I've lived in a number of places, including New England and the West, (born in California). Call me old-fashioned, but when it comes to a city like San Francisco, or really California in general, I always thought you could only live somewhere if you could afford to pay your bills without asking the government to do it for you.
I love all these great Great American Cities!
Have some pride, folks.
My heart is here with the rest of me in sunny (atm) San Francisco.
I was mtn biking sick secret single track a mile from my jacuzzi tub yesterday and no we don’t hate the high pay or wfh gigs.
Keep your gas guzzler mini coopers, my Tesla will detect your car fading quickly behind it. Or stuck in traffic I will be hands free to text in the NYT comments, for example.
Drought is over both for H2O and IPO, and yo we have SNOW — where it belongs at the resorts!
Trump took away our HSR so we will just be automating traffic and tunneling on our own (yeah ELON!)
Terrible challenges too ie I point out the income disparity then ask who pays the MOST per capita in homeless care taxes, yes we also have best recycling and co2 impact of basically any city this size. In the world.
That homelessness is so tightly correlated with the tech industry adds a whole new dimension to the whole robots taking over jobs as well as the rot of screen time and social medial. While tech is allowing us to so much more, that more isn't really benefiting much of anyone, unless you happen to be very wealthy.
Once again, there is a clear imperative to get rid of the .01%. No not kill them off but put in place measures for capital to be more freely circulated among the people who create it rather than stockpiled by a few who leverage themselves against everyone else by stockpiling potential, which is after all that capital is.
I read the linked to article about Minniapolis and applaud the spirit but wonder if they are just opening their city to NYC style gentrification where assets are bought or outright stolen from people in crisis and made into what only the wealthy can afford, totally circumventing any correction of past racial planned disadvantage.
What we have is an utter fail of city planning subverted again by the powerful keeping things in their favor. Instead of blanket laws like Minneapolis is doing, impose limits on the price of units according to incomes. If say the mean income is
$50K and as many people make less as more, then no more luxury price tag units until there are proportionally as many units for the bottom half even if it means taking back those empty luxury units owned by the corrupt, often criminal wealth class.
2
Minneapolis is just 10-20 years behind the other cities in the article on the same road to serfdom.
Minneapolis recently implemented a minimum wage hike and coincidentally (or not) a homeless encampment sprung up outside of downtown.
Similarly, stringent zoning laws, high taxes and government fees have constricted business growth and the supply of new and affordable housing.
Basically, the blue locusts have latched onto Minneapolis. They'll take advantage of everything that once made it great, just as they have done with the other cities in the article. In 10-20 years you'll see national articles on Minneapolis' homelessness problem, high crime rates, and high cost of living. It's inevitable.
Sincere questions: Is it true that "Once you let tech giants in the door, you have a homeless crisis"? If so, why? Despite having lived in Seattle for decades, this is the first time I've this statement, and I'm curious to learn more.
I wish I could sarcastically argue that us people in SF should build a wall... on the southern border of our city, to keep out the "riff raff" (you know... techies... those eeevil nerds!). Sadly, there are a lot of people in this city who might take that argument seriously and start advocating for that.
We don't have a density problem. We have a problem with situational conservatives in these cities that think just because you recycle and drive a prius that it's ok to engage in exclusionary zoning.
Most of Seattle, most of the west side of SF, is zoned single family. You could go to 3-4 stories in both cities and have more housing than anyone could ever need. But if you did that, 1500 sq foot homes would go for something under 1M.
And that's the rub. This is about protecting older millionaires from younger hundred-thousand aires. And the so-called Democrats in these cities who support such NIMBY policies should be utterly ashamed of themselves.
4
Ok so bulldoze all the existing homes with families in the west side to make more room for more tech bros ad/or homeless...?!
Nah.
Here is how it really looks on the ground in a typical SF block right now: We have a 4 story infill going into a teardown former 2 story SFH.
Thats going from a 2 story cottage to a 4 story *building* ie 3 x 1 family condos.
Talk about increased density?!
Sure it may block some views but we all want new neighbors, teachers and families etc.
So nobody is getting all NIMBY up in my neighborhood.
Inner Sunset, SF
But yeah, propose tearing down historic neighborhoods via eminent domain to house indigents or whatever you are scheming will never work. Redevelopment destroyed the Divisadero and Projects were built for poor people in the 60s-70s... how did *that* work out?
2
From my mind to your lips, when you mentioned Minneapolis. As I read the article, having just moved from the Bay area, and yes, housing problems are worse than written, I thought to myself "Hey, Minneapolis is cool, well, downright frigid, but I have family and friends there who love it". Now you've gone and spoiled it and soon there will be a stampede to snap up (relatively) affordable housing in part of the country that is still (relatively) Midwestern "nice".
1
Well, it's too late for Austin, so little point in adding it to your list.
1
To paraphrase Yogi, "That city is so crowded, nobody goes there anymore".
2
Public policy can play a significant role in promoting more equitable urban redevelopment today. For example, city governments can purchase property to provide housing and jobs for residents. This is what Jersey City did recently when it purchased 95 acres of vacant property for $180 million to develop as a mixed-use complex providing jobs and affordable housing for residents. Jersey City will be the “master developer” of this project with the potential of up to 50% affordable housing. This site will also include commercial space for local businesses and entrepreneurs who will provide jobs as well as goods and services not readily available to working class families in gentrifying cities. This is one small example of many ways in which development can take place without displacement. However, this requires community activism. In Jersey City this was the case as a group of activists, Jersey City Together, were able to convince the mayor to purchase private property for the public good. This was a reversal of an earlier decision to sell this property to private developers. Much of what is taking place in gentrifying cities today is about power. It’s about who decides how are cities are changing and why.
2
Sure, the Bay Area has a multitude of problems! But there is a will to try improve our cities; we welcome people of all ethnicities; we strive to improve living conditions for everyone. Do we succeed? Not always, but sometimes. Most of us who live here wake up thankful that we do. This is a vibrant, beautiful, area, filled with intelligent, creative, and caring people. There is a reason that thousands of people move here every year.
1
If good paying jobs were spread out over more cities then there wouldn't be such a housing crunch in any one place.
4
It's all about demographics
Simple as that!
The US population has increased 60% since 1950.
People need to live somewhere.
What better place to live than a place where you can get a job.
If it has an opera house, great weather, interesting food or a beautiful skyline so much the better
No need to blame tech companies, the millennials or greed for the loss of ''what was''.
This is reality
More people = More housing = Less of ''what use to be''
7
You misstate the real fears about Amazon coming to NY. It's not just gentrification of LI City or . In Seattle, Amazon used its immense wealth to squelch laws that increased wages, provided sick leave, affordable housing, etc. In other words, it wasn't just that Amazon brought all those jobs, it's that Amazon used its power to successfully stop the city's efforts toward fairness, affordable housing, decent wages, paid sick leave, arts, etc. We have reason to fear that Amazon's wealth joined with other regressive wealthy power centers here in NY -- real estate and Wall St for examples -- will turn our city backwards in its efforts toward 'Miinneapolization.'
7
Seattle is an absolute nightmare right now. Insufferable people, gridlocked traffic and heroin junkies shooting up in the open, while worn out and indifferent cops look on. Property crime is ridiculous. Anyone outside the core in semi rural areas is armed to the teeth with cameras all over their homes. To get the King County Sheriff out to your house after calling 911 can take upwards of an hour sometimes. It's the real zombie apocalypse and the politicians don't care.
2
ALL people are insufferable to SOMEONE.
You and I included.
It is density. Population almost doubled in USA what do you expect?
“Hell is other people...”
