Here's an interesting comparison. New York City's population density is 56% higher than San Francisco's, and the average height of a building in New York City is only 6.8 stories (in spite of skyscrapers pushing up the mean).
New York City's mayor has pledged to build (and preserve) that many units of affordable housing alone over the next 10 years [1]. About 80,000 of those will be new construction [2].
The broader picture is more vigorous. Developers applied to build 60% as much (over 50,000 units) in 2015 alone [3].
This is a political problem San Francisco has dug itself into.
I'm thinking the same thing. Is it physical limitations of building (such as earthquake proofing) that makes it difficult? Or is it the suffocating amount of bureaucratic red tape imposed by short-sighted interest groups?
Boosting housing by building vertically is virtually unlimited.
The trickier part is supplying the added people with water, electricity, gas, food, and other supplies without augmenting infrastructure (which is failing left and right as it is) and convincing them to never travel out of or into the city using its already-at-capacity freeways and rail.
i acknowledge that city ordinances can be a huge headache, but consider that trees serve more than just aesthetic purpose. They provide shade, filter particulate matter, and increase air quality for a much larger area than just 'your own property'.
This is especially important in the urban core of cities where greenery can be scarce, and mature trees even more so.
It is worth mentioning that building into the sky is expensive. Easy sure. But expensive. Each floor is more expensive than the one below it.
I'm not sure what the premium is though. Anyone know? What's the added cost for an apartment building as you go up?
Seattle has a lot of 2+4 construction. Where it's 2 floor concrete and 4 floors wood. I believe the limit used to be 2+2 but they raised it. Cheaper construction costs but also cheaper quality. These plastic and cardboard buildings won't be standing in 100 years that's for sure. Or so I'm told.
Except, it isn't. Construction costs of taller buildings scale non-linearly with every additional story [1]. Building skyscrapers costs upwards of $300 per square foot, whereas single-family homes cost a fifth or a sixth of that. It's so much cheaper to build low-rises, in fact, that virtually no developers will take on a high-rise project unless the property is so expensive that it can command luxury prices. This is more-or-less true for mid-rise projects as well, though at a lower price point (~$200 per square foot).
The conversation about planning and NIMBYs is misguided. As the article concludes, the city is out of land. Any new construction requires buying and knocking down something else, and the choices are all various flavors of "expensive" or "inconvenient".
For example, east of Divisadero, the density of SF is actually pretty high:
...the problem is, everyone wants to rebuild the dense parts to be skyscrapers (which is very expensive), and transit access to the suburban parts is quite bad. Developers won't build even medium-density projects in western parts of the city, because there's no demand, because there's no transit. Instead, they build higher density in the Mission and SOMA. These buildings will always be expensive, "luxury" units, because at $300+/sq.ft. construction costs the economics don't pencil out otherwise.
Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.
That's because you're talking about one of the most beautiful cities in the world (despite the attempts of some people to decry otherwise) and, as expressed through the will of its electorate, intends to stay that way. It's also a city that's keenly aware of ecosystem dynamics and environmental issues generally, and the effect of removing that removing certain kinds of trees (for example, trees of significant age, size, and/or foliage) -- particularly if they're close to the street -- can have on the neighborhood well beyond the tiny confines of your own property.
If you want to live in a city that couldn't begin to give a flying F* about trees, or anything else green, for most of its history -- and has the corresponding development footprint and visual character to show for it -- try moving to San Jose.
Obligatory reminder: If you care about housing in the Bay Area, register to vote now. Scott Wiener is a housing and transportation advocate running for State Senate in this election.
Show up to Planning Commission and Board of Supervisor meetings. Participate in public comment. We all talk about how NIMBYs rule SF, it's because they show up in full force at these gatherings.
I'm not sure if it's too late but consider registering as a Democrat so you can vote on the DCCC appointments since the DCCC endorsements have a fair amount of sway in elections. See: http://www.sfyimby.org/slate/
Gentrification step 13: vote out the pre-existing population's preferred politicians and install new "free market" policies (since the "free market" works in favor of the people with the money the new policies will benefit the richer new comers).
Out of curiosity, is there a way for a non-citizen to vote?
I see the logic of requiring you to be a citizen, but it does nevertheless feel a little unfair -- I live here too, and I pay my taxes like everyone else.
Scott Wiener seems to be a big part of the problem in terms of increasing the regulatory burden on new development. Have I missed something in his actual record that indicates he is removing restrictions on new housing development?
Answering a question, why the decline in rents 1950-1960? Far as I know during WWII the population of the city swelled due to war time industry. After the war people moved to newly created suburbs in Santa Clara and the Peninsula.
I'm unsure but I think my grandparents moved to SF during the 1939-1940 WWII preseason. And by the late forties had moved away.
He mentioned he didn't have good data for housing advertisements during that time frame, so one possibility is that during the boom lots of people started advertising rooms for rent instead of entire houses or apartments.
SF should work on rezoning some hub areas higher density, and build (lots of) unit blocks. For comparison, I live in a suburb that has had the zoning rules changed to allow for transit-oriented development. Houses are being moved out and being replaced by 5 story apartment blocks. I live in one of those, a 3 minute walk from a busway station.
