Setting the Record Straight
The City of Los Angeles is lagging behind in the construction of new homes to meet the needs of a growing population. The Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) projects another six million people coming to the region by 2035, with more than two-thirds of them children born to parents who are already here.
Many experts are predicting a housing crisis and some say that crisis is occurring now. By one estimate, the Harbor Area of the City of Los Angeles needs to build an additional 9,771 homes by 2010 in order to keep pace with regional housing demands.
Yet some people are opposed to the creation of new homes in their communities, if those new homes would be built close to where they live, even if they agree that new housing would benefit the community as a whole. Anti-housing factions sometimes try to cast this argument in moral terms, saying it is wrong for them to suffer any impacts from newcomers.
Advocates for adding more livable, workforce housing say this stands morality on its head. They say it is morally and environmentally untenable to prevent a worker from having local housing just because the current resident doesn’t want to drive an extra 30 seconds, while the unfortunate worker is left driving another hour to work every day.
These are volatile issues. Often the arguments are based on lack of information, inaccurate or misleading information or emotional reactions that have no basis in fact.
This blog was created to set the record straight where necessary on Bisno Development Company proposals, in order to ensure communities are provided with up-to-date, accurate information as well as the data and opinions of qualified and credible experts.
Compass Growth Visioning Report
Southern California Association of Government’s “Compass Growth Visioning” report, issued in 2004, established a set of principles for Southern California’s the future growth. “Compass Blueprint is a new way to look at how we grow,” according to SCAG. “The Compass Blueprint Growth Vision is a response, supported by a regional consensus, to the land use and transportation challenges facing Southern California now and in the coming years.” http://www.compassblueprint.org/
Principles of the Compass Growth Vision
One of the major principles of the Compass Growth Vision is the development of “livable communities” through the following strategies:
- Injecting new life into tired or under-used areas by creating vibrant new business districts, redeveloping old buildings and building new businesses or housing on vacant lots.
- Creating mini-communities - complete with a variety of uses such as shops, lofts and townhomes, and small businesses - along or near major transit hubs.
- Carefully preserving existing, stable, single-family neighborhoods and existing natural and green spaces.
- Designing communities that can be enjoyed on foot, with plenty of opportunities for “people-scaled” experiences. http://www.compassblueprint.org/about/principles
Creating Great Neighborhoods
According to the Local Government Commission, a coalition of city planners and local governments, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency “people are beginning to realize that nodes of more intense development can help achieve local economic development goals, provide housing options, create walkable neighborhoods, and protect their air, water and open space. This balance helps create a sense of place - a place to walk, a place to talk to neighbors, a place to know the children are safe to walk to school.” - Creating Great Neighborhoods: Density in Your Community, September 2003. http://www.epa.gov/dced/density.htm
Compass Growth Visioning
The Ponte Vista development in San Pedro is consistent with the goals and policies of the Regional Transportation Plan and with the “Compass Growth Visioning” effort, a set of principles established to promote and sustain Southern California’s mobility, livability, and prosperity for future generations, SCAG announced on February 9, 2007. “The Ponte Vista Project is a good example of an infill/redevelopment project that brings higher density homes to a jobs-rich, housing-poor area of the region,” stated Jill Egerman, Associate Environmental Planner for SCAG. http://pontevista.com/press/releases/Press_Release-SCAG.pdf
Environmentally Committed
Ponte Vista is committed to using environmentally friendly design and building practices with more than 40% of the site being dedicated to open space. More than 13 acres of Ponte Vista will be open to public use, including a six-acre public park with youth playing fields and a nearly three-acre village green. A Ponte Vista Waterscape Concourse will run through the residential areas of the Ponte Vista community and lead to a large reflection pool near the Village Green. The design will create visual interest along pedestrian pathways with waterfalls, bridges and passive seating areas. http://www.pontevista.com/environment/openSpace.php
Workforce Housing is Element in Addressing Climate Change
According to the Urban Land Institute, workforce housing and other compact development can result in significant reductions in carbon emissions, the major greenhouse gas that is affecting the earth’s climate. Since workers will have to drive less to reach their jobs, the amount of vehicle miles traveled is reduced. But in addition, such compact, near-to-work developments will mean that less infrastructure such as streets, highways and sewer lines will have to be built and maintained. http://www.uli.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Home&CONTENTID=117311&TEMPLATE=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm
Harbor Area First Program for Working Families
Ponte Vista is providing pricing incentives to encourage police, firefighters, nurses, longshore workers, teachers and other union workers to live in the community they serve. With an eye to creating a sustainable community where residents can live, play and shop without getting into a car, Ponte Vista offers village living with pools, recreation centers, and retail shops all within walking distance. http://www.pontevista.com/homebuyers/renderings.php
After Years of Neglect, Emphasis on Street Design
Street design is reemerging as a major element of neighborhood and town planning as citizens, planners and officials work to identify better ways to design new neighborhoods or retrofit existing ones to be more interactive, walkable, enjoyable and livable. The days of walking to the corner store have been replaced by driving a 2,000 pound vehicle to pick up a one-pound loaf of bread. Smart growth places houses, schools, shops and offices in close proximity to one another, but the street design creates a fully connected network with multiple routes to destinations. http://www.lgc.org/transportation/street.html
Redevelopment’s purpose
The City of Baldwin Park’s presentation to the Project Area Committee for the Central Business District Redevelopment Area states: “Redevelopment’s purpose varies with community’s goals, but generally:
- Provides affordable housing
- Provides street, drainage, sewer, water, and other important infrastructure improvements
- Supports new, usually “in-fill”, development
- Fills in the gap between needs and resources
- Overall community revitalization
http://www.baldwinpark.com/pdf/downtown%20projects/PAC%20Background%20Briefing%202-12-08.pdf
Livable communities
The non-profit Local Government Commission, coalition of city planners and local governments, says the redevelopment of aging downtowns is one of the keys to creating livable communities. “The smart growth and livable communities movements have proposed using elements including density, mix of land uses, pedestrian- and transit-oriented design and a central focus to reform the destructive development patterns that have resulted from postwar trends. In the fragmented, post modern landscape that has taken the place of urban America, we can see thriving efforts to rebuild the heart of older cities, and to create vibrant city centers in newer cities. Meanwhile, in existing suburban enclaves across the country there are efforts to build walkable, neighborhood commercial centers that will provide a heart for the community and a locus for neighborhood services such as schools, stores, restaurants and transit hubs.” http://www.lgc.org/community_design/centers.html