Apartments are a great way to ease the burden of population growth, if you would call it a burden. 

Blanca Torres
Reporter- San Francisco Business Times

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The Bay Area is a great place to live, and people keep moving here regardless of astronomical housing prices.

Somehow a prohibitively expensive cost of living doesn’t ward off population growth.

In fact, the Bay Area is expected to swell 30 percent by 2040 to 9.3 million people — meaning we will need an estimated 660,000 new housing units. Policy and market demands influence developers to build, yet residents often oppose planning for population growth.

I wrote on a story for our current print edition on how policy and market demands influence developers. That piece accompanies a larger story about residents who oppose planning for population growth.

The Bay Area’s perception of development is full of ironies.

No one wants sprawl because we want to preserve natural environments, but people also don’t want density or tall buildings that could possibly, at some angles, block views of nature.

People love it when companies go on hiring sprees and industries flourish, but they don’t like it when a new apartment building to house those workers comes along.

“Growth really needs to be seen as an opportunity,” said Gabriel Metcalf, executive director of SPUR, San Francisco Planning and Urban Research, during a recent Commonwealth Club panel I attended on how development trends need to address climate change. “Regions of the United States that are growing have the opportunity to take all that growth and rebuild both our cities and our suburbs so that they become more walkable, so that they can be organized into nodes for transit”

I know many dream of owning a single family home with all the fixings, but in reality, that’s just not sustainable and this is the Bay Area, right, aren’t we all about sustainability?

Now, here’s my take on why we should consider apartments a viable solution even though time and time again, residents do what they can to block those developments from moving forward.

1. Young and old people don’t like mowing lawns or cleaning large homes.

2. People in the Bay Area like using public transit — when it’s nearby. So, put apartments near transit and more people get to live by it.

3. Apartments are a way to fit lots of people in less space using up fewer resources such as land and energy.

4. Roof decks on apartments are great for catching views of the region and nature. If you are worried about an apartment building blocking your view, hike up Mt. Diablo and take some photos with your smartphone that you can refer to later.

5. Apartment developments can energize underutilized areas, such as vacant lots that you drive by and ignore all the time, places that won’t be turned into tract homes anyway.

Blanca Torres covers East Bay real estate for the San Francisco Business Times.

Article source: http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/2013/05/5-reasons-apartments-can-save-the-bay.html?page=all

Apartments are a great way to ease the burden of population growth, if you would call it a burden. 

Blanca Torres
Reporter- San Francisco Business Times

Email
 | Twitter
 | Google+
 | LinkedIn

The Bay Area is a great place to live, and people keep moving here regardless of astronomical housing prices.

Somehow a prohibitively expensive cost of living doesn’t ward off population growth.

In fact, the Bay Area is expected to swell 30 percent by 2040 to 9.3 million people — meaning we will need an estimated 660,000 new housing units. Policy and market demands influence developers to build, yet residents often oppose planning for population growth.

I wrote on a story for our current print edition on how policy and market demands influence developers. That piece accompanies a larger story about residents who oppose planning for population growth.

The Bay Area’s perception of development is full of ironies.

No one wants sprawl because we want to preserve natural environments, but people also don’t want density or tall buildings that could possibly, at some angles, block views of nature.

People love it when companies go on hiring sprees and industries flourish, but they don’t like it when a new apartment building to house those workers comes along.

“Growth really needs to be seen as an opportunity,” said Gabriel Metcalf, executive director of SPUR, San Francisco Planning and Urban Research, during a recent Commonwealth Club panel I attended on how development trends need to address climate change. “Regions of the United States that are growing have the opportunity to take all that growth and rebuild both our cities and our suburbs so that they become more walkable, so that they can be organized into nodes for transit”

I know many dream of owning a single family home with all the fixings, but in reality, that’s just not sustainable and this is the Bay Area, right, aren’t we all about sustainability?

Now, here’s my take on why we should consider apartments a viable solution even though time and time again, residents do what they can to block those developments from moving forward.

1. Young and old people don’t like mowing lawns or cleaning large homes.

2. People in the Bay Area like using public transit — when it’s nearby. So, put apartments near transit and more people get to live by it.

3. Apartments are a way to fit lots of people in less space using up fewer resources such as land and energy.

4. Roof decks on apartments are great for catching views of the region and nature. If you are worried about an apartment building blocking your view, hike up Mt. Diablo and take some photos with your smartphone that you can refer to later.

5. Apartment developments can energize underutilized areas, such as vacant lots that you drive by and ignore all the time, places that won’t be turned into tract homes anyway.

Blanca Torres covers East Bay real estate for the San Francisco Business Times.

Article source: http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/2013/05/5-reasons-apartments-can-save-the-bay.html?page=all

Manatt, Phelps Phillips, LLP, announced that Kristina D. Lawson has
joined the San Francisco office as a partner in the Real Estate and Land
Use practice. Lawson comes to the firm from Miller Starr Regalia, where
she was a shareholder.

