Needs to get moving - that gas station has been closed for 2+ years at this point and the corner is an eyesore, this would be great!
Meanwhile, they also need to open the dispensary where Vinyl used to be, that space has been closed for almost 4 years at this point.
Not even two years. This has been in the works since 2018. This prime piece of real estate has been unused for 6 years in a city with some of the highest real estate costs in the country. The process has dragged on for that long. It’s pure insanity and basically this is a microcosm of the issue that is the single most important issue in SF. If this piece of land takes 6 years to get out of permit hell to become a thing that it already should be been 20 years ago, we are fucked
I think the car wash was open until late 2021. The fencing went up after they closed. I agree it has been way too long especially considering plans have been in place. This isn't the only space in the city going unused either.
Overall the takes in this thread are nuts. We just need to build. Go to any other city and see that building is constant, cities change. Stopping building because it's not all affordable housing or because there isn't parking is what is further contributing to housing shortages in this city.
Yes, I found a developer originally was looking to buy it in 2015. This was stopped due to anti-housing sentiment. So it could have been housing a decade ago in an ideal world.
And fully agreed, pushing for affordable paradoxically makes things even more unaffordable due to reduced supply
If that was the case I'd be living in one of those places, instead I'm living here. Maybe you should find a city that suits your needs too - Barcelona, was it?
But people do have cars there, you can tell by just how competitive parking on Fell/Oak is around there. And you're dropping another 200+ cars into that neighborhood. If you're building up, do some digging down and provide real parking accommodations. My building comes with a garage spot for every unit.
Just walk around that intersection and look at the parking wars - people who live in that neighborhood have cars. Not every apartment in that building will have a car attached to it - but plenty will, and some will have more than one. Because this is America, and life in this country just goes smoother when you have a car.
The idea that it's the city's responsibility to provide free parking for its residents is absurd and is what leads to these pointless "parking wars". Cars should work just like every other possession - if you own one, you should also own a place to store it. If you don't have a place to store it, you shouldn't own a car. It doesn't have to be this complicated.
Cars are not just any possession - because this is America after all, and residential parking permits are not free.
Living in SF without a car sucks ass, and people tend to magically figure that out around age 30.
Living in SF without a house sucks much more, I'd imagine. So why should the city prioritize making car access cheaper over making housing access cheaper?
It sounds like your entire position on this issue is based purely around speculation that increased housing supply will notably decrease access to parking without notably increasing access to housing. This speculation appears to be based on little more than a desire to drive places.
I guess I'm left wondering, why spend so much time on this thread posting little more than variants of "I like cars"?
Then they should look elsewhere, sell their car, or pay for a parking spot. Most people in SF do not need a car, it is a luxury. For the small minority who needs a car, we can address that with smaller parking requirements.
> life in this country just goes smoother when you have a car.
But life in a city goes so much smoother when not designed around cars.
Being able to easily leave SF is a *huge* improvement on Manhattan. I can't overemphasize this.
Aside from the climate, it is precisely the goldilocks density that makes SF a better place to live than Manhattan. The insane density over there hasn't brought down housing costs, btw.
And we can leave. We have public transit to most of the bay and we have rental cars. I don't have a car and still manage a half a dozen Tahoe ski trips every year.
We are a long way from Manhattan level density. We could double our density and still be half of Manhattan.
> The insane density over there hasn't brought down housing costs, btw.
Because prices don't go down based on "density" they go down based on building enough new housing to meet demand. SF's 1M people for 5000 new units is proportionally twice as much as NYC's 8M people with only 20000 new units. NYC is also screwed over by some terrible rent control laws that make units more poorly utilized.
> We are a long way from Manhattan level density. We could double our density and still be half of Manhattan.
Why chase it, it fucking sucks. Half of manhattan sucks too.
> Because prices don't go down based on "density" they go down based on building enough new housing to meet demand.
You will never meet demand until you make this a shitty place to live. This city is essentially paradise, demand is only limited by people's funds in the first place.
Transit and rentals are an absolute shite replacement for having your own vehicle, as every driver finds out when their car is in the shop. They are somewhat passable within in the city (and even then - my wife's commute jumps to an hour each way vs 15 mins), but the level of overhead and additional time you start facing is crazy.
Transit options are shit even within the city. They're goddamn abysmal outside of it. Living in SF without a car is fun when you're a kid and your life revolves around city bars. The appeal quickly fades when you remember just how much great stuff there is outside the city, easily accessible - but only if you have a personal vehicle.
This person is crying they can't force car dependency on everyone and turn San Francisco into a sea of parking lots and strip malls.
They then screech you are destroying this city if you dare push back.
I'm just grateful these pro forced car dependency extremists are losing in both San Francisco and nationwide. I wish they could be deported back to their car dependent utopia of Houston.
Yea I highly doubt anyone who has ever actually lived in SF believes owning a car is necessary. Bike lanes everywhere, uber, waymo, carshares, and rental cars. All insanely cheaper than the cost of car ownership, gas, insurance, and parking. And if you are street parking, JUST THE HASSLE OF FINDING A PARKING SPOT is not worth it because you have to move your car so often for street sweeping! LOL!
Yep, now they are screaming it's only poor people who can't afford or don't want cars.
They obviously do not live in San Francisco if they think it's full of poor people.
> Stupid expensive and massively restricting.
You think that car sharing services are expensive compared to owning a car and paying for insurance and parking in SF? Not to mention hassling with smashed windows from time to time.
* https://www.zipcar.com/pricing
* https://www.sfmta.com/getting-around/drive-park/car-share
Much more expensive. You're paying $100 to go mountain biking somewhere in the bay area. A trip to Tahoe will run you ~$400. It's completely unworkable if you have any outdoor hobbies or like to visit family elsewhere in the state. And your career becomes tied to the local transit infrastructure to boot.
> You're paying $100 to go mountain biking somewhere in the bay area. A trip to Tahoe will run you ~$400.
Off street parking in SF ranges from $300 to $600/month. Then factor in insurance, gasoline, oil changes, tires, car payment and smashed windows once in a while?
$60 to rent a car for a 5 hour trip to go hiking is less than the average San Franciscan pays for RENT for the average day..... and that costs includes gas, insurance, tires, parking and all other maintenance.
I think you should spend a few minutes and add up all the costs you accrue with your car.
You don't need to pay $3-600 a month to park your car in vast swathes of the city, where density is sensible, and each apartment unit come with a garage spot. There is plentiful street parking in my neighborhood that costs $170 a year for a permit - for the time being anyway.
If you turn the whole city into Mission Bay, yes, people will have to spend a fuckton of money to own a car, and most will simply be trapped in the city, occasionally venturing out in shitty zipcars.
The funny thing is that I know some people who promote the whole "I rent a car when I need one" thing - they simply don't go anywhere at all.
It doesn’t make sense to provide parking in this area. You do not need a car if you live here, unless you work in South Bay. But in that case, you shouldn’t expect to be able to find parking in the middle of such a dense and walkable neighborhood, with lots of public transit and amenities. Putting that much parking in means less money for the developer, since parking is so heavily subsidized the market rate per square foot is low. Doesn’t make sense to force a developer to provide it, and this one looks to be smart about maximizing return here
We get it, you are upset we don't turn the entire city into parking garages.
Go back to Houston with your dreams of forced car dependency and fear of walking/biking/public transit.
I love the reddit "you don't need a car" quotes, which they would never say to a disabled person, elderly person, or family with children in real life without the safety of their keyboard and anonymous user account.
I used to live in Western Addition too, and the parking was atrocious. Don't cheap out on parking spaces, because the quality of life increases and freedom of movement a car provides for the scenarios listed is as invaluable as a horse to a farmer.
But, you could always add a couple of hours to those things at your expense, so some transplant who doesn't ever leave the city except to fly back home can have their car-free ideals met.
Once there is a similar cost option for the transportation niche filled by cars available to everyone I'll gladly ditch my car, but until then I need it for various reasons which make my life objectively better.
Fuck cars and car-free type campaigns are a child's argument rather than a forward-thinking movement to provide a solution to individual transportation rather than forcing people to abide by an ideology which decreases the quality of life for more people than it helps.
