Once when I was a planning practitioner we had a debate about how to handle the determination of a particular program under the California Environmental Quality Act. My colleagues argued that we should do an environmental impact report because otherwise we might get sued. I argued that we were going to get sued no matter what, so we might as well use an exemption. If we did an EIR, I said, some judge would just find that we didn’t do it right. On the other hand, if we used an exemption we had a chance of winning outright.

At least eight cities and coalitions of cities in California have submitted  proposals, among 238 nationwide, to lure Amazon's second headquarters by the deadline, last Thursday. The company’s criteria include leading universities systems, proximity to a major airport, and enough land to accommodate 8 million square feet and 50,000 employees. A multifaceted bid by the City of Los Angeles, the County of Los Angeles, the City of Pomona, the Pomona Fairplex, and Cal Poly Pomona proposed a joint plan through the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp. Irvine is bidding through the Irvine Company, and San Diego, and Chula Vista have each submitted proposals. Huntington Beach and Long Beach teamed up to offer “Sand, Sea and Air,” which includes the Boeing campus with 500,000 square feet and a 164-acre campus that can accommodate 5.4 million buildable square feet adjacent to Long Beach Airport. Santa Ana has proposed a 10 million-square-foot hub with developer Michael Harrah in the old Orange County Register’s building.  In the Bay Area , the City of San Jose submitted a bid, as did a coalition of four cities —  Concord, Fremont, Oakland, Richmond and San Francisco — with 60 million square feet of commercial across three counties. The proposal includes properties such as the former Concord Naval Weapons Stations, Hunters Point, and the Oakland Coliseum. It also includes 45,000 new homes with the motto: “Don’t aggregate and coagulate. Disperse and be diverse”.  Gov. Jerry Brown offered hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks and other incentives if Amazon chooses a California city as its second home. (See prior CP&DR commentary .) Fresno Water Fee Prompts Suit by Developers The Fresno City Council recently  approved , 5-1, a water capacity fee which adds up to $4,246 for a new single-family home in April. Three major home-builders are challenging the fees in court, saying they are too high, unfair, and amount to a tax that violates state law. The trial is scheduled for March 2018 in Fresno County Superior Court. One developer, Granville Homes president Darius Assemi, told the council the fee will be passed onto new homebuyers and therefore they need to make sure it is an appropriate fee. City Attorney Douglas Sloan says the fees are only what’s needed to cover the cost of service and that the fees bear a “fair or reasonable relationship” to new homeowners’ burdens on future water demands. Planning Funds Available for Hazard Mitigation The Governor’s Office of Emergency Services is accepting  applications for funding through the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program, available as a result of three Presidential Disaster Declarations. Planning activities that reduce the effects of future natural disasters are eligible for the funding if the subapplicants are state agencies, local governments, special districts, and some private non-profits. Planning Subapplications are due by January 1, 2018. Eligible activities include updating or enhancing sections of the current FEMA-approved mitigation plan; integrating information from mitigation plans, specifically risk assessment or mitigation strategies; building capability through delivery of technical assistance and training; and evaluating adoption and/or implementation of ordinances that reduce risk and/or increase resilience. California Homes Rank among Most Expensive in Study of Land and Construction Costs A new study by Buildzoom shows home prices have risen more dramatically than construction costs have. The study estimated the average home value compared to the cost of replacing the home, as well as related measures for zip code areas within each of the largest U.S. metro regions. In Coastal metro areas the high cost of housing is not driven by the construction costs but rather by the high cost of land (scarcity of zoned units, not available land).  The research shows how timing is vital in a developers’ land acquisition. Among cities with the highest average replacement cost per home, California cities occupied four of the five top spots; the average land value per home followed a similar pattern, meaning that the intrinsic costs of land — minutes the costs of building — are highest in California. The San Jose metro area had the highest average home value $1,133,000 and Buffalo metro the lowest $167,000. The data shows that in coastal metro regions the value of homes is derives less from their materials or construction but rather the opportunity they offer for living and working in the city. The goal of the research is to indicate the challenges that restricted housing supply- rules governing land use- brings to a region. Quick Hits & Updates The Sacramento Bee projects that the wildfires destroyed roughly 6,700 homes and business in and around Santa Rosa, which is approximately five percent of the housing stock. The Department of Housing and Urban Development says Santa Rosa has an unmet rental demand of more than 1,700 units over the next three years and only 200 new rental homes are under construction. The population of Santa Rosa had grown by 1,000 annually over the last seven years with fewer than 300 new homes built in 2016. The California State Transportation Agency is now accepting applications for the next round of  Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program  (TIRCP) awards and the first round of  State Rail Assistance (SRA)  Programs awards. These grants combined will provide about $2.5 billion over the next five years to transit and rail operators across the state. The TIRCP official Call for Projects, with detailed information about application requirements, is located  here . Program Guidelines are located  here . SRA Guidelines, with detailed information about program requirements, are located  here . The California Air Resources Board  released its Final Staff Report on the Proposed Update to the Senate Bill 375 Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Targets. The board hearing is scheduled for November 16 and the Final Environmental Analysis will be available at least ten days before the hearing. Three Newport Beach real estate firms have been picked to head the redevelopment of Dana Point Harbor. The mixed-use project is expected to cost around $300 million and will include new restaurants, shops, hotels, and other waterfront properties. San Diego City Councilmember Scott Sherman is proposing to soften park construction obligations that housing developers face to spur more development. Instead, developers should spend their required park contribution on adding playgrounds or other amenities to an existing park instead of future parks that may never be built. Los Angeles Metro, with $619 million from Measure M, is forging ahead with plans to extend the Green and Crenshaw/LAX Lines 4.6 miles southward to a new transit center in Torrance. There are currently two routes under consideration: one following the railroad right-of-way and the other along Hawthorne Boulevard. Both alternatives would service the new station being built to connect with the LAX Automated People Mover. Metro is conducting a supplemental alternative analysis for the project and is expected to go to the Board for a vote in winter 2018.   Google’s development partner, TC Agoge, has struck a deal with the Sucessor Agency to the San Jose Redevelopment Agency to buy a vacant property near the SAP Center. In June the tech company revealed its plans to build a transit-oriented campus of 6-8 million square feet where 15,000 to 20,000 employees might work. Google is incremental purchasing properties in the western edges of downtown near Diridon Station. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Sacramento Superior Court judge dismissed a lawsuit trying to block a 15-story residential tower in the midtown neighborhood that was blocked on the grounds of it being too dense. The Yamanee would be the tallest building in midtown, with three floors of parking and ten floors, or 134 units, of condominiums. The lawsuit alleged the city oversetepped its discretion in allowing the project to be three times more dense than the general plan’s designation for the area. Superior Court Judge Timothy Frawley denied the challenge and found the city has the authority to allow higher density when a project provides “significant community benefit.” JP Morgan Chase has awarded $3.5 million grant to a two nonprofit lenders: Housing Trust Silicon Valley and Genesis LA Economic Development Corp. to help spur construction of small-scale, affordable housing units such as accessory dwelling units. The funds provide seed money for a pilot program expected to begin next year. The low-cost flexible loans would be made to homeowners in exchange for their promise to rent the adu at affordable costs to low and middle-income earners. A group of environmental conservation groups filed an appeal against the Mid County Parkway, a proposed 16-mile east-west highway corridor that would link the cities of Perris and San Jacinto. The groups challenge the $2 billion project saying it would cut through low-income neighborhoods, threaten wildlife preserves, and worsen air pollution. The project would be partially paid through Measure A, a half-cent sales tax approved by Riverside County voters. ATTOM Data Solutions released its 2017 U.S. Natural Hazard Housing Risk Index. According to the Risk Heat Map, all of California is located in the “Very High” risk category.  TO collect the data, ATTOM indexed more than 3,000 counties and 22,000 cities on the risk of earthquakes, floods, hail, hurricane storm surge, tornadoes, and wildfires.  In California, Nevada County (Truckee) made the top five list for highest overall natural hazard risk and San Jose, Los Angeles, and Bakersfield were three of the top five cities to make the list. The San Francisco Planning Commission approved  changes to the Western Shoreline Area Plan including closing the southern stretch of the Great Highway and relocating the parking lot and restrooms. The amendments also call for added protection for the 14-foot-wide wastewater infrastructure buried under the Great Highway. The plans still need further approval at the local and state levels, including the California Coastal Commission.   The federal government has given Cadiz Inc, the go-ahead to lay pipeline for its proposed desert water project. In 2015, Bureau of Land Management said Cadiz couldn't use the existing railroad right-of-way and would have to obtain federal permission, which would have triggered a lengthy environmental review. The BLM follows other Trump administration moves to eliminate legal hurdles erected when President Obama was in office. The Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles is reopening the Section 8 waiting list lottery for the first time in 13 years. The agency is expecting more than 600,000 people to apply for the rental subsidy program and only 20,000 will be selected for placement on the waiting list. According to Mayor Garcetti’s office, 56,000 households in the City are currently enrolled. San Francisco Supervisor Norman Yee presented a revised ordinance that allows robots on the streets and sidewalks but only with permits and a human nearby to monitor the devices. Yee’s initial ordinance would have outright banned the devices from city sidewalks, but it did not appear to have enough votes to pass the board.  Los Angeles Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to look into restoring an expired ordinance that could help control rising rents and evictions at mobile home parks. The motion will begin by asking county departments to look into the feasibility of such an ordinance.

By 2040, California will have an "integrated statewide" rail network, according to a new public draft of the California State Rail Plan plan  released by Caltrans. The plan outlines a series of investments to connect most communities in California to each other at least every hour throughout the day, with many regions being connected with half-hourly service. It also highlights the critical role for the rail system to be expanded in its ability to move a growing volume of freight cleanly and efficiently. Caltrans intends for these investments to lead to an easy-to-use rail system that provides faster and more frequent service, customer-friendly timed multimodal connections, integrated ticketing and trip planning, and increased reliability of travel in congested corridors. Caltrans is seeking public input between October 11 until December 11. Caltrans will hold public workshops across the state in San Luis Obispo Oct. 14, Fresno the Oct. 30, Oakland Nov. 1, Sacramento Nov. 7, San Diego Nov. 13, San Bernardino Nov. 14, Los Angeles Nov. 15th, and an online webinar Dec. 6. S.F. Releases Strategy to Reduce Homelessness San Francisco’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing will release i ts “Five-Year Strategic Framework” to reduce homelessness this week. The plan’s goals are to cut the number of hard-core street people in half, ending family homelessness, and clearing away all large tent encampments. One of the key aims is to bundle the city’s homeless services tighter to make a Homelessness Response System that ties together the 15 existing independent databases now being used to track homeless people through housing, medical and other services. The new system should be fully up and running by December 2018. Other plans in the framework are to expand the Moving On Initiative to help 300 people leave supportive housing for independent living, open at least one new Navigation Center, ramp up family and youth aid programs and construct 1,367 new supportive housing units in five years. Fresno Takes Steps to Spend TCC Funds The Community Steering Committee of the Fresno Transformative Climate Communities Collaborative voted on a package  of projects that will be presented to the Fresno City Council and then Sacramento for final approval. The proposals include a West Fresno campus for Fresno City College, an electric car-sharing service, a mixed-use development in Chinatown, and a community activity center. In total 25 proposals were submitted for a piece of $70 million in cap-and-trade funding. Fresno was tapped for a large share of TCC funds for its combination of environmental challenges and poverty rate. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) State Legislation to Change Governance of SANDAG Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill that would establish an independent auditor for the San Diego Association of Governments and shift the balance of power on its 21-member board of elected officials in favor of the larger cities. For the past few months, SANDAG has faced allegations of mismanagement and negligence, such as overselling how much public money a tax proposal would raise for promised transportation projects. San Diego Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez authored the bill. Those opposed call it a “shameful power grab by Sacramento Democrats, leaving the majority of cities in our county at the mercy of the two largest.” However, many groups are in favor of the changes. To approve major decisions, SANDAG’s board of directors get a straight vote by each official and a weighted vote based on city’s population. The legislation alters how the weighted vote is calculated and allows the weighted vote to supersede the tally vote as long as four separate jurisdictions vote in the majority. Firm Floats L.A. River Revitalization Concept AECOM released  its LA River Gateway revitalization proposal for the hundreds of acres of land alongside the downtown section of the Los Angeles River. The multinational construction firm did the research at no charge and with no formal client because it wants to show what the vision could be for the future. AECOM officials propose that public agency landowners form a joint powers authority and leverage their ownership of more than one-third of the land within the plan area to form a taxing agency that could fund new streets, housing, and other development. The framework for the proposal is guided by the city of Los Angeles’s sustainability goals. Economic Forecast Calls for Rising Rents in S. California USC released  its 2017 Casden Economics Forecast and found that rising employment combined with low homeownership will continue to drive rent up over the next two years throughout the region. The forecast finds by 2019 rents are expected to increase over $136 from 2017 levels in Los Angeles County, $149 in Orange County, $124 in Inland Empire, $121 in San Diego County, and $98 in Ventura County. The report stresses the challenges employers have in attempting to recruit out-of-state talent. L.A. Metro Looks to Accelerate Key Projects with Private Funds Los Angeles Metro announced  three transit projects may be built sooner rather than later because of private investors. The three projects include designing and building a train through the Sepulveda Pass, building a light-rail line from downtown LA to southeast LA County cities, and creating an additional pay lanes on crowded freeways. By adding private capital up front, the agency can start designing next year instead of waiting for the tax revenues to accrue. The Sepulveda Transit Corridor includes an 11-mile train portion that is scheduled to be completed in 2033. The light-rail project will connect Artesia to downtown Los Angeles and is expected to break ground in 2022. The final project is ExpressLanes on the 10 Freeway from El Monte to Los Angeles and the 110 Freeway from South Los Angeles to the 105 Freeway in Norwalk. Quick Hits & Updates Donald Shoup, a research professor of urban planning at UCLA best known for his work on parking, is the 2017 recipient of the Distinguished Educator Award-the highest honor given by the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning (ACSP). The award is conferred every two years to honor significant contributions to the field of planning.  The Planning and Land Use Management Committee of the Los Angeles City Council approved a measure that would charge developers in the city a fee to help pay for low-income housing. The fee is expected to generate more than $100 million a year and produce or preserve hundreds of subsidized units. Those opposed to the fee say it will further stifle housing production. The fee would be around $15 per square foot and would be phased in over an 18-month period. The measure now goes to the full council.  The City of Santa Rosa is looking to dramatically increase housing densities throughout the city, especially downtown and near its two train stations. A new plan calls for density bonuses for developers that could allow up to 100 percent more housing units than traditional zoning would allow for the site. Developers who build affordable units in the city would be granted the right to build more units than normal. Under the Housing Action plan the city is also considering inclusionary housing and making easier and cheaper to build granny units. (Editor’s Note: This plan was drafted prior to last week’s fires.) A California State Audit found Gov. Brown’s $17 billion proposal for twin water tunnels under the Sacramento Bay-Delta was suffering from “significant cost increases and delays”. State auditor Elaine Howle also said the Department of Water Resources had not completed an economic or financial analysis to demonstrate the financial viability of the project.  The AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which sponsored and promoted the failed Los Angeles’s Measure S ballot measure in March, is forming a new division called the Healthy Housing Foundation to provide affordable housing. AHF has already purchased a Skid Row building for $8 million in an effort to provide apartments for hundreds of low-income tenants and is in the process of purchasing a Hollywood motel. Populous, the same architectural firm that designed Petco Park, has been hired by San Diego State University to begin initial planning on a multi-purpose stadium in Mission Valley. The plan is to build a 35,000-seat, expandable structure for around $150 million. SDSU would use land for a campus expansion and set aside space for a stadium for soccer games and other events. There are several other proposals pending for the property.  UCLA released an Affordable Housing Policy Brief from Paul Habibi “Housing Pays: Capturing the Economic and Fiscal Benefits of Increased Housing Production in L.A.” In LA County about 6 in 10 renters are cost-burdened, meaning paying at least 30 percent of income on housing each month, and one-third of county renters spend half their income on housing. The report shows that expediting and streamlining housing development to maintain high levels of housing production would produce $583 million over eight years.  Billionaire landowner Vinod Khosla has finally let people visit a beach accessible through his property between 9am and 4:30pm, but not every day. The California Coastal Commission say this does not sufficiently addresses his violations of state law guaranteeing public access to the coast. Khosla’s lawyers are arguing that the state interference with his “fundamental right to exclude the public from private property” would be a type of “taking” that requires compensation under U.S. Supreme Court property-rights rulings. Los Angeles County supervisors fired Sean Rogan, executive director of the Housing Authority and Community Development Commission. No public explanation has been given. According to an annual financial report, the San Diego Housing Commission funded fewer than 20 percent of the affordable rental housing units it hoped to finance, despite nearly 85 percent increase in revenue due to developer fees to support such projects. Officials were aiming to construction 310 units but by June 30 only had 51 rental units backed by the commission. The report cited delays in project timelines and funding approvals among the reasons for the low production totals. It says 800 low-income housing units are expected to be completed by July 2018. The State Lands Commission informed  Cadiz Inc. that its proposed water pipeline crosses a strip of state-owned land and therefore requires a state lease. The Trump administration cleared a major obstacle that was erected by the Obama administration but this recent letter is the latest hurdle in a long history of the politically connected company’s attempts to pump groundwater 200 miles east of Los Angeles. University of San Diego economist Alan Gin says the city needs to put restrictions on short-term rentals or else the existing supply of local housing will become even scarcer than it already is. Gin says the region is 68,000 units short of what it needs. San Diego County’s average rent hit a record of $1,875 a month. San Diego City Council is expected to take up the issue of STRs soon.

