

Why the San Francisco Bay Area should have 11 million residents today - Aloisius
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timothylee/2012/05/10/why-the-bay-area-should-have-11-million-residents-today/

======
DanBlake
As a new landlord in San Francisco, I can tell you that the biggest issue
forcing this is rent control. The way rent control works is certainly designed
to help those in need but instead it creates a artificial demand for
affordable housing.

Without rent control, the market is free to compete and suddenly open up a ton
of bottled up apartments. The issue is, a family on welfare with a income of
40k a year should not be living in a 4 bedroom apartment in pacific heights
for 1k a month. I have no problem with giving affordable housing to those in
need, but rent control is not the answer as it places the burden on individual
landlords to provide social security.

The biggest gap of people who can live in SF are not the poor (taken care of
by rent control) or the rich (dont care/buy homes) but those in between. Run
of the road engineers and others who make between 75k and 150k a year. These
are the people who are hurt most by san franciscos crazy rent laws.

If rent control was abolished, the one thing you would see is that rental
rates would lower significantly as supply starts to balance with demand. Yes,
some people would be displaced but the question is- If the city of san
francisco wants to provide affordable rental units, why dont they instead just
pay lower income people directly, letting them be free to choose where to
live?

~~~
rayval
This has nothing to do with rent control.

San Francisco is just one part of the Bay Area, and the Bay Area is just one
part of California.

The entire state has high real estate prices, despite pockets of low-priced
housing (Stockton, for example).

Law of supply and demand: a lot of people don't want to live in freezing
Minneapolis or bleak Detroit. Or Mumbai or Monterrey, for that matter.

Rich or poor, they would rather be in place where there is a chance to bask in
the sun by the ocean, even if requires an hour or two drive from their gritty
neighborhood.

~~~
mahyarm
If it's really weather, why are almost all of the east coast sun states
significantly cheaper? And two of them don't have a state income tax! (Florida
and Texas). New York also has fairly shitty weather comparatively and it's
even more expensive.

It's more complicated than that. Prop 13, cities forcing a lack of density and
other polices and forces I don't know about push California to it's sky high
rates.

~~~
bitops
_> If it's really weather, why are almost all of the east coast sun states
significantly cheaper?_

Simple - people don't want to live in those states as much as California. For
example, we have palm trees in California. They have them in Florida too -
it's not the same!

Similarly, Texas also has nice weather but it's way more variable than
California which has a fairly temperate climate. In TX crazy temperature
swings are the norm. Also, I've known a number of Texans throughout my time in
the Bay Area, pretty much all of them from Austin. The culture of Austin is
the most like California and San Francisco - artsy, liberal, etc. Places like
Dallas, Fort Worth and San Antonio are decidedly _not_ like San Francisco.

To your point about Prop 13, I agree that it's an issue, and it's definitely a
major part of why we keep having this budget crisis over and over and over
again, every friggin' year. Sadly, I don't think Prop 13 will be abolished or
really revised until the state is completely broke - much worse than it is
now. But eventually it will change.

------
antidoh
But the real estate restrictions will never change, not in the foreseeable
future.

If you imagine a world where that fact will never change in any usefully short
future, then you have to work around it.

 _Why_ does the _software_ industry need to all be located together? Yes I
know, software includes startups, and it's easier to pivot and meet investors
and all that when you're together. And yes, it's often more effective to be
working face to face with your team mates.

Which means that development practices and industry organization are wrong for
the economics of the industry, at least that part of the industry located in
highly concentrated and unexpandable locations.

However we're building apps, systems and businesses right now, we're doing it
wrong, if mere real estate is what's hindering hiring.

------
DanI-S
The Bay Area is one of the most beautiful places in the world, and if they
turn it into another Los Angeles I will cry.

This country is phenomenally huge and there is no reason whatsoever to live
clustered together in vile, concrete scabs. Compact cities are more efficient,
but congested urban sprawl is most definitely not. Strict building regulations
are part of what make this place productive and desirable in the first place.

~~~
gobbluth
I also love San Francisco, but you have the wrong target in mind. Urban
density is GOOD. What sucks is a car-centric culture that forces sprawl.