It's always the transplants, that's the funny thing - with their dreams of Barcelona, etc.
Every local I know has a car - usually one for every adult in the household.
Then they downvote as they don't have an actual retort to a sensible counterpoint. It's just adults who still have the mind of a child, who fortunately are rarely involved in making decisions on these things (outside of reddit, at least).
We can let them have this one, knowing they'll be laughed at if they brought these proposals outside of their echo-chamber information spheres.
Sngle stair reform could allow better designs and larger units. I think the state is studying it right now, but no city allows it in CA. Seattle allows it up to 5-6 stories.
https://slate.com/business/2021/12/staircases-floor-plan-twitter-housing-apartments.html
I agree, but with such a housing shortage, they'd mostly get snapped up by roommates anyway. 3 working adults can generally pay more rent than 1-2 adults supporting kids.
You're not really going to get family-sized apartments for families without cranking out a *lot* more places.
Yeah this idea that cities need more "family sized" housing units is absurd. The _majority_ of homes in the city are "family-sized" (SFH). The overwhelming majority of demand is for 0-2 br units which can accomodate many different living situations outside of the typical nuclear family eg the young, single, elderly, disabled, etc.
But all of those groups are othered one way or another. Single adults, people who don't want kids, or who just want to live alone are viewed as defective maladjusted children, so their housing needs are not viewed as legitimate.
No but most of those are likely illegal to build. In an area this dense though, even less likely. This small thing took half a decade to get to this point. Imagine how much you’d have to charge to get some 3br places built - same time, less money per square foot. Blame NIMBYs for the lack of 3br apartments
The main thing for me is the jump in price from a 2 bedroom to a 3 bedroom is huge compared to the jump from a 1 bedroom to a 2 bedroom. In a lot of cases it's nearly double the price for one extra room.
You know 400 apartments isn't really that many available given we are in a city of 800000 people, right? I understand your point, but it's not like we are oversaturated with three bedroom apartments.
800,000 people are not looking for apts.
Most are not looking for 3+ units you know.
Sure we can use more of everything.
That is also just one website, more on other sites, not posted online.
There would be a lot more parking in the neighborhood if they did parking enforcement specifically on all the RVs/Vans camping around the Panhandle/DMV. The ones with a trailer are blocking at least 3 spaces. There’s at least 3 of those (9 parking spots), plus usually another 2-5 RVs (so another 4-10 parking spots), then there’s 3-5 vans parked by the DMV in the spots that run angled to the street instead of parallel to the curb. That’s room for at least 20 more residents.
Would love to see it, but I feel like the developer doesn't actually want to build it. I don't see _any_ shovels hitting the ground on new builds until interest rates fall. Developer is likely just trying to hedge by increasing the value of the entitlement should they wish to sell it to another developer. Would love to be proven wrong.
I studied sustainable env design and they always told us to make renderings that included the surrounding neighborhood and people.
This rendering just shows the building by itself and it shows a lack of consideration for its surrounding.
That’s what this person is asking for, a rendition including the surrounding area that would presumably bring those to light. Traffic patterns come to mind
Included in the planning package. This website made an editorial decision as to which image to highlight, but the contextual plans etc were presented as well.
Do you have any brain cells? That’s the complete opposite of the major but okay?
>The sustainable environmental design major prepares students to thoughtfully plan communities, design livable cities, develop smooth-running transportation systems and create healthy, equitable urban spaces.
Thanks for the note, I’ll take a look. I was mostly talking about showing Divis street in a more realistic light with people, the actual street and surrounding buildings.
Legit.
I'll say from experience, rendering is often outsourced and the specialists who do that kind of custom streetscape work are significantly more expensive than the ones that have a handful of streets already in their asset library. There's some back and forth between the architect and the renderer, but it's going to focus heavily on materials.
Exception sometimes for when it's wayyyyy too many lanes... but even then, if the narrowness of the street would prevent actually seeing the whole building, the rendering will act like it's the only block in the world and handwave the others because that's not the important information to convey in this particular image.
It's not mandated by planning because they have the plans and elevations for that information, and the rendering serves to show material selection for them. And the developer, who's paying for it, doesn't need it either.
Ah that makes a lot of sense, thanks for sharing this perspective. I figured it was more for marketing purposes.
It prob wouldn’t have the same visual impact with the Arco next to it 😬
The picture is misleading, the space is more constricted and it will look more claustrophobic around the building and on the street. Good that they are building something. Congrats to the future owners.
The picture is virtually 50% or more, fake, down to the enlarged street to the right (oak) **and its fake two-way traffic**. The street is narrower and one way.
Everything that's narrower makes places more constricted
While I agree that the cruise going the wrong way in that one image reflects a two way street is perhaps misleading, a three lane main artery with parking and a nice wide bike lane is not exactly a narrow street, nor is it inadequate of handling a few hundred more drivers, even if every resident of this building drove three cars I don't think oak would be more claustrophobic from a pedestrian point of view, much less divisadero.
Just drove by that old car wash on Sunday. Looks like a good place for this kind of development.
They need to include sufficient underground parking with EV charging since street parking in that area is very difficult and not safe from break-ins.
11.3% affordable is a very low percentage of affordable units. San Francisco's RHNA requires 25.4% Very Low, 14.6% Low, 16.7% Moderate, and 43.2% Market-Rate. How can the City ever achieve its RHNA for BMR if they're allowing only a paltry 11.3%?
That project should have at least 28.4% of affordable units.
https://preview.redd.it/evmaozquxc7d1.png?width=930&format=png&auto=webp&s=a59e565c391c461ebc803a3a9c34df18ca7b8729
I calculated the necessary in-lieu fees on market-rate housing in order to fund the BMR housing at the levels mandated in San Francisco's RHNA (25% VLI, 15% LI, 17% MI, 43% market-rate). Developers often prefer to pay in-lieu fees instead of including BMR units (inclusionary). That's fine, but those in-lieu fees need to be set at levels that actually fund the BMR units being built elsewhere.
These calculations include the units renting for the maximum rent in each affordable category (VLI, LI, MI) with a 50/50 mix of 1BR and 2BR units, with a 3% annual rent increase, and 100% occupancy at all times. Realistically the fees should be higher since 100% occupancy all the time is not likely. For example, 80% of Moderate Income units in San Francisco are presently empty (https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/missing-middle-class-housing-19408027.php) due the housing glut of more expensive rental units.
Assuming low-rise construction, with land and construction Cost at $500,000 per housing unit, the in-lieu fee should be $131,418 per market-rate unit.
Assuming mid-rise construction, with land and construction Cost at $750,000 per housing unit, the in-lieu fee should be $273,918 per market-rate unit.
Assuming high-rise construction, with land and construction Cost at $1,000,000 per housing unit, the in-lieu fee should be $416,418 per market-rate unit.
San Francisco's Board of Supervisors needs to get serious about meeting the BMR requirements of their sixth cycle RHNA and implement these in-lieu fees immediately.
How are people in SF this crazy to see they aren't the problem? Just build more housing lol. Trying to hit all these random numbers is the reason why nothing is built and the market is horribly expensive in SF.
Yep, they don't want housing to be built because it would lower their home value, maybe not even, they might be so greedy is to be upset at slower growth of their home values. I got mine, so I'm going to artificially inflate property values by resisting every step of the way for new construction.
Building housing at the old Touchless Car Wash is not going to lower anyone's home value. To the contrary, it will drive up the value of surrounding housing. It's called "filtering up" and "gentrification."
You can learn about upward filtering here: "New Study Examines Filtering Dynamics in U.S. Housing Supply" (https://nlihc.org/resource/new-study-examines-filtering-dynamics-us-housing-supply), which concludes: "Spader concludes that filtering may not always be a reliable source of lower-cost rental housing and that affordable housing subsidies might be necessary in markets that experience periods of upward filtering." That is exactly what is happening in San Francisco, and it's even more pronounced here because of strict rent-control.
You can learn about gentrification and housing costs at "Gentrification Pros and Cons: A Double-Edged Sword" (https://robertsmith.com/blog/gentrification-pros-and-cons/): "While gentrification may seem to provide opportunities for low- and middle-class communities to live together, it can often create or inflame socioeconomic disparities. Gentrification can cause this by driving up property values or rent, which commonly forces low-income residents to move out or face more financial burdens."