—J.P.Sartre
I’m pleased to note that no one is concerned with becoming Philadelphia. My former college home continues to garner no respect though it offers a diverse economy with an easy commute from the Burbs and fine educational institutions and restaurants. Let’s continue to keep these facts of advantageous living a secret.
4
New York is the best city in the world <3
3
One of the inequalities that gets underplayed here is the change in inequality between American regions. From World War II to about 1970, household income levels between different parts of the country were equalizing. The federal government was putting major investments into rural areas, notably Appalachia. Modern industries were moving into Southern states. The Southern states hadn't yet adopted their "don't teach real science here" policies.
But in the 1970's it started changing. Small towns, often dependent on a single large factory, "deindustrialized"--a term that hides a world of misery and drug addiction. As the tech companies moved from counterculture to corporate culture and a "winner take all" world, they clustered in the so-called superstar cities. Within the cities, inequality between neighborhoods worsened, overt racial discrimination was often replaced by class discrimination.
There need to be a coordinated set of federal and local efforts to revitalize cities and regions that are hurting. They won't just magically come to life by themselves. That was the cruelty of the Amazon HQ bidding auction, which promised instant prosperity and ended up unsurprisingly settling in superstar cities. There's no inherent reason that Detroit and Cleveland and Saint Louis can't be decent places to live, but it will require major investments.
2
HaHa, have you tried to buy a house in Minn? A whole lot of money for whole of nothing:( And don't talk to me about taxes..eek.
Not one reference to income inequality. Not one!
3
You didn't mention Detroit. None of the horrible problems of congestion, or tweeness there!
You did, of course, mention San Francisco, claiming that the building boom there was too little too late. Hmm.
Way back when there was a consensus there to not build a bunch of high-rises, to not Manhattanize. That attitude disappeared under Willie Brown. That was a while ago. Lots of high-rises since then but we've also seen much of Silicon Valley move there so there's still not enough housing.
Why did Silicon Valley move to SF? They had space down there, lots of parking, of course rents went up as folks streamed into Tech.
I don't have much of an explanation. American cities were generally doing badly in the seventies. Folks were tired of crime and grime, they wanted out and quite a few got out. Their children found suburbia rather boring. The big city called out to them and enticed them.
Now that this trend of re-urbanization is surging everywhere it's probably about to come crashing to a halt. For a while.
3
Why do people act like this is a new thing here? I have lived and worked in Silicon Valley/SF for 20 yrs and it has always been expensive. I think the tech is the least likely culprit
2
I often wonder what it will take for governments to fully grasp the extent of the crisis which has befallen our cities today: the emergence of the elite and the unstoppable prevalence of commodities and services that cater foremost to them.
Manhattan has become a great example: once the true incomparable melting pot of the nation, it is now the increasingly wealthy and white center of the boros, continuously relegating its diversity and minority residents further out to the fringes, and yet, being entirely dependent on this very population for their participation in the service-based economy that pampers the wealthy, and perversely reliant on the creation of art and culture from the outside, purely for consumption on the island.
This is the "Manhattanization" that gentrifying cities are and will continue to experience.
7
I often wonder what it will take for governments to fully grasp the extent of the crisis which has befallen our cities today: the emergence of the elite and the unstoppable prevalence of commodities and services that cater foremost to them.
Manhattan has become a great example: once the true incomparable melting pot of the nation, it is now the increasingly wealthy and white center of the boros, continuously relegating its diversity and minority residents further out to the fringes, and yet, being entirely dependent on this very population for their participation in the service-based economy that pampers the wealthy, and perversely reliant on the creation of art and culture from the outside, purely for consummation on the island.
This is the "Manhattanization" that gentrifying cities are and will continue to experience.
Re-open Route 66.
The revival of the mid-west is coming.
Broadband & Whole Foods are going to remake the Fly-Over-States with a little help from climate changes & rising sea levels.
4
Quit moaning. Try this : an actual historic Cowtown. Horribly hot and dusty, with the occasional Tornado, but constant winds all Summer. Very cold and windy all Winter, with near constant Ice storms. About two weeks each of Spring AND Fall. Now, consider the Neighbors. Almost all very pious “ Christians “, of the Ruby Red, GOP/Trump variety. I’ve lost at least 10 I.Q. Points since moving here, without even trying. But no problem, I’m still FAR above average. Why am I still here ?? Because the Husband has a very large...wallet, and We are saving a lot of Money to retire in Seattle. Plus, I have Wine, and the NYT. Excellent Combo. Seriously.
8
Hang togh, Phyllis!
I lived many years in L.A. and 12 years in S. F., 3 years in Boston and 5 years in Salt Lake, and now 6 years in Portland, OR. and know that you can't rely on a city to provide every major condition you expect for your happiness, but make the most of what you have & need, and if constantly displeased, look into yourself for real change and wake to reality not myth, and adjust accordingly.
22
All that being said NYC has many more people coming in than leaving.
And based on tourism over New Years just about everyone at least wants to visit.
The article starts with a brag about Seattle. Seattle has a worse homeless situation than NYC
One thing that gets left out is that NYC is legally obligated to provide a bed to anyone who can evidence they are homeless. The city even spends hundreds of thousands of dollars a day for the overflow to hotels from the shelter system
And this has been a law for decades.
Walk around Seattle, of LA, or SF and you see tent cities. Cities of wealth that don’t provide emergency housing.
St Petersburg FL where I live has a significant homeless population. On the street and living in cars. Individuals and families. And there are almost no social services. But everyone talks about what a great place it is to live, better than NYC. (With 3 times the murder rate )
Which may explain why a fair amount of the homeless in NYC are not from NYC, or a foreign country but from other cities that send people on one way tickets to NYC
Of course shelters are not a solution. But they are critical.
NYC’s crisis of affordable housing is a very difficult problem to solve, especially when everyone else wants to be in NYC
As an aside - travel to Europe, or Canada - and you’ll see many more homeless than years ago. And they are not all refugees from Africa and the Middle East.
Homelessness is an issue everywhere.
4
I got out of Dodge about 4 years ago and retired in the tropics. My rent is a back breaking $291 a month under current exchange rates for a secure, clean, light, airy two bedroom apartment. Socialized medicine is a killer too -- $16 a month. Ouch. And the weather -- tough. Highs for the week will be 24-27 Celsius with frigid lows between a frosty 17-18 Celsius. Car? Who needs one? I can walk to the market, post office, municipal pool, my doctor, dentist, el parque, y mucho mas. I recently returned "home" to LA LA Land for a visit. Couldn't stand the place.
6
Congestion can also bring charming restaurants, shops and all the amenities of culture--without the long drives of the suburbs. What makes congestion humanly tolerable is parks and an intensive public transportation network, meaning more subways, not buses. The model is any German city. Planning matters.
3
Thank the Gods our Founders had the foresight to engineer a Constitutional Republic system that prevented these large clusters of rather bitter people from dominating our country.
1
Something overlooked in all this flocking is how young people, especially college grads and "young professionals" are shaping the urban landscape. You've just spent 100K+ on an education, where will go to earn the salary you need to pay off the debt? The earning of degrees is a high-priced proposition, and the cost doesn't sink in until little Johnny or Susie hits the streets to become Someone (Without Debt). Those of us who are older, less fortunate, chose not to attend college, lack the hyper-competitive DNA, or were just born jaded about the no-win rat race, are forced out while 20 and 30-somethings in the age of economic anxiety spar with each other for $5 coffees and international vacations.
1
@Jean Campbell
Bitter much?
Don’t be. As a retiree I do not envy my children’s generation. They will face some massive problems after I’m gone.
