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Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

darrellowens.substack.com

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Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#441

Post by terr-dav »

nostromo123 wrote: post #394
xwdv wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good. Fuck your neighbors. The region is long overdue for more housing to fix the ridiculous situation that has formed down there. Hopefully the region will become more affordable as new housing floods the area and brings down prices and makes things generally more affordable.

Yeah, f*k other people, let's cram as many souls as we can in affordable dystopian high rises... that's the spirit!

Souls? you mean other people? Or, f- them in favor of the existing residents...

And 'affordable dystopian' housing? Only 20% of the units are required to be affordable. Who knows what private developers will come up with to maximize their profits. So, dystopian? Probably. Affordable? Just a little.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#442

Post by fnordpiglet »

outworlder wrote: post #382
fnordpiglet wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Truth is people want to live in a community of the character they choose when they moved into that community. The high density housing community seems to think everyone just needs an efficiency unit in a Soviet style housing block and anyone else is an entitled NIMBY. What the person said was developers don’t care about the community they’re building into. Loosening of community rules means they can move in start bui…

> Truth is people want to live in a community of the character they choose when they moved into that community. They are not _entitled_ to forever freeze a city just because they live there. I bet they would not like their town if it still looked the same as it was in 1890.

They aren’t, but they’re entitled to advocate for it without derision. My point is the NIMBY crowd have their point, and it’s unreasonable and unfair to assume they’re entitled asshats that hate poor people. Solutions where they exist will lie in the middle, otherwise in a democracy we have ways of resolving these things.

However it really should be a city level decision - the whole point of having lots of cities is they can vary in their character and quality. Moving these decisions to a state level doesn’t allow for the advocacy of a neighborhood to matter as much. That’s not good.

The world shouldn’t revolve around some NIMBY, but a community of NIMBYs should be respected for their desires as the community. Ceding community control to the government and developers isn’t the right way to go.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#443

Post by mistrial9 »

pj_mukh wrote: post #381
gumby wrote: post #107

This is a great article about great news (except for the first sentence calling it "A little known law" -- it's been quite contentious). Palo Alto has fought these rules and I'm glad they will be enforced. When I first moved to Palo Alto in the early 80s it had a very progressive climate: a couple of SRO buildings, lower average income than some of the neighboring towns, a lot of social support programs, and decidedl…

Santa Monica building 4000 homes seems like such a dream. However, I wonder how many of these will get CEQA blocked [1] :( [1]: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/03/signature-...

but just two comments above, there is a no-zoning State person decrying rampant destruction of pristine areas.. so CEQA serves that purpose..

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#444

Post by eddsh1994 »

raldi wrote: post #327
gumby wrote: post #107

This is a great article about great news (except for the first sentence calling it "A little known law" -- it's been quite contentious). Palo Alto has fought these rules and I'm glad they will be enforced. When I first moved to Palo Alto in the early 80s it had a very progressive climate: a couple of SRO buildings, lower average income than some of the neighboring towns, a lot of social support programs, and decidedl…

If you were to stop 100 people on the street and ask if they'd heard of the law, how many do you think it would be?

I hear it brought up by someone almost every time I go to a bar in Palo Alto/Mountain View.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#445

Post by strawhatguy »

cal5k wrote: post #433
LynxInLA wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert, but I lean towards relaxing zoning laws but not getting rid of them completely. Look to Houston to see what happens when there are no zoning laws at all.

Median sale price in Houston is currently $310,500, vs $441,250 in Sacramento, $917,500 in LA and $1.3MM in SF. Aesthetic judgments aside, seems like a winning strategy for housing affordability?

Yes, zoning is a terrible idea, a way to insert politics literally in our homes, or at least the land the home sits on.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#446

Post by NovemberWhiskey »

sgt wrote: post #414

"San Francisco’s Sunset District will be upzoned for new, high density housing to help add 80,000 new homes via the housing element approved by SF city gov’t and the state." I don't understand that statement along with the photo. That is a high density neighborhood. The houses are very close to each other, many are double story, and I don't see many green areas in between. Did I miss something?

If you think two-story houses are high-density, You Too Might Be Part of The Problem™.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#447

Post by hibikir »

softsound wrote: post #364

Looking at other countries like Japan with like barely any zoning laws, this looks great, I hope it leads to more mixed cities again and more walkable/liveable areas like before WW2. It is funny that America land of the free had so many restrictions, building up hundreds of zoning laws across the country did a lot of bad and led to a lot of urban sprawl leading to very poor cities and towns that literally cannot pay…

This has little to do with the existence of zoning laws themselves, but the specific zones that they define. Japan has zones, so does Spain. But there's just nothing anywhere near as Restrictive as most US cities' R1 zone. Many places have R2s and R3s that are still more restrictive than the least dense thing than a Spanish city has.

Remove zones alone, and HOAs will get areas into legally binding covenants that are also just as tough as their current zoning regulation.

To solve the US density issue, localities have to be severely restricted in what they can block, but we also have to look at the bigger picture: What is making people want to restrict their neighborhood to extremely low density suburbs? The answers are very uncomfortable.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#448

Post by jimnotgym »

> The “builder’s remedy” is a very old law from the 1990s

I know the old jokes of 'in the UK 100 miles is a long way, in the states 100 years is a long time' et al.... but this is stretching even that understanding of 'very old'. It goes on to mention laws of the 1970's, I guess that is time immemorial. 'Before the war' said a commentator, what is that, Classical Civilisation?

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#449

Post by CydeWeys »

nostromo123 wrote: post #394
xwdv wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good. Fuck your neighbors. The region is long overdue for more housing to fix the ridiculous situation that has formed down there. Hopefully the region will become more affordable as new housing floods the area and brings down prices and makes things generally more affordable.

Yeah, f*k other people, let's cram as many souls as we can in affordable dystopian high rises... that's the spirit!

I live in a high rise and it's quite nice compared to a lot of the available alternatives at the same price. And the one I live in was built 7 decades ago, so imagine how nice a new one would be!

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#450

Post by closeparen »

foobarian wrote: post #406
ketzo wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you should be blindly downvoted for this -- I think it is a totally valid question, and one that the YIMBY movement needs to find a way to answer consistently. Personally, I would say that lots of low-density communities do remain low-density. And generally, that's because people don't want to move to them. But if you're a small town in Northern California, one of the most desirable places in the world,…

It seems pretty clear cut given the focus on property rights in the States that whoever got there first does get to call the shots. There are maybe some overrides like eminent domain but it seems the only non-coercive way to change this is to get your own land and make your own rules (e.g. HOAs, incorporate towns with better rules, etc). Besides, who's to say that these desirable places are not desirable because they…

Property rights absolutism would mean landowners can build what they want. Zoning has already moved the question of allowed building types into the realm of public policy; now we’re talking about what the policy should be.
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