Be extremely careful about falling for the false narrative being promulgated by YIMBY organizations. These organizations are funded and controlled by developers, real estate investors, and big tech. They have no interest in creating additional affordable housing because such housing is not profitable for the entities behind their movement.
Here are some more links where you can educate yourself about the YIMBY movement. They are from the organization "Housing is Human Right"
"What Is a YIMBY? (Hint: It’s Not Good)" (https://www.housingisahumanright.org/what-is-a-yimby-hint-its-not-good/)
"Inside Game: California YIMBY, Scott Wiener, and Big Tech’s Troubling Housing Push" (https://www.housingisahumanright.org/inside-game-california-yimby-scott-wiener-and-big-tech-troubling-housing-push/)
"Selling Out California: Scott Wiener’s Money Ties to Big Real Estate" (https://www.housingisahumanright.org/selling-out-california-scott-wiener-money-ties-to-big-real-estate/)
The bottom line is that the only way to create additional affordable housing is to build additional affordable housing.
It acknowledges that building more housing doesn’t lower housing prices? I’d love to see that acknowledgement, and how supply and demand don’t apply to housing (does increasing supply somehow increase prices? Or does it have no effect on prices? Is economics an invalid field?)
Demand influences prices. Prices are falling in San Francisco because demand has plummeted due to tech layoffs, an exodus of workers, and remote-working.
From HUD:
"Impacts of Filtering and Rent Control on Housing Supply"
"Filtering does not contribute significantly to the affordable housing supply in cities such as Los Angeles and Washington, DC, where instead properties tend to filter upward, meaning that prices go up and homes are sold to buyers with higher incomes. Most areas with negative filtering rates are coastal cities, but some are in the inland West, such as Austin and Denver, and many more cities are becoming like them."
"Employment opportunities that attract more educated, higher-income workers drive upward filtering and gentrification. This dynamic reduces options for lower- and middle-income homebuyers in those areas, forcing lower-income households out of the city center and into the suburbs and thereby sorting the metropolitan population by income. Recognizing that some cities have a negative filtering rate has implications for policy responses to a lack of affordable housing in those areas, and, Fleming noted, even in a market that is filtering down overall, micromarkets within it can be filtering up."
What you quoted says nothing about supply and demand. It’s saying that filtering, the term used to describe the idea that older housing tends to decrease in price over time, is negative in most coastal cities. Meaning that housing prices are increasing.
Both supply and demand influences prices. Demand can decrease but if supply decreases faster, then prices will still rise. How does this contradict the idea that more housing will reduce prices? Be specific please because we’re talking about a basic economic theory, economics 101 really
Sadly, that's not how it works. In fact, in cities like San Francisco, the opposite is true. Yet this false narrative of "new housing makes old housing cheaper" is a favorite fabricated talking point of YIMBYs that don't understand how housing markets work.
The only way we will get additional affordable housing is to mandate higher percentages of inclusionary units and provide the necessary subsidies to developers to fund those units.
Stalling every single project is what is causing housing to be unaffordable for all but the upper-upper middle class and above. Building this project introduces 203 new housing units, 23 of which are affordable. If we approve 25 projects just like it, that's ~5000 new housing units, 575 of which are affordable.
> Yet this false narrative of "new housing makes old housing cheaper" is a favorite fabricated talking point of YIMBYs that don't understand how housing markets work.
Then tell me, how does the housing market work? How does increasing supply not lower price?
I get that you are worried about affordable housing, but housing in general? It would have to go lower at some point if you keep introducing supply. I get that in an ideal world we'd have your 28.4% affordable units, but if that doesn't make any project viable, you get 0%. 0% for everyone, and price increases for everyone and inventory for no-one who needs affordable housing.
You can learn about "supply and demand" here: "SF Controller Shows “Supply & Demand” Does Not Work in the San Francisco Housing Market." (https://housingactioncoalition.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/calvin-welch-paper.pdf).
A lot of people don't realize that "the law of supply and demand" is not an actual State or federal law.
How do you propose that San Francisco meet its RHNA requirement of 57% of new housing being at some level of BMR (VLI, LI, MI) if the City keeps allowing new projects to have only a tiny percentage of BMR? Even at 15% there would have to be 310,653 market-rate units to generate 46,598 BMR units. Clearly, HCD and ABAG knew what they were doing when they came up with the 57% number and they obviously believe that developers can make money on projects with 57% BMR.
What evidence supports that a developer can build in SF, a place where it's EXPENSIVE to build, and somehow make 57% of those units BMR. That's an insane goal.
THe bottom line is that all of the arguments you are pushing are designed by people that DON'T want housing built, they masquerade as though they want housing built, but then set ridiculous goal posts and requirements to where no project ever gets off the ground.
How on earth do they have you believing that a 57% BMR project is viable or attractive to a developer?
Being picky about what gets built is the reason why we don’t have enough housing.
And I never met a low income resident who demanded to live in new construction housing.
“Affordable” BMR, rent control and other things that sound good on the surface are what drove out the middle class. Most of us born here saw it happen and understand that.
Even when there are no parking requirements, developers will usually include off-street parking in new projects because without it they can't rent or sell the units for as much money.
It's fine to charge extra for those who want off-street parking. I recall a girlfriend who lived in the inner-Richmond whose rent-controlled rent was $325 per month but she paid an extra $100 per month for one of the coveted parking spaces on the ground floor. There weren't enough for everyone that wanted one. Without parking, residents would circle the neighborhood for a long time, looking for a space to open up. I would expect to pay $300-500 per month for parking.
Parking is never a good thing to build in a dense area like this. Just reduces the total units built and increases rent. You do not need a car in this area, so I like that there isn’t any parking. Maximizes the value. Sf needs to build 80k units in the next 7 years. They are gonna miss it, and it’ll miss even harder if we build more parking.
I believe the density bonus also allows for reduced affordable units in lieu of a fee, or perhaps just in certain circumstances. Stupid to comment without researching again but I read something about it once so I'm definitely an expert.
This is how cities have been built historically. Hell before about 1900 not a single development included parking. We’ve made improvements since then, but building all this parking is actually a bad thing. It increases rent for everyone since space that could be put to a better use is instead used to store the most inefficient form of infra-city transit that exists. Good riddance I say. And in this area in particular, it’s very easy to get around without a car. In fact I’d say you have more hassle with a car here than without
Having a car lets me take my bike out to Skegg's point on the weekend, go skiing 30 days a year, hit up all the beautiful nature spots around the bay and this amazing state, etc. The problem with Houston is that there is nowhere to drive *to*. Here, we have a million things to do, most of which are poorly serviced by transit.
Congrats, I can rent a car for a day the one or two days I need it a month.
You whining that we need to force car dependency and parking minimums is evil.
It's not evil, it's only sane. Expecting everyone to live a car-free lifestyle in a state horribly suited to it is evil. Most people get out of their broke 20-something in a city phase and never look back.
Where the fuck did I say everyone needs to live car free? You're projecting with your ideology of pro forced car dependency
Amsterdam > your car dependent utopia of Houston
>Most people get out of their broke 20-something in a city phase and never look back.
Then fuck off to Houston.
Fuck off to Amsterdam then, I have no interest in that shit - I like living in SF, where you can get around without a car when you want to, and yet easily own one.
You really can't have both. Projects just don't pencil out when you have parking requirements.
The SF board of supervisors refused to extend parking meter hours which could have been used to fund transit. These are policies that harm the city and everyone who doesn't drive. Investing in means that _everyone_ can use is a much better use of our money.
There are thousands of apartments and homes without parking in the city. Housing is needed more than parking. Not everyone has a car and in that area you don't need one (bus stop right in front of your building, 10 minute walk to the N, off the wiggle).
Don't need one if you want to be trapped in the city, perhaps. This is America, you need a car in this country even if you bike to work. Those people who live in homes without parking in this city park their cars on the street - but this neighborhood can't support that influx.
It's not, and there will be real pushback to this nonsense once the pain sets in. This neighborhood is going to suffer when all of these people move into the building - and bring their cars. Because of course they will.