They will be required to pay the cost of massive social programs for a growing underclass.
Just one of these - “Medicare for All” - is a transfer payment scheme, if it is to be funded as Medicare is currently. Most of their generation of voters don’t understand what they’re voting for and what it means for their future as taxpayers.
They pay for our benefits under the current scheme. The fact that they will be paying exhorbitant taxes after we’re gone seems like a bullet dodged (or a problem kicked down the road) by today’s retirees.
4
@White guy Yeah, providing cheap or free healthcare to citizens is such a bad idea that every other developed country has provided it for their citizens. Aren't we rugged individuals lucky that we can go bankrupt, if someone in the family has a serious accident or illness.
3
This was Bloomberg’s dream as he crippled construction labor unions and changed building zoning in many neighborhoods. The billionaire Mayor who is worth $50 to $60 billion never spent city money to build low income and middke income housing or just spent 5% of his own wealth to build 2.5 billion of housing for the individuals in need of housing in NYC. When billionaires rule $40 million dollar apartments seem affordable. Public schools under Booomberg deteriorated as he supported charter schools. Teachers unions were also on the outside looking in as teacher salaries then and now are to low to afford a one bedroom in NYC. Not to worry real estate developers forced out many illegally out of rebt stabilized apartments without proper city controls. Teachers , and all public sector employees have not been represented as luxury real estate development went unchecked. Buildings should of been limited to 25 floors for there are so many high rise impersonal buildings crowding the city that the quality of life is deteriorating rapidly in NYC. About the only improvement in NYC is the 311 phone system which the public uses to highlight complaints. How many empty apartments are there in NYC currently that only a few can afford. If the Chinese are not buying no one is. Yet a few thousand more luxury units are under construction even with 6000 to 8000 empty ones due to poor city planning .
How many new schools and new hospitals have been built to meet the new units of housing?
5
Not to get all political here, but why are most of these unaffordable, dystopian hellscapes Democrat-run fiefdoms, and why are so many former residents fleeing to affordable, Republican-run sanctuaries? Is this an unwitting confession? And how long before the long-term residents of the habitable places start to resent the invaders for ruining their once-idyllic existences?
5
@Ed L.
$10,000 mortgage deduction change was huge mistake and that is why Northeast reL estate cram declining.
@Ed L.
There are more Democrats than Republicans in all urban places with "culture" including university towns, tech-savvy cities, and "weird" places. Urban, progressive types are often democrats. Democrats are managing the human trend, large urban centers, which obviously is a trend with huge pitfalls, because there are too many people on the planet and/or this is how we as humans are evolving, ever social and ever interdependent. But that doesn't matter, because wealth is the determining factor. Wealthy Republicans buy ranches or retire in gated suburban communities. The problem isn't political, it's the money divide.
3
@Jean Campbell:Wealthy republicans like Jerry Brown?
1
Come to Youngstown Ohio. We have a university, a symphony, an art scene, political activism, and the attention of national politicians. We are halfway between Cleveland and Pittsburgh (1 hour), triangulated between Detroit, Toronto, and Washington DC (4 hours), and halfway between Chicago and NYC (7 hours). Most importantly you can get a really nice house for under 100K and a good one for 50K or less. Telecommute, be creative, or retire here. Don't throw all your money away on housing.
7
@Heather Won't happen. There's not a Starbucks for miles.
Sprawl? I spent the first 68 years of my life living in Houston or the Houston metro area. I do not think the author has ever been there. Houston should be plural, "Houstons", and there are very interesting and liveable Houstons connected by freeways that work. One can live in the Houston where one works or live in the one you think is better for your family and work in one where you get the best job.
5
@Burton
Agreed. Not everyone wants to live cheek to jowl like in New York.
1
35 years ago America had about 213 million people. Today we have about 325 million (or 345 million if you count undocumented), yet our infrastructure has not been modernized or expanded. We are living in a nation built in the early 20th century. And we are still paid (salaries and wages) as if it were the 20th century, yet our consumer and worker protections have been stripped away. The robber barons have returned and the people of the The United States of America are clinging to some romanticized dream of a 1950s working-class nuclear family. There are too many people on earth. There are too many sociopaths in control of those people. There are too many self-righteous fools who can't think critically about the world. So it probably doesn't matter where you live because humanity is a plague unto itself.
9
Bingo
2
This process describes a mobius strip . . . no end in sight.
1
I have lived in New York, Chicago, London, Houston and Denver for most of my life, some of them multiple times - and have seen many changes in each city over the years. On balance, most changes for the better. Life is what you make it and we take that philosophy everywhere we have lived.
Urbanization will continue. Get used to it - work differently, explore and find things you like and get involved to improve the things you don't.
6
I lived in San Francisco for thirty years, established a satisfying family, career and community life until the techies arrived in the late 1990s when San Francisco felt what I imagined was the Gold Rush revisited. People were everywhere. Cars were parked on sidewalks, blocked intersections and the average techie bro spoke in the language of a terse email rather than in conversational English. Forget about getting a table at your favorite bistro or getting a seat at your local coffee shop to catch up with a friend. They parked their laptops and didn't budge for hours. They truly did see themselves as something "special".
The bust cleared everyone out and us long timers could really feel the difference. It built back up slowly and my neighborhood became ground zero for reverse commuters - living in SF on the weekends and camping out in Silicon Valley during the week.
Those who pulled the strings behind San Francisco's political machine made the decision to invest in what can now be characterized as the "robber baron class", perhaps hoping those making many millions would invest in the city. Did not happen.
The sense of community has been stripped from the city along with affordable housing, reasonable public transportation, clean and safe streets and the ability to raise a family in what was once a remarkable city of many peoples from all over the world making a go of it.
Choose wisely where you live. Work is only a small part of what you do with your life.
12
Fortune ebbs and flows ...
For those that dont like change, SF may not be a great fit...
It is *they* who are not dynamic or profiting from the repeating waves of opportunity.
What part of “gold rush town” do folks fail to grasp when moving here...? Or is the City supposed to lock into the 1970s free love forever?
These wonderful layers: gold rush, navy town during ww2, hub of west coast finance, summer of love, dot com boom, and now the tech boom of the 2010’s all layer upon the mythology of this town.
Our booms and busts create a rich tapestry that never stops weaving new hope and dreams!
Crushing others? I still find it a compassionate place. I mean compared to what, exactly?
SF will never “stay the same” and bless it for that very trait a place like this is what keeps America innovative.
Why should SF be so affordable though?
I mean, question your assumptions... is Dubai affordable? London?
We aren’t moaning about those cities’ cost of living...
Should *everywhere* be mediocre and affordable?
Why *wouldn’t* it cost a lot here like every other desirable world class city? Is that a sense of entitlement, to demand access without effort?
Sounds trumpy in a both-extremes-meet-in-the-middle kind of way.
Yea it is competitive here.... should it not be?
What does a flattened out society like some propose even mean for our entire concept of value and worth, not to mention striving and building many of us thrive on here.
1
Living in San Diego in the 70s and 80s, we became familiar with the PLAN movement - Prevent Los Angelization Now - which even then seemed doomed to failure. I decamped for coastal South Carolina 25 years ago & have no regrets.
5
It isn't "tech" or "techies" that run the prices up as high as they are in San Francisco. It is investors, many of them foreign, bearing funds that are often of dubious origin. Same as New York.
12
Come to Buffalo, NY. Experience Buffalodification. Gaze at the urban pasture with frolicking deer and serious groundhogs.
Work? You could be a bartender, musician, or if you need a "real" job, there is bus driving, or Buffalo PD (real job?).
