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Of the dozens of Grateful Dead songs that have been autoplaying in my head since the news of Bob Weir’s passing broke this Saturday, “Shakedown Street” has been in particularly heavy rotation. The  bassline helps, but so does its commentary about American urbanism.  The Dead’s landscapes rarely involved cities. Dead songs are vivid: fairy tales set in the real world, though its landscapes are more pastoral than urban. In “Truckin’,” we pass through the likes of Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, and Buffalo — but we end up at “home.” In “Friend of the Devil,” we “set out from Reno” only to wind up in points unknown.  Bob Weir, 1947 - 2026 These landscapes illustrate the Dead’s greatest thematic virtues: their uncanny grasp of Americana. With assists from lyricists including Robert Hunter and John Perry Barlow, the Dead sing of farmers, miners, outlaws, lovers, sailors, truckers, guitar pickers, criminals, innocents, prophets, and mortals. These characters danced, sang, schemed, and slipped away from sea to shining sea: in small towns, open spaces, celestial planes, trails, roads, rivers, and seashores.  “Shakedown Street” takes a surprising detour amid the long, strange trip.  Released in 1978, and performed live 164 times by the Grateful Dead (and many more by its successors, including Dead & Co.), it captures the demise of American cities as vividly as anything else I can imagine from that period. It’s Taxi Driver, Midnight Cowboy, Andy Warhol, Dirty Harry, and Richard Roundtree. It’s Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, the gas crisis, and the Zodiac killer. Fans in 1978 would have easily recognized all of these urban ills, many of them caused, in large part, by awful post-World War II policies that eviscerated cities from the inside out.  Compared to the rest of the Dead canon, “Shakedown Street” is darker — which is saying a lot for the band whose symbol is a skull — and it feels less ethereal and more of-the-moment. The Summer of Love was long gone by that time, and a malaise had come over the country, its cities, and music itself. By then, there’s “nothin' shakin’” in what “used to be the heart of town.” Even basic physics has turned against America: “the sunny side of the street is dark.” Jane Jacobs couldn’t have said it better herself. It’s their most urban sounding song, more funk and disco than country, blues, bluegrass, or rock. More Studio 54 than Woodstock.  The city of the Dead is neither Heaven nor Hell — it’s both. Like pretty much everything else in America and everything else in the Dead canon.  60th Anniversary show Dead songs capture the ambiguities and contradictions of American life like none other, equally aware of hippie idealism and the strong arm of The Man and bemused by the precarious balance between disaster and triumph. They express reverence for what America can be and bemusement for what it purports to be: a place where “every silver lining’s got a touch of grey: and "one man gathers what another man spills." The band itself, in its various incarnations and endlessly renewing audiences, lived those ambiguities exquisitely: living hard and singing softly night after night, decade after decade.  The anomaly of “Shakedown Street” is surprising given that the Dead are a thoroughly urban creation. Most bands are, of course. Cities bring together creative, multitalented people. But, whereas the bands of Los Angeles or New York consist of newcomers who step off the bus and find their people, the Dead were home-grown in San Francisco. The scene and the city were intertwined, and they were public.  The Dead’s 2,000-plus shows took them well beyond California, to venues as urban as Madison Square Garden and as rural as The Gorge Amphitheater in Washington State. There’s nothing necessarily special about that — plenty of big acts play big venues. But, of course, the Dead’s city traveled with them. Forming, reforming, and morphing at every leg, the extended Deadhead tribe exemplifies two of America’s greatest distinctions: the privilege of mobility and the yearning for community.  That’s one of many reasons for their resurgence. I hardly need to recount all the forces that have alienated Americans from each other these days: social media; politics; tribalism; covid; and, not insignificantly, urban stagnation and, especially, cost of living. “Bowling alone,” to invoke Robert Putnam, was the least of it. Dead & Co. shows brought people together, just as their predecessors had for decades. Most recently, they went back to their roots with a series of three shows in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, a venue rivaled for urban congregation only by New York’s Central Park and Chicago’s Millennium Park. It turned out to be Bobby’s final farewell.  Drivin' that train to Golden Gate Park Whatever the location, the band evoked happier times — albeit idealized — when hippies could hang out on stoops and streetcorners, play some music, twirl around, and imagine a better world. All while making rent, without a tech founder or stock option in sight.  The Dead even managed to soften our least-urban city, holding down residencies at the Sphere in Las Vegas. Its most  spectacular effect was nothing if not a celebration of urbanism. A life-size recreation of 710 Ashbury Street pulls back into an aerial of San Francisco, then the entire Bay Area, the state, and eventually, into outer space, from which their stalwart frontman now looks down upon us.  The ‘60s are officially over. For American cities, and California cities, that’s probably a good thing. They have bounced back mightily from their “Shakedown” era trough. Today’s San Francisco remains remarkable, but it’s entirely possible that the cost of living means that it will never again be built on rock n’ roll. I just hope that, someday, they can rekindle at least a few aspects of the Dead’s heyday, back when kids envisioned a new world and old folks were the squares (how times have changed).  To state the obvious: a counterculture cannot be planned. But the conditions to nurture creativity, novelty, optimism, and fellowship most certainly can. You don’t need a miracle. You need affordability, equity, density, walkability, openness, and, yes, a little bit of fairy dust. You might need righteous causes to support and Establishments to rage against, which are in woefully ample supply today. You need freedom, and you need some love--for art, music, and one another.  Bobby Weir may be gone, but don't tell me these towns ain't got no heart. We all gotta poke around. Images: Dead & Company via X.

In the first important court ruling following up on the People’s Park case, an appellate court in Los Angeles has reversed its earlier ruling that housing project near the University of Southern California isn’t eligible for the Class 32 infill exemption from the California Environmental Quality Act.

