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by kristjansson·1y ago·view on hn ↗
The point was that the headline numbers don't really represent the amount of existing development that was destroyed. There's been lots of comparisons of the area to e.g. Manhattan which I think drives some of these think-pieces that act like there's a city-sized blank-canvas area to rebuild.

Could we have built on more of the burned-over mountainside? Maybe? I'm not sure SF is the right comparison though. Just the developed portion affected by the Palisades fire ranges from sea level to 450m elevation (over ~2.5mi straight-line distance); Temescal Peak is 650m. Most of developed peninsular SF is below 100m elevation. Its more like trying to densifiy Berkely or Pacifica or Carmel by building apartment buildings up their hills.

Doable? Probably. But why go to the trouble? Why take the fire and seismic risk of building dense housing on a mountainside when LA is spoiled for space in the basin and valley?

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Twin Peaks is 282m in elevation. There many, many multi unit developments exactly at the top: https://maps.app.goo.gl/rm73b1j67W3u8uYo9

I'm just so sick and tired of ignorant people pretending that elevation, grade, or seismic matter at all when Japan exists, and builds high density housing, regularly in conditions that are vastly more inhospitable than coastal California. Pretending that suburban SFH are safer and more economical is just backward.

>Why go to the trouble?

Because density more efficient, can pay for it's own infrastructure in the long run: https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/1/9/the-real-reason...

It is also less prone to fire risk.

Building suburban SFHs requires everyone else to subsidize it's development, which is already happening exactly with the California FAIR Plan, which will now require literally everyone in the United States to pay more on their homeowners insurances policies to compensate for the predictable losses here, if the system isn't just federally bailed out directly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_FAIR_Plan

> I'm just so sick and tired of ignorant people pretending that elevation, grade, or seismic matter at all

If they don't matter at all, there's tons of steep lots you can buy in the hills for like 10-50k with neighboring houses in the mid-to-high millions. People say they're unbuildable but apparently there's no such thing?

More seriously, I generally agree with most what you're saying. It should be easier to increase density in Los Angeles. By-right ADUs & JADUs, 4-unit TIC conversions, transit-oriented dvelopment are all a good start. We should do more. I shouldn't see anything but the back of apartment buildings from my window on the Expo line. 500k people should live in DTLA. Wilshire should look like Tokyo as soon as the train is done.

It's just weird to bring this energy to such a tragic situation. I don't think you could honestly say Altadena and the Palisades were the top two areas you'd focus on increasing density prior to Jan 7. They're no closer, nor easier to connect to transit, nor less fire-prone today than they were then. Most of the SFH that was destroyed in the Palisades were $3-9m[1] houses on 1/8th acre lots i.e. doing a pretty good job paying their own way on their infrastructure. The insurance stuff is going to be a pain, but I expect the prospective-risk model that was just authorized will force homeowners to bear more of their risk (and thereby apply some market forces to land-use decisions in the rebuild). And if the highest-GDP county in the highest-GDP state in the county needs, for once, a bit of Federal help it'd be hard to characterize that as unfair.

To focus on them as a place to enact specific parts of your urban-design vision (however good it is!) feels just as exploitive as 'investors' trying to buy lots cheaply to remake in the image _they_ prefer. These are our friends and neighbors, victims of a disaster. We should help them rebuild as quickly and prudently as possible, so we all can continue pulling the city toward a denser, safer, healthier future.

[1]: yes yes some prop 13 bases in there that I'm approximating away sue me.

>If they don't matter at all, there's tons of steep lots you can buy in the hills for like 10-50k with neighboring houses in the mid-to-high millions. People say they're unbuildable but apparently there's no such thing?

Except that it was literally illegal to build anything except SFH's, until the state removed R1 zoning, and even now, you can generally only get two units. They are "unbuildable" because the projects won't pencil, not because we don't have the engineering capabilities.

>It's just weird to bring this energy to such a tragic situation.

I will be completely honest, that the move to exempt wildfire victims from the regulations that anyone without an established home has to deal with is one of the most self-serving, "rules for thee but not for me," results I've seen in my lifetime.

The housing system in CA is broken, and instead of taking this as an opportunity to fix it, we just exempt the very people who benefit from the broken situation most. It's perfectly legal, but it's deeply inequitable.

Is that insensitive of me? I want these people to be able to rebuild as soon as possible, but pretending it's not wildly inequitable to not change the rules for everyone, is just myopia.

To double down on my admittedly unpopular concerns, by allowing people to rebuild without exemption but not fixing the underlying issues, we've opened the door for one of the biggest cases of moral hazard I've ever seen. Call me cynical, but if some disgruntled and unscrupulous homeowner is in a fight with the Coastal Commission, they now know that a wildfire will likely let them do what they want. It's not something 99.9% of folks would do, but the incentives are right there. Moral hazard should be taken seriously.

>Most of the SFH that was destroyed in the Palisades were $3-9m[1] houses on 1/8th acre lots i.e. doing a pretty good job paying their own way on their infrastructure.

As you know the vast majority of them are not paying property taxes at that rate, and never will.

> moral hazard

Even SBF wouldn’t take that risk. Billions of dollars of personal liability against … the coastal commission lets you build 110% of the house you already had? Gotta do it a few times to get enough additional square footage to make it worthwhile…

The expedited permissions aren’t carte blanche, they’re pretty limited to rebuilding in place. Which I think you know since you’re agitating for looser regulations to allow the kind of development you’d prefer instead. Does the moral hazard work the other way? Should we worry about Strongtowns readers torching neighborhoods they want to rebuild?

> vast majority

Assessments are public record. Go poke around on the assessors map. There’s a fair share of low bases like my footnote said, but plenty of houses traded over the last 5-10 years, and plenty of people are paying 20-50k a year.

> take this opportunity

Again why does this disaster demand we also solve the housing crisis at the same time? We lost <1% of housing stock, it’s not like we’re rebuilding a leveled city. Work toward policies that that will incentivize the development you’d prefer in places it makes sense across the city, don’t be gross and seize on a crisis to try to impose the change you want.

> We lost <1% of housing stock, it’s not like we’re rebuilding a leveled city.

In a shortage, marginal consumers wipe out the consumer surplus. The new marginal consumer is now a multi-millionaire. Housing prices will spike dramatically in LA, in every neighborhood, for a decade.

That frictional pain is going to make the median person mad, and harm many peoples’ lives. We should talk again in a year when that new reality has settled in.