Gentrification issues

[Information Analyst]

Yep, those are the same people being priced out of Seattle. Also cops & firefighters, which means they don't see this as their city, just the hive of scum & villainy where they work. (see Seattle PD, use of force decree).

Cops in London are better paid than nurses and teachers. A few years ago it was reported that the majority of Metropolitan Police officers live outside of London, and it's only the last year that a bar was put on recruiting to try to reverse that trend.

 

[Travis]

I know. I'm joking, really. My post is a parody of those bemoaning the increase of private enterprise, investment in transportation and reduction in crime because of the effect on house prices that is caused by transforming somewhere into a desirable place to live.

I just wanted to make sure you knew my house is owned and that I really don't fear increased rent.

Cops in London are better paid than nurses and teachers. A few years ago it was reported that the majority of Metropolitan Police officers live outside of London, and it's only the last year that a bar was put on recruiting to try to reverse that trend.

In San Francisco the issue is that teachers cannot afford to live there. Which could be solved with...more housing! They are building a giant train station right in an area of lowrises. No reason not to put up some 50-70 floor towers all around it (there is one planned but only after a long fight). London has Crossrail coming on to help with the Underground. No reason not to have super density around those stations too.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I just wanted to make sure you knew my house is owned and that I really don't fear increased rent.

Rent isn't the only worry for gentrification. Suppose all the land around you were bought up, developed with fancy mansions, and sold to rich people. Congratulations! Your land (and the not-mansion on it) vastly increased in value! And so did the property taxes based on that new value. Where before you were paying $2500 a year, now you owe $25,000. Unless you happen to have that kind of extra cash laying around, you are now going to have to sell your house. You can no longer afford it, even though it was already paid for. Gentrification has driven you out.

 

[Donal]

Don't forget the increase in cost of living in your immediate area. And most employers don't really care about that, so don't expect a raise to make up for it. Assuming of course, you have a full time job and aren't a retiree living on a fixed income, like an increasing percentage of the population.

 

[Travis]

Rent isn't the only worry for gentrification. Suppose all the land around you were bought up, developed with fancy mansions, and sold to rich people. Congratulations! Your land (and the not-mansion on it) vastly increased in value! And so did the property taxes based on that new value. Where before you were paying $2500 a year, now you owe $25,000. Unless you happen to have that kind of extra cash laying around, you are now going to have to sell your house. You can no longer afford it, even though it was already paid for. Gentrification has driven you out.

Actually my home's property tax rate is frozen at its 1970 value. Proposition 13 did that. Of course that opens a whole other can of wax...er ball of worms....er you know what I mean. Anyways, in California since property tax rates can't go up there is no reason to not oppose new construction to increase your property value.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Actually my home's property tax rate is frozen at its 1970 value. Proposition 13 did that. Of course that opens a whole other can of wax...er ball of worms....er you know what I mean. Anyways, in California since property tax rates can't go up there is no reason to not oppose new construction to increase your property value.

No wonder the state seems to have so many financial problems.

 

[Travis]

No wonder the state seems to have so many financial problems.

That would be one of them. It is ridiculous that a state with more money than France has such a hard time finding ways to get revenue.

 

[uk_dave]

An under-stairs cupboard has been put up for rent in London for £500 a month plus bills.
Alex Lomax, 23, went to view the flatshare in Clapham, south-west London, which was described as "furnished" in an online listing.
Ms Lomax, who posted images on Twitter of the "bed under the stairs", said: "I was obviously shocked but was all-too-polite, I think."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-34404651

For the colonials, at the moment that is around $750/month

 

[The Don]

If people in the UK refuse to live in high rises then the problem is their own. But from an environmental and sustainable viewpoint they should be consolidating properties over tube stations and building 50-70 floor highrises.

I think you're very misinformed.

Highrise developments of the scale you're suggesting are impractical in London and, given the size of the problem, won't really deliver a solution. There are many reasons why people in London don't live in high rises:

• The geology of London makes it very unsuitable for building high rise buildings. In New York you hit bedrock almost immediately but in London there's a lot of clay. The foundations have to be very deep and at that stage you run into problems with underground services (and the tube itself)
• London has a rich archeological and architectural past which is largely protected through restrictive planning regulations. Apart from those parts that the Luftwaffe dealt with, there aren't many sites available to build high-rise on
• As I noted earlier, London and the rest of the UK has had an experience of high-density high rise living and it was an abject failure. While there are some people who will live in swanky high-rises where everything works (and the fees are accordingly high), then the lift stops working in the low cost version, how do you get to the 70th floor, how do children deal with having no accessible outdoor space and the elderly deal with social isolation ?

Again as with other types of construction, private developers are willing to jump through the hoops to build expensive apartments but are not prepared to do so for lower cost dwellings.

 

[uk_dave]

To be fair, they've not done too bad with the shard and gherkin, so these days high rise is viable even with London Clay subsoil.

And, of course we had 'orrible high rises in the 60, such as Ronan Point.

But the system build it was based on was not suitable for the height they went to, the workmanship was crap and it suffered disproportionate collapse when a gas oven exploded.

