
More housing near the Expo Line and other California transit stations - blondie9x
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-housing-transit-bill-20180104-story.html
======
rndmize
It feels like every time I hear something about Wiener, he's doing stuff that
needs to get done. I'm tempted to send him some money even though I'm not in
his district.

~~~
tmh79
do it!

the good people need money to keep up!

I just started political donations this year!

Any amount, however small, helps.

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ebikelaw
An interesting feature of this bill, and SB35 before, is that it makes
operations of local bus agencies far more relevant. As written, I could build
a 55-foot-tall building without parking on my land in Oakland. But if AC
Transit moves the bus stop a little bit, cancels my local bus line, or
increases the headway above 15 minutes, then I’m right back to 25 feet with
two car parking minimum.

Edit: actually 85 feet under this proposed bill.

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blang
> Koretz said the bill would lead to an increase in new home building that
> would snarl traffic and go against what his constituents want in their
> neighborhoods.

> Better ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions would be eliminating
> gasoline-powered cars and even gas stations in the city over time, he said.

Statements like this drive me crazy. While EVs can help in reduction of
greenhouse gas, it will not do as much as allowing people to move less on a
daily basis.

Regardless of the source, moving less stuff (only yourself vs. yourself and a
car) and doing it for a shorter distance will result in the use of less energy
which leads to fewer emissions of greenhouse gases.

~~~
riazrizvi
I suspect there is a mutual understanding with his constituents that his job
is to prevent big new development projects. It explains to me the half-assed
talking point, since almost anything is more palatable than 'the wealth of my
constituents depends on restricted housing'.

~~~
ryandrake
I hate to always be siding with NIMBYs but it's not always about wealthy
people's wealth. Can't it also be about families simply not wanting to be
stacked and packed into dense urban sardine can housing? As amazing as it
sounds, some people like suburban life and not everyone wants their
neighborhood to transform into a big city.

~~~
closeparen
Sustaining that charmed suburban life in booming metros requires making
everyone _else_ mega-commute or stay underemployed in more stagnant areas.
People who have already “made it” are not the only ones whose well-being
matters. A mid-rise next door is not going to hurt you anything like a 2-hour
commute or turning down a dream job hurts someone else.

~~~
ryandrake
When you choose to move somewhere, you're not just moving into an isolated
square on the map. You're moving into a lifestyle and a neighborhood with
attributes you desire. Those desirable attributes can include "no mid-rise
apartments next door".

Apartments springing up next door hurt, if one of the primary reasons you move
somewhere is that there are no apartments next door.

~~~
harryh
Lots of things hurt. It's not the government's job to make all of those things
illegal.

~~~
ryandrake
Where I live, the government's job is to support the will of the people
electing them, within constitutional limits.

~~~
TheCoelacanth
The government's job is to balance the will of the people with the rights of
minorities.

If 51% of people voted to outlaw single family houses would that be
acceptable? Of course not. People should be able to build the type of housing
that they want to on their own property.

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kevinburke
If you support these bills, please call your California State Assemblymember
and State Senator and ask them to vote yes. This is probably going to lead to
a really big fight and these will need lots of support.

You can find them here:
[https://sankarravi.github.io/yimbyscorecard](https://sankarravi.github.io/yimbyscorecard)

~~~
arthurjj
I think YIMBY related issues are one of those issues where directly contacting
your rep. does the most good. It's a locally decided issue that can reap huge
benefits. So go call your rep!

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pchristensen
Nice. I didn't like the part where it said "allowing single family homes near
transit". Moves like this are about allowing _more_ things, not taking away
any options. Anyone with a house near transit is allowed to continue living
there. It's just that, when confronted with new economic options, many of
their neighbors will sell their houses, which will be torn down and
redeveloped. But you can stay in your house as long as you want.

~~~
jccooper
It meant "allowing single family zoning near transit".

~~~
pchristensen
Thanks, that's better.

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electricslpnsld
Whats to stop municipalities that don't want to play along from simply cutting
public transit? I wouldn't put this past Marin or Atherton.