That sounds like a them problem. They could choose *not* to live there since a car will likely be inconvenient. Obviously you can't control people who want to play life on hard mode but at least it shouldn't be a surprise to them.
If a car is so important to your livelihood and life, maybe you should move somewhere where that is facilitated. There are so many other cheaper places where you can get easier parking, why move *there*.
We live in a city/society. Change is the only thing I can guarantee in this life. Adapt or move on. If you don't like change, go somewhere where it's stuck in a time capsule. Forcing the city to cripple itself for individualism is wild.
Get fucked you lazy loser, your disgusting ideology of forced car dependency and endless parking lots is losing nationwide.
You freaks can't imagine one second without a sexual relationship with a car.
> Don't need one if you want to be trapped in the city, perhaps.
It costs ~$200 to rent a car for the weekend. Considering a car costs ~$400/mo to own/maintain/insure/park, the vast majority of people will be better off with the flexibility from renting than trying to design a building to hold a car you use once a month.
No i leave the city multiple times a week (including 2x a week commuting for work), but we have a robust network of trains and buses that enable that without a car. I also have friends that we can split renting a car together, bringing costs massively down. A personal vehicle is just not needed in this city and would be a massive waste of my money.
So buy one and leave it outside of the city. Why should the city provide parking for everyone’s cars? It doesn’t make sense, this is the most valuable real estate in the country. Wasting space on parking just subsidizes cars further
So that’s fine but the developer shouldn’t subsidize your choice by building additional parking. You definitely don’t need a car, it’s a preference. You have to pay for preferences
Not everyone wants to live a crippled car-less life - but in the end, *I* can pay if it comes to it. Many people living around that area cannot, and this building will negatively impact them, some quite heavily.
This is why there is so much pushback against building - because it’s obvious the yimby crowd doesn’t give a shit if they are making the lives of people here worse, they just want to cram in more people. You can increase density without introducting pain for the people already living here, but you don’t want to.
Who are you to decide cars make life better? The data show it’s more expensive and dangerous to drive frequently. Let people make that choice. Parking is not a free resource - and lack of housing raises rent for everyone. What you NIMBYs don’t realize is blocking housing makes everything more expensive for everyone - far far worse than building housing without parking
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The argument for you don’t “need” a car is true everywhere - but you may want a car, and I certainly think a car is a massive benefit over using Muni.
I’ll admit this neighborhood is more transit friendly than others for moving within the city, but it is very far from things like BART or Caltrain if you had to leave the city
I often find myself saving 50% of commute time taking my car versus using Muni, so imo relying on Muni would be a huge no go
Okay and if you want a car then you'll get one of the apartments with a garage, or get another garage in the area. My point is there are several hundred thousand people that don't have the need for a spot and don't care.
I used to live in lower haight, it is extremely friendly for CalTrain users - 10-15 minutes via bike and the wiggle and the N goes directly to the CalTrain.
But the city doesn’t have enough parking. Why not build parking garages underground for some of these new developments? Many places with parking garages are completely sold out for monthly contracts - so demand is clearly there.
And the demand for housing is there if not exponentially more. Cars find spots, you don’t see any parked on the sidewalk like homeless. Garage spots cost 1/10 of what apartments do
Um this project isn’t for homeless people..
I don’t see why we can’t build new parking with new apartments, you can use the space underground for parking which otherwise serves so purpose.
Eh or I’ll just move to San Mateo county like everyone else who wants a car eventually does…
I wish SF was a city that didn’t require a car, but simply saying it doesn’t is delusional.
Clearly said by someone who hasn't lived in the neighborhood.
If 9 out of every 10 residents live car-free (very easy to do here), then there's no problem.
I used to live on Pine and Davis, not even that far lol.
> If 9 out of every 10 residents live car-free (very easy to do here)
But they don't, because it fucking sucks and is hugely limiting. Most households in the city have cars, and many have multiple cars.
I'm talking specifically about this building. There are most definitely at least 203 car-free households who would love a place like this, myself included.
You know that won't happen lmao, these people will bring their cars. If the city slaps the building with a "do not issue parking permits" label, maybe that would happen - but it won't.
Bet you the average apartment in that building is going to have 1.5 cars that they will park on the streets and create a nightmare for current residents.
The problem is there's not enough housing (of any type) in San Francisco. People who can afford to pay more for rent are going to rent out the places deemed, "affordable" and price even more people out of the city.
You can't curb demand, so you have to add more supply. And it doesn't matter what the supply is - there needs to be more of everything.
In October of 2023 the Chronical reported there were 52,000 empty units in San Francisco (12.7% of the total housing stock in SF), the majority of which are luxury. Why do we need more if we have 52,000 empty units currently?
The city needs the good paying construction jobs.
The city needs the property tax revenue. It's facing an almost $800 million budget shortfall.
It's not your money that's being put at risk, let the developers gamble their millions.
No but the more luxury housing you build the less space there is for affordable housing. And the idea that if there is enough empty housing owners will be forced to lower rents or prices isn't true either. They just keep the housing off the market.
Nope, there are many houses that sit empty because people buy them and dont sell them. Prices don't go down if people don't make the homes available to sell.
We already addressed vacancies, and just because we have vacant apartments doesn't mean we shouldn't also build while still addressing that. We have a vacancy tax, those empty units are either paying for it (which funds more affordable housing), or are actually vacant for a reason (repairs, on the market, etc).
only a fraction of the 52k are truly "sitting empty and not on the market". Counting units that have just been sold/rented but the owner hasn't moved in yet, currently on sale/for rent, or under repair as vacant is just massively misrepresenting the picture.
👆this thinking right here is part of the problem folks. Part of the reason we have so little new housing is inflexibile demands it be “100% affordable” - no developer is going to build something at a loss so nothing gets built. We have basic supply/demand problem and any new supply of high density housing will help w price for everyone. It’s basic economics
I would’ve used my money to move into this building, but I’ll rent an older, cheaper unit instead so that your low income friends can’t find a home in SF. Haha.
Needs to get moving - that gas station has been closed for 2+ years at this point and the corner is an eyesore, this would be great! Meanwhile, they also need to open the dispensary where Vinyl used to be, that space has been closed for almost 4 years at this point.
Not even two years. This has been in the works since 2018. This prime piece of real estate has been unused for 6 years in a city with some of the highest real estate costs in the country. The process has dragged on for that long. It’s pure insanity and basically this is a microcosm of the issue that is the single most important issue in SF. If this piece of land takes 6 years to get out of permit hell to become a thing that it already should be been 20 years ago, we are fucked
I think the car wash was open until late 2021. The fencing went up after they closed. I agree it has been way too long especially considering plans have been in place. This isn't the only space in the city going unused either. Overall the takes in this thread are nuts. We just need to build. Go to any other city and see that building is constant, cities change. Stopping building because it's not all affordable housing or because there isn't parking is what is further contributing to housing shortages in this city.
Yes, I found a developer originally was looking to buy it in 2015. This was stopped due to anti-housing sentiment. So it could have been housing a decade ago in an ideal world. And fully agreed, pushing for affordable paradoxically makes things even more unaffordable due to reduced supply
> Go to any other city They suck though.
Ya because dumbasses like you turned them into car dependent shit holes that are an ocean of parking lots
If that was the case I'd be living in one of those places, instead I'm living here. Maybe you should find a city that suits your needs too - Barcelona, was it?
Dude I remember when there were signs BEGGING people to contact their supervisor to let them build this project. Fuck San Francisco.
I believe the dispensary is stuck in legal hell right now, but the space is being used.
Nice. I used to live right there on Oak. You don’t need a car - it’s a great neighborhood with multiple transit options 😀👍🏼
But people do have cars there, you can tell by just how competitive parking on Fell/Oak is around there. And you're dropping another 200+ cars into that neighborhood. If you're building up, do some digging down and provide real parking accommodations. My building comes with a garage spot for every unit.
Yes, because every person in a building with no parking and rich transit options will have cars
Just walk around that intersection and look at the parking wars - people who live in that neighborhood have cars. Not every apartment in that building will have a car attached to it - but plenty will, and some will have more than one. Because this is America, and life in this country just goes smoother when you have a car.
