Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan • Hacker News Board

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#141

Post by blaisio » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:38 PM UTC

This is not a story of NIMBYs, this is a story of how LA can't make decisions for the greater good because anything that affects a useful part of the metro area requires independent agreement from multiple cities with very different demographics. A lot of people don't realize that, unlike NYC, LA isn't one city - it's a bunch of cities clustered together. Right now, there's no good way to force all the communities to agree on something.

Some communities might have a NIMBY attitude, but just saying that this is California NIMBYism is oversimplifying.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#142

Post by xkjkls » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:42 PM UTC

jimmy1 wrote: post #65

jseliger wrote: post #5

My dad used to work in local government and likes to call the automatic opposition, "People united against anything." Today we call them NIMBYs. California has empowered them in peculiar and powerful ways, as anyone, anywhere, can challenge any project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which actually supersedes the national version (NEQA).

Call me crazy, but as an outsider looking in with attachment to California (many friends moved from there, brother's wife from there, I visit often), isn't part of their empowerment of NIMBY's out of fear that if they don't empower them they will straight up leave? Owning a home in California close to any of the economic centers sounds like one of the hardest endeavors one could embark upon, I imagine if you don't gi…

I'd say California home prices are because they haven't built enough, and that people really love living in California.

California is a really nice place to live; great weather, great coast lines, great food, great people, etc. Most people don't live there on accident.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#143

Post by vibrato » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:42 PM UTC

jimmy1 wrote: post #139

mikeash wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prices can't exist without people willing to pay them. It doesn't matter how high your taxes, fees, and labor costs are, if people aren't willing to pay, prices don't stay high. Another way of interpreting "The median home price is California is $379,000" is "people are willing to pay, on average, $379,000 for a home in California." The home prices are the data to support my hypothesis. If there wasn't demand for hou…

> The home prices are the data to support my hypothesis. If there wasn't demand for houses then prices would fall. Demand for houses means people want to move there. If there were a net migration out of the state, prices would be dropping. This is true in general, but it isn't as immediate as you are making it out to be and doesn't give you any insight into how long it takes for the price to correct itself. The migra…

We have a disbeliever in the efficient market hypothesis! I generally am in the same boat but have yet to turn this into significant profit.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#144

Post by zjaffee » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:43 PM UTC

blaisio wrote: post #141

This is not a story of NIMBYs, this is a story of how LA can't make decisions for the greater good because anything that affects a useful part of the metro area requires independent agreement from multiple cities with very different demographics. A lot of people don't realize that, unlike NYC, LA isn't one city - it's a bunch of cities clustered together. Right now, there's no good way to force all the communities to…

Except for the fact that this tunnel was trying to get developed in a way that first off, violated California Environmental laws, something that the government owned and built metro would have to spend millions of dollars and several years on in order to complete, and second, it would've increased the complexity of building an already budgeted heavy rail line under that part of the city.

LA is very capable at making decision that work for the greater good as the county has a sizable amount of power around taxation, and manages the regions transit authority. The parts of the region most notable for NIMBYism are largely only effective at delaying action rather than completely blocking it unlike in the bay area which has multiple counties to deal with.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#145

Post by xkjkls » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:44 PM UTC

drb91 wrote: post #135

jseliger wrote: post #5

My dad used to work in local government and likes to call the automatic opposition, "People united against anything." Today we call them NIMBYs. California has empowered them in peculiar and powerful ways, as anyone, anywhere, can challenge any project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which actually supersedes the national version (NEQA).

I associate NIMBYs with going against things that improve a neighborhood. I don’t think that includes all types of resistance.

The problem is NIMBYs think that no things improve the neighborhood. Everyone would say they are for things that improve the neighborhood, but some are reflexively anti-change.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#146

Post by xkjkls » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:44 PM UTC

sjg007 wrote: post #107

jseliger wrote: post #5

My dad used to work in local government and likes to call the automatic opposition, "People united against anything." Today we call them NIMBYs. California has empowered them in peculiar and powerful ways, as anyone, anywhere, can challenge any project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which actually supersedes the national version (NEQA).

Eventually Elon will give up and take a helicopter to work.

He already takes a Gulfstream

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#147

Post by zjaffee » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:45 PM UTC

jerf wrote: post #19

It seems sort of shortsighted to block a tunneling company on environmental grounds. In the long term, cheap tunneling would be fantastic for the environment. Most of what we consider the biosphere is on the surface, and to the extent that there's life in the tunneled area, by volume tunneling isn't going to be significant for a long time. (Volume is much larger than surface; in general, areal intuition fails miserab…

They didn't block it on any known Environmental grounds, CEQA exists to insure major infrastructure projects evaluate many options and attempt to find the most environmentally friendly option. In this particular case, it was almost certainly not building a low capacity tunnel for small vehicles and cars, but to build the already planned metro rail line without having to add engineering complexity to maneuver around a privately owned and built tunnel.

I'd also add that the use of concrete in tunneling does have a large environmental impact as well (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_concre...), so cheap tunneling wouldn't necessarily improve the environment in any clear way. The best solution for the environment will always be electric powered rail lines that are at grade, although that would be a poor choice from a transportation planning stand point.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#148

Post by njarboe » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:48 PM UTC

anonymou2 wrote: post #92

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>or just allow more people to travel. Which is an increase in quality of life for those who would have otherwise forgone those trips. Either way it's a win. Whether it's a big enough win to be worth the cost is a perpetual debate with projects like this.

An increase in quality of life? Really? Who is to tell? Maybe those people would have done something more fulfilling instead of whatever they did as the porpose of those trips.

"Who is to tell?"

Generally the person themselves should be the one to tell. Other systems have not worked out so well.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#149

Post by eduah » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:50 PM UTC

carlivar wrote: post #113

choxi wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's building us an express loop in Chicago: https://www.boringcompany.com/chicago/ They're even paying for the whole thing, I think most residents here are excited about it.

Musk says a lot of things. He is really amazing at getting press attention for himself. Ask Buffalo how Musk promises regarding the solar roof factory have gone so far...

Ahead of the job numbers he promised https://www.wgrz.com/mobile/article/news/tesla-shares-new-jo... . I will say that project is going very well.

Re: Boring Co. Drops LA Westside Tunnel Plan

#150

Post by zjaffee » Wed, Nov 28, 2018, 5:51 PM UTC

nimbius wrote: post #53

For those not familiar with LA's private property rights, they are some of the strictest in the nation. The 710 freeway, originally designed and intended to go all the way from long beach to pasadena, has successfully been litigated for fifty years to prevent it from ever doing so. heavy truck traffic has to exit to surface streets to continue to the city or route around it using the 101. trucks are prohibited on the…

Why are you saying this like it's a bad thing? Transportation development has time over time been proven to work best when decisions are made by consensus rather than by letting central authorities and monied interests do whatever they think is right.

Had this never happened, LA would have far worse pollution problems than it does today, and NYC would be completely overrun with highways.