When we work, it is usually refurbishment of old wooden houses. Get your dust mask!
7
Funny how the writer, Emily Badger, doesn't mention another commonality with these cities: the majority are run by progressives. (I'm a native San Franciscan still living here.) The homeless crisis is exacerbated by many local city ordinances passed by the Board of Supervisors: homeless people in SF are given a monthly stipend (like, why bother leaving?), free injection needles for drug addicts, navigation centers popping up all over The City to further help the homeless, etc. The new mayor has beefed up efforts to clean all the human feces in the Tenderloin and adjoining downtown areas. Recently in the November election, the progressives wanted to tax companies with Prop. C to pay for more homeless services. OMG, how insane has this become?
8
@HenryW Driven across country lately? From upstate NY to Missouri to Nevada....I've seen miles and miles of dilapidated trailer parks, hopelessly poor communities, rundown strip malls, and entire towns that look like something from The Walking Dead...far more than I have seen prosperity. All of the areas have been solidly conservative for many years, and currently pro-You-Know-Who.
I wouldn't exactly say that conservative policies have been a soaring success in the US. At least the progressive enclaves offer jobs and a grocery store.
14
I love those cities even if the only place I could afford to live is Pittsburgh - at least a place with a couple of decent universities, one of Phillip Johnson’s greatest works (the medieval city reenvisioned in glass - formerly hq of PPG, now a public trust and a train or plane from BosNYWash.
It was, at least last time I checked, affordable on SSI and Workers’ Comp - which may not always be the case, because I’m earning the exact average salary of a NJ resident in 1999 - not likely to change except with Social Security.
And the winters are mean.
It’s an island of sanity in a state where the other’s 300 miles away in Philadelphia.
The problem we’re facing is due to the refusal of government to act as social leveler.
And Trump’s misguided populists just catching on that they’ve been had.
He’s making sure the 1% of the population stay in control of 99% of the nation’s wealth.
The answer is making a simple requirement that every company paying millions for retail build homes where cost varies with income, say two for every job it creates - not as vertical company towns, but to provide a place where you don’t know know what your neighbor pays.
Units that go by lottery, so many at $1 million fees, so many for $1,000 a month, total.
Amazon shouldn’t been given incentives to move here, the megastore should have been given an estimated new housing bill.
People should live where they wish, they won’t all be brownstones but people will choose where to call home - tough, but no rm.
3
NYC, San Francisco, Portland and Seattle are indeed wonderful cities, I've enjoyed visiting them all. However, don't overlook the intermediate sized cities that provide 90% of the advantages of these cities and perhaps 5% of the disadvantages. What about, Nashville, Columbus, Kansas City, Tampa, Knoxville, Cincinnati, Ft. Worth, Cleveland, Indianapolis………….All pleasant cities with low living costs, reasonable amenities and best of all, the ability to earn/save enough money to visit all those stellar cities any time you want.
5
I need the resources of a Boston or NYC - not the Land of the Trumpanicks.
An old college friend, top in his area of neuroscience in the land, took his best offer at an academic career - with lab space, grants, the works - in Bloomington Indiana.
Born and raised in Queens, an averaged out 25 cents to one if the greatest cities on earth - I don’t think he has ever really been happy in a town that us nothing but feed corn past its limits...
That has a good French restaurant, one good non-Canto-American Chinese place, one teal Mexican place and a steakhouse.
And a campus large enough for some theater, some range of music, and even a bit of a minority crowd that isn’t there on a sports scholarship.
When his daughter was growing up, he carefully selected entertainment that reenforced things he believed in like you cannot tell from the exterior what a person’s like.
Growing up in the lab, her favorite TV show at 3-4 was Star Trek 2nd Generation - because a major character was “lady doctor”, and blacks, whites, yellows, greens & blues all with equal chances to do what they wanted to if they could do the job.
It was hard to find that outside of a five-mile circle of mixed humanity in a sea of corn, he said.
He’s close to retirement age, probably will put in another decade, and his only joy of living in a small hole in nowhere,as a life-long horseman, he, has been able to afford to feed and stable one of his own (the horse is the cheapest part of the deal by far, he tells me).
3
@Eatoin Shrdlu you're kind of missing Jim from Sanibel's point. Bloomington, Indiana has little in common with Nashville, Columbus, Kansas City, Tampa, Knoxville, Cincinnati, Ft. Worth, Cleveland, and Indianapolis. Those cities all do have a lot of the amenities and "resources of a Boston or NYC", but I don't think it's fair to put them in the same category as Bloomington, Indiana.
2
The Bay Area is just a tragedy. The thing with Manhattan and other cities is that you can still escape to the ‘burbs to escape high costs and congestion, to some extent. With the Bay Area, the preposterous cost of living extends well past the actual city of SF, through the “Peninsula”, even the “East Bay”, and touching parts of San Jose at this point. My husband and I were brought up in the Bay, but had to leave after a couple of years of making it back there (after med school and law school on the east coast), because it was depressingly unaffordable.
6
I was born and grew up in the Bay Area and spent nearly all of my adult life in San Francisco, but at the age of 61 was forced by circumstances to move to my brother and sister-in-law’s farm up in the Willamette Valley of western Oregon. I finally found a job in Mendocino County, which puts me only four to five hours (depending on traffic) from my friends. I miss San Francisco so much, and it hurts to know that I can never move back to the Bay Area.
4
Or Vancouver or Toronto!!
2
After living in Seattle all of my adult life, I retired to Idaho. People in Seattle would say why do you want to move to that redneck state? Probably for same reason all the Californians are now moving in here. Low cost of living, cheap housing, good medical care, great recreation and four wonderful seasons. I can drive across town in 20 minutes tops and that is starting south barely in the city limits. The one thing I don't like is the politics but even that is changing some. Plus the people are so nice here.
8
@Rebecca
I moved to Boise 18 years ago to escape the crowds of DC. Altho Boise is growing rapidly now, I love our vibrant cultural scene, good schools & health care, and beautiful mountains. Traffic and housing costs are getting worse, but nothing like the BIG cities. At least here in Boise we are getting bluer by the year, with a progressive outlook. (No, I am not a real estate broker!)
2
Over the past 9 years the Fed pumped $3 trillion into the economy at nearly zero interest rates. Trump & republicans dumped another $1.5 trillion into corporate coffers with the tax cut. Both combined to inflate the value of real estate, stocks and bonds. Except for the corporate tax cut, the central banks in the rest of the world did the same thing to the same effect.
Now the Fed is taking all that free money out of the economy. And the result is the value of both stocks and bonds deflated significantly in the last two weeks and they will continue to drop. The same is happening in real estate only it’s less liquid so it takes longer to play out. But note that home prices across the country are coming down. And Manhattan has a glut of high end condos.
Things are going to get uglier in these cities, but not necessarily the way this article implies. They’re about to see that the end of free money is the limit; not the sky.
4
As a lifelong Texan I am packing up and leaving my home state, probably for good.
I realize now that Dallas in the 1950s -1970s was a pretty good place to live. I left there 15 years ago for Plano, about 30 miles north of Dallas and never looked back. Plano has become a colony of expats from California, Illinois and to a lesser extent N.Y. and the rest of the world. That’s not why I’m leaving though.
It’s not just one thing that makes me look forward to living in another state. Texas isn’t Texas anymore. It’s hard to put my finger on it, but something has been lost here that was unique. Keep Austin weird? What a joke. Austin was weird in the 60s and mid-70s. Now it’s just a larger version of Dallas with some nicer scenery close by.
Standing in line to vote last November and listening to the people around me talk, I realized I was a stranger in my own land. Time to move.