If ever a movie made a star out of a building, the movie was Blade Runner and the star was the Bradbury Building . Rumor has it that it was restored in part because of the fame director Ridley Scott conferred on it by making it the setting for the death of Roy Batty, the emotional undoing of Deckard, and one of the more potent testimonies to the fragility of humanity. The real Los Angeles is thus better off for what happened in the fictional Los Angeles. Then again, 2019 is still two years away. Blade Runner created a dystopic vision of Los Angeles that remains as culturally potent today — if not more so — than it was when it came out in 35 years ago. It shows up in books, articles , and offhand remarks with astounding regularity. It’s a testament to the arresting visuals of hyper-dense polyglot streets illuminated by sparkling advertisements and the possibility, however slim, that our sunny, spread-out paradise could, someday, become one of the dark places of the earth. After all, perhaps the biggest fantasy to come out of Los Angeles is Los Angeles itself. For all the theorizing about Blade Runner, it’s worth asking not what Scott was saying about the future of Los Angeles (or of cities in general) but rather why he chose Los Angeles in the first place. If Blade Runner had taken place in an older, more endearing city — say San Francisco or London — we’d be sad to witness its demise. If it had taken place someplace more generic, like Phoenix, Denver, or Gotham City, we might not care. Los Angeles hit the sweet spot between lamentation and acceptance, and, as Mike Davis says, between sunshine and noir. Director Ridley Scott, like his fellow Briton Reyner Banham, approached Los Angeles with equal parts dread and fascination. His choice was not so much a commentary on the Los Angeles of the future but rather of the Los Angeles of the present. K trudges down a sunless street in Los Angeles in 2049. The challenge that speculative fiction faces, of course, is that eventually the future catches up with it. Blade Runner 2049 takes place 30 years later, in an even bleaker world. An apparent combination of nuclear war, climate change, and technological sabotage has rendered the planet even less habitable than it was before. The dove that Batty released years ago has left no offspring. J.F. Sebastian, the sad-eyed toymaker in the first film, jokes, “No housing shortage around here. Plenty of room for everybody” since everyone who can has moved Off-World. That’s how he can afford an entire office building for his dolls and marionettes and how Deckard can afford to live in an architectural masterpiece on a cop’s salary. In the intervening years, though, the housing shortage has returned with a vengeance, not necessarily because the world has more inhabitants but because it has less land. The moral question, of course, is whether the city should accept all who need safe haven. That’s the same question that today’s Los Angeles is asking itself – or should be asking itself, at any rate. In 2049, untold numbers of stragglers, humans and replicants alike are forced into cities, where they subsist on synthetic food and artificial light. In fact, there may be no cities – plural. From the looks of things, there may be nothing else left besides Los Angeles, with all of humanity and non-humanity crammed into a piece of land whose chief virtue is that it is not radioactive. K, the new blade runner designed to hunt his own kind, searches among tens — or maybe hundreds — of millions of Los Angeles residents, all waiting for their time to die. Areal shots depict the city’s familiar endless rows of boulevards and residential streets. The houses that dot Reyner Banham’s Plains of Id are replaced by high-rise shantytowns, made up of apartment buildings, each many stories tall, each more dilapidated than the last. Mere dingbats they are not. In this Blade Runner, the billboards walk the street, as 80-foot tall interactive holograms that shake their asses just for you. (We’ve come a long way from Angelyne.) Skyscrapers rise into the ochre fog, and all is overshadowed by the new citadel of the Wallace Corporation, the corporation that rose from the ashes of Tyrell. There’s a popular Angeleno parlor game in which you try to spot real-life locations, whether they’re playing themselves or standing in for other places. The original Blade Runner was not all fantasy. Somewhere beneath the gas flares, the billboards, and Tyrell’s pyramid are the Ennis House, Union Station, and, of course, the Bradbury Building. These locations give Blade Runner a sense of reality, at least to those of us who live in L.A. -- a chilling reminder that that the future may be closer at hand than we think. That game brings few rewards with Blade Runner 2049. Director Denis Villeneuve wisely avoided the Bradbury Building, which, in the world of Blade Runner, is as fraught and freighted as Calvary. But it was far from his only omission. In fact, not a single, structure or landscape connects fiction to reality. Villeneuve offers no ruins or repurposed vestiges of the old city. The camera catches no glimpses of a ruined Dodger Stadium, a looted Getty Center, or even a lifeless palm tree. The Wilshire Grand does not stand next to the fictional police station. We know Blade Runner 2049 takes place in Los Angeles only because of arbitrary signifiers, like the LAPD, and because of its cosmetic resemblance to the city in the previous film, not to the one that lives and breathes, evolving before our eyes. In only a single, fleeting sequence in does the cityscape of Los Angeles becomes legible. K flies his Spinner police cruiser over a recognizable, but altered, expanse of the Los Angeles Basin towards what used to be the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Tendrils of ocean creep into what used to be Venice and the other coastal communities. A metal seawall the height of the Hoover Dam and width of the coastline itself protects the city from the bloated Pacific. It’s obviously not a prescription. And yet, some among us appreciate the original Blade Runner for its urbanity: the density, the diversity, and the grit. By avoiding Los Angeles entirely, the sequel lacks that exquisite ambivalence, making Los Angeles seem less human — it is a replicant of itself. Los Angeles does not so much play itself as it stands in for the entire world, obliterated beyond recognition. Villeneuve’s vision conveys more about the future of cities in general than it does about Los Angeles specifically. (Las Vegas makes a cameo, however.) A seawall protects what is left of Los Angeles from the risen Pacific.  Interestingly, of all the reasons that Scott might have envisioned for the demise of the world, climate change surely was not one of them. Blade Runner came out in 1982, after all. If anything, he probably had in mind the Cold War, signified by passing references to our them-communist antagonists, Russia and China. So, while the fictional city hasn’t changed much, its allegorical power has changed dramatically, as the real threats to humanity have evolved (and, arguably, worsened). So, Blade Runner may yet turn out to be a prediction. If the Los Angeles of the original Blade Runner was, as Ridley Scott put it, “Hong Kong on a bad day”, the updated version is closer to Mumbai or Lagos. The misery and squalor of K’s Los Angeles of the future prevails today in plenty of real places on our own planet. Add rising seas or an unthinkable human tragedy, and more people may have to cram into smaller areas. Urban planners are going to have to be ready for that — maybe not in California, but in plenty of other places – and we’re going to need compassion, cooperation, and emotional resilience just as dearly as we’re going to need planning wisdom and technological advances. We’re all going to have to be ready to find out how human we really are. Images courtesy of Sony Pictures.

The First District Court of Appeal has concluded that a challenge to a 16-home project on Laurel Way in Redwood City is not ripe for a challenge under the Subdivision Map Act. The city issued a planned development permit, which covered the installation of infrastructure but not actual approval of the homes. A citizen group challenged the approval, claiming that the Subdivision Map Act’s grandfather provision did not apply to the 1926 Map that is being used for the project. But the appellate court ruled that because the PDP dealt only with infrastructure and not actual homes, the challenge was not ripe. Save Laurel Way v. City of Redwood City, A147942 .