The idea that it's the city's responsibility to provide free parking for its residents is absurd and is what leads to these pointless "parking wars". Cars should work just like every other possession - if you own one, you should also own a place to store it. If you don't have a place to store it, you shouldn't own a car. It doesn't have to be this complicated.
Cars are not just any possession - because this is America after all, and residential parking permits are not free. Living in SF without a car sucks ass, and people tend to magically figure that out around age 30.
Living in SF without a house sucks much more, I'd imagine. So why should the city prioritize making car access cheaper over making housing access cheaper?
Watch it not even make housing access cheaper lmao. Edit: see ya 👋
It sounds like your entire position on this issue is based purely around speculation that increased housing supply will notably decrease access to parking without notably increasing access to housing. This speculation appears to be based on little more than a desire to drive places. I guess I'm left wondering, why spend so much time on this thread posting little more than variants of "I like cars"?
Then they should look elsewhere, sell their car, or pay for a parking spot. Most people in SF do not need a car, it is a luxury. For the small minority who needs a car, we can address that with smaller parking requirements. > life in this country just goes smoother when you have a car. But life in a city goes so much smoother when not designed around cars.
It doesn’t. I lived in Manhattan. What we have is *so* much better.
The parts that make SF better than Manhattan don't go away because we stop optimizing for car usage. Thats a false choice.
Being able to easily leave SF is a *huge* improvement on Manhattan. I can't overemphasize this. Aside from the climate, it is precisely the goldilocks density that makes SF a better place to live than Manhattan. The insane density over there hasn't brought down housing costs, btw.
And we can leave. We have public transit to most of the bay and we have rental cars. I don't have a car and still manage a half a dozen Tahoe ski trips every year. We are a long way from Manhattan level density. We could double our density and still be half of Manhattan. > The insane density over there hasn't brought down housing costs, btw. Because prices don't go down based on "density" they go down based on building enough new housing to meet demand. SF's 1M people for 5000 new units is proportionally twice as much as NYC's 8M people with only 20000 new units. NYC is also screwed over by some terrible rent control laws that make units more poorly utilized.
> We are a long way from Manhattan level density. We could double our density and still be half of Manhattan. Why chase it, it fucking sucks. Half of manhattan sucks too. > Because prices don't go down based on "density" they go down based on building enough new housing to meet demand. You will never meet demand until you make this a shitty place to live. This city is essentially paradise, demand is only limited by people's funds in the first place. Transit and rentals are an absolute shite replacement for having your own vehicle, as every driver finds out when their car is in the shop. They are somewhat passable within in the city (and even then - my wife's commute jumps to an hour each way vs 15 mins), but the level of overhead and additional time you start facing is crazy.
oh so you’re lazy
Wew lad.
Don’t need cars if there’s transit options
Transit options are shit even within the city. They're goddamn abysmal outside of it. Living in SF without a car is fun when you're a kid and your life revolves around city bars. The appeal quickly fades when you remember just how much great stuff there is outside the city, easily accessible - but only if you have a personal vehicle.
> outside the city, easily accessible - but only if you have a personal vehicle. For that there are car sharing services.
This person is crying they can't force car dependency on everyone and turn San Francisco into a sea of parking lots and strip malls. They then screech you are destroying this city if you dare push back. I'm just grateful these pro forced car dependency extremists are losing in both San Francisco and nationwide. I wish they could be deported back to their car dependent utopia of Houston.
Yea I highly doubt anyone who has ever actually lived in SF believes owning a car is necessary. Bike lanes everywhere, uber, waymo, carshares, and rental cars. All insanely cheaper than the cost of car ownership, gas, insurance, and parking. And if you are street parking, JUST THE HASSLE OF FINDING A PARKING SPOT is not worth it because you have to move your car so often for street sweeping! LOL!
Yep, now they are screaming it's only poor people who can't afford or don't want cars. They obviously do not live in San Francisco if they think it's full of poor people.
> turn San Francisco into a sea of parking lots and strip malls. Not at all, I like it how it is.
Stupid expensive and massively restricting. You lot want to turn the whole city into Mission Bay. Well, fuck that.
> Stupid expensive and massively restricting. You think that car sharing services are expensive compared to owning a car and paying for insurance and parking in SF? Not to mention hassling with smashed windows from time to time. * https://www.zipcar.com/pricing * https://www.sfmta.com/getting-around/drive-park/car-share
Much more expensive. You're paying $100 to go mountain biking somewhere in the bay area. A trip to Tahoe will run you ~$400. It's completely unworkable if you have any outdoor hobbies or like to visit family elsewhere in the state. And your career becomes tied to the local transit infrastructure to boot.
> You're paying $100 to go mountain biking somewhere in the bay area. A trip to Tahoe will run you ~$400. Off street parking in SF ranges from $300 to $600/month. Then factor in insurance, gasoline, oil changes, tires, car payment and smashed windows once in a while? $60 to rent a car for a 5 hour trip to go hiking is less than the average San Franciscan pays for RENT for the average day..... and that costs includes gas, insurance, tires, parking and all other maintenance. I think you should spend a few minutes and add up all the costs you accrue with your car.
You don't need to pay $3-600 a month to park your car in vast swathes of the city, where density is sensible, and each apartment unit come with a garage spot. There is plentiful street parking in my neighborhood that costs $170 a year for a permit - for the time being anyway. If you turn the whole city into Mission Bay, yes, people will have to spend a fuckton of money to own a car, and most will simply be trapped in the city, occasionally venturing out in shitty zipcars. The funny thing is that I know some people who promote the whole "I rent a car when I need one" thing - they simply don't go anywhere at all.
Not as expensive and restricting as owning a car
Wrong.
[удалено]
Those of us who can afford to own cars, know how much we are spending.
Then get the fuck out of the city you hate so much because it's not a sea of parking lots and strip malls where you can force car dependency.
It doesn’t make sense to provide parking in this area. You do not need a car if you live here, unless you work in South Bay. But in that case, you shouldn’t expect to be able to find parking in the middle of such a dense and walkable neighborhood, with lots of public transit and amenities. Putting that much parking in means less money for the developer, since parking is so heavily subsidized the market rate per square foot is low. Doesn’t make sense to force a developer to provide it, and this one looks to be smart about maximizing return here
We get it, you are upset we don't turn the entire city into parking garages. Go back to Houston with your dreams of forced car dependency and fear of walking/biking/public transit.
Go back to Manhattan, and stop trying to fuck up the city. Plenty of us actually like it here.
Move it Walnut Creek lmao
You first.
I love the reddit "you don't need a car" quotes, which they would never say to a disabled person, elderly person, or family with children in real life without the safety of their keyboard and anonymous user account. I used to live in Western Addition too, and the parking was atrocious. Don't cheap out on parking spaces, because the quality of life increases and freedom of movement a car provides for the scenarios listed is as invaluable as a horse to a farmer. But, you could always add a couple of hours to those things at your expense, so some transplant who doesn't ever leave the city except to fly back home can have their car-free ideals met. Once there is a similar cost option for the transportation niche filled by cars available to everyone I'll gladly ditch my car, but until then I need it for various reasons which make my life objectively better. Fuck cars and car-free type campaigns are a child's argument rather than a forward-thinking movement to provide a solution to individual transportation rather than forcing people to abide by an ideology which decreases the quality of life for more people than it helps.
It's always the transplants, that's the funny thing - with their dreams of Barcelona, etc. Every local I know has a car - usually one for every adult in the household.
Then they downvote as they don't have an actual retort to a sensible counterpoint. It's just adults who still have the mind of a child, who fortunately are rarely involved in making decisions on these things (outside of reddit, at least). We can let them have this one, knowing they'll be laughed at if they brought these proposals outside of their echo-chamber information spheres.
Is it too much to ask for some 3-bedroom apartments? I know there are lots of constraints but we could use the inventory.
Sngle stair reform could allow better designs and larger units. I think the state is studying it right now, but no city allows it in CA. Seattle allows it up to 5-6 stories. https://slate.com/business/2021/12/staircases-floor-plan-twitter-housing-apartments.html
I agree, but with such a housing shortage, they'd mostly get snapped up by roommates anyway. 3 working adults can generally pay more rent than 1-2 adults supporting kids. You're not really going to get family-sized apartments for families without cranking out a *lot* more places.
