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Mountain View approves 10,000 homes by Google's North Bayshore project (2017)
- TaylorGood 9y agoThe elephant in the room wasn’t addressed. There is an affordable living developer involved yet no mention of pricing strategy? That said, hard to imagine it being any different than the highest of comps.
- DuskStar 9y agoBuilding more high income housing still reduces housing costs at the low end. Every person who rents in a new development - even if it's $5000/month - is a person who isn't competing in a lower cost market.
- newnewpdro 9y agoSurelly there's a threshold which must be crossed before the highly paid pool is depleted enough to make such an impact. Edit: To clarify, it's not as if tech companies, especially Google, are going to stop hiring and attracting more highly paid people to the area. 10,000 sounds like a number small enough to be gobbled up pretty quickly by SV tech growth. Not that I'm in favor of turning the bay area into a high density population. A lot of what makes the region so nice to be, especially the peninsula, is the relatively low density. I really wish tech companies would make more of an effort to distribute their workforce and better leverage technology to enable remote work. It's really messing with the demographics, culture, and gender distribution of places like SV. When San Jose is being referred to as Man Jose, you've got a real problem.
- bo-chen 9y agoThe demand curve is continuous so the effect on prices is continuous. There is no threshold effect.
- dredmorbius 9y agoI tend to agree, though it might be interesting to consider dynasmics in which this wouldn't hold. Housing-as-asset-class, with phased new supply and demand stimulation might have opposite effects if the stock substitutes for other investment vehicles. Typical asset bubble.
- briandear 9y agoSupply and demand. If you increase supply, prices overall will go down. “Affordable” or other non-market schemes simply raise the prices for everyone else — including the non rich that don’t win the “affordable” lottery. More market housing everywhere solves the affordability crisis.
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- jartelt 9y agoYes, more housing of any type will help! But, it seems like developers are only building high end housing, which means only units priced at the very top of the market are added. It would be great if developers built normal apartments that do not include every single possible amenity. Not every renter wants to pay a premium for granite countertops, a fancy gym, a pool, bathrooms for every bedroom, etc. I just want a well-built apartment that is within a mile of a caltrain stop, not a $5,000 2 bedroom luxury apartment...
- closeparen 9y agoLook at the price differential between apartments in similar geography that do and don’t have these things. I have not found “luxury” to command a significant premium, particularly since “luxury” buildings are sometimes the only ones offering small units where the older stock is all large. The crappiest old buildings are still exorbitant. The amenities and countertops are practically free next to the cost of the fixed costs of a “well built” building of any kind.
- driverdan 9y agoThat's still a supply problem. So long as there is an artificially limited supply forced by NIMBYs they'll continue to build higher margin housing. If you open it up to allow 10x or even 100x more housing units you'll get ones in every price range.
- MBlume 9y agoIf you passed a law that car manufacturers could only sell 1000 cars per year, you can bet those would be some really fancy, expensive cars. Just let them sell cars and they start doing market segmentation and producing budget cars all on their own. Same with homes.
- salimmadjd 9y ago(Dec 13, 2017) - This is a great start. But I think we really need more like 100,000 new units built. Just to help reverse some of the astronomical housing prices. I have no idea how a teacher would be able to live in SV and plan to have a family and everything else. At this rate, the housing costs are unsustainable. We wont be able to have a functioning city with all the needed staffing like teachers, nurses, sellers, etc. I'm rather disappointed by lack of vision from SV and SV companies in this regard. Apple has enough money that they could buy a huge block of land across the hills in Santa Cruz county. Build a large housing community of 10,000+ and hire the boring company to dig tunnel connecting that community to their new campus. Probably using autonomous electric shuttles. That kind of housing project probably lessens the salary demands and I would imagine the project could not only pay for itself in 5-10 years, but it could also help increase Apple's retention rate.
- moonman272 9y agoIt’s not the industries issue, it’s the NIMBYism that has been at the heart of the Bay Area for decades, especially the peninsula.
- freyr 9y agoDespite the reputation of the Bay Area as a liberal and progressive region, the reality is that almost everyone who “makes it” here quickly changes their tune to “I got mine, now screw you.”