Good luck Texas. When they turn you blue there will be absolutely no reason for any sane person to live there.
2
Moved to the Eastern Shore of MD 3 years ago from Golden, CO. I had never heard of it. Bought a huge, beautiful Colonial house for $185K. Sold our 2 mountain cabin/houses for $480K. It is quiet here. Guess if it hasn't been "discovered" for 350 years, probably won't. Close to DC, Baltimore, Norfolk, Phil, and NYC. Lots of MAGA here, tho.
CO was being loved to death by the time we left.
2
There were a number of years that I couldn't go to a party or any social gathering in SF in which conversations didn't entirely revolve around the assault on the character of the city unleashed by the rise of tech. Or who was losing their apartment to a condo developer and being gentrified out. At some point I realized I was taking part in a sort of collective mourning.
But I think it's worth pointing out, like others have said here, that SF still has a number of significant institutions like UCSF with a public spirit that, however battered by tech, have held on. And that's why some of the people I know have also held on despite the losses suffered.
I don't mean this as a stupidly optimistic comment or to overlook how awful and violent to the vulnerable this transformation is. Because that's the truth. But let me challenge the basic premise of this article: SF the city didn't do any of this. Cities aren't the real agents here. Tech, characterized by a narcissistic libertarian ethos and visionless, privileged, and small-minded leaders like jack dorsey and the Stanford MBA set are responsible. Our business leaders and their combined greed, lack of civic vision, and capitalist theology are responsible for the decline of our cities.
7
I lived in Seattle for a very long time. It was my base of operations. In 1999 I moved away because the city was so unlivable, people had becomes so insular. Seattle of old was a great town, with friendly people. No more.
I moved to L.A. I knew no one. I met people. They were all "busy" people. It was difficult to actually connect with folks, even at church. But I managed to make a few friends in the five years living there. But I had to move. It was indeed "where people move to be alone", as someone told me.
I moved to Portland, Oregon. Oh. My. God. I thought it would be a very friendly and warm place. No, not so much. So many hipsters and "weird" people... they even stole Austin's "Keep Austin Weird" slogan. And that describes Portland in a nutshell, inauthentic and trying so hard to be... well, when they figure it out, they'll tell you. And the violence that arose at the hands of Antifa! These fools were the worst of the lot.
Now I have moved from Portland, and the West Coast entirely, to a small town in North Carolina (family). Peaceful, friendly in a genuine sense, and so much less expensive to live (I'm self employed and can do my work anywhere).
I will never move back to any major metropolitan area again.
I'm originally from New York, so the City has certain attractions to me that only New Yorkers will understand (and, yes, that could be said of other major metro areas, that only natives "get" it). But, no, I would not move back. Not now.
4
@G Arnold I've lived in NYC, Portland, LA, Detroit and London and was able to meet friends a conduct a social life in all of them. I don't think the problem is with the cities you spoke of.
2
Have they forgotten tectonic shifts?
2
It saddens me to see what has happened to San Francisco, a city I loved as a visitor.
As a longtime resident of Queens, one who went to high school in Long Island City, Amazon's move to NY saddens me as well.
Long Island City has been for generations the enduring symbol of working class New Yorkers. Now is it to become the East Coast isolation ward of the tech community, which has no sense of community at all?
3
In its neighborhoods, San Francisco is still the old human-scale and very livable city it has been for decades.
The question is: does the city keep that character? Or go high-rise, the way Manhattan did and continues to do?
What is a city? Is it just jobs and a set of zip codes? Why does a city of 800K people have to become a city of - I don't know - maybe 2 or 3 million?
There's a small peak I hike up here in Marin that offers a fine view of the bay, the east bay hills, Mt. Diablo, Mt. Tam etc. And now in my field of vision is the very top of the Salesforce tower.
Grateful to live here, thankful I can still hike the hills, but I do wonder about the future of the city, and the bay area by extension.
5
Here is still comparatively small (300,000+) Boise, Idaho, we are facing the fastest growing city in the country on a percentage basis: Over 1000 people per week are moving here, mainly from California, Oregon and Washington. Housing and rental prices are increasing, traffic congestion overwhelms our streets, and the homeless are increasingly populating our many parks and sidewalks. For many years Boise has been described as one of the "last best" places to live. I guess we will keep growing until we no longer warrant that accolade.
4
In light of the climate crisis the mere fact that a behemoth like Amazon can install itself next to Manhattan is very disturbing. It just shows that society by and large isn’t grasping the severity of the situation. If we really want to be rid of skyrocketing real estate prices and tech bros from cities, one obvious step is to address society’s addiction to consumption and same day gratification. The path we’re on and the speed we’re going is frightening.
3
Some comments make no sense: aren't these cities large and popular because they house many economic opportunities and jobs? I'd love to live in a small town and have no neighbors but a bunch of trees, but I live in San Francisco, where my husband has a good job in his field (tech) and we are raising our kid. It's a decent place to live with pleasant architecture and pretty views, and California, despite a myriad of problems, is still beautiful.
6
@Mel
You missed the point of the article. What happens to the people and businesses that are already there?
You admit yourself that your husband has a good job in the tech sector, the very group that is the source of many problems and cause for concern from the people who are being forced out because they can no longer afford their longtime home.
You are not the one being pushed out. There are plenty of people who would like to live there but cannot afford it.
My cousin was a longtime SF resident who has been priced out.
Why are tech people so clueless about how they affect people's lives? Do they even care?
6
It perplexes me that people keep flocking to (or at least not fleeing from) these overcrowded and unaffordable cities. It is no longer the 80s, or even the 90s, when you truly could not get the newest fashions, the best food, good art, culture, etc, outside of big cities. Every single one of us has access to everything on the internet and streaming, and many of us can do our work from anywhere because it's all on the computer or the phone. All the Broadway shows tour to the small cities. Every new fashion is available everywhere immediately. The same exact concerts and shows that play in NYC play in the small cities. There are fabulous restaurants in every city now. I honestly don't get it.
When I have visited SF, LA, and NYC over the past decade, I could not figure out for the life of me what privileges the residents were getting, in return for paying such astronomical amounts to live there. Every amenity is available in smaller cities, for 1/3 of the price, and often better weather. About the only thing I could tell that the big cities have, that smaller cities don't, is massive amounts of pretension and status anxiety.
The big cities do have some nice architecture and fewer ugly strip malls, I will give them that. And, I suppose, a larger collection of strangers to look at. Doesn't seem worth the massive mortgage or two hour commute.
12
@kryptogal - you’re lumping all large cities and all small cities together. I disagree with this assessment here.
if you’re looking for a city to feel alive, why would you spend your time time in a small city? no buzz or hum there. transportation systems, green spaces, history, culture, weather, opening/closing times, sports teams, universities, a variety of restaurants, environmentally-friendly living and so on and so on are different throughout.
I just moved from a large European capital city to a small city in America. I now walk 5.2 miles to and from work. Busses hardly run am due only to 5:30 pm. Once an hour, if that. Very few sidewalks so most of my walking is on the shoulder of busy roads or in mud. I trek past ugly strip malls everyday. No originality. No culture here. Walmart and target heaven. Chick-Fil-A’s Drive thru is packed all day. The view is depressing. I’m only here for a few months. Otherwise, my spark may be snuffed out.
I’ll take a large city over a small city any day. Large offer so much more on so many levels.
