4 ms·

Cities are expensive for a relatively simple reason: the number of people who want to live there exceeds the number of open spots. Two immediate solutions: (1

by nilkn 11y ago

Cities are expensive for a relatively simple reason: the number of people who want to live there exceeds the number of open spots. Two immediate solutions: (1) Create compelling reasons for someone to not want to live in this one particular city. For instance, allow one to work remotely. There are hundreds if not thousands of amazing cities to be enjoyed, not to mention the vast stretches of rural land for those who don't want to live in a city at all. (2) Build more housing units in the city. Eliminate zoning restrictions. Stop worrying about protecting the existing homeowners and pay more attention to everyone else. Note that both of these are mostly matters of just convincing people to jump on board the plan. People in general are resistant to remote work (especially outside the software world, but even inside it), and some cities like San Francisco are extremely hostile towards a vast number of proposals to just build more housing. When you combine the desire to compress an entire industry into one city with a refusal to build more housing units, what result could you possibly expect?

seizethecheese 11y ago
> (1) Create compelling reasons for someone to not want to live in a city. For instance, allow one to work remotely. A lot of folks who work remotely prefer the city since it gives them all the amenities that an office usually would like food (restaurants), gyms, cafes and an environment with a lot of people.
- nilkn 11y ago
  And there are thousands of cities in the world in which they can enjoy all those amenities. (I edited the above quote now to reflect this.)
  - seiji 11y ago
    NYC is the only city in the world with a 24 hour subway system every day. Many people enjoy not having a car: especially the very poor (can't afford car anywhere), so NYC is full of very poor; and they very middle (can't afford car in NYC), so NYC is full of very middle and everybody fights for the same resources.
    - tracker1 11y ago
      It's funny, I'm currently looking for a next job, and am talking to a company in Manhattan... One of my thoughts was "damn, I'd have to get rid of my car." :-( Though, I'd absolutely hate driving in that town. The same applies to SF (made the mistake of renting a car there for a business trip, the next one Uber/Lyft was better).
    - ido 11y ago
      It might not have 24/7 subway (i think it's 24h on the weekend and 20h during the week), but I've been living in Berlin for 2 years and have yet to chance upon the situation where I didn't have transit available to get back home (neither me not my wife have a driver's license). Having good transit is really really important. But it doesn't have to be 24/7 for the vast majority of people. In the maybe once per year that I need to go somewhere in 3am on a weekday I can take the night bus or even a taxi.
      - seiji 11y ago
        Yeah, those are good times. SF sucks transit-wise because Caltrain (SF to South Bay) stops at midnight. BART stops around the same time too. Heck, in NYC many events don't even start until 10 pm. Every evening transit trip to SF (if you live in the south bay) results in end-of-day stress of trying to make the last train home if you don't have overnight accommodations. Not to mention the full South Bay route takes 90 minutes (to go 40 miles!), so you leave at midnight SF and arrive at 1:30 am San Jose.
        ido 11y ago
        Yeah everything stopping at midnight even on the weekends would suck. I guess because of the way you wrote it I thought the literal 24h even on weekdays was your point which seemed pretty odd. I've lived n Vienna and Berlin and in both the subways go till around 1am on weekdays and 24h on weekends, iirc it's about that way in Prague too. I thought this was the type of situation you were comparing it to. Before they started running the subways all night on weekends in Vienna (which I think only started maybe 5 years ago) I would often have to take the night busses on weekend evenings, which would suck cause they only went every half an hour.
- ryanSrich 11y ago
  San Francisco is not the only city in existence.
- Chanel_Bunnell 11y ago
  Towns do that too. Pretty much all of them.
- tracker1 11y ago