In an important followup to the Berkeley Hillside case, the First District Court of Appeal has upheld a CEQA exemption for a three-unit condo project just below Coit Tower in San Francisco. Neighbors argued that the project’s unique location on Telegraph Hill represented “unique circumstances” that should have overridden the CEQA exemption. Relying on the California Supreme Court’s ruling in Berkeley Hillside Preservation v. City of Berkeley (2015) 60 Cal.4th 1086, the appellate court disagreed. “ he project is within the density, height and bulk limitations for its designated zoning,” wrote Justice Peter Siggins for a unanimous three-judge panel. “It will also be immediately adjacent to a four unit building of similar proportion. It would be odd at best for us to conclude a development project that conforms with zoning requirements on Telegraph Hill is in and of itself an unusual circumstance that requires CEQA review. We decline to do so.” The court also rejected the neighbors’ argument that conditions of approval imposed by the San Francisco Planning Commission were really mitigations under the California Environmental Quality Act, suggesting that the CEQA exemption was invalid. But the court knocked that argument down also, creating a potentially important distinction between The case involved a plan to restore a 1,000-square-foot 1906 cottage and building three new condomiums ranging in size from 3,700 to 4,200 square feet, all on a mostly vacant 7,500-square-foot lot just below Coit Tower on Telegraph Hill. Although the proposed development project is similar in scale to adjacent buildings, it generated controversy in the neighborhood. (More background on the project, including photographs of the site and the proposed project, can be found in an SFCurbed article here . ) The Planning Commission approved the project in 2014 with a number of conditions of approval designed to minimize the disruption of the project during construction. Under the San Francisco City Charter, the Planning Commission has broad discretionary power to impose conditions on projects. The Planning Commission also exempted the cottage rehab from CEQA under a categorical exemption for restoration and rehabilitation, and the three condos because the project was less than four units. The citizen group Protect Telegraph Hill sued, arguing that the exemptions were wrongly applied and the conditions imposed were really CEQA mitigations that were inappropriate to be imposed in a conditional use case. San Francisco Superior Court Judge Teri L. Jackson ruled in favor of the city and Protect Telegraph Hill appealed. On appeal, the neighbors argued that, among other things, the situation involved “unusual circumstances” that should have overridden the CEQA exemptions. The neighbors called the location and site constraints “unequivocally rare,” and says the exception applies because it is the “ first among the ‘Outstanding and Unique Areas’ that ‘contribute in an extraordinary degree to San Francisco’s visual form and character.” The neighbors also argued that this unique character is reflected in the city’s general plan and urban design element. But the appellate court disagreed. “The City rejected the notion that the designation of Telegraph Hill in the urban design element supports a claim of unusual circumstances, and so do we,” the court wrote. “ The full description of the Hill in the element shows that it is lined with low, small-scale buildings with flat roofs that hug the topography. While one may argue the scale of the proposed building, this seems a question of degree rather than an unusual circumstance.” The neighbors’ other major argument was that the conditions of approval were really CEQA mitigations that the city should not have imposed as part of a conditional use approval. But the court wrote, “There is simply nothing in this record that demonstrates the Board was imposing the additional conditions in order to mitigate the project’s significant environmental effects as opposed to taking precautions to address the ordinarily anticipated inconvenience and danger that arises when significant construction activity occurs in a congested urban environment like San Francisco’s Telegraph Hill.” The Case: Protect Telegraph Hill v. City and County of San Francisco , No. A148544 (published October 13, 2017) The Lawyers: For Protect Telegraph Hill: Susan Brandt-Hawley, susanbh@preservationlawyers.com For City and County of San Francisco: Andrea Ruiz-Esquide, San Francisco City Attorney’s Office, andrea.ruiz-esquide@sfgov.org For developers of lot (real parties in interest): James Reuben, Reuben, Junius & Rose, jreuben@reubenlaw.com , and Anna C. Shimko, Burke,Williams, & Sorenson, ashimko@bwslaw.com .

The City of Stockton City Council voted unanimously to approve  the first phase of downtown’s proposed Open Window redevelopment project. The proposed project includes 15-square-blocks of mixed-use development with about 1,000 residential units, 90,000 square-feet of commercial space, and 110,000 square feet of industrial/art studio space. Last week, the City Council increase the city’s commitment of funding from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development that is required to rebuild parts of downtown’s aging infrastructure. In 2016, the council voted to set aside $3.8 million but that number has increased to $6.18 million. The $67.5 million project is expected to break ground in 2018. Bakersfield Park Named to APA’s ‘Great Places' American Planning Association released its 15 “Great Places in America”. These neighborhoods, public places or streets are celebrated for being exemplary planning that results in stronger, healthier, and more just communities. Mill Creek Linear Park in Bakersfield was the only California community to be a designee. The 1.5-mile urban trail won in the “2017 Great Public Spaces” category along with four other projects nationwide. The park was originally an irrigation canal that has evolved into the center of revitalization for downtown Bakersfield. It connects several civic resources and has been credited with spurring revitalization in downtown Bakersfield. The APA writes that the park "serves as a national model for how cities and rural communities can repurpose single-use canals into a multi-use focal point for an entire community.” San Jose Mayor Proposes 25,000 New Units, with 10,000 Downtown San Jose Mayor Sam Licardo proposed constructing 25,000 residential units in the city over the next five years. Part of the proposal includes changing the landscape of downtown by increasing higher-density homes and more transit-oriented development. According to the mayor, half of the proposed units should be built in downtown and roughly 10,000 should be affordable units. Mayor Liccardo notes the city departments tasked with project, permit and building approvals is understaffed as well as the planning department. Several developers attended the event and said they have considerable units in the pipeline that assists the goal of the mayor’s proposal. However, director of public policy for Working Partnerships USA- a community coalition pushing for more affordable housing- says there needs to be stronger rent control policies and assurances that companies such as Google contribute to solving the housing crisis rather than just increasing housing prices. The City Council will consider the proposal during its Oct. 17 meeting. (See prior CP&DR coverage of downtown San Jose.) SDSU to Sponsor Ballot Measure for Redevelopment of Qualcomm San Diego State University may launch a citywide ballot initiative that would authorize the city to sell 132 of the 166 acres at the SDCCU Stadium (former Qualcomm) site to create the SDSU West Campus Research, Stadium and River Initiative. The goal is to bring the measure to voters in the June 5 primary or Nov. 6 general election next year. A competing initial, to develop SoccerCity sports complex, is scheduled to be on this November's ballot. The SDSU measure does not specifically lay out the uses for the stadium land but instead calls for the University to prepare a master plan that would be approved by the state and leaves the city and university to negotiate the fair market price, mitigation measures, and other details. However, part of the initiative calls for a new stadium of at least 35,000 seats to be built within sever years. The city had planned to close the 50-year-old stadium in 2019 to save about $12 million in annual operating costs since the Chargers have relocated to Los Angeles. S.F. Mayor Calls for Adding 5,000 Units Annually, Hastening Entitlements San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee mandated a citywide goal of 5,000 new homes built every year. To reach this ambitious goal, Lee is asking all city agencies to cut average wait times in half to facilitate more construction. According to the U.S. Census, the city only added 2,600 new units of housing between 2015 and 2016. The year before it had added 3,500 new homes and 5,500 the previous year. The mayor’s office created a timeline for housing project approval saying buildings exempt from CEQA should take no more than six months for approval and housing that requires a full EIR should take 18 months at most. Mayor Lee mandates that 11 city agencies appoint new managers with the job of speeding up entitlements. Visualization Tool Provides Detailed Information on Climate Change in Calif. The California Energy Commission (CEC) announced the release of Cal-Adapt 2.0. This comprehensive climate change data visualization and download tool is developed and maintained by the UC Berkeley Geospatial Innovation Facility with funding and oversight from CEC. Cal-Adapt 2.0’s new updates and enhancements include alignment with the latest scientific research, more robust analysis of climate change impacts and risks to local communities. The program now enables access to climate change data through new public application programming interface, downloadable charts and graphs, CSV charts, GeoTIFF format, and direct access to data for all 32 models for two representative concentration pathway scenarios. Quick Hits & Updates The California Department of Housing and Community Development and the Strategic Growth Council have announced approximately $255 million available for Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) Program. Applications and required documents must be submitted by Jan. 16, 2018. Former Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson faces legal scrutiny for the second time in two years for deleting texts related to developer Paul Petrovich from his cellphone. Petrovich contends Johnson and other councilmembers colluded to deny him a fair hearing and says they erased text messages that Petrovich contends may have supported his claims that members agreed to vote against him beforehand. Johnson said his emails automatically delete after 30 days and he habitually erases texts from his personal cellphone to declutter. Two years ago, another judge reprimanded Johnson for erasing texts after being told not to by the city attorney. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Google has backed down from its threat to not build more housing on the Charleston East campus without more office space. The tech company is planning to build 9,850 units and originally asked for more office space than the 3.6 million square feet in the draft plan. The final City Council vote is set for November for the North Bayshore plan. The Coastal Commission is challenging the City of Los Angeles's 30-year-old beach curfew, which applies to beaches, piers and oceanfront parks. In 2015, Venice activists sued the city’s defiance of the Coastal Commission’s jurisdiction and sought to suspend the curfew enforcement. The city has now agreed to seek a permit, first from the city engineer and then the Coastal Commission, and to have police issue warnings before citing curfew violations. In 2001, the City of Sacramento and CalPERS signed a memorandum of understanding saying the giant pension fund would build 400 housing units downtown. As of today, only 36 units have been constructed. City officials have now sent a letter contending CalPERS is out of compliance. The 36 single-family homes were supposed to be finished in 2009 and 300-unit development on R Street expected to be completed in 2012. According to a new report from Apartmentlist, rents in San Jose rose 2.5 percent from last year to $2,050 for a one-bedroom, Oakland rose 5.4 percent to $1,780, and San Francisco rose 1.6 percent to $2,450. Across the Bay Area rents rose 1.3 percent to 6.2 percent. Los Angeles Metro has commissioned a study of the benefits of eliminating the Claremont Metrolink commuter rail station and replacing it with a light-rail station as part of the 12.3 mile Gold Line extension, which paraells the Metrolink line. Metro has allotted nearly $1.4 billion for the Glendora-to-Montclair Gold Line and is getting underway in the next few months. A group of Central Valley officials want to bring back  Amtrak service from southern valley cities into Sacramento on the old train tracks. The service could start as soon as 2020 with at least one daily train in each direction. The cost for the project would be around $189 million, mostly for the construction of new rail platforms. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife published  a draft EIR on three alternatives for the Ballona Wetlands restoration project in west Los Angeles; they include 483 acres and the mouth of the 8.8-mile creek. The three alternatives include: naturalized creek, restored partial sinuous creek, and levee culverts and oxbow. Construction would occur over five years, and the more ambitious first two alternatives would require a second phase of construction approximately one-and-a-half years after the initial construction.

Here’s a dream request-for proposals, if ever there was one: Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos recently kicked off a site search for a 5 million-square-foot “second headquarters” for his fast-growing e-commerce, newspaper publishing, luxury food, and film production concern. (Can you believe this guy got started selling books ?) To qualify as the future home of Amazon, Mr. Bezos is asking for a community with a population of at last 1 million people, good public schools, a major airport, and a decent public transit system. The game is afoot.  Insofar as no city in California can meet all three of these criteria (indeed, Slate writer Henry Grabar says no city in America can fill the bill) we suggest waiving all the requirements. By so doing, we can throw open the door to an otherwise deserving future home of Whole Washington Ama-Bezos Inc. and offer a dazzling array of landscapes and cityscapes from which to choose. Among Mr. Bezos's 482 choices in California -- not counting unincorporated county land where he might build his city from scratch -- here is a sample of some hidden gems he might want to consider.  Taft This small city in Kern County serves as a historic marker for the oil business that flourished here and in nearby Bakersfield decades ago. Tiny Taft has many points of interest, such as a number of working oil derricks. And the traffic court. Much of the town, sadly, has a kind of beaten-down look. A landscape ravaged by the oil business has never been repaired, and no new core business has moved in to fill the gap. If the oil derricks of Taft symbolized 20th century industry, the same town could symbolize 21st Century business: a consumer economy in which is every store in the world is owned by a single company. The derricks, with their non-stop pumping, could be made over as public art: with each pump decorated to depict the arm of an Amazon worker stuffing a book into an envelope over and over again. And no need to worry about CEQA suits. The land in Taft isn’t exactly pristine, and oil pumps don’t file lawsuits. Costa Mesa This Orange County community is the home of the South Coast Plaza shopping center, a sprawling, high-end retail complex containing nearly 3 million square feet. Buying an existing building is much cheaper than new construction, so I suggest Mr. Bezos simply acquire the entire complex and occupy the space vacated by stores he has already put out of business . With the proverbial handwriting on the wall for brick-and-mortar retail, the current owners should exult in the chance to exchange their mortgages for shares of Amazon. And don’t worry about displacing the remaining merchants: Bloomingdale’s et al can stay in place and become on-site amenities for tech workers accustomed to nice things. (“No need to leave work for a day of mad, impulsive shopping,” goes the recruitment brochure. “You can suppress your feelings of rage by overspending during lunch, and suppress your feelings of shame by over-achieving in the afternoon.”) Amazon should also buy the nearby Orange County Center for the Performing Arts, a great venue for Mr. Bezos to announce the release of, say, Kindle 17.3 or the acquisition of the German auto industry. Santa Nella This car-friendly tourist town in Merced County is the ultimate expression of freeway-oriented urbanism: Lots of fast food and cheap motel rooms, gasoline and impulse retail, with very little urban design to get in the way. It would be tacky and wrong to say that Santa Nella is a glorified pea-soup pit stop along Interstate 5, but a little bit of that DNA would show up if the town took a geneaology test. So why would Amazon locate here? With the laissez-les-bon-temps-rouler attitude toward freeway-oriented development in this city, the company could build here any which way it wanted, without so much as a dirty look, much less a protracted approval battle. As for the transit requirement, well, please observe Santa Nella is right on the freeway. If that’s not enough, Mr. B. could buy a fleet of touristy charter buses to shlepp in folks from Los Banos. This service can be supplemented by high-speed rail, which is expected just in time to celebrate the retirement of your grandchildren. Mendota This Fresno County city is, regrettably, “the unemployment capital of California,” according to McClatchy News Service. At the height of the recent drought, joblessness hit 40 percent in a community heavily dependent on seasonal farm work. The poverty rate hovers around 60 percent. Here, the selling point for Amazon is a motivated workforce. Forget the sulky brats in Seattle or Silicon Valley, who interrogate you, during their own job interviews, about the number of ping-pong tables to be found on the barbecue deck with the ocean view. Folks in Mendota are willing to work, period. Any company should be willing to hire them, give them fair pay, and share the California dream. Santa Monica This ocean-front hub of tech and entertainment would be a common-sensical choice for Amazon’s HQ No. 2. Of course, the arrival of 50,000 workers to Santa Monica to a city with an inventory of 95,000 dwellings might make an already expensive housing market even more exclusive. Imagine a line of people standing on Wilshire Boulevard, wearing imported knit clothing and staring off in the distance like refugees. “I sold my home before realizing that I couldn’t afford anything else in Santa Monica, even after making a profit,” bewails Lindsay Gwyneth, a personal assistant. The hyperinflation of Santa Monica real estate would also bring about a cataclysmic eastward shift to the entire LA housing market. Downtown would become the new Culver City, East LA would be Larchmont and Victorville would be Riverside. While benefiting homeowners and investors, this eastward march in value may be less helpful for young renters in search of affordable digs. I hear there are some great saguaro catcti in the Arizona desert just waiting to be converted into Santa Monica’s newest bedroom community. Dialogue overheard between two young non-homeowners in the high desert: First Young Person: “Hey! I know a large saguaro cactus where you can live!” Second Young Person: “Is this one of those co-housing situations where I have to share the cactus with eight other people”? First Young Person: “Actually, you’ll be subletting from one of nine other tenants. She works at night.” Second Young Person: “Done!” San Francisco Who are we kidding? Even Jeff Bezos can't afford to live in San Francisco.

