Why San Fransisco developers can’t build more housing. They take for granted that new housing needs to be profitable for developers. Public housing should also be in the conversation.
Public housing follows the same rules. This makes any multi-story building more expensive for everyone, and the rules need to be reformed regardless of who builds the building and regardless of their motivations.
It’s true, it’s still a bit more expensive to build, but the profit motive is removed. Public housing doesn’t need to recoup its costs. People need housing, you build housing.
It’s important for public projects to manage their costs as well, as it affects how much can be built using the limited public funds available. I think we can all agree that we need large amounts of public housing in constrained places like San Francisco, to alleviate the current situation.
It is in fact one of the major advantages of building public housing - you unlock the lower costs of building at scale, which reduces costs in several ways:
Building the same type of units makes workers familiar with the product and allows them to complete them faster
Pre-fabricated modular units can be constructed off-site and shipped in, and making them at scale drives costs down
Large contracts are more lucrative and can hence be negotiated to better rates with contractors
For a wildly successful example, look to Miljonprogrammet that took place in Sweden during the 60s and 70s. Following that project, a vast supply of housing was available for the population, with housing costs below 1% of income being common.
I don’t dispute any of that. More housing, modular construction, all great. It’s just separate from the issue of this staircase requirement. I don’t have any stake in staircases. If building technology makes the requirement obsolete, great. If the fire department is happy with one staircase, great. It just doesn’t sound plausible that 6-15% premium for additional staircases is a root cause of the housing crisis, when developer profit opportunity is clearly the greater constraint.
If the fire department is happy with one staircase, great.
Fire departments make for very poor authorities on these matters, unfortunately. See the issue of them mandating completely oversized roads, since they can’t imagine smaller fire engines that have precedent around the world.
It just doesn’t sound plausible that 6-15% premium for additional staircases is a root cause of the housing crisis, when developer profit opportunity is clearly the greater constraint.
That’s the thing though - there is no single root cause for the housing crisis. It’s just a bunch of small issues stacked on top of each other, and each has to be addressed individually.
I’m still not sure if we’re disagreeing even. Yeah, there are lots of issues at play, and I don’t have strong feelings about stairs either way. I just think among all the issues, start with the most egregious, which is the commodification of housing. Beyond that, sure, tackle all the issues of inefficiency including outdated stair laws. The stair issue just feels like a scapegoat to avoid talking about societal issues.
Why
San Fransiscodevelopers can’t build more housing. They take for granted that new housing needs to be profitable for developers. Public housing should also be in the conversation.Public housing follows the same rules. This makes any multi-story building more expensive for everyone, and the rules need to be reformed regardless of who builds the building and regardless of their motivations.
It’s true, it’s still a bit more expensive to build, but the profit motive is removed. Public housing doesn’t need to recoup its costs. People need housing, you build housing.
It’s important for public projects to manage their costs as well, as it affects how much can be built using the limited public funds available. I think we can all agree that we need large amounts of public housing in constrained places like San Francisco, to alleviate the current situation.
It is in fact one of the major advantages of building public housing - you unlock the lower costs of building at scale, which reduces costs in several ways:
For a wildly successful example, look to Miljonprogrammet that took place in Sweden during the 60s and 70s. Following that project, a vast supply of housing was available for the population, with housing costs below 1% of income being common.
I don’t dispute any of that. More housing, modular construction, all great. It’s just separate from the issue of this staircase requirement. I don’t have any stake in staircases. If building technology makes the requirement obsolete, great. If the fire department is happy with one staircase, great. It just doesn’t sound plausible that 6-15% premium for additional staircases is a root cause of the housing crisis, when developer profit opportunity is clearly the greater constraint.
Fire departments make for very poor authorities on these matters, unfortunately. See the issue of them mandating completely oversized roads, since they can’t imagine smaller fire engines that have precedent around the world.
That’s the thing though - there is no single root cause for the housing crisis. It’s just a bunch of small issues stacked on top of each other, and each has to be addressed individually.
I’m still not sure if we’re disagreeing even. Yeah, there are lots of issues at play, and I don’t have strong feelings about stairs either way. I just think among all the issues, start with the most egregious, which is the commodification of housing. Beyond that, sure, tackle all the issues of inefficiency including outdated stair laws. The stair issue just feels like a scapegoat to avoid talking about societal issues.