- epistasis 9y agoUnfortunately Scotts Valley and Santa Cruz have anti-housing factions similar to everywhere else in the Bay Area, and the pro-housing faction is in earlier stages of organization than in the Bay Area. Scotts Valley City Council actually had a member say in open meeting that they don't want "those type of people" living there, in reference to renters and presumably others without the means to buy a home. Santa Cruz is similarly non-inclusive, and both are extremely homogenous communities that tend to scare away the typical racial diversity seen in a tech company. Many people of color in tech I've met say they simply don't feel welcome here like they do in the Bay Area. Santa Cruz also has a green belt. But instead of encouraging density and all the environmental benefits of density, the aging political crew that enacted it now prefer sprawl, since they have their single family single story homes that continue to appreciate at astronomical rates. (At least until the homes are bought as tear-downs and replaced with single-family two story homes that extend to all corners of the property to maximize square footage.) But if anybody can change attitudes, it's probably Apple or Google.
- kqr2 9y agoArticle is actually from December 2017.
- zavi 9y agoHow long will it take for people to actually move in?
- teacpde 9y ago... it will likely like take years or even decades to build out the 9,850 units that Mountain View has slated for North Bayshore, depending on market conditions.
- beambot 9y agoThose have to be condos, right? There isn't acreage for 10k single family homes in that area...
- s0rce 9y agoIdeally a mixture of medium and high rise condos and some higher density single family homes, duplexes and town/row houses would be great.
- hkmurakami 9y ago10k in that space has to be midrise condos throughout given that high rises will meet stern neighborhood resistance.
- oh-kumudo 9y agoHow do we know what kind of house is planned?
- rlanday 9y agoOr apartments
- icebraining 9y agoIsn't that the same type of building? I thought an "apartment" in the US was just a rented condo.
- henrikschroder 9y agoThe type of housing is called "apartment", because it's a part of a larger building. A condominium is an apartment that is owned by an individual, who then pays maintenance fees to the condominium association, who in turn manages the building. If you own a condo, you may be allowed to rent it out to someone else. A more common option for rental apartments is that a landlord of some sort (an individual, a corporation, etc) owns an entire building, and rents out all apartments.
- RestlessMind 9y agoI hope they also invest in roads and mass transit. A lot of residents in those 10K new homes will be working outside of North Bayshore. Heck, even if one is working at Google, it could be at any other myriad campuses across Sunnyvale / San Jose / Mt View. There would also be kids, who need to be transported to schools. Without roads and transit improvements, North Bayshore can easily turn into a nightmare.
- andys627 9y agoBuilding roads/auto-dependence will exacerbate said nightmare: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand It's time for a serious change to building around transit, walking, and biking.
- jonursenbach 9y agoThe peninsula isn't really walkable.
- closeparen 9y agoFor it to become walkable, we would have to build buildings close together.
- DrScump 9y agoA lot of residents in those 10K new homes will be working outside of North Bayshore. Yes. And they will all be jamming already-gridlocked Shoreline Blvd. and Amphitheatre Parkway, since US 101 separates them from the rest of civilization.
- closeparen 9y agoAgreed, but >There would also be kids, who need to be transported to schools. We should be building neighborhoods such that kids can walk to school. Even my single-family-home dominated 2.5 square mile "village" could manage that.
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- baron816 9y agoParking would be less of a deal if they built mixed developments, which are more desirable anyway. It’s quite nice being able to walk out of your house and drop right into a coffee shop, bar, or restaurant. Walking to work or school is amazing too. People here seem to be so afraid that their neighborhoods will begin to look more like Dubai or Hong Kong. But clearly what we’re doing now isn’t sustainable, nor is it even that pleasant. Much of SV looks like it did in the 1970s, and you have to sit in a half hour plus of traffic if you want to do anything. I think we would be in pretty good shape if maybe we didn’t go to the extremes, but took a housing model more like Paris, London, or Amsterdam. We can limit heights, but still build dense and create a place people really want to live in.
- stevenwoo 9y agoMountain View has done a decent job on the streets near me on San Antonio with a lot of three-four story apartments/retail going up versus say Palo Alto or Los Altos right next door. The mall going under around the same time helped of course.
- prawn 9y agoOn my first trip to Hong Kong (decades ago, as a teenager) I remember my family stayed in a hotel with a shopping centre on the lower levels. You took an elevator down from your room that literally opened out into a supermarket, food court, department store, etc. I remember thinking it was awesome. Add other facilities within enjoyable walking distance and you're laughing, for those keen to live with that density.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoI don’t see why people think HK is a bad model, sure Kowloon walled City was bad, but modern HK is quite nice. I also got the impression that Dubai wasn’t very walkable, but I’ve never been there.
