How does not building new residential units help prevent gentrification?
Last I checked a 1BR in the Mission is approaching $3K. It would seem like gentrification is happening whether SF likes it or not. In fact it seems like gentrification is accelerated, not slowed or prevented, by this housing policy.
Having lived in SF, and now live in NYC, IMO NYC is dealing with the problem of gentrification far better than SF. The transport infrastructure here means that people can be displaced farther but still maintain economic viability. You may be 3 stops further further on the train line, but you're still getting to work.
Compare with SF where, because of just how insanely horrific the transportation infrastructure is, getting pushed out of SF-proper has a litany of consequences for the middle and lower classes.
> How does not building new residential units help prevent gentrification?
The new construction makes no guarantee and a reduction in real estate prices. So long as the demand is very high, prices will continue to rise even with new construction. This is essentially what NYC is going through now, there isn't enough construction that could possibly keep pace with demand and its unlikely that there could be without a collapse in demand.
> Having lived in SF, and now live in NYC, IMO NYC is dealing with the problem of gentrification far better than SF. The transport infrastructure here means that people can be displaced farther but still maintain economic viability. You may be 3 stops further further on the train line, but you're still getting to work.
This is changing as we speak. The outermost parts of Brooklyn are gentrifying, esp. in places that are predominantly black and/or hispanic. Those places are already on the extreme edge of subway mass transit, so once people living there are displaced they will have very little recourse. Queens is also beginning to go through this phase although its still just getting started.
All of this happens while wages remain the same, esp. for low wage or minimum wage workers. These people won't be able to stay as the prices inflate and I'm not eager to see more tenement style apt. crowding due to the cost.
Last I checked a 1BR in the Mission is approaching $3K. It would seem like gentrification is happening whether SF likes it or not. In fact it seems like gentrification is accelerated, not slowed or prevented, by this housing policy.
Having lived in SF, and now live in NYC, IMO NYC is dealing with the problem of gentrification far better than SF. The transport infrastructure here means that people can be displaced farther but still maintain economic viability. You may be 3 stops further further on the train line, but you're still getting to work.
Compare with SF where, because of just how insanely horrific the transportation infrastructure is, getting pushed out of SF-proper has a litany of consequences for the middle and lower classes.