There will probably be 50000 units built in my the city in the near future. However, Brisbane, Australia has twice the population of SF, and a possibly irrational building boom happening though:
New housing doesn't even need to be right in San Francisco. Anywhere along the Peninsula, even Oakland would be good enough, as long as it's close enough to public transportation.
To a lot of people though, it does. And public transit is already stretched thin with a lot of problems. A second Transbay Tube is being discussed so you're not looking at anything soon.
Inflation is exponential. It removes all the contrast in the the historical data, and trends are more difficult to spot if a linear scale is used on exponential data.
Everyone in SF knows that and actually seems to not want to increase the supply.
Strike that, they want the property tax revenue but only from huge, high-brow luxury apartment build-outs. The City has no problem letting the supply at the high end of the market increase.
By stopping any growth in the supply of nominally affordable rentals, the City leadership is pushing people of limited means outside of the city.
Let's see then if the City's limitations to increasing Supply makes sense:
1) low-income people -- like it or not, the vast majority of crime is committed by this group -- are pushed out of the city. That reduces crime. Check, makes sense from the City leadership perspective.
2) Rent control fools the city's renters into voting for more of the same. Landlords cannot profit; take affordable units off the market. Again, the low income types are pushed out of the city. Check. (see #1)
3) Also, by putting these mom-and-pop landlords out of business, rent control eliminates a COMPETITOR for the Luxury Apartment developers -- if there are no low-cost apartments to rent, people have no choice but to pay up or get out. Rent control also pushes up rents at the low end as those units go offline/out of business/converted to condos/etc., leaving fewer units available for low income folks.
The City is acting in its own best interest to:
- limit supply growth of apartments
- put mom and pop landlords with affordable units offline
- thus eliminating affordable units and the low socio-economic status people who create most of the crime problems from the city
And all that pushes up rents to benefit high-property-tax-paying Luxury apartment developers.
The City needs as much property tax revenue as they can get.
"How do we attract luxury apartment developers to boost the City's property tax haul?
- eliminate the low-priced competitors -- and even get the voters to approve it -- by imposing rent control
- reduce crime so Luxury apartment developers will feel they can attract high-dollar customers
- reduce/eliminate the creation of new affordable housing
SF wants property tax revenue. If you understand the above, you know everything.
It's not like the City leaders are going to announce their strategy to voters. Too many low-income/moderate-income renters here in SF.
But you can see the effects:
- high rents due to the gradual elimination of mom-and-pop low rent units (they go out of business or convert to condos)
- no more low-end Supply allowed to be created
- rent control is here to stay (at least until all the low-priced apartments are gone)
[+] [-] rayiner|10 years ago|reply
Doesn't seem that hard in a city full of three-story housing.
[+] [-] thescriptkiddie|10 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_b...
http://www.sunilmishra.in/2012/07/05/average-building-height...
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|10 years ago|reply
The broader picture is more vigorous. Developers applied to build 60% as much (over 50,000 units) in 2015 alone [3].
This is a political problem San Francisco has dug itself into.
[1] http://www1.nyc.gov/site/housing/index.page
[2] http://gothamist.com/2016/05/16/depends_on_what_affordable_m...
[3] https://www.buildingcongress.com/outlook/
[+] [-] matt_wulfeck|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|10 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] scotty79|10 years ago|reply
https://www.google.pl/maps/place/Superjednostka,+aleja+Korfa...
Googleplex to scale: https://www.google.pl/maps/place/Googleplex/@37.42302,-122.0...
[+] [-] matt_wulfeck|10 years ago|reply
You want a challenge? Build in a city where you're required to post notice any time you cut down a tree on your own property.
[+] [-] DrScump|10 years ago|reply
The trickier part is supplying the added people with water, electricity, gas, food, and other supplies without augmenting infrastructure (which is failing left and right as it is) and convincing them to never travel out of or into the city using its already-at-capacity freeways and rail.
[+] [-] snewk|10 years ago|reply
This is especially important in the urban core of cities where greenery can be scarce, and mature trees even more so.
[+] [-] forrestthewoods|10 years ago|reply
I'm not sure what the premium is though. Anyone know? What's the added cost for an apartment building as you go up?
Seattle has a lot of 2+4 construction. Where it's 2 floor concrete and 4 floors wood. I believe the limit used to be 2+2 but they raised it. Cheaper construction costs but also cheaper quality. These plastic and cardboard buildings won't be standing in 100 years that's for sure. Or so I'm told.
[+] [-] timr|10 years ago|reply
Except, it isn't. Construction costs of taller buildings scale non-linearly with every additional story [1]. Building skyscrapers costs upwards of $300 per square foot, whereas single-family homes cost a fifth or a sixth of that. It's so much cheaper to build low-rises, in fact, that virtually no developers will take on a high-rise project unless the property is so expensive that it can command luxury prices. This is more-or-less true for mid-rise projects as well, though at a lower price point (~$200 per square foot).