Perhaps modern factory produced system building could be viable again and modern design of lifts making them reliable and less easy to vandalise could overcome some of the stigma.

Thing is, with any development utilising common, shared spaces you need to have a management structure to look after those areas because the residents are not inclined to do it themselves. And that costs money too.

High rise would be an expensive build, probably only viable on the cheapest land.

 

[Brainster]

I can't pretend that one size fits all but I know in San Francisco the issue is basically one of lack of domiciles. The same neighborhoods that protest against Google workers moving in have also, for decades, prevented any new construction of tall residential towers. And now there is a severe housing shortage. How could you complain about what would seem to be fairly inevitable results?

San Francisco, where I lived for three years in the 1980s, is indeed the classic case. Back then they had rent control, which meant that my landlord could "only" raise the rent 7% per annum. But commercial property lenders (whom I worked for at the time) would not loan on properties with such rent controls. They had taken back a lot of properties in the 1970s when sudden and dramatic rises in the cost of energy resulted in a wave of foreclosures on properties that could not pass on the increased costs to their tenants.

The result was that vacancy rates on SF apartments went under 1% and many people (fortunately not including me because I transferred out of the region) found themselves unable to afford to move (as apartments were allowed to be leased at market when they were vacated). In fact, I laughed at my landlord when she tried to say that she would have big losses after I moved out to do minor repairs. I was paying $575 a month at the time. I pointed out that she would almost certainly rent at $775 a month. The couple hundred in repairs that she had skimped on while I was a tenant, would easily be recouped in a few months.

 

[Brainster]

High rise would be an expensive build, probably only viable on the cheapest land.

This is completely backwards. High rise is only viable on the most expensive land, which is why on a purely economic basis high rise construction only appears in high value areas.

Construction costs are highest per SF on the ground floor; they decline with the second and third floor.

 

[GlennB]

If people in the UK refuse to live in high rises then the problem is their own. But from an environmental and sustainable viewpoint they should be consolidating properties over tube stations and building 50-70 floor highrises.

Er, virtually every one of those is on a main road and has multiple buildings in its immediate vicinity. And that's apart from the geological and subterranean infrastructure already mentioned. Sorry, but nope.

 

[ponderingturtle]

That would be one of them. It is ridiculous that a state with more money than France has such a hard time finding ways to get revenue.

Because it is way to easy to put such things to a popular vote.

 

[ponderingturtle]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-34404651

For the colonials, at the moment that is around $750/month

How about $1100 a month for 100 square feet?

http://nypost.com/2015/08/19/inside-nycs-infamous-100-square-foot-apartment/

 

[truethat]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-34404651

For the colonials, at the moment that is around $750/month

Honestly, maybe because I live in NYC but I can certainly understand someone being willing to pay that to live close by to a law office or hospital for someone who spends a great deal of time at work.

When I did car service dispatch years and years ago on the over night shift, we'd have lawyers working until 3 am and then going home to shower and take a nap then coming back by 6 am.

So not necessarily to "live" in the cupboard under the stairs, but merely to have a place to crash and sleep and shower and dress, I could easily see someone willing to pay this to be in the heart of the city.

The ones with the kitchens and the mattresses in them are actually pretty reasonable lol. I could see someone willing to pay up to $2000 a month for that in the city.

 

[luchog]

Cops in London are better paid than nurses and teachers. A few years ago it was reported that the majority of Metropolitan Police officers live outside of London, and it's only the last year that a bar was put on recruiting to try to reverse that trend.

Similar to Seattle. Police in this city are amazingly well-paid, yet still tend to live outside the city. A rookie officer starts at US$70k, and by the time they have 4.5 years on the force, they're making $90k. And that's just base pay rate, not including overtime and bonuses; plus they have a better benefit package than any blue-collar job, and a lot of white-collar jobs.

The average full-time teacher's salary, by comparison, is $50k. The average salary for a full-time registered nurse is $72k (which is about 9% percent above the national average).

 

[Information Analyst]

London has Crossrail coming on to help with the Underground. No reason not to have super density around those stations too.

Almost all the Crossrail stations are already stations for other lines, so as such if there isn't a lot of residential development in the vicinity already, there'll generally be a reason for it that preludes any future major changes. Prices near the stations are, of course, already rising in anticipation.

 

[Information Analyst]

How about $1100 a month for 100 square feet?

http://nypost.com/2015/08/19/inside-nycs-infamous-100-square-foot-apartment/

Pah! Try £3,835 ($5,800) per month for 72 square feet! Mind you, it is across the road from Harrods.

 

[Information Analyst]

Almost all the Crossrail stations are already stations for other lines, so as such if there isn't a lot of residential development in the vicinity already, there'll generally be a reason for it that preludes any future major changes. Prices near the stations are, of course, already rising in anticipation.

Regarding your earlier comment about high-rises over Tube stations, it'll never happen, mostly for reasons already mentioned by others. A lot of the stations were designed to have upper storeys added - and most actually did - but only up to a certain limit. Most stations now have protected listed building status, so knocking them down and building something new isn't an option.