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Slide Notes
To encourage new housing in complete neighborhoods while preserving sufficient lands for necessary production, distribution and repair (PDR, generally light industrial) the San Francisco Planning Department drafted and adopted community plans for four neighborhoods: Eastern SoMa, the Mission, Showplace Square/Potrero Hill and the Central waterfront.
Planning for Community Change in SF's Eastern Neighborhoods
Published on Nov 22, 2015
Outlining the dynamics of contemporary neighborhood renewal in San Francisco and mediating community change, balancing industrial land preservation with new housing opportunity.
MORE DECKS TO EXPLORE
PRESENTATION OUTLINE
Planning for Community Change
in San Francisco's Eastern Neighborhoods
To encourage new housing in complete neighborhoods while preserving sufficient lands for necessary production, distribution and repair (PDR, generally light industrial) the San Francisco Planning Department drafted and adopted community plans for four neighborhoods: Eastern SoMa, the Mission, Showplace Square/Potrero Hill and the Central waterfront.
Urban morpholoGy
- Urban form (origin and transformation)
- Community, Political, Organizational Contexts
- uncertainty: tensions between rationality and chaos
- complexity: socio-political-economic factors irreducible
- Emergent Urbanism
Emergent Urbanism
**focuses on spontaneous settlement and growth as necessary for sustainability
**rejects modernist view of city growth as a function of mass-production processes
**it is complexity theory, drawing from computational schools of
process morphology (Christopher Alexander);
computational physics (Stephen Wolfram);
Austrian school of economics & sociology
(Friedrich von Hayek)
***urban complexity expressed through complex networks consisting of a multitude of nodes.
It is "emergent" because it represents the bottom-up interaction among diverse actors that generate opportune conditions facilitating order in the midst of change.
**focuses on spontaneous settlement and growth as necessary for sustainability
**rejects modernist view of city growth as a function of mass-production processes
**it is complexity theory, drawing from computational schools of
process morphology (Christopher Alexander);
computational physics (Stephen Wolfram);
Austrian school of economics & sociology
(Friedrich von Hayek)
***urban complexity expressed through complex networks consisting of a multitude of nodes.
It is "emergent" because it represents the bottom-up interaction among diverse actors that generate opportune conditions facilitating order in the midst of change.
Untitled Slide
We haven't given everything up to chance: we have a hand in the business of city making are influenced by the environments we create.
CHANGE CONCEPTS & PRACTICES
- Complexity, Field Theory, Cumulative Factors
- Social Capital, Empowerment, Co-Production
- Community Assets, Needs Based Assesments
- Vertical and Horizontal Networks
- Advocacy
Field theory suggests that in order to engender effective change, one must understand the totality of "coexisting facts that are mutually interdependent."
I will touch on how issues of land use pattern and building size and type are inherent to a variety of seemingly far-flung yet interconnected issues: including respiratory disease and economic diversity; to climate change and the viability of late night entertainment.
Much of the analytic work that urban planners do involves inventorying community assets and identifying deficiencies or needs. This collection of assets or resources is referred to as a baseline condition.
The anticipated change is then added to this setting and the degree of change which it could cause is evaluated and its outcomes may be beneficial or significant and adverse.
I will touch on how issues of land use pattern and building size and type are inherent to a variety of seemingly far-flung yet interconnected issues: including respiratory disease and economic diversity; to climate change and the viability of late night entertainment.
Much of the analytic work that urban planners do involves inventorying community assets and identifying deficiencies or needs. This collection of assets or resources is referred to as a baseline condition.
The anticipated change is then added to this setting and the degree of change which it could cause is evaluated and its outcomes may be beneficial or significant and adverse.
LEADERSHIP CONCEPTS
- Values
- Citizen Leadership
- Adaptivity, Collaboration, Networks
- Transactional (organizational context)
- Transformational (political/societal context)
Land Use regulation in California, aside from a few key statutes and laws is hyper-local.
This hyper-localism is attributed to the division of powers but it also reflects local preference and values.
Individuals who share similar preferences form communities with shared values. This is partially why it is uncommon to see a mid-rise apartment building in a gated-community of single-family homes.
Citizens help shape a communities values by participating in visioning exercises, or charettes, which municipalities use to aid in long-range policy-making.
Policies may be used to guide future growth or to direct resources to invest in public resources, such as parks or recreation centers.
This hyper-localism is attributed to the division of powers but it also reflects local preference and values.
Individuals who share similar preferences form communities with shared values. This is partially why it is uncommon to see a mid-rise apartment building in a gated-community of single-family homes.
Citizens help shape a communities values by participating in visioning exercises, or charettes, which municipalities use to aid in long-range policy-making.
Policies may be used to guide future growth or to direct resources to invest in public resources, such as parks or recreation centers.
FACILITATING AND HINDERING FACTORS
- Police Powers, Due Process, Judicial Review, Transparency
- General Plan, Zoning, Subdivision, Permit Streamlining
- Environmental Statutes, Resource Conservation
- Public Opinion, Support or Opposition, Risk
- Feedback Loops, Business Cycles, Innovation, Migration...
Police powers are the powers that the California state government grants counties and cities to regulate private activities that may affect the public realm.