  That said, with remote work, you can choose any city. I'd rather live in Boise, Denver or Portland than Seattle, SF or NYC. For reference I'm in Phoenix, and I mainly stay because pay:cost-of-living is better here for developers than most cities. Most of the work is very business centered, but still plenty of options. If there was more remote work that split the difference in pay, and allowed me to work in a slightly smaller city farther north, I'd really prefer that. But the income:living ratio in most of the places with more tech jobs just isn't as good.
chimeracoder 11y ago
> (2) Build more housing units in the city. Eliminate zoning restrictions. Stop worrying about protecting the existing homeowners and pay more attention to everyone else. These three things are not synonymous - or at least, they need not be. For example, New York is building a lot of units. (A lot of them happen to be luxury units which often sit vacant since they are used purely as investment vehicles by foreign entities, but that's a separate problem.) The real issue is that Manhattan is an island, and there's only so much you can cram into 33 square miles (though they're working on squeezing every last cubic inch out of that). They're also, of course, building at an absolutely unbelievable pace in Brooklyn, Queens, and even the Bronx[0]. San Francisco, on the other hand, has been incredibly slow to build more inventory (and also build upwards), compared to the amount that the demand has increased. This may be partly due to zoning issues, but not entirely, and the situation that San Francisco is in is not typical of most cities. Houston is famous for having no zoning code, but New York has a very extensive zoning code[1]. In fact, the market for air rights in New York is quite complicated and fascinating[2]. You can build more housing without scaling back zoning restrictions or removing them entirely; there's just not always enough will to do so in every city. [0] not sure about Staten Island, but... well, let's not talk about that. [1] http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/subcats/zoning.shtml http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/subcats/zoning.shtml [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights
- bradleyjg 11y ago
  Manhattan has plenty of places where it could get denser. The limits are 1) public transportation -- especially on the East Side and 2) rather silly preservation / zoning rules -- like preserving the character of the East Village which is ugly and not worth saving. The second avenue subway should help somewhat (assuming it's finished before the heat death of the universe) but increasing congestion and the subsequent decay in the quality of buses transit is a worrying countervailing trend.
tracker1 11y ago
Expanding on #1, if you already have multiple offices remote/home workers are less of an issue in reality. You already have to make coordination efforts. As long as people show up as available in link/hangouts and respond during regular hours it shouldn't be as much of an issue. In addition to this, you can save a lot of money... paying someone 80% more in SF or NYC, vs letting them stay in Phoenix or Austin and splitting the difference is a great option... you get very senior people for mid-level pay (vs in office). I'd much rather see $150k in Phoenix, than $190-210k in NYC, or $215-240k in SF... especially given Sr. positions in Phoenix tend to cap out around $110-130k. Of course I'd love to keep east coast hours on the west coast ;-)
kitsunesoba 11y ago
A third factor at play that certainly can’t be helping anything is how a handful of companies and individuals own the majority of real estate and use their vast fortunes to snatch up anything new the moment it appears. Ownership should be more diversified.
spiralpolitik 11y ago
You could also approach the problem from the other end. Have the state offer a reduced business tax cut rate for open offices and employing people in underdeveloped cities. Similarly at the other end of scale increase business taxes for companies that insist on expanding in overdeveloped cities. This is common in Europe where business parks are setup in underdeveloped areas to encourage investment from outside. Usually these are coupled with reduced tax deals as it's in the governments interest to have people in the area in work rather than claiming unemployment.