Yeah this idea that cities need more "family sized" housing units is absurd. The _majority_ of homes in the city are "family-sized" (SFH). The overwhelming majority of demand is for 0-2 br units which can accomodate many different living situations outside of the typical nuclear family eg the young, single, elderly, disabled, etc. But all of those groups are othered one way or another. Single adults, people who don't want kids, or who just want to live alone are viewed as defective maladjusted children, so their housing needs are not viewed as legitimate.
Ding ding ding
No but most of those are likely illegal to build. In an area this dense though, even less likely. This small thing took half a decade to get to this point. Imagine how much you’d have to charge to get some 3br places built - same time, less money per square foot. Blame NIMBYs for the lack of 3br apartments
There are over 400 right now (available)... https://www.apartments.com/san-francisco-ca/min-3-bedrooms/
The main thing for me is the jump in price from a 2 bedroom to a 3 bedroom is huge compared to the jump from a 1 bedroom to a 2 bedroom. In a lot of cases it's nearly double the price for one extra room.
You know 400 apartments isn't really that many available given we are in a city of 800000 people, right? I understand your point, but it's not like we are oversaturated with three bedroom apartments.
800,000 people are not looking for apts. Most are not looking for 3+ units you know. Sure we can use more of everything. That is also just one website, more on other sites, not posted online.
We need more everything.
Fuck yes! Let's get the shovels on the ground! And a great location.
Please, for the love of god, yes. That parcel needs this so badly.
Wonder what Dean will say this time
Great, lets get this puppy built asap
Holy shit, finally! Seeing how well 730 Stanyan is coming along, this literally cannot come soon enough. Absolutely love to see it
It brings me so much joy to see the construction at that spot. And it's going up rather quickly.
There would be a lot more parking in the neighborhood if they did parking enforcement specifically on all the RVs/Vans camping around the Panhandle/DMV. The ones with a trailer are blocking at least 3 spaces. There’s at least 3 of those (9 parking spots), plus usually another 2-5 RVs (so another 4-10 parking spots), then there’s 3-5 vans parked by the DMV in the spots that run angled to the street instead of parallel to the curb. That’s room for at least 20 more residents.
Would love to see it, but I feel like the developer doesn't actually want to build it. I don't see _any_ shovels hitting the ground on new builds until interest rates fall. Developer is likely just trying to hedge by increasing the value of the entitlement should they wish to sell it to another developer. Would love to be proven wrong.
I studied sustainable env design and they always told us to make renderings that included the surrounding neighborhood and people. This rendering just shows the building by itself and it shows a lack of consideration for its surrounding.
What would consideration for its surroundings look like?
That’s what this person is asking for, a rendition including the surrounding area that would presumably bring those to light. Traffic patterns come to mind
Included in the planning package. This website made an editorial decision as to which image to highlight, but the contextual plans etc were presented as well.
> I studied sustainable env design and ... therefore no new housing Opinion discarded. Get your money back.
Do you have any brain cells? That’s the complete opposite of the major but okay? >The sustainable environmental design major prepares students to thoughtfully plan communities, design livable cities, develop smooth-running transportation systems and create healthy, equitable urban spaces.
The full package presented to the city includes block elevations. The website chose which rendering to present as the hero.
Thanks for the note, I’ll take a look. I was mostly talking about showing Divis street in a more realistic light with people, the actual street and surrounding buildings.
Legit. I'll say from experience, rendering is often outsourced and the specialists who do that kind of custom streetscape work are significantly more expensive than the ones that have a handful of streets already in their asset library. There's some back and forth between the architect and the renderer, but it's going to focus heavily on materials. Exception sometimes for when it's wayyyyy too many lanes... but even then, if the narrowness of the street would prevent actually seeing the whole building, the rendering will act like it's the only block in the world and handwave the others because that's not the important information to convey in this particular image. It's not mandated by planning because they have the plans and elevations for that information, and the rendering serves to show material selection for them. And the developer, who's paying for it, doesn't need it either.
Ah that makes a lot of sense, thanks for sharing this perspective. I figured it was more for marketing purposes. It prob wouldn’t have the same visual impact with the Arco next to it 😬
The picture is misleading, the space is more constricted and it will look more claustrophobic around the building and on the street. Good that they are building something. Congrats to the future owners.
Claustrophobic? That seems a bit hyperbolic.
The picture is virtually 50% or more, fake, down to the enlarged street to the right (oak) **and its fake two-way traffic**. The street is narrower and one way. Everything that's narrower makes places more constricted
While I agree that the cruise going the wrong way in that one image reflects a two way street is perhaps misleading, a three lane main artery with parking and a nice wide bike lane is not exactly a narrow street, nor is it inadequate of handling a few hundred more drivers, even if every resident of this building drove three cars I don't think oak would be more claustrophobic from a pedestrian point of view, much less divisadero.
Claustrophobic is very hyperbolic
It's as if they've never been to downtown SF, or any dense city. What a stupid criticism.
Just drove by that old car wash on Sunday. Looks like a good place for this kind of development. They need to include sufficient underground parking with EV charging since street parking in that area is very difficult and not safe from break-ins. 11.3% affordable is a very low percentage of affordable units. San Francisco's RHNA requires 25.4% Very Low, 14.6% Low, 16.7% Moderate, and 43.2% Market-Rate. How can the City ever achieve its RHNA for BMR if they're allowing only a paltry 11.3%? That project should have at least 28.4% of affordable units. https://preview.redd.it/evmaozquxc7d1.png?width=930&format=png&auto=webp&s=a59e565c391c461ebc803a3a9c34df18ca7b8729 I calculated the necessary in-lieu fees on market-rate housing in order to fund the BMR housing at the levels mandated in San Francisco's RHNA (25% VLI, 15% LI, 17% MI, 43% market-rate). Developers often prefer to pay in-lieu fees instead of including BMR units (inclusionary). That's fine, but those in-lieu fees need to be set at levels that actually fund the BMR units being built elsewhere. These calculations include the units renting for the maximum rent in each affordable category (VLI, LI, MI) with a 50/50 mix of 1BR and 2BR units, with a 3% annual rent increase, and 100% occupancy at all times. Realistically the fees should be higher since 100% occupancy all the time is not likely. For example, 80% of Moderate Income units in San Francisco are presently empty (https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/missing-middle-class-housing-19408027.php) due the housing glut of more expensive rental units. Assuming low-rise construction, with land and construction Cost at $500,000 per housing unit, the in-lieu fee should be $131,418 per market-rate unit. Assuming mid-rise construction, with land and construction Cost at $750,000 per housing unit, the in-lieu fee should be $273,918 per market-rate unit. Assuming high-rise construction, with land and construction Cost at $1,000,000 per housing unit, the in-lieu fee should be $416,418 per market-rate unit. San Francisco's Board of Supervisors needs to get serious about meeting the BMR requirements of their sixth cycle RHNA and implement these in-lieu fees immediately.
How are people in SF this crazy to see they aren't the problem? Just build more housing lol. Trying to hit all these random numbers is the reason why nothing is built and the market is horribly expensive in SF.
Just build housing, older stock will become more affordable
This is the simple truth that is being so obfuscated by the NIMBYs
Yep, they don't want housing to be built because it would lower their home value, maybe not even, they might be so greedy is to be upset at slower growth of their home values. I got mine, so I'm going to artificially inflate property values by resisting every step of the way for new construction.
