4 ms·

There would be 3-4X the people, yet still the same amount of roads, services, and public utilities. Why is densifying always seen as some unalloyed good? I cons

There would be 3-4X the people, yet still the same amount of roads, services, and public utilities. Why is densifying always seen as some unalloyed good? I constantly see this pitched as a plan for housing problems without the basic consideration of whether human beings thrive in such an unnatural environment. If you're going to force-densify anything, why not actual low-per-capita population areas [0] and develop mass transit, so North America can have the successful China city-tier model [1] with spread-out opportunities instead of cramming everyone together in one place. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_population_map.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:California_population_map... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_city_tier_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_city_tier_system

m-ee 2y ago
Public schools are closing due to lack of enrollment. Transit agencies are cutting back from low ridership and lack of fare revenue. If housing costs were low enough for more people to move in affordably it could be a boon for the city.
- adamiscool8 2y ago
  Maybe a boon for the city, but is definitively a boon for the people? Or could they be better served by building up another nearby town and connecting it?
  - rangestransform 2y ago
    There are also a lot of nearby towns already connected by somewhat frequent rail service that could also do well to densify
- what 2y ago
  Public schools are closing because of DILDOs (dual income, little dog owners). If people aren’t having children, there’s no need for the schools.
  - slater 2y ago
    Not because their budgets are being slashed every year?
    - what 2y ago
      Why wouldn’t you slash the budgets when enrollment is decreasing? And when you expect a 15% decrease in enrollment over the next 10 years?
      - slater 2y ago
        Chicken, egg?
legitster 2y ago
I would not say that dense city living is not without its downsides. But if people need to work in these cities, they may as well get to live closer. And if you are already living in an apartment, it's not that much different to live in a 6 story apartment building vs a 4 story one. > There would be 3-4X the people, yet still the same amount of roads, services, and public utilities. That's the point! Per capita, it should be cheaper to live in cities because infrastructure goes so much further. And if you are arguing for better mass transit, you will have to build many, many more miles if you also want to encourage people to sprawl. Although I think the strongest case for allowing cities to get dense is it allows greenbelts and less dense areas closer to the city. You can build a big dense city UP and make it easier for people to get out and enjoy nature and farms and etc. Or you can build a city OUT and then it's just desolate city for hours around.
- adamiscool8 2y ago
  Is it cheaper because the infrastructure is going farther, or because every individual is getting less and less of an overburdened commons? If you build out instead and everyone gets the SFH white-picket-fence life, the escape to nature is suddenly less important. Even if it's more expensive to connect, in the process we develop ample capacity in the commons. Maybe it's just not possible with so much cost focus and so many competing incentives in the West. And no superseding body who can make it happen like China. Converting 4-story to 6-story isn't really what I see pitched either, it's generally rezoning SFH/2/4-plex to 6-story+ with subsidies, which is really a huge remaking of neighborhoods.
  - llm_trw 2y ago
    The only reason why suburbia is possible is because it is _heavily_ subsidized. If you had to pay the real bill for road maintenance alone suburbs would no longer be viable. So the suburbs take from the commons and don't give back in your example.
    - adamiscool8 2y ago
      Would be interested in reading more about this claim, but it is not true for my suburb which raises plenty in development fees and property tax. Looking at a random SF suburb, "Pleasanton" [0] - it looks like 72% of their budget is funded through taxes and only ~7% is transfer payments. [0] https://www.cityofpleasantonca.gov/assets/our-government/finance-department/financial-reports/pafr-6-30-24.pdf https://www.cityofpleasantonca.gov/assets/our-government/fin...
FredPret 2y ago
I enjoy both low and high density living. The argument in favour of density is that if you increase density, then you also decrease the average distance that people have to travel until they get somewhere interesting, like a job or a shop. Vehicle-delivered utilities like garbage collection, package deliveries, and mass transit get more efficient, and the same goes for tunnel-delivered utilities like fiber internet and water. San Francisco is economically one of the world's most impactful cities; it'd be good for all of us if there was more of it. You get all sorts of interesting multiplier effects when you put lots of a certain kind of person in one place. - all the theater kids in one town: LA - all the bankers: NYC, London - all the computer people: SF
- adamiscool8 2y ago
  Granted there are economic efficiencies. But I'm not convinced the fully expanded multipliers from one Super SF with 4X the density - turning it into somewhere like Manila - would be better across all metrics (economic and human) than fostering four easily interconnected mini-SFs.
TylerE 2y ago
Have you actually checked on those Chinese cities to see how they’re doing? Many are literal vacant ghost towns because it turns out people don’t want to live in the middle of nowhere.
- adamiscool8 2y ago
  Not saying those don't exist but China also has like 50 tier-3 cities significantly larger than SF. And for the most part, really great transit between them.
pchristensen 2y ago
It is currently being force "low-densified" by restrictions. If those restrictions and force were removed, it would densify itself due to market demands. It would be much, much less forced than the current paradigm.
protocolture 2y ago
Mass transit isnt a silver bullet either. Here in Brisbane, they standardized around a narrow gauge designed to pull cart loads of timber down mountains. They duplicate it where they can, but effectively its a city of technical debt. Theres a maximum size of train we are already at, and a maximum number of trains per minute we can sustain. So we have a decent mass transit system but its not far from peak capacity, and most of what the government has been doing is hacking around that. Trammish busses, cross river rail etc. So we need to attack the issue from the other side too. We have a weirdly non dense central region, largely due to single issue anti development voters, who dont want apartment buildings right where they should be (on top of mass transit hubs). Instead the inner suburbs are littered with 1950s character homes, battleaxed once for massive profit. We can take significant load off of a system close to a decade from collapse by simply removing outdated zoning. And the way the council here operates, utilities and road upgrades necessitated by development are borne by the property developer. So there's really near zero cost in approaching things this way. And they have also used priority approvals, where if a certain amount of floor space of a development is earmarked for light commercial, they can cut a few years off approval time. So theres absolutely no reason not to, as the big residential buildings grow, they grow their own services and utilities.