You want a NYC or European-style transportation system, where it's completely
unnecessary to own dangerous, unreliable, expensive automobiles. Cities
designed around walking -- like the good parts of San Francisco -- are WAY
more human-friendly and memorable. I guarantee that whatever parts of San
Francisco you love, they're almost definitely not parts you're forced to drive
to.

~~~
kitsune_
You can have sprawl without having to rely on individual transport by car.
This is precisely what is going on in smaller European countries such as
Switzerland. Cities and villages are connected through an extensive rail and
bus network.

From my city, trains are leaving for Zurich, Geneva, Bern, Lausanne, Basel
etc. every 30 minutes.

Most commuters take the train even if they own a car.

I'm still a proponent of urbanization because suburbs seem to disrupt natural
spaces. If you travel from east Switzerland to Geneva in the west by train,
you will always see a house somewhere, on the entire 400 kilometres of
journey. Every village looks alike.

That said, I do think mega-cities can be very tiring and demanding. I only
have limited experiences in this regard but cities like Seoul or Istanbul are
not the most relaxing environments for its inhabitants.

~~~
gobbluth
Agreed on basically all counts. But you're critical because you're spoiled...
just visit anywhere in the American Midwest for a week to truly understand how
blessed Switzerland is.

------
vannevar
_In short, the reason there’s too much money chasing too few businesses isn’t
that the country is running out of people with good technology ideas. It’s
just that bad housing policies mean that there’s nowhere for additional people
to live._

Well, you could spend millions and take years to move thousands more engineers
to Silicon Valley. Or you could just get on a goddamned airplane and _invest
your money more than a few miles from your house._ Silicon Valley self-
absorption never ceases to amaze me.

~~~
redditmigrant
I think you are ignoring the fact that Silicon valley is an ecosystem of
engineers/product managers/sysadmins etc. all of which a growing startup
needs. Hence, while a remote area might have people with ideas, it most likely
will not have the eco system to sustain the growth of the startup.

~~~
vannevar
I think 'the ecosystem' consists mostly of people with connections to money.
Which of course is true, since the money is so provincial. Yes, there are lots
of engineers there too, but as the article points out, they all have jobs plus
back-up offers lined up three deep. Instead of going to the trouble to import
people, why not invest in them where they're at? I'm not talking about farm
towns in Iowa, I'm talking about places like Boston, New York, Austin,
Atlanta, Chicago, etc, etc.

------
rizzom5000
This article seems to have missed or glossed over a number of critical
relevant points:

1\. Few people on this planet would consider Atlanta, Phoenix or Las Vegas as
cities to emulate. They are all excellent examples of unsustainable growth -
and to the point where water shortages are a very real future possibility for
any or all of the three.

2\. The 'nut' of the story is that Silicon Valley needs more engineers, and
that more engineers would move there if only the cost of living were less. By
this logic, Silicon Valley investors should be able to take a quick drive over
to the cheaper Las Vegas, where all the cheapskate engineers must be hiding
out waiting for a Silicon Valley investor to show them the way to the riches
that can be found building web services and phone apps for sweat equity.

3\. No mention of telecommuting? Still a taboo topic? If it's such a problem,
maybe one of those start ups should start looking for a solution to _that_
problem - that way engineers could live wherever they wanted and we wouldn't
have to contemplate what the Bay Area, Phoenix style, would be like.

------
oscardelben
I just moved here from Italy, and it's almost impossible for me to get an
apartment that's near public transportation. I mean, other than caltrain
there's little if nothing public transportation here, and that may be part of
the problem too. I certainly can't rent a house in the hills if there's no way
for me to get to work from there. I ended up renting from a colleague.

~~~
gobbluth
Agreed with you and MJN. The US is in desperate need of investment in public
transportation. Europeans have absolutely mastered the art of urban design and
public transportation, and I wish we'd learn from their example.

But try telling 99% of the US that 1) their shitty sprawled real estate is
effectively worthless, 2) their obese asses will have to give up their cars,
and 3) we've spent 70 years of infrastructure investment supporting the
dumbest possible lifestyle choice.