10
I have "lived" in each of the targeted cities in this article. Once in awhile, I enjoy retracing life's steps within the confines of all three. Then, we lived in a great hotel in nyc, a distant suburb of seattle, and even the fantastic marina district in s.f. However, we could feel the growing creep in each city every day. We experienced two national tragedies: (89' earthquake), and the most obvious one in nyc. And, of course, endured the dreary atmosphere of Seattle. now we "live" in a non-descript small town where we can walk to everything we will ever need, at least while we are still vital. I don't miss living in any of the above cities; however, at the time, we loved our life and enjoyed living in all 3. It's easy to criticize and postulate about how it "should be" but new residents will still crowd into these cities because they are the best for newbies. I hope everyone who now reside in any one of these cities enjoy there own time as much as we did. God Bless!
17
As with all things a stabilization will occur. A New Deal style “broadbanding” of rural America would be a great investment to help dying communities attract talent and not require everyone to live in a metropolitan area. It will only get worse as automation improves and manual labor disappears (think automated tractors and harvesters).
5
Reading the last phrase in my sub-250k home, on my middle class block, just a quick stroll down the parkway from my neighborhood lake makes this former-Seattlite, current-Minneapolitan “shirt-bustin’ proud” (to borrow my midwestern grandfather’s phrase).
And while we are at it: Duluth, Des Moines, Missoula, Birmingham & Portland (the other one). I agree that the upcoming crop of “affordable” urban opportunity isn’t confined to big, liberal cities in blue states. Set up shop in an up-and-comer and use that unspent fortune on an occasional ticket to sip on cocktails in Ballard, Williamsburg, Streeterville, or Mission District. (Hint: St. Paul has good sazeracs, too.)
But if we are really being honest, Minneapolis is affordable and pleasant only for those of us who are fortunate enough to dabble in “twee” NYT articles comparing the inconvenient challenges facing various liberal metros.
Something tells me the shout-out for our well-intentioned and forward-thinking 2040 Plan doesn’t mean much to the kid in the tent along Hiawatha Ave. We still have plenty of work to do, even if all our children are above average.
7
I agree that Minneapolis/St.Paul is hip, affordable & beautiful. I have many fond memories of college there.
Blame urban planners who follow trends and tax and federal policies and incentives that favor large urban cities over other alternatives. Now my cities' planners and leadership are working on making my city more like Portland and telling us at least we don't have the traffic of San Francisco. Being slightly better than San Francisco is a horribly pathetic standard.
Meanwhile empty houses are abundant in rural America, which could use some investment. Folks should remember not building is more economically friendly than providing tax increment financing to spur new development and mostly benefits developers and investors and recipients of kickbacks.
As for being like Minneapolis, no thanks. Too crowded and getting worse. The freeways are ugly and traffic is bad.
5
"It’s much harder to point to cities that have gotten all of this right — the growth without the congestion, the tech jobs without the homeless crisis, the affordable housing without the sprawl."
Try Salt Lake City.
1
@Arundo Donax you're kidding. I've driven through Salt Lake City quite a few times as it seems to be between wherever I am and wherever I need to get to. I regard it as the most nightmarish stretch of congestion anywhere in the Southwest. I dread SLC.
2
I spent 40 years in Northern Virginia
The quality of life declined as the metropolitan area doubled in size. Big cities are usually quite stressful due commuting issues.
Inflation over a very long time has made housing prices impossible.
Mid size towns are better if you can earn a living.
2
It is a triumph for all of us living in Philadelphia that we didn't get one mention in this piece. Happy to keep this awesome city a secret a little while longer.
12
@Elizabeth
A great, livable city and it lives up to its reputation for friendliness. Stay classy, Philadelphia.
2
@Elizabeth
You just let the cat out of the bag...
It doesn't matter where you live now. I raised five children in the Mountain West after fleeing the congestion and cost of living in my Northern Virginia family of origin.
My children had a lovely and safe place to grow in a beautiful University town. Now, I could not afford to replace my home.
My children with advanced degrees and hard working spouses struggle to get a foothold in cities all over this country that have priced them out of the American dream. We encouraged a Christmas sans travel and gifts to give our adult children a time out from forced spending. For our adult children, it has become the American Scam, not the American Dream, regardless of the Metro area they live in.
18
There is a revolution coming, one that will make the French Revolution seem tame by comparison. And it will be worldwide. The 1% will find they have no where to run and hide.
22
Before we condemn the trajectory of San Francisco over the last three decades consider the following: following the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989, San Francisco has re-created its downtown waterfront with parks, public art, and multi-use recreation areas; we have converted a decaying army base into the most vibrant urban national park in the country complete with free transit, beaches, forests and restored historic buildings; we have torn down miles of double-decker freeway off ramps that negatively impacted residential/commercial neighborhoods; we took an abandoned railway transfer area and built a baseball stadium where people can (and do) walk to games and concerts. UCSF, the nation’s leading public medical school, has more than doubled in size. And while we focus on the impact of the tech sector, consider that San Francisco’s medical research community has spawned Genentech, Gilead and hundreds of biotechnology companies that are saving lives throughout the world. Yes, we have formidable challenges in providing housing throughout the greater Bay Area (it is not just a San Francisco problem), but as a native of this city, I continue to be impressed with how the people of San Francisco continue to confront urban problems with compassion, creativity, and energy.
15
@James All of this is fine for those who can afford to live there, and then have the time to benefit from things like parks and concerts. What I often see in S.F. are outspoken and self-righteous residents who are very good at calling out privilege while they step over homeless on their way to enjoying $100/plate restaurants and $250 hair appointments, and never stop to consider how their own wealth is itself a "wall" and a form of social injustice. When I think of S.F. I think of a land of wealth disparity and hypocrisy.
17
Fascinating. San Francisco’s primary issue is an unwillingness to develop, and the challenge of being a 7 mile by 7 miles landlocked city. Comparing it to anything other than Honolulu is misguided.
Otherwise, there are fewer people on the streets than there were in 2004, the city has doubled its spending on homelessness, created one of the first affordable health access programs for low income and middle income, has one of the better performing urban school systems (go immersion). The city is facing the challenge of the opiate crisis and the inflationary nature of what happens when tech salaries skyrocket, but I raised a young family happily in that city, enjoying public transit, wonderful food, the ocean, beautiful parks. SF is a lot more than the tiny area tourists see for 5 minutes.
5
My son recently finished his master’s at NEC. His rent for a smelly one-bedroom third-floor walkup within walking distance of school was $2,400 a month, with the ridiculous add-on in Boston of an enormous realtor’s fee for the hard labor of letting him sign a lease. His roommate slept behind a screen in the living room. I love Boston, but the cost is unbelievable. His twin sister finished her master’s at LSU and is teaching in Baton Rouge, where she lives in an old but spacious duplex at about $650 a month. I love Boston, but for affordability you’d definitely go elsewhere.
8
These cities lost more than they gained.
San Francisco has compromised itself into self parody with a dense concentration of tall buildings that hide the very shape of the land. It's no longer art friendly but money driven art acquiring, institutions less human in scale, poverty a disease of the lured, incurable because it is a dumping ground of the self destroyed, in a city than can find no use for them, only burdens. Money is the goal, ordinary life of families and children an anachronism.
There is too much there there. The streets dreadful, lined with cars on every curb, streets signed to warn away not to welcome. The ruling values are wealth and real estate that, once set in place, become permanent, all else secondary. Get enough of either and you can continue to pretend that everything is just hunky-dory, live in a cloud and step over the awfulness.
11
People in Minneapolis are passive aggressive. The whole "Minnesota Ice" thing is real. If you are a married while person then this might be a good place for you.
If you are a minority, then life will be difficult. I have lived in Minnesota for most of my life.What really hurts about Minneapolis is that passive aggressive racism.
I also lived in Sioux falls south dakota for 2 years and I would say the people there are more straight forward.