Lawson has substantial experience in obtaining land use entitlements and
permits from local, state and federal agencies for real estate and
energy projects, and has a sophisticated understanding of matters
involving the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Additionally, Lawson has
extensive environmental compliance experience and frequently serves as
an advisor to public and private clients on water quality, air quality,
hazardous materials, and other regulatory matters. More recently, her
practice has focused on climate change-related matters, including those
related to AB 32, SB 375, the Bay Area Air Quality District’s CEQA
Guidelines, and the San Francisco Bay Plan.

“Kristina has worked on significant land use projects throughout
California, including a wide variety of residential, commercial, retail
and mixed-use projects. She is known as an adaptable and creative
thinker – key qualities in the land use entitlement and real estate
space – and someone who can successfully complete challenging projects,”
said Susan K. Hori, co-chair of Manatt’s Real Estate and Land Use
practice group. “We are thrilled to welcome her to the team.”

Lawson regularly appears before state and local agencies throughout the
Bay Area and California on behalf of private clients. In addition, she
often serves as special counsel to public agencies on complex land use
and environmental matters, including matters involving California’s
tidelands trust, and emergency water supply projects.

“Structuring a real estate project has become increasingly complex due
to increasing economic, political and regulatory challenges,”
said Clayton B. Gantz, co-administrative partner of the San Francisco
office. “Manatt’s Real Estate and Land Use practice is nationally
recognized for delivering successful projects from conception to
acquisition to disposition, and Kristina’s talents and experience
provide additional depth to help us help our clients achieve their
objectives in Northern California.”

Lawson’s broad advisory and advocacy practice focuses on all aspects of
California land use and environmental law, from the interpretation and
application of local General Plans, specific plans, and zoning
ordinances, to local land use initiatives and referenda, to state and
federal natural resources, air, and water law.

“Manatt has a well-deserved reputation for excellence and a true
commitment to land use and environmental law,” said Lawson. “I am
excited to join Manatt’s prominent national real estate land use
practice.”

A frequent author and lecturer, Lawson is an elected member of the
Walnut Creek City Council, and is an appointed member of the TRANSPAC
Board of Directors, in Contra Costa County.

Lawson earned a B.A. from the University of Arizona and a J.D., cum laude,
from Santa Clara University School of Law.

About Manatt, Phelps Phillips, LLP

Manatt, Phelps Phillips, LLP, is one of the nation’s leading law
firms, with offices strategically located in California (Los Angeles,
Orange County, Palo Alto, San Francisco and Sacramento), New York (New
York City and Albany) and Washington, D.C. The firm represents a
sophisticated client base – including Fortune 500, middle-market and
emerging companies – across a range of practice areas and industry
sectors. For more information, visit www.manatt.com.

Manatt, Phelps Phillips, LLP
Lawrence Martinez, (310) 231-5443
/

Article source: http://www.benzinga.com/pressreleases/11/08/b1826726/manatt-expands-real-estate-and-land-use-practice-in-northern-california

But in the Bay Area, officials are already preparing for global warming by rewriting local building policies in anticipation of rising sea levels.

The San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission, a 27-member state agency that regulates activities that affect the waters and shoreline of San Francisco Bay, is in the process of crafting regulatory guidelines that could restrict new development projects in parts of the Bay Area threatened by rising waters.

While environmentalists see these measures as wise, some developers contend that the BCDC is being overly precautionary and will unnecessarily stifle employment opportunities for contractors and builders.

The BCDC’s proposed guideline suggests “that state agencies should generally not plan, develop, or build any new significant structure in a place where that structure will require significant protection from sea-level rise.” If one prediction — produced by the United Nations — of a 55-inch rise in sea level by 2100 proves true, the BCDC’s advisory could apply to 332 square miles of Bay Area real estate. This 213,000-acre region is home now to 270,000 people, and state officials believe that figure should grow no larger.

“Given what’s coming in the next century, there are some areas where we just shouldn’t be building,” said BCDC Executive Director Will Travis. Though BCDC only holds authority over land within 100 feet of Bay waters, its proposed recommendations could be applied by local governments in areas beyond the agency’s jurisdiction.

David Lewis, executive director for the environmentalist group Save the Bay, is among those encouraging the enforcement of precautionary building restrictions for the future.

“We know from New Orleans and Japan that building in areas at risk of inundation is a bad idea,” he said. “We’ll need to protect some critical areas, like airports, but the state is saying it’s not smart to put new people at risk.”

But critics of the BCDC’s process have argued that the commission is basing policy-making on faulty maps that show ominous future high-tide lines drawn without regard to existing flood protections. These maps, critics argue, could drive down property values and scare away insurers from real estate where the waters may never reach.