~~~
briandon
I don't disagree with you per se, but I have spent nearly a decade living in a
city which has amazingly great public transport, very dense living
arrangements (30-story highrises are the norm), and people walk constantly.

Are you ready to go grocery shopping pretty much every single day or every
other day? Or can you manage to be at home during a 6-hour window for the
grocery delivery if you want to shop once a week for that stuff?

Would you get stressed waiting, at least twice a day (leaving from your floor
and returning from the lobby), for elevators in a 30-story building? Remember
that people in wheelchairs, kids taking their bikes downstairs to ride,
workmen w/materials/tools, people moving house, etc. are all going to be using
the elevators.

If you're out somewhere and buy anything (in my case, yesterday, it was a new
electric toothbrush) that's not groceries or something large, like an air
conditioner, you're going to have to lug it around with you until you go home,
even if you have several other stops to make or errands to do. There's no such
thing as going to your car and putting something in the trunk until later.

Are you ready for even short trips to take much longer? You'll need to get out
of your highrise, walk for some time until you get to the public transport
pick-up point (bus stop, train platform, etc.), wait a while, ride the public
transport (which usually moves slower than a car even if it weren't making a
bunch of other stops between your home and ultimate destination's drop-off
point), and then, finally, you'll have to walk some more to reach wherever it
was that you wanted to go.

If you already live in a highrise, use public transportation exclusively, and
don't own a car, then I'm glad that the experience hasn't soured you on high-
density living and public transportation.

~~~
kiwidrew
Except that's not the only style of living that HK offers.

Some people do opt for the arrangement you've just described, living in e.g.
the "Lake Silver" high rises way out at the very end of the Ma On Shan metro
line. Most of them don't seem to mind it, even though it means long rides on
the bus or MTR to go anywhere.

But it's just as easy to live a few stops from work, in an older neighbourhood
like Sa Ying Poon or Prince Edward with smaller buildings, where you have
three different supermarkets within a five-minute walk and are surrounded by
shops selling everythinng imaginable.

I mean, how many cities have two overlapping and completely independent public
transport networks? HK has the "official" bus and metro system, but the red
minibuses are essentially a rogue invisible-hand-of-the-market creation that
just sprung up organically. And unlike most American cities, where the public
transport struggles to even survive, both of these HK networks are thriving...

~~~
briandon
The overwhelming majority of people in HK live in highrises, virtually all new
housing being built here (unless your uncle is a village chief and/or you're a
male who can prove that he is of villager stock and has a right to build a
village house) consists of giant highrises, and most of the existing housing
stock consists of the same.

So, while you're correct in saying that highrise living is not the _only_
choice, it is the reality that most people here are living in highrises and
that the small percentage of people living in smaller buildings will continue
to dwindle over time.

Regarding older, low-rise, buildings, those low-rise residential buildings
that do exist and which aren't out in the boonies are being gradually
"redeveloped", as you may already know. The government or a developer buys a
certain percentage of the flats and compels the holdouts to sell, usually at a
price that won't permit the residents to buy a newer flat in the same
neighborhood, demolishes the building(s), and erects a huge tower block.

Regarding the minibuses, a car or taxi is still faster than taking a minibus
for the same reasons that a car or taxi are faster than the MTR: no
walking/waiting/walking and you're going to your destination directly rather
than following a route and making lots of stops at places that you don't want
to go and then.

This is a separate issue, but haven't you noticed that most of the drivers are
visibly impoverished (raggy-looking clothing, many missing/black teeth, etc.)
and many are senior citizens? The minibuses, especially the red ones, also
tend to speed and get into lots of accidents. Rarely does more than a day or
two pass without a report of a minibus ramming into something and most of the
passengers being injured, or two minibuses t-boning each other and two
minibus-fulls of passengers being injured, etc.

Also, you do know that most of the red minibuses are under triad control, that
the drivers have to pay a huge lump sum when they start driving and then
"parking fees" every month thereafter?

------
balloot
All I know is I have lived in and visited many other places in the US, and the
SF Bay Area (and especially San Francisco proper) is hands down the most
distinctive and beautiful. Whatever is being done here needs to be done _more_
and not less.