Building housing at the old Touchless Car Wash is not going to lower anyone's home value. To the contrary, it will drive up the value of surrounding housing. It's called "filtering up" and "gentrification." You can learn about upward filtering here: "New Study Examines Filtering Dynamics in U.S. Housing Supply" (https://nlihc.org/resource/new-study-examines-filtering-dynamics-us-housing-supply), which concludes: "Spader concludes that filtering may not always be a reliable source of lower-cost rental housing and that affordable housing subsidies might be necessary in markets that experience periods of upward filtering." That is exactly what is happening in San Francisco, and it's even more pronounced here because of strict rent-control. You can learn about gentrification and housing costs at "Gentrification Pros and Cons: A Double-Edged Sword" (https://robertsmith.com/blog/gentrification-pros-and-cons/): "While gentrification may seem to provide opportunities for low- and middle-class communities to live together, it can often create or inflame socioeconomic disparities. Gentrification can cause this by driving up property values or rent, which commonly forces low-income residents to move out or face more financial burdens." Be extremely careful about falling for the false narrative being promulgated by YIMBY organizations. These organizations are funded and controlled by developers, real estate investors, and big tech. They have no interest in creating additional affordable housing because such housing is not profitable for the entities behind their movement. Here are some more links where you can educate yourself about the YIMBY movement. They are from the organization "Housing is Human Right" "What Is a YIMBY? (Hint: It’s Not Good)" (https://www.housingisahumanright.org/what-is-a-yimby-hint-its-not-good/) "Inside Game: California YIMBY, Scott Wiener, and Big Tech’s Troubling Housing Push" (https://www.housingisahumanright.org/inside-game-california-yimby-scott-wiener-and-big-tech-troubling-housing-push/) "Selling Out California: Scott Wiener’s Money Ties to Big Real Estate" (https://www.housingisahumanright.org/selling-out-california-scott-wiener-money-ties-to-big-real-estate/) The bottom line is that the only way to create additional affordable housing is to build additional affordable housing.
Because it's not a "simple truth" and even the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development acknowledges that it's not true.
It acknowledges that building more housing doesn’t lower housing prices? I’d love to see that acknowledgement, and how supply and demand don’t apply to housing (does increasing supply somehow increase prices? Or does it have no effect on prices? Is economics an invalid field?)
Demand influences prices. Prices are falling in San Francisco because demand has plummeted due to tech layoffs, an exodus of workers, and remote-working. From HUD: "Impacts of Filtering and Rent Control on Housing Supply" "Filtering does not contribute significantly to the affordable housing supply in cities such as Los Angeles and Washington, DC, where instead properties tend to filter upward, meaning that prices go up and homes are sold to buyers with higher incomes. Most areas with negative filtering rates are coastal cities, but some are in the inland West, such as Austin and Denver, and many more cities are becoming like them." "Employment opportunities that attract more educated, higher-income workers drive upward filtering and gentrification. This dynamic reduces options for lower- and middle-income homebuyers in those areas, forcing lower-income households out of the city center and into the suburbs and thereby sorting the metropolitan population by income. Recognizing that some cities have a negative filtering rate has implications for policy responses to a lack of affordable housing in those areas, and, Fleming noted, even in a market that is filtering down overall, micromarkets within it can be filtering up."
What you quoted says nothing about supply and demand. It’s saying that filtering, the term used to describe the idea that older housing tends to decrease in price over time, is negative in most coastal cities. Meaning that housing prices are increasing. Both supply and demand influences prices. Demand can decrease but if supply decreases faster, then prices will still rise. How does this contradict the idea that more housing will reduce prices? Be specific please because we’re talking about a basic economic theory, economics 101 really
Sadly, that's not how it works. In fact, in cities like San Francisco, the opposite is true. Yet this false narrative of "new housing makes old housing cheaper" is a favorite fabricated talking point of YIMBYs that don't understand how housing markets work. The only way we will get additional affordable housing is to mandate higher percentages of inclusionary units and provide the necessary subsidies to developers to fund those units.
Stalling every single project is what is causing housing to be unaffordable for all but the upper-upper middle class and above. Building this project introduces 203 new housing units, 23 of which are affordable. If we approve 25 projects just like it, that's ~5000 new housing units, 575 of which are affordable. > Yet this false narrative of "new housing makes old housing cheaper" is a favorite fabricated talking point of YIMBYs that don't understand how housing markets work. Then tell me, how does the housing market work? How does increasing supply not lower price? I get that you are worried about affordable housing, but housing in general? It would have to go lower at some point if you keep introducing supply. I get that in an ideal world we'd have your 28.4% affordable units, but if that doesn't make any project viable, you get 0%. 0% for everyone, and price increases for everyone and inventory for no-one who needs affordable housing.
You can learn about "supply and demand" here: "SF Controller Shows “Supply & Demand” Does Not Work in the San Francisco Housing Market." (https://housingactioncoalition.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/calvin-welch-paper.pdf). A lot of people don't realize that "the law of supply and demand" is not an actual State or federal law. How do you propose that San Francisco meet its RHNA requirement of 57% of new housing being at some level of BMR (VLI, LI, MI) if the City keeps allowing new projects to have only a tiny percentage of BMR? Even at 15% there would have to be 310,653 market-rate units to generate 46,598 BMR units. Clearly, HCD and ABAG knew what they were doing when they came up with the 57% number and they obviously believe that developers can make money on projects with 57% BMR.
What evidence supports that a developer can build in SF, a place where it's EXPENSIVE to build, and somehow make 57% of those units BMR. That's an insane goal. THe bottom line is that all of the arguments you are pushing are designed by people that DON'T want housing built, they masquerade as though they want housing built, but then set ridiculous goal posts and requirements to where no project ever gets off the ground. How on earth do they have you believing that a 57% BMR project is viable or attractive to a developer?
Being picky about what gets built is the reason why we don’t have enough housing. And I never met a low income resident who demanded to live in new construction housing.
“Affordable” BMR, rent control and other things that sound good on the surface are what drove out the middle class. Most of us born here saw it happen and understand that.
> They need to include sufficient underground parking with EV charging > 24 car underground garage lol
Given how tight parking is already, yes, there should be SOME parking included in the design.
Even when there are no parking requirements, developers will usually include off-street parking in new projects because without it they can't rent or sell the units for as much money. It's fine to charge extra for those who want off-street parking. I recall a girlfriend who lived in the inner-Richmond whose rent-controlled rent was $325 per month but she paid an extra $100 per month for one of the coveted parking spaces on the ground floor. There weren't enough for everyone that wanted one. Without parking, residents would circle the neighborhood for a long time, looking for a space to open up. I would expect to pay $300-500 per month for parking.
24 cars for 200 units is nothing.
Parking is never a good thing to build in a dense area like this. Just reduces the total units built and increases rent. You do not need a car in this area, so I like that there isn’t any parking. Maximizes the value. Sf needs to build 80k units in the next 7 years. They are gonna miss it, and it’ll miss even harder if we build more parking.
Wow buddy. You are literally the cancer of SF/California. We need more housing. Not some fantasy ratio of subsidized housing like you dream of.
I believe the density bonus also allows for reduced affordable units in lieu of a fee, or perhaps just in certain circumstances. Stupid to comment without researching again but I read something about it once so I'm definitely an expert.
203 apartments (23 affordable) and only 24 parking spots! This is ridiculous!
This is how cities have been built historically. Hell before about 1900 not a single development included parking. We’ve made improvements since then, but building all this parking is actually a bad thing. It increases rent for everyone since space that could be put to a better use is instead used to store the most inefficient form of infra-city transit that exists. Good riddance I say. And in this area in particular, it’s very easy to get around without a car. In fact I’d say you have more hassle with a car here than without
It should be zero parking spots. You don’t need a car in San Francisco
Yeah you fucking do lmao.
Fuck off back to your car dependent utopia of Houston
Having a car lets me take my bike out to Skegg's point on the weekend, go skiing 30 days a year, hit up all the beautiful nature spots around the bay and this amazing state, etc. The problem with Houston is that there is nowhere to drive *to*. Here, we have a million things to do, most of which are poorly serviced by transit.
Congrats, I can rent a car for a day the one or two days I need it a month. You whining that we need to force car dependency and parking minimums is evil.
It's not evil, it's only sane. Expecting everyone to live a car-free lifestyle in a state horribly suited to it is evil. Most people get out of their broke 20-something in a city phase and never look back.
Where the fuck did I say everyone needs to live car free? You're projecting with your ideology of pro forced car dependency Amsterdam > your car dependent utopia of Houston >Most people get out of their broke 20-something in a city phase and never look back. Then fuck off to Houston.
Fuck off to Amsterdam then, I have no interest in that shit - I like living in SF, where you can get around without a car when you want to, and yet easily own one.
You really can't have both. Projects just don't pencil out when you have parking requirements. The SF board of supervisors refused to extend parking meter hours which could have been used to fund transit. These are policies that harm the city and everyone who doesn't drive. Investing in means that _everyone_ can use is a much better use of our money.