~~~
philsnow
I'm reminded that Atherton has a Caltrain stop that trains only stop at on
weekends.

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omegaworks
My one worry about this is that it will intensify opposition to new transit
projects and transit improvements. Otherwise, great job Senator Wiener. Please
call your Assembly member and State Senator and support. Find them here:

[https://whoaremyrepresentatives.org/](https://whoaremyrepresentatives.org/)

~~~
asabjorn
In that case the opponents have to be explicit in why they fight against any
kind of dense transit-near development, which would be an improvement over the
current situation where in my opinion many opponents are not honest about why
they oppose it.

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mrfusion
What’s in the actual bill?

~~~
yonran
SB 827 upzones for apartments half a mile around every major transit stop
[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180SB827)

SB 828 would double the amount of zoning capacity that each city is required
to provide in the Housing Element report (currently each city must provide
zoning capacity for only 100% of estimated RHNA population growth; this would
increase it to 200%) and carry over approval deficits (currently if a city
does not approve any housing, the deficit is forgiven every 8 years and the
city can reuse the unbuilt parcels in the next Housing Element report).
[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180SB828)

SB 829 would allow farmers to build farmworker housing
[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180SB829)

All of these bills have just been announced by Senator Wiener
([https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/california-needs-a-
housing-...](https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/california-needs-a-housing-
first-agenda-my-2018-housing-package-1b6fe95e41da)) and may be watered down,
heavily amended, or dropped over the next year.

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api
LA slowly transforms into an actual city.

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oh-kumudo
About time. Good move.

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dragonwriter
This is well-intentioned, but I predict will very often result in development
of superificially attractive high-density housing with inadequate parking near
transit lines with inadequate capacity and existing connected services.

Development limits and parking requirements are often abused, to be sure, but
they _do_ have real purposes, and the mere presence of a transit station
doesn't eliminate the development externalities they legitimately exist to
address.

~~~
ebikelaw
This bill is saying that cities can’t take state money to build transit and
then sabotage it with sparse housing and cars. Cars in the vicinity of transit
unquestionably reduce the utility of transit projects.

This is also a big middle finger to Berkeley which for decades has refused to
put residential zoning around its incredibly expensive subway stations.
Berkeley’s BART parking lots are zoned “unclassified” and can’t be developed
without a giant NIMBY hissy fit. This bill short-circuits the hissy fit and
allows BART to build 85-foot apartment buildings without parking at Ashby and
N. Berkeley stations. This will provide way, way more riders for BART than a
handful of parking spaces provide.

~~~
closeparen
822 parking spaces at N. Berkeley. Are they really going to build “way more”
housing units?

Not that many people live in reasonable walking distance of the suburban
commuter stations; building on the parking won’t really change that. I would
love it, though, if we could radically upzone the whole area for a mile
around.

Walking for half an hour to work is great. Walking for half an hour just to
get to your train is no way to live.

~~~
ak217
Look at the map. Six city blocks at North Berkeley and 2-3 at Ashby. You could
easily put 2000+ new units there if you get past the NIMBYs. Most other
stations in the East Bay already have all adjacent lots spoken for with
(relatively) high density development (Lafayette and Orinda being the notable,
also NIMBY driven exceptions).

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dbatten
Overall, this seems like a good policy to me.

However, I'm not sure I like the means used to achieve it. Do we really want
to set a precedent where the state government comes in and overrides local
regulations about things like zoning which are usually purely the
responsibility of the local governments?

I'm not necessarily saying I don't like this either... just thinking through
the implications of living in a federal system. You want people to have
maximum voice in the things that affect the places where they live, but you
also don't want those people to abuse the privilege with NIMBY policies.

~~~
tmh79
> "Do we really want to set a precedent where the state government comes in
> and overrides local regulations about things like zoning which are usually
> purely the responsibility of the local governments?"