I want to move to a bigger city, but I know that comes with a bigger cost.
9
There's one simple truth. Real estate prices are high where people want to live. They are low where people DON'T want to live. That's the simple fact of supply and demand. Where prices are low there may be bad weather, lack of cultural opportunities, like museums, theaters, etc. Or, more likely a problem for young people, conservative, backward-thinking governments and people. We moved from Indiana to Long Beach, California, two years ago and paid more than twice as much for our condo than we would have paid in Indianapolis. But the value of what we gained being a stone's throw from LA -- and the diversity and culture of Long Beach itself -- is priceless.
16
More professional people (medical, legal, insurance, etc.) spend more time working from their home computers. The tax advantages of writing off a home office can be significant. A central office remains a fine place to visit and to exchange a few items that cannot be easily digitized.
For everyday comfort, the suburbs in general, and a single family home in particular, offer the best residential options. The massive construction in crowded cities is a Trump Tower lifestyle where the rich get richer and young professionals and their families get used by the urban dystopia and uncomfortable level of diversity and cultural deconstruction.
2
the solution is equally simple and impossible. rezone everything for high density till there is an abundance of housing and throw public funds at infrastructure - schools, parks, roads, trains.
the first part won't happen as it goes against basic supply and demand, and existing home owners and real estate moguls would fight it tooth and nail.
4
Where are these towns going to get enough water to hook up all these new highrises? Many of these areas are suffering from water shortages already.
No one lives in those cities anymore. They're too crowded. Thanks, Yogi.
2
Given sufficient income I'd be more than happy tp live in any of those cities. What I want in a place to live is culture, interesting neighbors, museums, a world class symphony and opera, a good international airport and public transit. What I don't want are narrow minded conservative neighbors, football, tailgate parties, lawns and McMansions, hunting or fishing.
677
@Marc Hall - emigrate!
8
Montana or Alabama is out of the question then?
8
@Marc Hall You feel that strongly about... fishing?
40
I still work downtown and was raised in Boston, which used to be kind of like an old shoe. Comfortable but a little down at the heels.
(We liked it that way.)
Of course, there were always a fews enclaves for the wealthy (the sunny side of Beacon Hill, the lower end of Back Bay) but they were Boston tweedy wealthy, not gold-plated flashy, in your face wealthy .
(We liked it that way.)
That city of my youth is completely gone. ( a glitzy 'investment' penthouse condo in a new high rise in Downtown Crossing recently sold for $44 mill. Nobody even lives there.)
It all happened very rapidly and I am not sure how.
I think there is simply too much money in the hands of too few.
And the people that are "investing" have no relationship with or stake in the city.
Potholes are the size of footballs, public transit is a bigger mess than ever, and people seeking to live downtown spend thousands a month for small, walk-up dumps that will eventually be gutted and converted into investment condos or Airbnb short term rentals.
There should be a HUGE luxury tax on such investment dwellings, and we need rent control.
This is not sustainable.
883
@r mackinnon I completely agree I have lived and worked in the city for the last 12 years and am scared to see what’s next. I recently bought a small house in the outskirts of the city so of course I want property value to go up for my investment sake but I felt so much pressure to buy now with the market skyrocketting.
31
@r mackinnon
In 2003, after 20-years away, we returned to our home area on the North Shore/Cape Ann. Well, then we realized $500k (and then some) for a small zero-lot was all that we could find and reasonably afford.
Plan B: Southern NH
It had it all, space, value, and reasonable commute to job in MA.
Fast forward to today, we were clearly not alone with this impression. In 2018-2019, it feels more like Northern VA.
E.Badger looked at the obvious... perhaps a better question to have been asked is: if this the case with all these "grand dames", then what is the alternative for the middle to upper middle class? What are the outcomes, potential and real, of these choices and migration? We had a choice: Boston metro sprawl into the North Shore or quality of life (country/city/sea side) and schools with a + 40 min. commute? We chose NH. The quality of life, family, and things to do here are plenty. What is really sad for us is the MA exodus into NH and the drive times have doubled in our case. It's now at a tipping point for us to look north of the boarder for a slightly lower paying job. There is a cultural impact, too. In NH, we love the NE Independent mindset here and we've seen the "negative" impact of MA "refugees" into our state.
It's had an impact and not all of us see it as a positive. Their reliance upon government services and their insatiable appetite for more of this seem odd?
It didn't work in MA (otherwise why would you have moved?) so why repeat it here in NH?
8
@r mackinnon
“I think there is simply too much money in the hands of too few.”
You hit the nail on the head.
123
Don’t come to Plant City! Why would you want to live in a town like this? Police officers leave their car running with the door open while they go inside to chat with shop owners in our little downtown. The traffic is awful - we once had a ten minute backup at the main street light when a bunch of watermelons fell off the back of a farmer’s pickup truck. They’re always having fundraisers for worthy causes and community events, and who’d want to go to wiener dog races? The independent coffee shop owner recognizes you after a couple of visits and asks how you’re doing, they do art shows and sponsor activities for teens that rudely interrupt their social media marathons. It couldn’t get more twee than those shops selling local crafts and homegrown produce! We have managed to keep a couple of our goats from embracing yoga and stick to clearing weeds instead. It gets so wild at night! Last night the neighbors’ cattle were up all night partying - they were mooing so loud it woke my chickens! But seriously, don’t come here unless you love strawberries, because thanks to our vast productive fields, you’re required to own and regularly wear at least one hat/tshirt with an embroidered red berry, and partake of strawberry shortcake at every meal in February. Wouldn’t you rather go east down I4 to Orlando, or maybe west towards Tampa?
46
@Kim S - Starbucks baristas recognize you and your drink after a few visits, too. Just sayin’.
@Kim S Don’t worry, rural Florida has issues, but people wanting to relocate there isn’t one of them. And that’s truly saying something when you consider what you describe, plus the warm weather, and the minuscule cost of living. I could go on, but it would just sound mean and that’s not my intent.
2
@Kim S
Sounds lovely! But don't you get hurricanes, even inland where you are?
Sitting in the freezing weather and thinking about stepping outside in December in shorts and a T-shirt......
San Francisco is worried about becoming Manhattan? Anytime I find myself complaining about the subway, garbage on the street, or anything besides the weather in New York, I compare the same issue in San Francisco and realize it's not that bad. There is no east coast bias here either; I am a proud Northern Californian who has seen the area change for the worse since growing up there in the late 80s through the early 2000s.
So San Francisco, you can keep your homeless and drug problems, your NIMBY anti-development attitudes killing off the middle class, and your transit that's worse than the MTA, the last of which takes serious talent to pull off.
46
@Tony San Francisco used to be one of my favorite cities in the world. The city once had an edge, and it felt both rebellious and welcoming at the same time - no doubt a result of its long countercultural traditions. While I'm not a boomer, I appreciated its 60's legacy of psychedelia, free speech and radicalism. However one feels about those things, it's undeniable they lent San Francisco the qualities that made it one of the unique American cities.
And now? It's basically gone. Every time I go back to SF, I do a double take - is this the same town I used to hold in such esteem? It's become a bland, homogenous gilded city inhabited by hordes of highly-paid people in fleece vests. It's lost its flavor and, for me at least, its allure.
This is another of the unfortunate side effects this growth is having on some of our best cities. San Francisco is a bland imitation of its former self; Manhattan is little more than corporate chains these days; Austin hangs on to its "keep Austin weird" motto, despite the fact that it increasingly caters to white collar yuppies, and its weirdness is long gone. None of these are tragedies, in the big scheme of things, but it's still saddening to see money erase so much of what made these places special to begin with.