Neil Struthers, CEO of the Santa Clara and San Benito Counties Building and Construction Trades Council, said sea walls, levees and other structures can subdue risks of flooding and inundation of low-lying land.

One location whose future is the subject of a fierce debate is Cargill Salt’s former drying pond in Redwood City, a 1,400-acre parcel where the corporation wants to build a bayside community of 12,000 homes for 25,000 people.

The Arizona-based developer tapped to do the job — DMB Associates — currently has lobbyists at work against the BCDC’s suggested building restraints, and Save the Bay’s Lewis suspects Cargill’s so-called “Saltworks” project is fueling much of the opposition to the BCDC’s Bay Plan amendments.

Though the BCDC’s proposal contains no specific language that could immediately halt the project, Pete Hillan, a DMB spokesman, said the BCDC is creating an atmosphere generally unaccommodating to development — what he calls a “retreat and surrender policy approach.” Hillan added that, in spite of some opposition, Cargill is committed to carrying out its project, now six years in the planning.

But what Cargill remains most concerned about, Hillan says, is Bay Area property values, which could drop as a result of the BCDC’s warnings of regions that could one day be flooded or lie below sea level. “Their amendments will basically declare people’s property as heading toward losing all value,” said Hillan, who believes the map depicting threatened areas shows lands that saltwater will never reach. “You can’t reduce someone’s property value without good reason.”

Save the Bay’s Lewis, like many environmentalists, feels that Cargill’s property would best be restored to tidal marshlands, which can buffer shorelines against flooding.

But Hillan said the Saltworks project would include a sturdy seawall that would protect much of Redwood City, amounting to community infrastructure built with private money.

Alan Talansky, chair of the policy committee of San Mateo Area Chamber of Commerce, feels that required environmental impact reports and general community involvement already provide sufficient regulation of building activity. “BCDC is proposing a level of oversight that isn’t necessary,” Talansky said. He also feels that predictions of sea level rise are all too speculative.

“To look at the next 100 years and surmise now what might be and then set regulations is the wrong approach,” Talansky said. “No one knows what the real rise will be.”

Many will be made to move away from swelling sea

If projections of rising sea levels are correct, in the coming century thousands of Bay Area residents will be forced to pull up their roots, pack their belongings and abandon their homes for higher ground.

Just as surely, other people’s properties will be protected, their communities buffered with public and private resources against the swelling of the sea by levees, seawalls and other barriers. The question is: Who will be protected and who will be forced to evacuate?

“That’s where we’re going to face some huge environmental justice and social justice issues,” said the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission’s Will Travis. “We as a society will need to decide which areas we’re going to protect.”

Important commercial centers, such as downtown San Francisco, the Port of Oakland, San Francisco International Airport and Silicon Valley, will certainly receive prioritized safeguarding, Travis said.

Already, plans are being proposed to guard Treasure Island — which will undergo a massive redevelopment in coming years — from the expected sea level rise.

But other threatened areas may never see such protections.

“We may lose Crissy Field, the Aquatic Park, parts of Emeryville, near-shore areas of Mission Bay, and the Eastshore State Park [between Richmond and Oakland],” said Saul Bloom, executive director of Arc Ecology, a development consultant in San Francisco. He points out that ocean-facing land will also be impacted. “At Ocean Beach, the water could come lapping over the Great Highway.”

This, he says, will give us two options: retreat or build seawalls.

“We’ll have to ask, ‘How much do we want to look like the Netherlands?’,” Bloom said.

The cost for protecting Treasure Island — a community that could house, at most, about 19,000 people — could be $190 million, according to a city spokesman. Under such looming figures, entire neighborhoods, in all likelihood, will be vacated.

“So the question is, how do we move people out of threatened areas in an equitable and fair way?” said the Green Party’s Eric Brooks. “We have to plan. Where will people go? They obviously can’t stay there — even in some wealthy neighborhoods. Parts of the Marina we’ll probably have to evacuate.”

Going under

16 inches: Sea level rise possible by the year 2050
55 inches: Sea-level rise projection for 2100
332 square miles: Area surrounding the Bay that could be under water if sea levels rise 55 inches
270,000: People now living in those areas

Source: United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, BCDC

Slipping away

In the coming century as sea levels rise, some places will be saved while others probably won’t. Here are the areas the experts – regulators, environmentalists, urban planners – predict will be protected and those that might be abdandoned.

What will be saved

• Downtown San Francisco
• Downtown Oakland
• Treasure Island
• Silicon Valley
• San Francisco International Airport

What may be abandoned?

• Richmond-Berkeley Shoreline
• Crissy Field
• Alameda
• Highway 37

Article source: http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/2011/07/environmentalists-developers-clash-over-how-deal-rising-tide