
Demolishing the California Dream: How SF Planned Its Own Housing Crisis - docker_up
https://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/demolishing-the-california-dream/
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toast0
I think the unfortunate thing is that by preventing almost all change for so
long, by the time change is going to happen, it no longer makes sense to try
to make a gradual change, you have to make a dramatic change.

In less tightly zoned areas, it's pretty common for single family homes to be
replaced with two or three story apartment buildings over time. But there's no
point in building a three story apartment building in SF, you need to build a
6-10 story building. A 6-10 story building is going to be out of character in
a neighborhood of small single family homes; but a smaller building wouldn't
necessarily be. In a block that had most of the single family homes replaced
with small apartment buildings, a 6-10 story building would probably be OK.

I don't know how to make fair rules that allow for that, though. Nobody can
build anything bigger, and everybody can build whatever they want are both
easy to apply in a fair manner, but lead to bad results. Maybe allowing to
build up to double the median size could work.

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tmh79
> But there's no point in building a three story apartment building in SF, you
> need to build a 6-10 story building

Strong disagree. I would love the city to be covered in 6 - 10 story
apartments at 10.0 FAR with no setbacks, but right now, SF bans apartment
construction in 70% of the city, which is largely SFHs currently. Transforming
this entire landmass from mostly SFHs to 3 floor 4 - 8 unit buildings would
have an enormous impact on the housing crises here.

Additionally, there is a deadzone in building construction between about 6
floors and 12 floors where the costs don't pencil out due to construction
costs (changing fromm wooden to steel framing, changes to HVAC, enhanced fire
safety requirements etc). The lowest cost buildings to build in cost/unit are
"missing middle" housing, of 3 - 6 storeys. Construction costs are ultra high
right now (900k+/unit), so building less expensive topoligies is a neccessary
part of lowering costs.

~~~
romed
"Four floors and corner stores" on every block of the Sunset would make a
significant dent in San Francisco's housing crisis.

~~~
pmiller2
You would also need to have better public transportation, so all those people
don’t have to drive to work. As it is, it can take an hour to get to work from
the Sunset to SOMA. And, if the commute is going to be that long anyway, why
not just live in the East Bay and pay less in rent?

~~~
deathanatos
Denser housing in areas such as SOMA — where you're close enough to bike or
walk to work if you work nearby — could actually _reduce_ the need for better
public transit, as more people now have the option to live closer to where
they work. Or at the very least, they wouldn't need to transit as far. You
bemoan an hour long commute, but thousands of people in the Bay Area whose
commute is far worse would welcome it.

And that's not to say that better public transit isn't something worth
striving towards; it should be done _together_ with housing. But currently,
the area's general attitude is to have neither.

~~~
pmiller2
Of course it would, but I’m responding to someone saying “build up the
Sunset,” and saying you also need to build up transit. Your criticism is not
relevant.

As far as an hour commute goes, if any part of SF could be made as affordable
as places like Concord and Vallejo, where those mega-commutes are originating,
then I’m sure people would flock to those areas. But I doubt it would be those
same people: it would be tech workers living in the East Bay who would want to
live in SF but don’t want roommates.

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jiveturkey
A lengthy but fantastic read. Apparently 1954 was the real turning point (a
series of minor ones earlier), and here we are 60+ years later.

Not an insightful, opinionated piece as might be implied by the title. It's a
well done historical piece with just enough analysis so as to provide some
color yet still appear unbiased.

Not sure if the problem is fixable at this point. It seemingly would require
more political will than is available. Too many vested parties.

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gnu8
The article mentions the now unenforceable racially restrictive home deeds and
I am curious to know, does anyone who has bought a house in SF recently have a
document with such a clause? It would be interesting to see how such an
anachronism survives today.

~~~
TomVDB
I'm pretty sure that my current house, built in the sixties, in the South Bay
has a covenant that has all kinds of restrictions, including one on race. (It
might have been a covenant on a different house that we bid on, but got
rejected.)

It definitely also has a restriction where we are prohibited from replacing
our current house with a new one that has a value of less than $10k. :-)

I was told that removing these kind of restrictions from the covenant is a
pretty heavy procedure so nobody goes through the trouble of doing so.

~~~
lostapathy
Modifying covenants is really hard - but with good reason. You don't want a
heavy-handed HOA to drastically change the rules after you're heavily invested
in a property.

Historically, some states have passed laws that allow racial restrictions to
be amended out without the usual process, and without the usual filing fees,
but even then nobody wants to take on the work (or their own legal fees).

~~~
village-idiot
Looking in as a renter, HOAs just look like a giant pile of petty corruptions
and abuses. I’m amazed anyone puts up with them.

~~~
lostapathy
They often turn into that. Unfortunately, in many ares you don't have a lot of
choice - nearly all new housing is in an HOA, most established "good
neighborhoods" are in an HOA, and not enough housing turns over in non-HOA,
non-crappy neighborhoods.

