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Home Resource Center In the News Home Greenbelt Alliance in the News |
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Greenbelt Alliance In the News September 10, 2007 ABAG vs. Palo Alto's "infrastructure-housing imbalance" Michele Beasley In her opinion piece on Sept. 5, Karen White claimed that Palo Alto should not build any more homes, and that the city's imbalance between jobs and housing is not a problem. Let's take a second to do the math. According to the Association of Bay Area Governments, as of 2005, Palo Alto had 79,250 jobs and 26,240 households. If each household has, say, 1.5 employed people, that makes 39,360 employed people living in the city. Even if we assume that all those people work in Palo Alto, that means there are still about 40,000 people who had to commute in from other cities to work in Palo Alto. That creates a real problem for people who live or work in Palo Alto, as they are forced to spend hours in traffic instead of with friends and family, because of all the three-hour commutes workers are making. That creates a problem for young people, too. Many are already being forced to move away--to the Central Valley and beyond--because they can't find places they can afford near where they grew up. That's a problem for the economy. According to the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, the lack of homes workers can afford remains the number-one concern voiced by CEOs and employees. This is why cities like Austin and Seattle are becoming tough competition for Silicon Valley. That's a problem for local businesses, when not enough people live nearby to provide the customers they need. Lunardi's, a popular grocery store in San Jose, just announced it will be closing with 15 years still on its lease -- a casualty of too few neighbors. Palo Alto needs more homes now, and as it continues to add jobs, it will need even more. The city will need to build these homes in existing urban areas to support local businesses, to make it easy for new residents to take public transit and reduce the need to drive -- and to make new homes affordable to local workers and young families. Ms. White made some good points about Palo Alto's need for infrastructure funds. Yes, Palo Alto, like many cities, could certainly use more money for infrastructure. The good news is that regional and state policies are starting to reward cities that plan for homes, by giving them funds for new infrastructure. But cities can only get them if they commit to providing those homes, and building them for the people who need them, in places that are convenient (downtown and near transit). It is the shortage of housing in job-rich areas that fuels sprawl development on the suburban fringe. And yes, with 50% of the Bay Area's greenhouse gas emissions coming from driving around, building more compact housing near jobs, services, shops and public transit will help fight global warming. It will do more than driving a Prius or changing a light bulb. Palo Alto has a lot of problems that are real. Stopping the creation of homes in the city will solve none of them. ### |
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