m-ee 2y ago

Public schools are closing due to lack of enrollment. Transit agencies are cutting back from low ridership and lack of fare revenue. If housing costs were low enough for more people to move in affordably it could be a boon for the city.

adamiscool8 2y ago
Maybe a boon for the city, but is definitively a boon for the people? Or could they be better served by building up another nearby town and connecting it?
- rangestransform 2y ago
  There are also a lot of nearby towns already connected by somewhat frequent rail service that could also do well to densify
what 2y ago
Public schools are closing because of DILDOs (dual income, little dog owners). If people aren’t having children, there’s no need for the schools.
- slater 2y ago
  Not because their budgets are being slashed every year?
  - what 2y ago
    Why wouldn’t you slash the budgets when enrollment is decreasing? And when you expect a 15% decrease in enrollment over the next 10 years?
    - slater 2y ago
      Chicken, egg?

legitster 2y ago

I would not say that dense city living is not without its downsides. But if people need to work in these cities, they may as well get to live closer. And if you are already living in an apartment, it's not that much different to live in a 6 story apartment building vs a 4 story one. > There would be 3-4X the people, yet still the same amount of roads, services, and public utilities. That's the point! Per capita, it should be cheaper to live in cities because infrastructure goes so much further. And if you are arguing for better mass transit, you will have to build many, many more miles if you also want to encourage people to sprawl. Although I think the strongest case for allowing cities to get dense is it allows greenbelts and less dense areas closer to the city. You can build a big dense city UP and make it easier for people to get out and enjoy nature and farms and etc. Or you can build a city OUT and then it's just desolate city for hours around.

adamiscool8 2y ago
Is it cheaper because the infrastructure is going farther, or because every individual is getting less and less of an overburdened commons? If you build out instead and everyone gets the SFH white-picket-fence life, the escape to nature is suddenly less important. Even if it's more expensive to connect, in the process we develop ample capacity in the commons. Maybe it's just not possible with so much cost focus and so many competing incentives in the West. And no superseding body who can make it happen like China. Converting 4-story to 6-story isn't really what I see pitched either, it's generally rezoning SFH/2/4-plex to 6-story+ with subsidies, which is really a huge remaking of neighborhoods.
- llm_trw 2y ago
  The only reason why suburbia is possible is because it is _heavily_ subsidized. If you had to pay the real bill for road maintenance alone suburbs would no longer be viable. So the suburbs take from the commons and don't give back in your example.
  - adamiscool8 2y ago
    Would be interested in reading more about this claim, but it is not true for my suburb which raises plenty in development fees and property tax. Looking at a random SF suburb, "Pleasanton" [0] - it looks like 72% of their budget is funded through taxes and only ~7% is transfer payments. [0] https://www.cityofpleasantonca.gov/assets/our-government/finance-department/financial-reports/pafr-6-30-24.pdf https://www.cityofpleasantonca.gov/assets/our-government/fin...

FredPret 2y ago

I enjoy both low and high density living. The argument in favour of density is that if you increase density, then you also decrease the average distance that people have to travel until they get somewhere interesting, like a job or a shop. Vehicle-delivered utilities like garbage collection, package deliveries, and mass transit get more efficient, and the same goes for tunnel-delivered utilities like fiber internet and water. San Francisco is economically one of the world's most impactful cities; it'd be good for all of us if there was more of it. You get all sorts of interesting multiplier effects when you put lots of a certain kind of person in one place. - all the theater kids in one town: LA - all the bankers: NYC, London - all the computer people: SF

adamiscool8 2y ago
Granted there are economic efficiencies. But I'm not convinced the fully expanded multipliers from one Super SF with 4X the density - turning it into somewhere like Manila - would be better across all metrics (economic and human) than fostering four easily interconnected mini-SFs.

TylerE 2y ago

Have you actually checked on those Chinese cities to see how they’re doing? Many are literal vacant ghost towns because it turns out people don’t want to live in the middle of nowhere.

adamiscool8 2y ago
Not saying those don't exist but China also has like 50 tier-3 cities significantly larger than SF. And for the most part, really great transit between them.

pchristensen 2y ago

It is currently being force "low-densified" by restrictions. If those restrictions and force were removed, it would densify itself due to market demands. It would be much, much less forced than the current paradigm.

protocolture 2y ago

Mass transit isnt a silver bullet either. Here in Brisbane, they standardized around a narrow gauge designed to pull cart loads of timber down mountains. They duplicate it where they can, but effectively its a city of technical debt. Theres a maximum size of train we are already at, and a maximum number of trains per minute we can sustain. So we have a decent mass transit system but its not far from peak capacity, and most of what the government has been doing is hacking around that. Trammish busses, cross river rail etc. So we need to attack the issue from the other side too. We have a weirdly non dense central region, largely due to single issue anti development voters, who dont want apartment buildings right where they should be (on top of mass transit hubs). Instead the inner suburbs are littered with 1950s character homes, battleaxed once for massive profit. We can take significant load off of a system close to a decade from collapse by simply removing outdated zoning. And the way the council here operates, utilities and road upgrades necessitated by development are borne by the property developer. So there's really near zero cost in approaching things this way. And they have also used priority approvals, where if a certain amount of floor space of a development is earmarked for light commercial, they can cut a few years off approval time. So theres absolutely no reason not to, as the big residential buildings grow, they grow their own services and utilities.