by nilkn 11y ago

seizethecheese 11y ago

> (1) Create compelling reasons for someone to not want to live in a city. For instance, allow one to work remotely. A lot of folks who work remotely prefer the city since it gives them all the amenities that an office usually would like food (restaurants), gyms, cafes and an environment with a lot of people.

nilkn 11y ago
And there are thousands of cities in the world in which they can enjoy all those amenities. (I edited the above quote now to reflect this.)
- seiji 11y ago
  NYC is the only city in the world with a 24 hour subway system every day. Many people enjoy not having a car: especially the very poor (can't afford car anywhere), so NYC is full of very poor; and they very middle (can't afford car in NYC), so NYC is full of very middle and everybody fights for the same resources.
  - tracker1 11y ago
    It's funny, I'm currently looking for a next job, and am talking to a company in Manhattan... One of my thoughts was "damn, I'd have to get rid of my car." :-( Though, I'd absolutely hate driving in that town. The same applies to SF (made the mistake of renting a car there for a business trip, the next one Uber/Lyft was better).
  - ido 11y ago
    It might not have 24/7 subway (i think it's 24h on the weekend and 20h during the week), but I've been living in Berlin for 2 years and have yet to chance upon the situation where I didn't have transit available to get back home (neither me not my wife have a driver's license). Having good transit is really really important. But it doesn't have to be 24/7 for the vast majority of people. In the maybe once per year that I need to go somewhere in 3am on a weekday I can take the night bus or even a taxi.
    - seiji 11y ago
      Yeah, those are good times. SF sucks transit-wise because Caltrain (SF to South Bay) stops at midnight. BART stops around the same time too. Heck, in NYC many events don't even start until 10 pm. Every evening transit trip to SF (if you live in the south bay) results in end-of-day stress of trying to make the last train home if you don't have overnight accommodations. Not to mention the full South Bay route takes 90 minutes (to go 40 miles!), so you leave at midnight SF and arrive at 1:30 am San Jose.
      - ido 11y ago
        Yeah everything stopping at midnight even on the weekends would suck. I guess because of the way you wrote it I thought the literal 24h even on weekdays was your point which seemed pretty odd. I've lived n Vienna and Berlin and in both the subways go till around 1am on weekdays and 24h on weekends, iirc it's about that way in Prague too. I thought this was the type of situation you were comparing it to. Before they started running the subways all night on weekends in Vienna (which I think only started maybe 5 years ago) I would often have to take the night busses on weekend evenings, which would suck cause they only went every half an hour.
ryanSrich 11y ago
San Francisco is not the only city in existence.
Chanel_Bunnell 11y ago
Towns do that too. Pretty much all of them.
tracker1 11y ago
That said, with remote work, you can choose any city. I'd rather live in Boise, Denver or Portland than Seattle, SF or NYC. For reference I'm in Phoenix, and I mainly stay because pay:cost-of-living is better here for developers than most cities. Most of the work is very business centered, but still plenty of options. If there was more remote work that split the difference in pay, and allowed me to work in a slightly smaller city farther north, I'd really prefer that. But the income:living ratio in most of the places with more tech jobs just isn't as good.

chimeracoder 11y ago

> (2) Build more housing units in the city. Eliminate zoning restrictions. Stop worrying about protecting the existing homeowners and pay more attention to everyone else. These three things are not synonymous - or at least, they need not be. For example, New York is building a lot of units. (A lot of them happen to be luxury units which often sit vacant since they are used purely as investment vehicles by foreign entities, but that's a separate problem.) The real issue is that Manhattan is an island, and there's only so much you can cram into 33 square miles (though they're working on squeezing every last cubic inch out of that). They're also, of course, building at an absolutely unbelievable pace in Brooklyn, Queens, and even the Bronx[0]. San Francisco, on the other hand, has been incredibly slow to build more inventory (and also build upwards), compared to the amount that the demand has increased. This may be partly due to zoning issues, but not entirely, and the situation that San Francisco is in is not typical of most cities. Houston is famous for having no zoning code, but New York has a very extensive zoning code[1]. In fact, the market for air rights in New York is quite complicated and fascinating[2]. You can build more housing without scaling back zoning restrictions or removing them entirely; there's just not always enough will to do so in every city. [0] not sure about Staten Island, but... well, let's not talk about that. [1] http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/subcats/zoning.shtml http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/subcats/zoning.shtml [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights

bradleyjg 11y ago
Manhattan has plenty of places where it could get denser. The limits are 1) public transportation -- especially on the East Side and 2) rather silly preservation / zoning rules -- like preserving the character of the East Village which is ugly and not worth saving. The second avenue subway should help somewhat (assuming it's finished before the heat death of the universe) but increasing congestion and the subsequent decay in the quality of buses transit is a worrying countervailing trend.

tracker1 11y ago

Expanding on #1, if you already have multiple offices remote/home workers are less of an issue in reality. You already have to make coordination efforts. As long as people show up as available in link/hangouts and respond during regular hours it shouldn't be as much of an issue. In addition to this, you can save a lot of money... paying someone 80% more in SF or NYC, vs letting them stay in Phoenix or Austin and splitting the difference is a great option... you get very senior people for mid-level pay (vs in office). I'd much rather see $150k in Phoenix, than $190-210k in NYC, or $215-240k in SF... especially given Sr. positions in Phoenix tend to cap out around $110-130k. Of course I'd love to keep east coast hours on the west coast ;-)

kitsunesoba 11y ago

A third factor at play that certainly can’t be helping anything is how a handful of companies and individuals own the majority of real estate and use their vast fortunes to snatch up anything new the moment it appears. Ownership should be more diversified.

spiralpolitik 11y ago

You could also approach the problem from the other end. Have the state offer a reduced business tax cut rate for open offices and employing people in underdeveloped cities. Similarly at the other end of scale increase business taxes for companies that insist on expanding in overdeveloped cities. This is common in Europe where business parks are setup in underdeveloped areas to encourage investment from outside. Usually these are coupled with reduced tax deals as it's in the governments interest to have people in the area in work rather than claiming unemployment.