I became president of ours on a promise to reduce dues and shrink the scope of
the HOA as much as possible. It's a giant PITA, but less so than if the crazy,
bored and power-hungry types took it over. We remind people with truly out of
control maintenance issues to clean it up, and will only get more aggressive
on super egregious things. As it should be.

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40acres
If you look deep enough into the history of any modestly large Amercian city
(pop. 250,000 +) and it's surrounding suburbs, you will see a metro area that
was and still is being shaped by race.

It's not a surprise that SF's first zoning law was a veiled attempt at curbing
Chinese immigrants, it's not a surprise that when the highways were built in
Portland, OR the mostly black neighborhoods in NE Portland were razed to make
room for cars.

Here is a quote from a recent Cupertino City Council meeting where new
apartments, with a % allocated to affordable house, were up for discussion:

“The idea of Cupertino is to have people living here that are educated with
degrees. Bringing this in would bring a lot of probably lower income people,
and that would definitely bring down our median average household income.”

American urban policy is filled with slight of hand comments and maneuvers
just like this.

A poster has been down-voted to oblivion for pointing out the hypocrisy that
the bluest states have the most un-affordable housing, but I do think there is
a thread here which highlights the hypocrisy of those who virtue signal for
equality but advocate for policies that secure their wealth and make it almost
impossible for lower income folks to survive.

~~~
jiveturkey
> “The idea of Cupertino is to have people living here that are educated with
> degrees. Bringing this in would bring a lot of probably lower income people,
> and that would definitely bring down our median average household income.”

Doesn't seem covertly racist to me, but maybe I choose not to see it. It's bad
enough on its face so no need to add racism really.

A: they don't like poor people

B: they don't want poor people living near them

C: they want to prop up home values and this would limit that

D: they feel comfortable speaking for cupertino as a whole, so probably a long
time resident.

Cupertino is overwhelmingly asian, 63% vs 32% in the county. Cupertino is a
very wealthy town (rank 11th nationally in its size range). I think it's
completely understandable, without introducing race, that anyone in a wealthy
town doesn't want poor people bringing down the neighborhood. (Not saying it
is or isn't correct or moral.)

Also just want to point out that Cupertino is not urban.

~~~
bigdubs
The dirty secret is that socioeconomic status and race are very related.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Related but not very. There are plenty of poor white people in the USA,
trailer park trash and red neck being the slurs often used.

And outside of the US, it can be totally separated. In China, for example,
many of the poor people are ethnic han.

~~~
ProfessorLayton
Related, and _very_ much so.

The biggest indicator of future socioeconomic status is educational
attainment. The biggest indicator of educational attainment is wealth.

> Where does the biggest source of material wealth typically come from?
> Housing!

> Was housing policy racist? Very explicitly so, even in the progressive Bay
> Area. See: redlining.

> Are some of the policies that stemmed from racism still on the books in
> major metropolitan areas? Yes! Many of these exact policies are what's
> keeping from more housing from being built _right now_!

What policies, you ask? Here's a few.

\- Excessively large minimum lot sizes

\- High setback requirements

\- Very low height limits

\- Very high car parking requirements

While many of these requirements sound reasonable on their face, they were in
fact implemented to keep out PoC [1]. Now they're used by people on the top of
the socioeconomic pyramid to keep those on the bottom out.

[1] Further reading: The Color of Law by Richard Rothstein

~~~
briandear
How does lot size affect people of color?

~~~
ProfessorLayton
Collectively all these ordinances increased housing prices by limiting
density. It meant that PoC couldn't pool their resources and build more on a
lot, or just buy a smaller home on a small lot in the first place. Combined
with the fact that PoC couldn't get loans approved due to redlining, it was
_very_ effective.

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Animats
Remember how SF emptied out after the last dot-com crash? That may happen
again. Real estate investors I know in SF say things have peaked. Outside the
Bay Area and some coastal areas near LA, California's population is not
increasing much.

~~~
cft
My 85,000 sq ft class C office building in SF peaked to 7 series A startups in
2014. Now it's down to one.

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quantgenius
We are 10 years into an expanding economy into one of the longest expansions
ever. Interest rates are near all time lows and despite this the US it’s
starting to spend more on interest than the military. Commercial real estate
loans amortize over 30 years but need to be refinanced every 5-10 years so if
rates go up.... Is it a good idea for SF to accommodate the tech bubble? There
have been other tech bubbles and many country level and regional single
industry bubbles in the past. Why is this bubble different? Not changing
zoning and reducing the risk of SF turning into a sea of unfinished projects
seems like the rational thing to do.

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bfrog
Wouldn't larger buildings cost inordinate amount to build in SF to deal with
inevitable quakes and fires?

~~~
Atheros
No. Developers want to build the buildings and can do so safely.

~~~
bfrog
But at what price per unit?