If the author wants to take his ball and stomp off to some urban-sprawly
McMansion-filled city that is supposedly more optimal for talent, go right
ahead. You have your choice of the vast majority of the country. There is a
wonderful lack of regulation and population density out in the plains of South
Dakota - just go there and I'm sure all the talent will follow in droves.

------
pwthornton
Silicon Valley has some of the least progressive views on housing in the
country. Limiting people to single family homes, which much of the valley
does, is terrible for the environment and drives housing prices up. Space is
finite. Building up leads to more affordability, shorter commuters and more
creativity (by making it more likely that smart people run into each other).

The issue in the Valley is that there isn't enough housing stock. That's not
hard to fix, unless you have too many regulations and nimbys.

Steve Jobs was a genius about a lot of things, except housing and work
environments. The new Apple campus is almost laughably stupid. Everything we
know about cities and their ability to forward humanity and creativity can't
happen in Apple's new campus. It's disconnected from the larger community and
sits next to a freeway.

See Triumph of the City as to why density of knowledge workers leaders to more
innovation and creativity (or why the Renascence would never happen in rural
America).

I bring up Jobs because I think his ideas on housing is common in the area. He
loved the suburbs and perhaps the suburbs of the 60s and 70s were nice for a
kid growing up. But Apple doesn't employ kids and our country's populations
has doubled since 1960 and shows no signs of slowing down.

------
nnnnnnnn
The author uses three examples to assert his 11 million number, but he doesn't
explain _why_ he believes the bay area should model these growth points.

In the case of Detroit, the boom was driven by many cheap manufacturing jobs
available to all. This differs significantly from the fairly specialized and
specific technical positions available in the valley. Cheap, uneducated labor
isn't seeking out the valley -- in fact the economic incentive is an exact
opposite: If you can't earn a high salary, you flee to a cheaper state.

Las Vegas has a booming service industry, which is much more in line with the
manufacturing boom in Detroit.

Phoenix is where people go when they flee expensive southern California life.
Phoenix is also close to Mexico, and the hispanic population is by far the
fastest growing demographic (46% growth vs 17% for all other demographics per
2010 census).

The author of this Forbes article ought to spend more time analyzing the
_cause_ of population booms, rather than trying to rely weak and unsupported
correlations. What a disappointment.

------
rachelbythebay
Have these people looked at North San Jose lately? They have been tearing down
office buildings (Sony, on Zanker) and have been putting up _huge_ residential
complexes. One of them just opened its first phase, and many more are on the
way.

Basically, anywhere between the Guadalupe River and Coyote Creek north of
Montague is starting to go crazy, and if that isn't the Valley, I don't know
what is.

------
rdl
The big hack for living in the Bay Area seems to be having roommates. I'm
currently trying to find a really nice, big house in San Mateo County (the
only Bay Area county which is pro firearms ownership, thanks to an excellent
sheriff, Greg Munks).

There's really spotty availability of nice houses in a "reasonable" price
range (2-3br/2ba for $3000 or less) anywhere reasonable, but a lot of huge,
absurdly nice houses (8-12br, 8+ ba, multiple pools, etc. for about $10k/mo).
The rent vs. buy calculation is totally rent for properties like that too.

Clearly the arbitrage play, assuming you don't mind sharing a $300k gourmet
kitchen, housekeeper, chef, etc., is to rent a house like that and share it.
$1-2.5k/mo, and you get to live as well as you would in Texas, while being in
SFBA.

~~~
ahh
I've been looking all over for such a situation--can you show a link to one
such house? I'm not convinced they exist.

------
rbranson
Those types of regulations exist in every city. The problem isn't housing,
it's transportation. Without the necessary transit infrastructure, it's
pointless to just build buildings. It seems as if it was up to the author of
this piece, the Bay Area would look a lot like LA. Please, for the love of all
that is good, do not make this place like LA.

~~~
benmccann
The two are fairly related. Without sufficient housing density, it's difficult
to build efficient mass transportation.