A “reverse-reverse-CEQA” ruling from Lake County has been upheld by an appellate court, meaning the county still has not complied with the California Environmental Quality Act in trying to approve a controversial resort in Guenoc Valley north of Napa Valley.

In a case brought by grocery workers involving a proposed Grocery Outlet in King City, an appellate court has rejected a narrow definition of the infill exemption under the California Environmental Quality Act. In particular, the court concluded that other provisions of the CEQA Guidelines defining “infill” do not apply to the so-called Class 32 exemption. Doing so, the court said, would thwart the intent of the CEQA Guidelines The case is an important followup to the landmark Berkeley Hillside case in 2015 and further boxes out project opponents seeking to limit the use of the infill exemption. It was initially unpublished but the Sixth District Court of Appeal recently published the case, meaning it can be used as a precedent in other cases. Best Development proposed a Grocery Outlet store on Broadway in King City, adjacent to Highway 101. The site is almost immediate adjacent to Safeway shopping center. It is surrounded by the freeway, industrial uses, and a cemetery, with residential development a block or two away, though it is also located close to agricultural land. Safeway workers are unionized by the United Food and Commercial Workers. In reviewing the project, King City applied a so-called Class 32 infill exemption, which is available under §15332 of the CEQA Guidelines. The infill exemption, which is being widely used by local governments in California now, can be applied to a site that is less than 5 acres and is “substantially surrounded by urban uses”.

In a bold move, two judge from an influential federal appellate court have ruled that the White House Council on Environmental Quality doesn’t have the legal authority to issue “regulations” implementing the National Environmental Policy Act. A third judge ared from the ruling.

The City of Upland should be able to move forward with renovation of a major park now that an appellate court has upheld the city’s mitigated negative declaration on the project. The appellate court specifically chose not to use the Save Our Capitol! CEQA case to rule against the city.

In a case that could have significant consequences up and down the state, an appellate court has ruled that buildings built after the passage of the 1976 Coastal Act are not entitled to seawalls or other “hard armature” protection from erosion. In reversing a trial court judge’s ruling, the First Distrct Court of Appeal concluded that while the Coastal Commission could issue a permit for a seawall to protect an apartment building built on a bluff in Half Moon Bay in 1972, it could not do so for a neighboring condo complex and coastal trail built in 1984. The ruling puts many projects built after 1976 at risk. The Coastal Act permits seawalls and othe har armature “to serve coastal-dependent uses or to protect existing structures . . . in danger from erosion.” (Public Resources Code § 30235.) The court concluded the word “existing” means existing on the date the Coastal Act went into effect, which was January 1, 1977. Rejecting the reasoning of San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Marie Weiner, the appellate court concluded that allowing the seawall would open the door to a bait-and-switch approach for new projects, through which developers would obtain Coastal Commission approval for a new project and then the Coastal Commission would subsequently be required to allow a seawall. The court said this was not the Legislature’s intent in 1976, adding: “Such an interpretation gives no independent meaning to the term ‘existing,’ rendering it surplusage.” The case involved several developments along a coastal bluff in Half Moon Bay. A four-unit apartment complex was built immediately on the bluff in 1972. Twelve years later, the four-building Casa Mira condominium complex was built slightly further back from the bluff, along with a sewer line and a trail owned and operated by the state Department of Parks & Recreation.

A controversial hotel project adjacent to a tribal casino on coastal bluff in far northern California may or may not move forward after an appellate court found that the Coastal Commission’s review under the did not contain sufficient evidence that fire protection was adequate. Just as important, the appellate court ruled in favor of the Coastal Commission on all other environmental issues, including most significantly the hotel’s visual impact. The hotel is proposed by the Cher-Ae Heights Indian Community of Trinidad Rancheria, which owns a nearby casino in the coastal town of Trinidad in Humboldt County. The project was considered a federal project because of a loan and lease requiring approval of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, meaning the project had to be consistent with the federal Coastal Zone Management Act. The BIA declared the project consistent, but this determination then went before the Coastal Commission because the California Coastal Act is the federally approved coastal plan for California under the CZMA. The tribe originally proposed a 64-foot hotel. The Coastal Commission staff originally recommended that the commission object to the BIA’s consistency determination because of the visual impact, citing Coastal Act §30251, which requires protection of “scenic and visual qualities”. After originally agreeing with the staff, the Coastal Commission then voted to conclude that the project could be consistent with the Coastal Act if the height were reduced to 40 feet.

A conditional use permit in Santa Barbara County has been overturned by an appellate court … because transporting marijuana is illegal under federal law even though the sale and use of marijuana is legal under state law.

Landowners are increasingly trying to find easy ways to split big lots into smaller pieces in order to build more housing. But one property owner in Oakland won’t be able to do that. That’s because the California Supreme Court has reversed a lower court ruling and said that even though a parcel was created in the 19 th Century, it’s not a legal parcel under the Subdivision Map Act. It’s the first major “antiquated subdivision” ruling in almost 20 years. The case involves the property owner’s attempt to establish that an 8,800-square-foot single-family lot in the San Antonio neighborhood of Oakland – which currently has a single-family home first built in 1895 – is actually several lots because the original parcel map was filed prior to the Subdivision Map Act’s passage and the lots existed prior to later Map Act amendments. The property in question is located on East 21 st  St. in Oakland, east of Lake Merritt. The existing home has a large yard, so most likely the property owner is seeking to essentially split the lot to allow additional development.

An appellate court has ruled against a Vista cannabis dispensary’s attempt to knock a competitor out of a coveted position for a permit, saying the second dispensary met all requirements to obtain the permit. The case is unpublished, meaning it cannot be used as precedent.

The state’s challenge to Norwalk’s moratorium on homeless shelters and supportivre housing projects can move forward, a Los Angeles judge has ruled.