Yes, yes we do. Local control of land use is the reason we are in this mess.
Local control of land use is the reason why our neighborhoods are still de
facto segregated by race even though de jure segregation ended 50 years ago.
Local control constricts the policy influencers to a circle that is too small,
because it exlcudes from the discourse people who: 1) work in the locale in
question, but cannot afford to live there, 2) people who commute through the
locale in question, 3) people who live in a community that is not in the
locale, but is impacted by the locale's land use decisions (ex: brisbane
building 8m square feet of office and expecting SF to build housing for the
workers).

~~~
timr
_" Yes, yes we do. Local control of land use is the reason we are in this
mess."_

No, no we don't. I don't usually side with conservatives, but this is
comically bad policy. It's a state power-grab for supply side controls --
planned economy thinking -- justified by Adam Smith rhetoric, because some
folks in San Francisco have decided that they know what's wrong with the local
planning of every other city in the state.

It's especially irritating, because the transit corridors that this
legislation targets -- BART, Caltrain, etc. -- _suck_ , and the sheer vacuum
of their suckage probably has more to do with local housing density than any
particular zoning rule. I cracked up at your Brisbane example...people choose
not to live in Brisbane because _it 's inconvenient to everywhere_, not
because Brisbane has zoning restrictions. You could let developers build
skyscrapers right next to the single Caltrain station (you know...the one
_next to the city dump?_ ), and they still won't do it, because the _demand_
doesn't exist. People aren't clamoring to live in Brisbane, and office parks
are probably the only thing that sells.

Make it quick and painless to commute to Brisbane (or any other city) by
something other than car, and you won't have to tell the local lawmakers how
to set their rules. The flow of money will do it for you. This is just silly
grandstanding, not practical legislation.

~~~
asabjorn
> ... It's a state power-grab for supply side controls -- planned economy
> thinking -- justified by Adam Smith rhetoric, because some folks in San
> Francisco have decided that they know what's wrong with the local planning
> of every other city in the state.

How is this planned economy thinking? It seems to loosen regulation in local
markets to allow developers to more readily meet demand.

Quite to the contrary the current city zoning rules seem like planned economy
thinking, because it makes a zoning plan that is rarely changed over even a
decade-long timeline to match housing supply with the current demand.

> people choose not to live in Brisbane because it's inconvenient to
> everywhere, not because Brisbane has zoning restrictions.

Your argument seem to assume that the state will force developers to build
where there is no demand. This law says nothing about that and the state has
no such power, and this law to the contrary seek to ease regulation where
there _is_ demand for developers to build.

Contrary to what you say Brisbane is served by public transit by both Muni and
Caltrain. There is also a developer that wants to build a lot of new housing
in Brisbane, so the market clearly think there is demand for new housing in
Brisbane. The largest obstacle for the market to meet this demand is local
zoning and the planning process in Brisbane.

~~~
timr
_" How is this planned economy thinking? It seems to loosen regulation in
local markets to allow developers to more readily meet demand."_

It's state government trying to override local economic (zoning) decisions.
It's the very _definition_ of a centrally planned economy.

 _" Contrary to what you say Brisbane is served by public transit by both Muni
and Caltrain."_

There's one Caltrain stop. It's a 30-minute walk from the residential part of
Brisbane, across the freeway and around the dump. MUNI bus service to the area
is irregular and unreliable. The only practical commute option is car.

~~~
asabjorn
> It's state government trying to override local economic (zoning) decisions.
> It's the very definition of a centrally planned economy.

You are mischaracterizing the law and what zoning is. Zoning does not produce
any housing and is instead an artificial constraint on housing supply. The
planning after this law is still done at the city level, but the city is
constrained in what planning it can do.

> There's one Caltrain stop. It's a 30-minute walk from the residential part
> of Brisbane, across the freeway and around the dump. MUNI bus service to the
> area is irregular and unreliable. The only practical commute option is car.

The developer is proposing to build upon the landfill just next to the
caltrain stop, so for the new development this won't be a concern.