The conversation about planning and NIMBYs is misguided. As the article concludes, the city is out of land. Any new construction requires buying and knocking down something else, and the choices are all various flavors of "expensive" or "inconvenient".
For example, east of Divisadero, the density of SF is actually pretty high:
https://www.google.com/maps/@37.7907112,-122.424097,3a,75y,4...
But west of Divisadero, there are huge sections of the city that look like a suburb:
https://www.google.com/maps/@37.7468355,-122.4598049,3a,75y,...
...the problem is, everyone wants to rebuild the dense parts to be skyscrapers (which is very expensive), and transit access to the suburban parts is quite bad. Developers won't build even medium-density projects in western parts of the city, because there's no demand, because there's no transit. Instead, they build higher density in the Mission and SOMA. These buildings will always be expensive, "luxury" units, because at $300+/sq.ft. construction costs the economics don't pencil out otherwise.
[1] https://westnorth.com/2014/03/18/between-rocks-and-a-tall-pl...
[+] [-] martinald|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kafkaesq|10 years ago|reply
That's because you're talking about one of the most beautiful cities in the world (despite the attempts of some people to decry otherwise) and, as expressed through the will of its electorate, intends to stay that way. It's also a city that's keenly aware of ecosystem dynamics and environmental issues generally, and the effect of removing that removing certain kinds of trees (for example, trees of significant age, size, and/or foliage) -- particularly if they're close to the street -- can have on the neighborhood well beyond the tiny confines of your own property.
If you want to live in a city that couldn't begin to give a flying F* about trees, or anything else green, for most of its history -- and has the corresponding development footprint and visual character to show for it -- try moving to San Jose.
[+] [-] capkutay|10 years ago|reply
http://registertovote.ca.gov/
Show up to Planning Commission and Board of Supervisor meetings. Participate in public comment. We all talk about how NIMBYs rule SF, it's because they show up in full force at these gatherings.
[+] [-] ASinclair|10 years ago|reply
Though feel free to vote as you wish.
[+] [-] forgotmysn|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] guelo|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fsaneq2|10 years ago|reply
I see the logic of requiring you to be a citizen, but it does nevertheless feel a little unfair -- I live here too, and I pay my taxes like everyone else.
[+] [-] mgraczyk|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Gibbon1|10 years ago|reply
I'm unsure but I think my grandparents moved to SF during the 1939-1940 WWII preseason. And by the late forties had moved away.
[+] [-] refurb|10 years ago|reply
In 1950 the population of SF peaked (at the time) at 775,000, by 1960 it was down to 740,000, then by 1980 down to 678,000 (13% drop over 30 years!).
Hard to believe it living in SF today.
[+] [-] rqebmm|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] busthrow|10 years ago|reply
There will probably be 50000 units built in my the city in the near future. However, Brisbane, Australia has twice the population of SF, and a possibly irrational building boom happening though:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-01-27/brisbane-to-see-50,000...
[+] [-] ktRolster|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ghaff|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] original_idea|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bagels|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] youngButEager|10 years ago|reply
Demand is higher than supply.
Everyone in SF knows that and actually seems to not want to increase the supply.
Strike that, they want the property tax revenue but only from huge, high-brow luxury apartment build-outs. The City has no problem letting the supply at the high end of the market increase.
By stopping any growth in the supply of nominally affordable rentals, the City leadership is pushing people of limited means outside of the city.
Let's see then if the City's limitations to increasing Supply makes sense:
1) low-income people -- like it or not, the vast majority of crime is committed by this group -- are pushed out of the city. That reduces crime. Check, makes sense from the City leadership perspective.
2) Rent control fools the city's renters into voting for more of the same. Landlords cannot profit; take affordable units off the market. Again, the low income types are pushed out of the city. Check. (see #1)
3) Also, by putting these mom-and-pop landlords out of business, rent control eliminates a COMPETITOR for the Luxury Apartment developers -- if there are no low-cost apartments to rent, people have no choice but to pay up or get out. Rent control also pushes up rents at the low end as those units go offline/out of business/converted to condos/etc., leaving fewer units available for low income folks.
The City is acting in its own best interest to:
- limit supply growth of apartments - put mom and pop landlords with affordable units offline - thus eliminating affordable units and the low socio-economic status people who create most of the crime problems from the city
And all that pushes up rents to benefit high-property-tax-paying Luxury apartment developers.
The City needs as much property tax revenue as they can get.
"How do we attract luxury apartment developers to boost the City's property tax haul?
- eliminate the low-priced competitors -- and even get the voters to approve it -- by imposing rent control
- reduce crime so Luxury apartment developers will feel they can attract high-dollar customers
- reduce/eliminate the creation of new affordable housing
SF wants property tax revenue. If you understand the above, you know everything.
It's not like the City leaders are going to announce their strategy to voters. Too many low-income/moderate-income renters here in SF.
But you can see the effects: - high rents due to the gradual elimination of mom-and-pop low rent units (they go out of business or convert to condos) - no more low-end Supply allowed to be created - rent control is here to stay (at least until all the low-priced apartments are gone)
[+] [-] dang|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mfringel|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marincounty|10 years ago|reply
[deleted]