After 25 years of negotiations, lawsuits, acrimony, and revisited proposals, environmental groups agreed to conditions under which the Newhall Ranch mega-development of 58,000 residents in Santa Clarita Valley will proceed. Covering roughly 12,000 acres, it is expected to be the last major greenfield development to be approved in Los Angeles County. Under the deal, developer FivePoint Holdings agreed to provide about $25 million for conservation efforts aimed at protecting a number of endangered species along the Santa Clara River and a separate agreement with a nonprofit Native American organization to provide a parcel and an undisclosed amount for construction of a multimillion-dollar cultural center. In exchange, the environmental and native American groups will drop lawsuits against the company and will not oppose development of new homes, golf courses, schools, recreation centers and 13 million square feet of commercial space. A first phrase of Newhall Ranch was approved in July.  Google Gets into Dispute over Proposed Office Complex in Mountain View In a new twist on the housing pressures faced by Silicon Valley, Google is reportedly demanding more office space for its new “Charleston East” campus in Mountain View in exchange for constructing nearly 10,000 units in North Bayshore. The Mountain View City Council gave preliminary approval on the construction of 9,850 homes, but at a council meeting last week Google warned it would not allow the housing unless the city approved another 800,000 square feet of office space in addition to the 3.6 million in the draft North Bayshore plan. The city is concerned the new office space would further increase the gap between jobs and housing in the city. Councilmember Margaret Abe-Koga says an additional 2,700 housing units on top of the nearly 10,000 would be required to fix the imbalance. Google, in a letter to the city, says the development requires significant investment and the demolition of existing office space and therefore the net new office development is required. The North Bayshore plan calls for three neighborhoods on 154 acres. Nearly 40 percent of the housing will be “micro-unit/studios”, 30 percent 1-bedroom units, 20 percent 2-bedroom units, and 10 percent 3-bedroom units. Mountain View’s City Council will vote in November on the final plan. (See prior CP&DR coverage of Google.) Los Angeles Takes Major Step to Promote Transit-Oriented Development Los Angeles Department of City Planning  released its official Transit Oriented Communities (TOC) guidelines. The new program was created through November’s Measure JJJ, a ballot measure that affects density bonuses citywide, and will incentivize the production of affordable housing by addressing all housing developments within a one-half mile of major transit stops. The TOC Affordable Housing Incentive areas are designed  in tiers based on the type of transit and distance of the stop (Tier 1-4). The incentives vary depending on the density, amount and distance of the transit stop, open space, lot coverage, yards, and many more. These guidelines provide eligibility standards, incentives, and other necessary components of the program. Pursuant to Measure JJJ, the guidelines have been drafted and implemented by the Planning Department and did not require a vote of the city council. TOCs will be designated around the city’s several-dozen transit stops.  San Jose May Resort to Ballot Measure for Senior Housing Project Two San Jose city councilmembers are pushing a ballot measure that would allow 910 new senior homes on empty land in east San Jose that is set aside for industry and jobs. While some city officials support the new affordable housing project, Mayor San Liccardo argues the proposal “upends San Jose’s careful planning process while enriching wealthy developers and failing to provide housing for those who need it most.” The proposed Evergreen Senior Homes would call for 20 percent of the new homes to be “affordable” for those earning no more than 120 percent of the area median income ($128,500 a year for family of four) but there is no guarantee those homes would be built in the first nine phases. The proposed project would prioritize affordable housing for veterans as well as include some open space. The Evergreen Senior Homes Initiative would change the city’s general plan as well as include a specific Evergreen area plan that limits housing to allow the zoned “industrial” to become “residential”. UCLA Crunches Numbers on Housing Affordability vs. Production According to the new UCLA Anderson Forecast  it could take 20 percent more housing production to achieve a 10 percent reduction in prices. Such a reduction in prices would bring down housing to roughly 2014 levels throughout the state. However, an increase of 20 percent took Los Angeles and San Francisco 30 years to accomplish. Gov. Jerry Brown’s housing department says the state needs to build 180,000 units a year to keep up with housing demand, but falls 80,000 units short. Catching up to demand would cost an additional $26 billion. In Gov. Brown’s recent budget summary he states half of all California households are spending more than 30 percent of their income on housing and nearly one-third are spending more than 50 percent. The author of the UCLA Anderson Forecast, the recent signing of 15 housing bills in Sacramento will not do much to alleviate the high cost of living in the state. Quick Hits & Updates According to a report from Attom Data Solutions, an Irvine-based real estate research firm, San Jose and Los Angeles are two of the top three cities in the nation most at risk of losing housing from natural disasters. If only earthquakes are considered, LA is most at risk with San Jose, Bakersfield, and Seattle. The group also found homes in high risk areas have grown twice as fast as those in the bottom 20 percent. The Ventura City Council approved 200 residential units last year in East Ventura but needed Ventura LAFCo approval to turn the county land over to the city. Two weeks ago LAFCo voted, 6-1, to approve the change. The city will be responsible for providing water, sewer, and emergency services to the future residents. One of the remaining issues was the city’s ability to assure the commissioners there was sufficient water to meet the project’s current and long-term demand. The Strategic Growth Council is hosting a series of consultations for prospective applications to the Transformative Climate Communities Program. Consultations will be available for proposals from Los Angeles Oct. 9 and 10 and from other eligible TCC cities Oct. 11 and 12. To schedule an appointment, email  tcc@sgc.ca.gov . (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Los Angeles Metro has earmarked $9 million for a Metro Affordable Transportation Connected Housing Program aimed at incentivizing more affordable housing near its transit stations. The public-private partnership will loan money to developers to build more affordable housing within a half-mile of transit lines. Executive officer of the program, Jenna Hornstock, said the loans will help preserve affordable units and help build roughly 1,800 new units. Sacramento Superior Court Judge Timothy M. Frawley criticized the title and summary for a proposed initiative that would repeal recent gas tax increases in California. Frawley wrote in his ruling, "The Attorney General’s title and summary… must be changed to avoid misleading the voters and creating prejudice against the measure.” The title and summary will be placed on petitions to be circulated by those trying to qualify the measure for the November 2018 ballot.  