4 ms·

Surely there are other ways of increasing density than some concrete tower dystopia? I mean, there's this entire movement, 'new urbanism' or whatever you want t

by jabl 5y ago

Surely there are other ways of increasing density than some concrete tower dystopia? I mean, there's this entire movement, 'new urbanism' or whatever you want to call it, which is specifically about creating nice AND decently high density towns and cities. IMHO, the Bay Area is its own kind of dystopia, with low-density 'burbia spreading like a mat over the (previously beautiful, I presume) landscape. Even things like central Santa Clara are quite low density, with wide (very wide!) streets, low houses (typically 1-2 stories) set back far from the streets with ginormous parking lots.

vidarh 5y ago
The mid-point I like to argue for is to default to quite tall, dense buildings allowed in a circle around public transit stations, and tapering off from there. Maybe with some exceptions in areas where it'd really impact the character of the local areas. But e.g. having taken Caltrain from Palo Alto to SF a few times, there is plenty of room for much higher density around several of the stations without losing much of value, and in doing so you'd take a lot of pressure off both the nearby city centres and the less developed land. I live in London and wish for the same here - instead of increasing density in areas that are already high density, pull development out of the centres, surround well connected stations, and use that to justify more services on more suburban stretches of existing rail etc. My favourite example is that highrises going up surrounding my local train station will house as many people on ca. 2,000m^2 of land as my road of 660 houses has space for on ca. 40,000m^2 of land. And the environmental effects of less travel etc. as more of those people can rely on public transit will be enormous. Increasing density around the stations like that will reduce the need for smaller density increases across the board, or eating into greenfield sites.
- nradov 5y ago
  Prior to the pandemic, Caltrain was already at maximum capacity during commute hours. If people are going to return to offices in large numbers then Caltrain needs a major upgrade before we build a lot of housing near stations. On the other hand if remote working continues then there's less reason to locate new housing near transit hubs.
  - vidarh 5y ago
    Caltrain capacity when I used to visit was on the level of a low traffic suburban train line elsewhere. It felt comical from someone used to e.g commuting on London trains. It may well be it needs upgrades to be able to handle more, but even just having the land is a major part of the cost. It's certainly better than depending on trying to dump higher density housing in the middle of neighbourhoods where transport upgrades will require starting from scratch. And if remote working continues, that'd allow far more housing near transport hubs. People will still travel on occasion, for all kinds of reasons. And the second advantage of construction near transport hubs is that it usually means fewer neighbours likely to object. E.g. last time I was at Palo Alto at least, there was no low density housing immediately surrounding the station, and even where there is, there's typically little enough to make buying up the required properties to resolve the issues a lot easier.
    - jabl 5y ago
      If you're seriously going for some major change in land use patterns to increase density, surely you can fit in some public transit expansion as well.
      - vidarh 5y ago
        If you have the budget for that, sure. But upping density can be done fairly cheaply and piecemeal by allowing denser development stage by stage along existing transit and upgrading as necessary. Support for transit expansion becomes a lot easier once there's higher volume of voters who use public transit because they're close to it. Consider that the number of trains per hour for Caltrain today is a joke, and the length of the trains likewise. From a few quick searches it seems much of that is due to lack of electrification, which is apparently in progress. Complete that and you get 30%+ capacity increase without increasing train lengths, and Caltrain trains are about half the length of e.g. London commuter trains. I suspect you'd need signalling upgrades to increase the frequency much, but you probably could more than quadruple Caltrain capacity from current levels with relatively low impact works to the actual lines (finish electrification; extend platforms to handle at least 12 cars; signalling upgrades to handle a few more trains per hour) - most of the cost would be additional trains. That gives a lot of room for additional density along the existing line before you need to justify expensive expansions. But getting support for expansions would probably also be easier if people come to see it as a way of keeping development pressure away from their neighbourhoods and focused on the transit hubs.

by jabl 5y ago

vidarh 5y ago

The mid-point I like to argue for is to default to quite tall, dense buildings allowed in a circle around public transit stations, and tapering off from there. Maybe with some exceptions in areas where it'd really impact the character of the local areas. But e.g. having taken Caltrain from Palo Alto to SF a few times, there is plenty of room for much higher density around several of the stations without losing much of value, and in doing so you'd take a lot of pressure off both the nearby city centres and the less developed land. I live in London and wish for the same here - instead of increasing density in areas that are already high density, pull development out of the centres, surround well connected stations, and use that to justify more services on more suburban stretches of existing rail etc. My favourite example is that highrises going up surrounding my local train station will house as many people on ca. 2,000m^2 of land as my road of 660 houses has space for on ca. 40,000m^2 of land. And the environmental effects of less travel etc. as more of those people can rely on public transit will be enormous. Increasing density around the stations like that will reduce the need for smaller density increases across the board, or eating into greenfield sites.

nradov 5y ago
Prior to the pandemic, Caltrain was already at maximum capacity during commute hours. If people are going to return to offices in large numbers then Caltrain needs a major upgrade before we build a lot of housing near stations. On the other hand if remote working continues then there's less reason to locate new housing near transit hubs.
- vidarh 5y ago
  Caltrain capacity when I used to visit was on the level of a low traffic suburban train line elsewhere. It felt comical from someone used to e.g commuting on London trains. It may well be it needs upgrades to be able to handle more, but even just having the land is a major part of the cost. It's certainly better than depending on trying to dump higher density housing in the middle of neighbourhoods where transport upgrades will require starting from scratch. And if remote working continues, that'd allow far more housing near transport hubs. People will still travel on occasion, for all kinds of reasons. And the second advantage of construction near transport hubs is that it usually means fewer neighbours likely to object. E.g. last time I was at Palo Alto at least, there was no low density housing immediately surrounding the station, and even where there is, there's typically little enough to make buying up the required properties to resolve the issues a lot easier.
  - jabl 5y ago
    If you're seriously going for some major change in land use patterns to increase density, surely you can fit in some public transit expansion as well.
    - vidarh 5y ago
      If you have the budget for that, sure. But upping density can be done fairly cheaply and piecemeal by allowing denser development stage by stage along existing transit and upgrading as necessary. Support for transit expansion becomes a lot easier once there's higher volume of voters who use public transit because they're close to it. Consider that the number of trains per hour for Caltrain today is a joke, and the length of the trains likewise. From a few quick searches it seems much of that is due to lack of electrification, which is apparently in progress. Complete that and you get 30%+ capacity increase without increasing train lengths, and Caltrain trains are about half the length of e.g. London commuter trains. I suspect you'd need signalling upgrades to increase the frequency much, but you probably could more than quadruple Caltrain capacity from current levels with relatively low impact works to the actual lines (finish electrification; extend platforms to handle at least 12 cars; signalling upgrades to handle a few more trains per hour) - most of the cost would be additional trains. That gives a lot of room for additional density along the existing line before you need to justify expensive expansions. But getting support for expansions would probably also be easier if people come to see it as a way of keeping development pressure away from their neighbourhoods and focused on the transit hubs.