- dlwdlw 9y agoIt takes time to build up a high density culture. Thicker skin, a bit more aloofness, etc.. many run counter to what is considered "good" in sparser area.
- w1ntermute 9y ago10k is a drop in the bucket. We need blocks of high rises going up around all the Caltrain stops, and a corresponding increase in Caltrain capacity.
- ex3ndr 9y agoFor what? To turn them into ghetto in 10 years? Examples are almost everywhere in the world.
- throwawaybbq1 9y agoBS ... Manhattan is dense and not a ghetto. Stop scare mongering. A lot of people are sick of paying 3-5K for single-two bedrooms in Mountain View. Just because you have had yours doesn't mean the rest of us don't deserve the opportunity to live in SV.
- maksimum 9y agoThere are high rise "settlements" all over the former Eastern Bloc countries, and none of them have become ghettos. It's social inequality, lack of access to good health care, and education that lead to ghettos; not density and public transit.
- adventured 9y agoYour points are sound, however you're simply wrong about Eastern Europe not having high rise ghettos. Bucharest has several that are among the most dangerous urban areas on earth. And Romania is better off than some of the poorer Eastern European nations such as Moldova or Bulgaria.
- richardknop 9y agoFrom Eastern Europe. You are wrong about none of them being ghettos. Plenty of ghettos in Eastern Europe including high rises.
- geezerjay 9y agoThe center of Paris is an extremely dense urban area packed with over7-story appartment buildings.
- Cw67NTN8F 9y agoI wonder if it works: Company buys land to build office but sets apart a certain percentage for employee apartments. In essence a company town. Hires a management co to run it, no buys just lease. When the company folds, downsizes or whatever, the apartments are part of it. It costs, but it's cost of doing business. Otherwise a huge company can distort the home market . Maybe not enough land is available, especially in places like NYC or the city wont let them build 50 stories high apartment buildings?
- kevinburke 9y agoCompanies could certainly do more, but a lot of cities don't really want them to. Cupertino stands out in this regard; they wanted the huge office space but none of the housing for the 14,000 workers the new Apple office would generate.
- nikanj 9y agoMy Microsoft HQ friends tell me Redmond is in the same boat. A lot of millionaires from Microsoft competing for a relatively small supply of homes close to the office, and everyone else commuting for miles and miles.
- bobbyi_settv 9y agoWhen I worked at MS in Redmond, I lived in Seattle and my commute was 25 minutes. I knew people who had houses in Redmond, and their commute was around 5 minutes. This is not "the same boat" as Cuptertino and MV.
- StudentStuff 9y agoMS has moved so much out of Redmond, pushing employees to Downtown Bellevue & opening up a satellite office in Vancouver, BC. Its quite a change from just a decade ago, but apparently talent retention is better in Bellevue than out in the hinterlands of Redmond. Then again, I don't think I'll ever take a job or live on the Eastside, perpetually trapped in my car!
- bamboozled 9y agoNo mention of high density apartment blocks. I find the fascination with urban sprawl in California really unusual. Maybe I'm missing something but why not built up instead of out and focus on better transport etc?
- epistasis 9y agoThough there are many that agree with you, all it takes is a small minority to completely block development. And if it's not completely blocked, it can be delayed with enough changes of plans to significantly increase building costs. Why cause such problems for others? There are some people, even in this thread, that view the existence of such options as threats against their way of life. See for example the quotes in this opinion column about a San Francisco project in its 26th (!) public meeting: https://www.thebaycitybeacon.com/politics/a-housing-crisis-case-study-the-th-balboa-reservoir-project/article_2078c688-1609-11e8-8073-539d11304f08.html https://www.thebaycitybeacon.com/politics/a-housing-crisis-c...
- debt 9y agoThe housing crisis in the Bay Area will never be fixed at this rate.
- jcriddle4 9y ago"....a culmination of more than six years of planning and nearly three years of public meetings....". Now why would you say that? /S
- dolguldur 9y agoI fail to connect the renderings shown in the article to 10,000 homes. There's no way 10,000 units fit into this building. Why are they so obsessed with building low?
