4 ms·
> And the best way to fix Bart overcrowding is to build apartments near where people work so they don't HAVE to commute. Why not build businesses where people
by _pmf_ 9y ago
> And the best way to fix Bart overcrowding is to build apartments near where people work so they don't HAVE to commute.
Why not build businesses where people live? Apple can spend 5 billion on its new campus in the middle of nowhere, but the public has to shoulder the cost for transit. 90 percent of Google's and Apple's domestic workforce could probably do at least 70 percent of their work from home. Apple prides itself on renewable energy usage, but it's perfectly OK for its employees to spend 3 hours idling in traffic?
- WalterBright 9y agoApple should have build a couple apartment towers next to it.
- bluedino 9y agoThen you'd have a bunch of millionaires in a price war to live right next to work
- stale2002 9y agoWhy is that a problem? For every millionaire that is price waring over NEW Apartments is one less millionaire that is gentrifying and kicking out a family living in the mission.
- wbl 9y agoCupertino didn't let them.
- WalterBright 9y agoApple has enormous influence, and Jobs was a very good salesman. Maybe Apple didn't try very hard.
- astrange 9y agoCupertino voted down the attempt to replace Vallco with mixed-use because it might increase traffic. They’d rather have the corpse of a mall than anything apparently.
- lmm 9y agoIf you want to build a big new campus it pretty much has to be in the middle of nowhere, because people tend not to like you bulldozing a chunk of city. They could build their own housing but people tend not to like the "company town", and for good reason. Fixed-line transit is pretty much impossible to build without eminent domain powers; I'm sure the tech companies would be happy to contribute to building a line but they would need cooperation from the government. Meanwhile they do run their own bus services because that's the only form of transit that a private company can realistically operate, and people complain about those too. Planned development areas where you get a bunch of housing, businessplaces and transit built in the same place can work really well. But they need coordination and collaboration from the public side; there's only so much one business can do on its own.
- stale2002 9y agoIf the city allowed Apple or whoever to build a whole bunch of skyscrapers in the middle of Soma SF, then I can assure you that the companies would Love to do that. I agree. Density should be the focuses. And zoning laws should be changed so BOTH companies and residential apartment companies are allowed to build more densely.