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Hi rainier - but what about my comment above? Austin City Region is 271.8 square miles. SF is 47. My question is, how much of that growth in austin occurred

by geebee 10y ago

Hi rainier - but what about my comment above? Austin City Region is 271.8 square miles. SF is 47. My question is, how much of that growth in austin occurred in the regions of Austin, TX that were at or above SF's average density of 18,000 per square mile for the last 75 years. Or even half that? If we're going to say SF is uniquely against growth, wouldn't you need to compare it to something comparable? There's a big difference between expanding into "empty" space and tearing down a neighborhood that has had a medium to high stable density for the last 75-100 years.

rayiner 10y ago
Austin isn't expanding into "empty space." It's going from low density to medium density, but that poses the same problem of tearing down and densifying existing neighborhoods. DC is maybe a better example. It was already pretty dense (over 10,000 per square mile), and fully developed. Most of the development has been tearing down townhouses and building 10-14 story mid-rise buildings. Indeed, places that were already dense (Chinatown) have seen much of the new development.
- geebee 10y ago
  I'm still not sure I agree about Austin. Going from low to medium density by Austin outskirts standard may just be too different from going from 15,000 residents mi to 30,000+ to say it poses the same problem within the context of understanding political opposition. If we're going to say that SF residents are uniquely politically opposed to growth, we'd need something at least reasonably comparable. Pointing out that people haven't objected on the outskirts of Austin suggests to me that people have different political reactions to different things. Your DC example is fairly compelling, though. DC (according to wikipedia) has density of about 11,000 on a land area of 68 sq mi. That's close enough for useful analogies. We're looking at 17% growth in the last 15 years within that region (any links for that?) I'll try to find some data for SF, but do you have a comparable link for increase in residential units in SF in that time? Keep in mind also that SF experienced a massive slowdown in construction after the housing bust, that may now be ramping up. So you do need to make sure you aren't measuring and projecting velocity without considering acceleration.
  - wott 10y ago
    DC is just catching up from the huge losses it experienced in the previous years. In such a case, it's easy to re-increase the population. SF is different, population had been growing for 20 years already before the boom happened. Before that, the days of losses were much older than for DC, and the losses were not as big, so the available 'free' population growth margin was much smaller.

by geebee 10y ago

rayiner 10y ago

Austin isn't expanding into "empty space." It's going from low density to medium density, but that poses the same problem of tearing down and densifying existing neighborhoods. DC is maybe a better example. It was already pretty dense (over 10,000 per square mile), and fully developed. Most of the development has been tearing down townhouses and building 10-14 story mid-rise buildings. Indeed, places that were already dense (Chinatown) have seen much of the new development.

geebee 10y ago
I'm still not sure I agree about Austin. Going from low to medium density by Austin outskirts standard may just be too different from going from 15,000 residents mi to 30,000+ to say it poses the same problem within the context of understanding political opposition. If we're going to say that SF residents are uniquely politically opposed to growth, we'd need something at least reasonably comparable. Pointing out that people haven't objected on the outskirts of Austin suggests to me that people have different political reactions to different things. Your DC example is fairly compelling, though. DC (according to wikipedia) has density of about 11,000 on a land area of 68 sq mi. That's close enough for useful analogies. We're looking at 17% growth in the last 15 years within that region (any links for that?) I'll try to find some data for SF, but do you have a comparable link for increase in residential units in SF in that time? Keep in mind also that SF experienced a massive slowdown in construction after the housing bust, that may now be ramping up. So you do need to make sure you aren't measuring and projecting velocity without considering acceleration.
- wott 10y ago
  DC is just catching up from the huge losses it experienced in the previous years. In such a case, it's easy to re-increase the population. SF is different, population had been growing for 20 years already before the boom happened. Before that, the days of losses were much older than for DC, and the losses were not as big, so the available 'free' population growth margin was much smaller.