------
dionidium
See, also, Matt Yglesias on parking regulations, among other things:

<https://www.google.com/search?q=matt+yglesias+parking>

------
redwood
There's another problem: integration of mass transit across counties... BART
and Caltrain each have their advantages, especially BART which is truly rapid.
But those are arteries, and we need to see veins also connect across counties.

For example it's a pity that Palo Alto, being at the county line between
SAMTRANS and Valley Transit, does not have any good street car service. The
light rail that ends in Mountain View should continue to Palo Alto, and I hope
the density will push that.

------
tom_m
Haha that's nit why. The reason why is living cost. I live in Palo Alto (rent
of course) and its STILL increasing in cost. Startups can only pay so much.
Since this area carries prestige from Stanford and the tech industry its
expensive. Always has been. But real estate sees all this glamour and wild
success stories as an excuse to charge lots of money. It's an inflated
area...in the cost of homes, rent, and food. The crap I overpay for at most
restaurants downtown is insane. Coming from NYC, I had far more options and
better food for cheaper. Why? Size. Competition, sure...But also no bubble.
Ladies and gentlemen we are in the middle of another tech bubble here. Prices
are outrageous and companies are over valued. So it'd the cost. That's why.
People do their best to find places to live and they over extend themselves. I
know doctors (both husband and wife) who are struggling. A nice
profession...Still not enough. If you actually look at the stats (there's a
map/site for this) most people move out after moving here. So "growth" and how
many people actually do try to move and live here are two different things.
It's not the running out of space...it's the cost.

------
guelo
Coincidentally this other article also published today has a similar theme
making the case that California's previous prosperity was caused by higher
population growth and advocating construction in Silicon Valley.
[http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/05/14/the_decline_o...](http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/05/14/the_decline_of_california.html)

------
redwood
I'd love to see the bay area achieve a level of density that makes mass
transit (and not cars) the norm everywhere.

There has been a lot more progress, at least in areas like Palo Alto, than
this article makes clear. Throughout my life countless properties have been
turned into relatively high density homes.

------
wes-exp
Also, not as many women => not as many babies supporting population growth.

~~~
ttfntatafornow
there are just as many women here as anywhere else.

Males: 408,462 (50.7%) Females: 396,773 (49.3%)

if anything, when you consider that there are far more homosexual men than
homosexual women, men have it good here.

<http://www.city-data.com/city/San-Francisco-California.html>

~~~
hollerith
That's the ratio for San Franciso. Silicon Valley, different story.

~~~
jarek
Oh you mean like San Jose? "For every 100 females there were 101.1 males. For
every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 99.8 males."

Palo Alto? "For every 100 females there were 95.7 males. For every 100 females
age 18 and over, there were 93.0 males."

Cupertino? "For every 100 females there were 97.4 males. For every 100 females
age 18 and over, there were 94.6 males."

San Bruno? "For every 100 females there were 97.1 males. For every 100 females
age 18 and over, there were 95.1 males."

Redwood City? "For every 100 females there were 99.2 males. For every 100
females age 18 and over, there were 98.1 males."

Menlo Park? "For every 100 females there were 93.7 males. For every 100
females age 18 and over, there were 91.5 males."

Millbrae? "For every 100 females there were 90.0 males. For every 100 females
age 18 and over, there were 86.7 males."

San Carlos? "For every 100 females there were 93.6 males. For every 100
females age 18 and over, there were 90.7 males."

San Mateo? "For every 100 females there were 95.4 males. For every 100 females
age 18 and over, there were 92.8 males."

Atherton? "For every 100 females there were 96.6 males. For every 100 females
age 18 and over, there were 95.3 males."

Milpitas, Mountain View, Santa Clara, and Sunnyvale were the ones with more
males - worst ratio in Milpitas, 104.5 and 104.6 respectively. Surrounding
cities would more than balance that out.

~~~
hollerith
Well, look at that! Thanks for the information.

------
hristov
I am going to be captain obvious here and mention that you cannot compare the
growth rates of a city that is on an enormous flat desert plateau with that of
a city on an already crowded peninsula.

------
vorg
> A variety of regulations—minimum lot sizes, maximum building heights,
> parking mandates, restrictions on renting out basements,...