Every city in California is required to prepare a General Plan in which community values form the basis of municipal policies or objectives that guide future population growth and help cities achieve other state mandates -- whether related to education or air quality.
Zoning is a tool that implements the General Plan. It was first implemented in in New York City in the 1920s to regulate and mitigate the externalities of heavy industry on residents by identifying zones where certain intensities of land uses may or may not be permitted.
Zoning could facilitate change by illustrating to builders what and where it is feasible to build. But zoning is not a sophisticated tool and fails to produce organic, emergent mixed-use development so valued in historic cities.
CEQA is the state's key environmental statue.
Other important environmental laws are the Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act and McAteer Petris Act, which if we didn't have it we would not know San Francisco Bay as it presently exists. Environmental law often involves detailed reporting and lengthy compliance, with the length of the process alone constraining opportunity and feasibility of change proposals.
Every city in California is required to prepare a General Plan in which community values form the basis of municipal policies or objectives that guide future population growth and help cities achieve other state mandates -- whether related to education or air quality.
Zoning is a tool that implements the General Plan. It was first implemented in in New York City in the 1920s to regulate and mitigate the externalities of heavy industry on residents by identifying zones where certain intensities of land uses may or may not be permitted.
Zoning could facilitate change by illustrating to builders what and where it is feasible to build. But zoning is not a sophisticated tool and fails to produce organic, emergent mixed-use development so valued in historic cities.
CEQA is the state's key environmental statue.
Other important environmental laws are the Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act and McAteer Petris Act, which if we didn't have it we would not know San Francisco Bay as it presently exists. Environmental law often involves detailed reporting and lengthy compliance, with the length of the process alone constraining opportunity and feasibility of change proposals.
COMMUNITY IN CONTEXT
The five Eastern Neighborhoods form a community that is located within a more expansive context.
When you consider your neighborhood think of how its individual buildings and public spaces are interconnected by the paths and roads and greenways or maybe waterways that connect to the broader environment.
Jasper O'Farrell's Street Grid
incrementalism, evolution, growth and adaptation
Jasper O'Farrell's first survey, published in 1837.
The grid rational, Cartesian conception of space. It establishes urban form by fixing footprint dimensions.
The grid is simple, scalable, pragmatic and modular and accommodates incremental population growth through subdivisions.
It is the basic spatial organizing principal in San Francisco's urban form today.
The grid defined North of Market neighborhoods for commerce and living and south of Market neighborhoods for industry as they are today.
Imagine how different San Francisco would be if its grid conformed to the curves of its topgraphy rather than daring it!
The grid rational, Cartesian conception of space. It establishes urban form by fixing footprint dimensions.
The grid is simple, scalable, pragmatic and modular and accommodates incremental population growth through subdivisions.
It is the basic spatial organizing principal in San Francisco's urban form today.
The grid defined North of Market neighborhoods for commerce and living and south of Market neighborhoods for industry as they are today.
Imagine how different San Francisco would be if its grid conformed to the curves of its topgraphy rather than daring it!
EXTERNALITIES
INDUSTRIALIZATION
Advent of mechanized steam industry lead caused rash of environmental, health and social issues to pollution and other adverse industrial externalities.
Prompted proposals for societal change by rethinking human settlement pattern.
The proto-suburb was proposed by English sociologist Ebenezer Howard.
The Garden Cites were residential settlements that were spatially segregated from centers of industry in an attempt to reduce adverse health and human impacts.
Prompted proposals for societal change by rethinking human settlement pattern.
The proto-suburb was proposed by English sociologist Ebenezer Howard.
The Garden Cites were residential settlements that were spatially segregated from centers of industry in an attempt to reduce adverse health and human impacts.
SUBurbANIZATION
ANYWHERE, USA
From the early 20th century onward forces were pulling American cities outward.
Street cars lead to steetcar suburbs, but they were still walkable and moderately dense.
Frank Lloyd Wrights Broad Acre City concept distributed populations over far flung distances, necessitating transportation by automobile.
The first model suburb appeared in Levettown, New Jersey.
Before Ozie and Harriot even finished moving in the federal government were financing them all across the country by extending low-interest loans to returning WWII vets.
This pit the forces of suburbanization against the dynamics of the city and instead of creating a symbotic relationship, it tended more toward a game of winners and losers.
Street cars lead to steetcar suburbs, but they were still walkable and moderately dense.
Frank Lloyd Wrights Broad Acre City concept distributed populations over far flung distances, necessitating transportation by automobile.
The first model suburb appeared in Levettown, New Jersey.
Before Ozie and Harriot even finished moving in the federal government were financing them all across the country by extending low-interest loans to returning WWII vets.
This pit the forces of suburbanization against the dynamics of the city and instead of creating a symbotic relationship, it tended more toward a game of winners and losers.
De-inDUSRTRIALIZATION
SHIFT TO A SERVICE-BASED ECONOMY
Cities began to be at a locational disadvantage as a consequence of shipping technologies.
Container shipping replaced break bulk facilities and the Port of San Francisco languished while new Port facilities in Oakland took the lions share of international trade and distributed goods via rail connection.