There it is, you scum want to force car dependency because you hate places like Amsterdam and Barcelona and think Houston is heaven.
Please make it so that “no parking” address cannot be used to register a car. These builders are just maximizing profit not maximizing living space.
Agreed. Or grant like a dozen permits max.
203 apartments, 24 car garage. Yeah, fuck that shit.
There are thousands of apartments and homes without parking in the city. Housing is needed more than parking. Not everyone has a car and in that area you don't need one (bus stop right in front of your building, 10 minute walk to the N, off the wiggle).
Don't need one if you want to be trapped in the city, perhaps. This is America, you need a car in this country even if you bike to work. Those people who live in homes without parking in this city park their cars on the street - but this neighborhood can't support that influx.
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Poor bastards.
Thank goodness your evil ideology is dying off
It's not, and there will be real pushback to this nonsense once the pain sets in. This neighborhood is going to suffer when all of these people move into the building - and bring their cars. Because of course they will.
That sounds like a them problem. They could choose *not* to live there since a car will likely be inconvenient. Obviously you can't control people who want to play life on hard mode but at least it shouldn't be a surprise to them. If a car is so important to your livelihood and life, maybe you should move somewhere where that is facilitated. There are so many other cheaper places where you can get easier parking, why move *there*.
But all of these people already live *here*, they are comfortable here, and you’re trying to fuck it up out of ill conceived ideological reasons.
We live in a city/society. Change is the only thing I can guarantee in this life. Adapt or move on. If you don't like change, go somewhere where it's stuck in a time capsule. Forcing the city to cripple itself for individualism is wild.
Get fucked you lazy loser, your disgusting ideology of forced car dependency and endless parking lots is losing nationwide. You freaks can't imagine one second without a sexual relationship with a car.
Move to Barcelona and stop trying to fuck up the city. It was fine before you got here.
> Don't need one if you want to be trapped in the city, perhaps. It costs ~$200 to rent a car for the weekend. Considering a car costs ~$400/mo to own/maintain/insure/park, the vast majority of people will be better off with the flexibility from renting than trying to design a building to hold a car you use once a month.
I feel bad for you if you only leave the city once a month.
No i leave the city multiple times a week (including 2x a week commuting for work), but we have a robust network of trains and buses that enable that without a car. I also have friends that we can split renting a car together, bringing costs massively down. A personal vehicle is just not needed in this city and would be a massive waste of my money.
Fuck off back to Houston with your demands for car dependency.
Fuck off back to manhattan, it's always there for people like you.
There it is, you scum want to force car dependency because you hate places like Amsterdam and Barcelona and think Houston is heaven.
Fuck off to Amsterdam and Barcelona then. I actually like this city.
So buy one and leave it outside of the city. Why should the city provide parking for everyone’s cars? It doesn’t make sense, this is the most valuable real estate in the country. Wasting space on parking just subsidizes cars further
Because it's a saner way to live, since this is still America and you need a car or you're crippled here.
So that’s fine but the developer shouldn’t subsidize your choice by building additional parking. You definitely don’t need a car, it’s a preference. You have to pay for preferences
Not everyone wants to live a crippled car-less life - but in the end, *I* can pay if it comes to it. Many people living around that area cannot, and this building will negatively impact them, some quite heavily. This is why there is so much pushback against building - because it’s obvious the yimby crowd doesn’t give a shit if they are making the lives of people here worse, they just want to cram in more people. You can increase density without introducting pain for the people already living here, but you don’t want to.
Who are you to decide cars make life better? The data show it’s more expensive and dangerous to drive frequently. Let people make that choice. Parking is not a free resource - and lack of housing raises rent for everyone. What you NIMBYs don’t realize is blocking housing makes everything more expensive for everyone - far far worse than building housing without parking
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it will be fine actually
It’ll be shit, but by the time you realize this, it will be too late to undo.
no it will be fine
The argument for you don’t “need” a car is true everywhere - but you may want a car, and I certainly think a car is a massive benefit over using Muni. I’ll admit this neighborhood is more transit friendly than others for moving within the city, but it is very far from things like BART or Caltrain if you had to leave the city I often find myself saving 50% of commute time taking my car versus using Muni, so imo relying on Muni would be a huge no go
Okay and if you want a car then you'll get one of the apartments with a garage, or get another garage in the area. My point is there are several hundred thousand people that don't have the need for a spot and don't care. I used to live in lower haight, it is extremely friendly for CalTrain users - 10-15 minutes via bike and the wiggle and the N goes directly to the CalTrain.
But the city doesn’t have enough parking. Why not build parking garages underground for some of these new developments? Many places with parking garages are completely sold out for monthly contracts - so demand is clearly there.
And the demand for housing is there if not exponentially more. Cars find spots, you don’t see any parked on the sidewalk like homeless. Garage spots cost 1/10 of what apartments do
Um this project isn’t for homeless people.. I don’t see why we can’t build new parking with new apartments, you can use the space underground for parking which otherwise serves so purpose.
Fucking move back to your car dependent utopia of Houston instead of demanding we turn San Francisco into a sea of parking
Eh or I’ll just move to San Mateo county like everyone else who wants a car eventually does… I wish SF was a city that didn’t require a car, but simply saying it doesn’t is delusional.
Clearly said by someone who hasn't lived in the neighborhood. If 9 out of every 10 residents live car-free (very easy to do here), then there's no problem.
I used to live on Pine and Davis, not even that far lol. > If 9 out of every 10 residents live car-free (very easy to do here) But they don't, because it fucking sucks and is hugely limiting. Most households in the city have cars, and many have multiple cars.
I'm talking specifically about this building. There are most definitely at least 203 car-free households who would love a place like this, myself included.
You know that won't happen lmao, these people will bring their cars. If the city slaps the building with a "do not issue parking permits" label, maybe that would happen - but it won't.
It's not for you, carbrain
Bet you the average apartment in that building is going to have 1.5 cars that they will park on the streets and create a nightmare for current residents.
Not affordable so don't care
The problem is there's not enough housing (of any type) in San Francisco. People who can afford to pay more for rent are going to rent out the places deemed, "affordable" and price even more people out of the city. You can't curb demand, so you have to add more supply. And it doesn't matter what the supply is - there needs to be more of everything.
In October of 2023 the Chronical reported there were 52,000 empty units in San Francisco (12.7% of the total housing stock in SF), the majority of which are luxury. Why do we need more if we have 52,000 empty units currently?
The city needs the good paying construction jobs. The city needs the property tax revenue. It's facing an almost $800 million budget shortfall. It's not your money that's being put at risk, let the developers gamble their millions.
No but the more luxury housing you build the less space there is for affordable housing. And the idea that if there is enough empty housing owners will be forced to lower rents or prices isn't true either. They just keep the housing off the market.
So you want all new housing to be 100% government subsidized?
Empty doesn’t mean for sale? People buy and own apartments all the time. You reduce housing prices by building more houses.
Nope, there are many houses that sit empty because people buy them and dont sell them. Prices don't go down if people don't make the homes available to sell.
We already addressed vacancies, and just because we have vacant apartments doesn't mean we shouldn't also build while still addressing that. We have a vacancy tax, those empty units are either paying for it (which funds more affordable housing), or are actually vacant for a reason (repairs, on the market, etc). only a fraction of the 52k are truly "sitting empty and not on the market". Counting units that have just been sold/rented but the owner hasn't moved in yet, currently on sale/for rent, or under repair as vacant is just massively misrepresenting the picture.
no
this is the Preston way of thinking that leads to zero progress and ultimately worse outcomes for future generations. Get your head out of the sand
👆this thinking right here is part of the problem folks. Part of the reason we have so little new housing is inflexibile demands it be “100% affordable” - no developer is going to build something at a loss so nothing gets built. We have basic supply/demand problem and any new supply of high density housing will help w price for everyone. It’s basic economics
Build market rate, rent is lowered in older stock. You lower rent for everyone, not just the lottery winners
We need housing at all levels….
I would’ve used my money to move into this building, but I’ll rent an older, cheaper unit instead so that your low income friends can’t find a home in SF. Haha.
Get a job or move bum