According to an official at the Oakland Alameda County Coliseum Authority the Raiders “might likely” play at the stadium through the 2020 season until the team’s Las Vegas stadium is built.The current contract will run through the 2018 season, and there is a likelihood that two-year extension will be sought. The San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved a $1.25 million contract with a private company to oversee the eviction and relocation of hundreds of Treasure Island households to make way for the thousands of homes and businesses that will be constructed in the next four years. There are currently 675 households on the island, including 250 residents who will receive economic support for the moving expenses. Those living on Treasure Island before 2011 can receive a cash payment or a choice of a Transition Housing Unit or down payment toward the purchase of a new unit. Those moving in after the City approved new island development in 2011, can get “advisory services” for relocating.  Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors gave  conditional approval to the $1-billion Frank Gehry-designed residential and hotel complex planned in downtown LA. The supervisors’ approval is conditional because the Grand Avenue Joint Powers Authority wants more details on a number of issues, including the parking plan which reduced the number of parking stall from 1,350 to 800. The City and County of Los Angeles are providing tax breaks and other subsidies valued at nearly $200 million. The Anaheim Convention Center recently opened an  addition  of 200,000 square feet to join a handful of U.S. cities that have at least 1 million square feet of exhibit space. McCormick Place in Chicago is the nation’s largest with 2.6 million feet of exhibit space, but Anaheim is now 11thin the country. The convention and meeting industry generates more than $280 billion in spending per year and employs more than 1.8 million workers. In San Francisco, the Moscone Center is getting an additional 305,000 square feet bringing the facility to more than 1 million square feet.

CP&DR Vol. 32 No. 9 September 2017

A week or so ago, in less time than it takes to pop open a can of Pringles, the Internet fawned over and then recoiled against retail startup Bodega. Promising to do for potato chips what Uber did for transportation, Bodega intends to place what are essentially glorified vending machines all over, well, everywhere. The machines’ inventories will be customized according to location (train station; sorority; gym; tech startup office) so that inhabitants of our new, perfected cyber-world can acquire necessities without having to confront ugly realities of space and distance.  For those among us who are truly that antisocial, agoraphobic, or overworked, I can’t imagine why this system is preferable to home delivery, but whatever. Bodega is making a go of it, crossing off yet another industry on the disruption hit list.  How fast do things happen when you’re not constrained by things like public outreach, CEQA, city council meetings, and construction schedules? Very. On literally the same day that Bodega the company launched — that would be two days ago, Sept. 13 — Fast Company ran a comprehensive profile of the company, replete with praise and skepticism. By that afternoon, Eater ran an entire article , and then a follow-up , about the backlash against Bodega, calling it “Twitter’s least-favorite startup” and quoting Tweets making fun of its logo (a cat), questioning the ethnic sensitivity of its name, and saying that it should be called “Gentrification Box.” Ouch.  Now that the world knows what Bodega is, residents of California can be forgiven for wondering what a bodega is.  As anyone from an East Coast city knows, a bodega is a corner store. It’s the type of place that sells milk, chips, and ramen in single-serving cups. They are also the types of places where, depending on their selection of malt liquor, you can get panhandled or shaken down. They have neither the placemaking power of a local bar nor the culinary selection of a supermarket. But they’re nice parts of the urban fabric and often provide economic substance for individual entrepreneurs. And, since they’re generally located in dense neighborhoods, no one ever drives to a bodega.  Fast Company notes that Bodega could present fatal competition for its namesakes:  The major downside to this concept–should it take off–is that it would put a lot of mom-and-pop stores out of business. In fact, replacing that beloved institution seems explicit in the very name of McDonald’s venture, a Spanish term synonymous with the tiny stores that dot urban landscapes and are commonly run by people originally from Latin America or Asia. Some might bristle at the idea of a Silicon Valley executive appropriating the term “bodega” for a project that could well put lots of immigrants out of work. While this prediction may be exaggerated, what it implies is that cities don’t need fewer bodegas. In fact, they need more of them — especially in California.  Bodegas are essentially illegal in most neighborhoods in California. In California, separation of uses is next to godliness. Our residential neighborhoods, urban and suburban alike, can span dozens of square miles and require drives of many miles to get a quart of milk. And, yet, if anyone were to propose the addition of a corner store in these homogenous neighborhoods — to, you know, cut down on those drives and maybe give neighbors a place to run into each other — orthopedists would be overwhelmed for all the pearl-clutching. And don’t get me started on parking requirements.  A bodega could easily prosper on my nearest corner, and on hundreds of others like it. I’m in the heart of a west Los Angeles neighborhood packed with mid-rise apartment buildings as far as the eye can see. There’s no earthly reason why one of those buildings can’t have a retail space on the ground floor. I can only imagine the number of car trips that would be eliminated if my neighbors and I could walk to a bodega rather than drive to the supermarket. And, I can only imagine what it would be like be to have a place to bump into neighbors that doesn’t include rear-ending them in rush-hour traffic. My point here is, the question of whether or not this silly startup will “disrupt” the corner store industry is beside the point. Zoning regulations and our stunted notions of what constitutes a “proper” neighborhood have already prevented more bodegas from opening than will ever be run out of business by the likes of Bodega. It’s telling that Eater jumped so quickly to criticize Bodega and to publicize those mean tweets. Eater is a restaurant blog. Its entire existence depends on people going out into the world and doing things — in their case, consuming food, alongside other people who are also consuming food. So they get rightfully jumpy when yet another cyber-something comes along that would compel people to stay at home and watch The Bachelor. (Restaurants themselves aren’t doing so well these days.) Of course, Eater’s mission should be every planner’s mission: to promote and celebrate physical places where poeple can enjoy each other. I hope the current generation of planners will grab a can of Pringles — or whatever else they need to fuel up — and figure out ways to give bodegas a fighting chance.

Among the foggy peaks of Mt. Tam, the vineyards of Sonoma County, the spires of the Golden Gate, and the gracious communities that make up the northern fringe of the Bay Area runs a parking lot known as Highway 101. It’s not a pretty sight.