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I love what you're doing, so let me tell you what's holding me back from jumping on board. Traffic. You want more housing, but that almost always means more c

I love what you're doing, so let me tell you what's holding me back from jumping on board. Traffic. You want more housing, but that almost always means more cars - and how do you handle that? But it's more than just traffic - broadly speaking it's the principle of Chesterton's fence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton#Chesterton.27s_fence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton#Chesterton.27...). Before making rapid changes, let's understand why the status quo is the status quo. The reason I can't support YIMBY is because it comes off as too much like reverse stupidity - let's just do the opposite of those nasty NIMBY's and then things will be all right! That never works. As for your claims about Berkeley, I've been frequenting Berkeley since 2014 and I've witnessed a pretty significant amount of construction on Shattuck - and I'm left wondering - how on earth are the roads going to accommodate the massive increase in traffic? One thing people should consider is banning automobile ownership for residents of new buildings. That would address the concerns of critics like myself and lead to a whole lot less opposition to new construction. Plus, it would create stronger demand for public transportation and car-sharing - both of which are conducive to the goal of greater density. And honestly, a lot of tech-savvy millennials don't even want to own a car.

dgacmu 9y ago
Traffic is an important concern. If it doesn't take proposition 13 into account, it's probably not going to be as effective as it should. Prop 13 creates too many financial incentives not to relocate to be near your job -- part of the reason that California has become a commute nightmare [0]. It also creates too strong an incentive to hang on to empty property and not improve it. [1] That said, increasing the housing density in some of those currently-suburban areas (around Google, Apple, and Facebook, for example) could help them transform into more viable urban areas, without an increase in car traffic. [0] http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/files/2008-19151-1.pdf http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/files/2008-19151-1.p... " observed changes in commuting patterns in major metropolitan areas in California support that hypothesis. In particular, between 1980 and 1990, the number of workers in San Diego, San Francisco, and Los Angeles who commute outside the metropolitan statistical area to work increased 119 percent, 88 percent, and 80 percent, respectively. That is well above the growth in the number of similar commuters in other metropolitan areas across the nation, which generally ranged from 25 percent to 45 percent." [1] http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/09/22/california_s_proposition_13_is_bad_policy_and_here_are_some_graphs_to_show.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/09/22/california_s_...

dgacmu 9y ago

Traffic is an important concern. If it doesn't take proposition 13 into account, it's probably not going to be as effective as it should. Prop 13 creates too many financial incentives not to relocate to be near your job -- part of the reason that California has become a commute nightmare [0]. It also creates too strong an incentive to hang on to empty property and not improve it. [1] That said, increasing the housing density in some of those currently-suburban areas (around Google, Apple, and Facebook, for example) could help them transform into more viable urban areas, without an increase in car traffic. [0] http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/files/2008-19151-1.pdf http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/files/2008-19151-1.p... " observed changes in commuting patterns in major metropolitan areas in California support that hypothesis. In particular, between 1980 and 1990, the number of workers in San Diego, San Francisco, and Los Angeles who commute outside the metropolitan statistical area to work increased 119 percent, 88 percent, and 80 percent, respectively. That is well above the growth in the number of similar commuters in other metropolitan areas across the nation, which generally ranged from 25 percent to 45 percent." [1] http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/09/22/california_s_proposition_13_is_bad_policy_and_here_are_some_graphs_to_show.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/09/22/california_s_...