Are you still allowed to start a business in your garage with a friend
building, say, printers? What about hooking up a server to the web running a
search engine?

------
cafard
Are you weeping for the engineers or for the developers?

------
kcima
I am moving there anyway. Bringing my camper.

------
rsanchez1
This presents an opportunity that other cities in the US should be taking
advantage, but aren't. There aren't enough engineers in Silicon Valley? Move
somewhere that has enough engineers. If a city provides enough incentives for
tech companies to move there, and attracts enough recognizable companies to
increase its reputation, then that represents an opportunity to bring some of
that Silicon Valley money home. I wonder what it will take for entrepreneurs,
engineers, and investors to consider other locations instead of Silicon Valley
first.

------
ktizo
I wonder if some enterprising soul could park up some old cruise liners and
rent them out if the building regulations are that much of a problem.

~~~
pavel_lishin
Like BlueSeed? <http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/06/blueseed-startup-ship/>

(How do I create a link on HN again? The one place where a "help me with
formatting" link would do some good - the reply page
(<http://i.imgur.com/R8oS8.png>) - of course doesn't have one.)

(Edit: Turns out the "edit" page _does_ have it, and shows that there really
isn't a way.)

~~~
ktizo
Oooo.. that's nice, but a pricey way to do it.

Buying existing liners, rafting them up and retrofitting would seem like a
more achievable aim in practice.

You could probably get some off Costa at the moment for less than the market
rate.

~~~
pavel_lishin
I admit to knowing nothing about real estate, and even less about ocean
liners, but it seems that an ocean liner - even at sub-market rates - would be
ridiculously expensive to buy, and then merely ludicrously expensive to
operate.

Sure, you're not burning a ton of fuel a minute plowing through dolphins and
kelp, but you still need to generate power to operate all of the on-board
facilities such as electricity, plumbing, elevators, etc. Would the city allow
an entrepreneur to run a fat power cable onto a sitting ship - leaving aside
political implications of a big honkin' vessel blocking the ocean view, are
there even any regulations written for it?

Based only on what I've read of jwz just attempting to put a door in a
nightclub wall, it seems that a hostile takeover over San Francisco, followed
by some summary executions of most of the city government and a formal
secession from the United States of America would be easier.

~~~
ars
Why can't the ship generate its own power? Is a power plant can do it, so can
a ship - it's large enough to be able to make the generator efficient enough.
Load it up with LNG every one in a while - LNG is transported by sea all the
time anyway.

If you plan ahead you can pipe the LNG throughout the ship for cooking, and
maybe even heating.

~~~
pavel_lishin
It can absolutely generate its own power. But then you have to pay to ship a
whole lot of diesel onto your ship. I'm betting that the liner's efficiency is
a heck of a lot less than a local power plant's, since I assume that a line is
optimized to move a screw through water, with electric power being a lower
priority.

You could also build a better power plant on the ship, but that's not free,
either.

~~~
ktizo
Modern vessels use electric motors powered by a generator to move the screw
anyway.

------
joelandren
I'll try to be nice here, but the author is a fucking idiot.

To posit that the Bay Area can handle the population growth of sprawling and
ill-planned Atlanta, Phoenix and Las Vegas is patently ridiculous. The Bay
Area is already one of the most dense metro regions in the US and to think
that the area could see growth like that without a MAJOR disruption in quality
of life is absurd.

I also think many engineers, who can usually pick where they want to live,
already find the Bay Area to crowded and have decided upon less lucrative
opportunities elsewhere.

~~~
fusiongyro
You're sort of both right. One reason I don't want to relocate to the Bay
(despite several offers) is when I do the math, my quality of life is
substantially higher here in the middle of nowhere New Mexico on astonishingly
less money. If you're not after the glory, it doesn't necessarily make
economic sense. Doubly so if you don't like the kind of work that exists in
the bay. If the housing and commute time issues weren't so dramatic, I would
think about it, but still probably would stay out here.

~~~
dennisgorelik
If you are single or DINK (double income no kids) - moving to Bay Area (or NYC
for that matter) can have economic sense.