- austincheney 9y ago60,000 per year - https://qz.com/1189388/conservative-californians-are-moving-to-texas-for-the-home-prices-and-politics/ https://qz.com/1189388/conservative-californians-are-moving-... The bad part about that is that if the valley already seems like an extreme mono-culture a mass exodus certainly won't help.
- russellbeattie 9y agoEvery time they mass-build housing, the results are horrible. The quality of the homes is always "transitional". In Europe or even New York, you can rent flats which are large enough for a family and constructed to give you a sense of privacy, even with density. Floors and ceilings and walls are solid enough you barely notice you're sharing the building. Shops are always close by, as well as public transport and schools. California high-occupancy buildings are always in the middle of nowhere, made on the cheap, meant to last years - not decades - and aimed at single 20 somethings without any thought to the long term or general community. If you can't buy a bottle of milk and some bread without getting into a car, you're doing it wrong. I grew up in and around Boston, where three family homes and corner groceries were the norm, schools were in the neighborhood and the T could get you just about anywhere. I remember seeing Karate Kid when I was young and boggled at the apartment he lived in (with the empty pool and all the doors facing in like a motel) and couldn't imagine that was a real apartment building, but even 30 years later, they're still everywhere in California, and newer versions aren't much better. Apartments are for collecting poor people and built as such, and suburbia everywhere else.
- albertgoeswoof 9y agoNot sure that's true about Europe, most mass-built housing globally suffers from the same issues.
- russellbeattie 9y agoI have to admit that when I say "Europe", I'm talking about Spain where I lived for 4 years, and a few other countries I've visited over the years. My son's family in Spain bought into the real estate boom and the flat they eventually got in a new highrise is actually great and just like I described. It's smallish by American standards, of course, but not insanely so. And you can't hear anyone else. It's a real home.
- shady-lady 9y ago> In Europe or even New York, you can rent flats which are large enough for a family and constructed to give you a sense of privacy, even with density Not in Ireland. The last housing boom (late 90s/early 00s) gave us poor quality apartment blocks along with deficient building control regulations which in essence allowed developers to self-certify. Which leads me to agree with your statements: "Every time they mass-build housing, the results are horrible" & "aimed at single 20 somethings without any thought to the long term or general community" Made horrible as: 1) plenty of work so sub standard builders get away with it. 2) plenty of work so jobs are rushed 3) far left shouting for loads of (mainly free) housing to b e built right now. 4) plenty of work that any and all officials rush through decision making/inspection so that they don't have get chewed out of it. Even with good facilities around and location being very walkable, nothing can compensate for not having a nice peaceful place to lay your head.
- fishbone 9y agoSlightly off topic, are there any good books on urban planning? It’s a topic I want to educate myself more on.
- ghaff 9y agoYou might take a look at the OpenCourseware for the MIT Urban Studies and planning department: https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/urban-studies-and-planning/ https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/urban-studies-and-planning/ A classic is Jane Jacobs' The Death and Life of Great American Cities. There was a fairly recent documentary on her as well. This book is a bit of a Rorschach test though. People who rail against cars highlight her opposition to Robert Moses' highways. But opponents to large-scale high-rise construction highlight her general opposition to urban renewal projects.
- fishbone 9y agoThank you for the suggestions
- luka-birsa 9y agoHaving lived in the valley a couple times for months-long stints I never quite understood how the Valley doesn't get how cities should be built. I live in Ljubljana (https://www.google.si/maps/place/Ljubljana/ https://www.google.si/maps/place/Ljubljana/, ~300k), a capital of a tiny nation of Slovenia. I live in the city center and have in 5 minutes on foot radius (50m): multiple grocery stores, schools, kindergartens, parks, market, cafes, restaurants... In the valley, it's impossible to live without a car. Just getting a freaking coffee usually includes a ride. ATM = ride, burger = ride, ... You guys spend hours in your car just to get the basics done. I actually didn't know what to do in Palo Alto until I got a rental. And SF ain't any better. Sure there are parts of the city that are actually similar to what you would expect in a normal, livable European city, but most of it is not really. And you still need a car to move across town. I find east coast much better - Boston is quite walkable and New York even more so. Can anyone explain to me why do you have this shitty setup in the valley? Feels so random that it must be some kind-of wierd policy enforcement that caused this.
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