Earlier this month I wrote about California Senator Scott Wiener’s bill to increase housing supply and mandate greater land-use intensities adjacent to transit. Here is that post.

Judging by the comments, many of you seemed to think this was a fairly sensible proposal. I know I certainly did. Senator Wiener called it a housing-first agenda, as opposed to a housing-last agenda.

So I thought it would be interesting to share how some people have responded to the proposal. 

Los Angeles City Councilman Paul Koretz called it both “devastating” and “the worst idea [he’s] ever heard.” He went on to tell the LA Times that, within 10 years, people should expect their neighborhoods to be transformed into Dubai. 

His conclusion: “I don’t think people want to see significant rezoning around single-family neighborhoods whether they’re near transit or not.”

I don’t agree with his first set of remarks, but I agree with his second one. And that, of course, is the challenge. If you own a single-family home down the street from transit, what great incentive do you have to support intensification?

Paul is the messenger.

California State Senator, Scott Wiener, introduced 3 new bills at the beginning of this year intended to address the statewide housing shortage and continue the pivot from a housing-last agenda to a housing-first agenda.

Here is a summary of the 3 bills:

These three bills (1) mandate denser and taller zoning near transit; (2) create a more data-driven and less political Regional Housing Needs Assessment process (RHNA provides local communities with numerical housing goals) and require communities to address past RHNA shortfalls; and (3) make it easier to build farmworker housing while maintaining strong worker protections.

And here is a bit more information about the first one:

SB 827 creates density and height zoning minimums near transit. Under SB 827, parcels within a half-mile of high-connectivity transit hub — like BART, Muni, Caltrain, and LA Metro stations — will be required to have no density maximums (such as single family home mandates), no parking minimums, and a minimum height limit of between 45 and 85 feet, depending on various factors, such as whether the parcel is on a larger corridor and whether it is immediately adjacent to the station. A local ordinance can increase that height but not go below it. SB 827 allows for many more smaller apartment buildings, described as the “missing middle” between high-rise steel construction and single family homes.

The belief is that transit-oriented sites in the state of California have the potential to accommodate up to 3 million additional housing units.

Fewer barriers to creating new housing. More data. And less politics. You can read more about Wiener’s 2018 housing package over on Medium.

Earlier this month I wrote about California Senator Scott Wiener’s bill to increase housing supply and mandate greater land-use intensities adjacent to transit. Here is that post.

Judging by the comments, many of you seemed to think this was a fairly sensible proposal. I know I certainly did. Senator Wiener called it a housing-first agenda, as opposed to a housing-last agenda.

So I thought it would be interesting to share how some people have responded to the proposal. 

Los Angeles City Councilman Paul Koretz called it both “devastating” and “the worst idea [he’s] ever heard.” He went on to tell the LA Times that, within 10 years, people should expect their neighborhoods to be transformed into Dubai. 

His conclusion: “I don’t think people want to see significant rezoning around single-family neighborhoods whether they’re near transit or not.”

I don’t agree with his first set of remarks, but I agree with his second one. And that, of course, is the challenge. If you own a single-family home down the street from transit, what great incentive do you have to support intensification?

Paul is the messenger.

California State Senator, Scott Wiener, introduced 3 new bills at the beginning of this year intended to address the statewide housing shortage and continue the pivot from a housing-last agenda to a housing-first agenda.

Here is a summary of the 3 bills:

These three bills (1) mandate denser and taller zoning near transit; (2) create a more data-driven and less political Regional Housing Needs Assessment process (RHNA provides local communities with numerical housing goals) and require communities to address past RHNA shortfalls; and (3) make it easier to build farmworker housing while maintaining strong worker protections.

And here is a bit more information about the first one:

SB 827 creates density and height zoning minimums near transit. Under SB 827, parcels within a half-mile of high-connectivity transit hub — like BART, Muni, Caltrain, and LA Metro stations — will be required to have no density maximums (such as single family home mandates), no parking minimums, and a minimum height limit of between 45 and 85 feet, depending on various factors, such as whether the parcel is on a larger corridor and whether it is immediately adjacent to the station. A local ordinance can increase that height but not go below it. SB 827 allows for many more smaller apartment buildings, described as the “missing middle” between high-rise steel construction and single family homes.

The belief is that transit-oriented sites in the state of California have the potential to accommodate up to 3 million additional housing units.

Fewer barriers to creating new housing. More data. And less politics. You can read more about Wiener’s 2018 housing package over on Medium.