grocery stores would not be allowed to restock, then put in a zoning ordinance saying new grocery stores could only sell 1/10 the amount of food that existing grocery stores sell.
That is what is happening with housing. Land might be finite, but housing stock is nowhere near its limits. Developers are more than willing to spend money to build more. It is not being built due to the opposition of those who already have a place to live.
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#127Is she suggesting that land be taken through eminent domain? Or is she merely suggesting that developers who own land should be allowed to build on it? Their DSP proposal is so clouded by the political language that it is difficult to determine their true intentions. Also, I'm quite troubled by their suggestion that tearing down homes is morally equivalent to not building them in the first place. Tearing down homes i…
> Tearing down homes immediately destroys value
Decreasing the zoning on land so less housing can be built immediately destroys value. That land can now house 10% of the people it previously was able to house.
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
And you're going to pay for it? Because there's a big difference in simply not having a latte, and having paid for one only to have to knocked all over your shirt...
This is exactly what the speaker seems to be missing. Building homes required significant money in the first place; there's no such thing as a free house. My point is that if Person A purchases something, and then Person B says that having that thing taken is equivalent to not having it in the first place, then Person B is ignoring the cost that Person A had to incur in the first place.
> This is exactly what the speaker seems to be missing. Building homes required significant money in the first place; there's no such thing as a free house.
You do realize the speaker is advocating for developers, who have the money (typically through financing, which is fairly straightforward to get if you are a competent developer), to be allowed to build the projects they propose. Not for housing to magically appear out of the ether.
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#129As a former resident of Lafayette, I'm glad that someone is taking action against the NIMBYs but BARF is out of line here. The picture BARF paints of what happened is not entirely accurate. The city did not deny the developer from developing the land. After years of public planning meetings the owner of the land decided to work with the city after overwhelming public opposition against the development.
The argument is that the city "approved the project conditional on lower density." Which is in violation of the HAA. Here's more info about it: http://www.trauss.com/HAA_Lafayette.pdf pg 6 is where the Lafayette thing starts.
What do you think would have happened if instead of relenting, the developer had gone forward with the 315 unit version? Do you think it would have been approved?
Re: Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is musical chairs with a finite resource a problem? We do this with most finite things right, oil, gas, water, food, etc? The supply is usually slightly less than needed, pegging prices such that it's available (not free) at a profitable rate. The problem here seems like people feel entitled toward something they cannot afford and will sue in light of their inability to pay.
You're talking like this is a free-market situation. It's not, because supply is being artificially constrained below what the market could naturally and profitably support, by overregulation of new construction. We don't take too kindly to all of the holders of oil, gas, water, or food conspiring to restrict its availability to drive prices up either.
Yes we don't take kindly but said resources are almost entirely subject to conspiracy in one way or another either to suppress or inflate rates. Living space is like any other resource, scarce but sometimes alternatives exist, ie. move to a different location for better access to resources on more favorable terms.