Land value in cities reflects a premium for the adjacency to conveniences, services and transportation network.
Land is cheaper in the suburbs because it reflects less value offered through proximity.
Businesses such as distribution centers, storage and warehousing generally require large floor areas on large sites pay a premium for urban locations.
With the relocation of shipping many of these ancillary businesses also relocated to the suburbs where lower land values meant lower overhead.
Cities experienced neighborhood out-migration, a weakening of its economic activity, reductions in tax revenues, increases in joblessness...
Container shipping replaced break bulk facilities and the Port of San Francisco languished while new Port facilities in Oakland took the lions share of international trade and distributed goods via rail connection.
Land value in cities reflects a premium for the adjacency to conveniences, services and transportation network.
Land is cheaper in the suburbs because it reflects less value offered through proximity.
Businesses such as distribution centers, storage and warehousing generally require large floor areas on large sites pay a premium for urban locations.
With the relocation of shipping many of these ancillary businesses also relocated to the suburbs where lower land values meant lower overhead.
Cities experienced neighborhood out-migration, a weakening of its economic activity, reductions in tax revenues, increases in joblessness...
Photo by kohlmann.sascha
GLOBALIZATION
HYPER-LOCALISM AND NEOLIBERALISM
Manufactures sough to decrease production cost and increase competitive advantage by locating in labor-cheap destinations.
Since the end of WWII the following exemplified urban problems and macro-level trends:
-shrinking cities (global north)
-and hyper urbanism (global south)
-decreased tax revenues, decreased public services
-decreased role of government to ensure social safety net
-downscaling of federal urban/social policy in alignment with neoliberal trends now in full force by the 1980s
-elimination of job centers that create clusters of poverty, economic wastelands
-and an increasing realization that the separation of powers under federalism in light of local land use controls are oft insufficient to address environmental and economic problems that scale to the regional or beyond.
Since the end of WWII the following exemplified urban problems and macro-level trends:
-shrinking cities (global north)
-and hyper urbanism (global south)
-decreased tax revenues, decreased public services
-decreased role of government to ensure social safety net
-downscaling of federal urban/social policy in alignment with neoliberal trends now in full force by the 1980s
-elimination of job centers that create clusters of poverty, economic wastelands
-and an increasing realization that the separation of powers under federalism in light of local land use controls are oft insufficient to address environmental and economic problems that scale to the regional or beyond.
Planning area
2,300 acres
XX,XXX population
Freeway access points
Rail infrastructure
Significant clusters of PDR jobs
68,000 Citywide
45,000 in EN
36% of the land area dedicated to PDR use
19% to residential
Furniture
Transportation
Food/Beverage
Printing and Publishing
Construction
XX,XXX population
Freeway access points
Rail infrastructure
Significant clusters of PDR jobs
68,000 Citywide
45,000 in EN
36% of the land area dedicated to PDR use
19% to residential
Furniture
Transportation
Food/Beverage
Printing and Publishing
Construction
THreats, CHANGE CATALYSTS
- Industrial land conversion, job displacement
- Speculative, ad-hoc residential development
- Insufficient infrastructure, inadequate financing
- Gentrification
- Tipping point: 2660 Harrison St MND appeal
Harrison St MND appeal
CUMULATIVE IMPACTS
Change Impasse -- finish the programmatic review first!
Proposal
New Land Use Regulations
Building Height
Community Plans tailored to neighborhood conditions
Fees and Exaction Program
Impacts
Over 20 years anticipated upwards of 10,000 new housing units in EN
Less PDR land, more PDR to other conversion
Deficit in projected supply versus projected demand
Accommodations of new parks and other public amenity
CUMULATIVE IMPACTS
Change Impasse -- finish the programmatic review first!
Proposal
New Land Use Regulations
Building Height
Community Plans tailored to neighborhood conditions
Fees and Exaction Program
Impacts
Over 20 years anticipated upwards of 10,000 new housing units in EN
Less PDR land, more PDR to other conversion
Deficit in projected supply versus projected demand
Accommodations of new parks and other public amenity
Untitled Slide
Planning Commission
Seven members appointed by Mayor, BOS
Board of Supervisors (2008)
elected, representing one of 11 districts
San Francisco Planning Department
Bureaucrats, Technocrats, Administrators
Community leaders
Citizens and Neighborhood Groups
In San Francisco, neighborhood groups are the most common groups that in planning projects and contribute to dialogue and debate about land use change.
There are current 300 individuals associated groups on the city's master neighborhood group list.
Interest groups naturally may also represent private business, religious, cultural or economic interests
There are current 300 individuals associated groups on the city's master neighborhood group list.
Interest groups naturally may also represent private business, religious, cultural or economic interests
OUTCOMES
(and implementation guiding further change)
LINKAGES TO:
Respiratory disease
Economic diversity
Late Night Entertainment
And other unintended consequences:
(Reductions in EN speculation finally pushes development to MidMarket?)
Respiratory disease
Economic diversity
Late Night Entertainment
And other unintended consequences:
(Reductions in EN speculation finally pushes development to MidMarket?)
thANK YOU
QUESTIONS OR COMMENTARY?