20
@Tony
It isn't NIMBY-ism killing off the middle class.
In fact, in Seattle, NIMBY-ism is often the dying breath of the last generation of wage-slaves still able to live in a neighborhood (where, you know, you actually know and talk to your neighbors).
NIMBY-ism, when it's city-wide, is just another symptom of a city exploding with housing and opportunity for the wealthy (who I define as: people whose wealth has nothing to do with personal labor).
6
@Vin. A million times Yes! Each of these cities had distinct cultures, vibrations, histories, looks and attracted huge swaths of people who wanted to be parts of these cities for these reasons. The art, the music, the streets, the nightlife, the excitement. Not only did money play a part in erasing what was great, but so has technology or specifically tech jobs, tech mindsets, tech people. Everything the same, no reverence or awe for the soul, the soul that once inhabited and enriched these great cities.
4
'May your city never become the global cultural, social, and business centres that these great cities have become' should be the title of this piece
This nostalgia for the past, for the Brooklyn of the 80s and the fight against gentrificantion or 'Manhattenization' is exhausting and rediculous. Do we miss the violent crime? the rampant drug use? We talk about the break up of community, but you forget that many of these places housed migrant communities who took over from those before them, they have always been transient.
Yes there are extreme rents, homelessness, and a myriad of other social and legislative problems, and these extremely wealthy cities should be ashamed of this.
By cities I mean their populations too, not just those who govern them, or the extremely wealthy. I know almost no one who would take a 1% tax hit to their income to help deal with income disparity or low income housing. We are obsessed with hoarding what is ours, not sharing with others which is terrible.
These cities face problems, but they are jewels shining with humanities best intentions, bringing together people from all over the world who dream accomplishing greatness, they offer far more than a large living room, and 3rd bedroom
That being said, I'd (personally) rather live in a small apartment in any of these cities for a silly amount of rent and get to experience their greatness and opportunity every single day than not.
9
Too many investors. You talk about affordable housing from an investor's perspective ("not enough building!") but fail to mention the endless housing bubbles in many of these places brought on by a decade of super-cheap money (for large investors), tax codes favoring real estate investors and way too much new money flooding in from places like China and Russia. Good luck buying as a foreigner in China but our cities are fair game.
People speak of California like it's the ultimate liberal state but that's a facade. California is owned by special interests and always has been. Even before the oil boom there were real estate hucksters. They recently defeated a rent control ballot measure.
Just for kicks, Times readers, search out that article and read the comments section. At least half of the posts were from real estate industry shills.
I can tell you that Los Angeles was downright cheap back in the 1990s. Housing was underpriced if anything. Rent control in Beverly Hills, Santa Monica and West Hollywood kept rents in check. Having the most desirable rental markets controlled, effectively controlled rents in nearby neighborhoods. Boy, did the real estate hucksters hate that! Yet there were still entrepreneurs re-habbing apartment buildings in K-Town and other places in the city. Well, they got rid of rent control in the late nineties and look at things now. Welcome to SanFrYorkAngeles, leave your money at the door.
9
The solution to all of this is quite simple, as pointed out by Henry George 139 years ago: tax land values only, and stop taxing everything else. It's disappointing in the extrene to read articles such as this over and over again. How can you possibly write about these issues without understanding the history behind them? Article after article decries, "whatever shall we do", author after author fails to comprehend how we got here in the first place. Economist after economist replies, "tax land values", only to be met with the blank gazes of the audience. Henry George and John Sherwin Crosby are two of the most famous people ever associated with New York City. Maybe you should investigate what they wrote.
3
We love LA. Always have, always will.
2
i guess we’re safe in Chicago (sarcasm intended)!
2
Anyone up for a move to a big white house in D.C.? 2020?
1
More of a survey article linking to a bunch of other content. Unusual style for a NY Times article. Not sure if whimsical writing style is intended, but it dilutes what could have been a really interesting article on urbanization trends of each city covers, drawing on similar and uniqur trends. Overall, the building and migration to cities will continue among younger demographics while families and retired couples will comprise bulk of movement away from large cities. I wish this story had more substance delving into these and related trends.
3
Was lucky to move from an expensive city (one of those listed) to the Twin Cities when they were affordable. Part of the draw here was that I saw people in their 20s and 30s buying a house on one income, and I did so. I could no longer afford my house in St. Paul, nor pretty much any other house here.
Young people -- don't do the boring thing and squeeze into a city that has already peaked! Try Fargo or Sioux Falls or Dayton or Newark! Get cheap housing and bring your energy to a place where you can work with others to increase livability -- it's a much better deal than living where you are one missed paycheck away from ruin!
82
@heliotrophic
Indeed! And, after the youngsters move, they can help turn those more rural states blue which will help all of us :))
1
@heliotrophic Sioux Falls and Fargo are both solid choices. I would toss in Omaha, Lincoln, and Des Moines as well. Lincoln in particular is super affordable relative to the quality of life possible.
The article in today’s paper showing the old photos of NYC reminds me of why NYC was such a great city and what we have lost. People used to live where they worked and there were thousands of small businesses on the ground floors when rents were affordable. And you could find anything you needed and thee were stores that fixed and repaired things before we adopted a throw away culture. Replacing all that with high rise condos for the very wealthy has given us a not so livable city.
5
It's not Minneapolisization, it's Twin Citiesization. The magazine article cited addresses both Minneapolis and St. Paul in its analysis, even though it sometimes mentions only Minneapolis, as in its misleading title.
What's interesting and pertinent is that both cities rank similarly high on various relevant measures, e.g., ranking #1 and #2 for best city parks among the biggest 100 US cities. So, it is not merely the policy-making and governance of one city and county, but two cities and two counties. It's a regional ethos.
Minneapolis' population is nearing 420,000 and St. Paul's is nearing 315,000 currently, forming one contiguous urban core of about 735,000 people in an area of 114 square miles. Policy-making and governance here are more complicated than in most peer metro areas by having two main cities in different counties, only separated by the width of the Mississippi River.
The success of the area rests on balancing the interests and influence of the two cities and counties, and that requires regional cooperation and coherence, not just leadership from one central city.
9
It’s not quite a city, but surely the ultimate example of an American place that has gone from lonely enchantment to built-up crassness are the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
Once, when you had made your way to Cape Hatteras or to Ocracoke, you knew you were standing at the end of the world. The choice of accommodation was among salt-imbued cottages or motel rooms with flapping screen doors and very mineral-rich running water. City people had vacation homes there, but homes suited to the roughness of the place and not the wealth of the occupants.
Then somebody started plopping strange buildings down on the sand and among the live oaks as if the genie of Aladdin were at work shooting palaces off to new locations: the big Ramada Inn at Nags Head, the craft shops run by newcomers who were not about to compromise with the roughness of the place. Where night ought to bring humbling darkness, there was now reassuring light. Pavement. Pizza. I have no idea what has happened to rents.
It’s not a city yet, and should it become one it could easily disappear again. The banks themselves stand in danger of being reclaimed by the waves, even without a rising sea level. Now, that’s something you won’t have to worry about in Denver.
9
I grew up in L.A. and have lived 30 yrs in Boston. I've worked and volunteered in shelters in both cities--when the Reagan administration abandon decent housing as a societal value, the modern US urban homeless crisis began.
Along with the homeless, these cities are breaking my heart, specifically for the young people in my life. My nieces & nephews in L.A; my sons no longer in Boston. None of my family's next generation can afford to live in our "home" cities; they are not into finance or tech. Two have left the country, my niece to earn her MD in Argentina and stay out of debt and my son who works and is also earning his master's degree south of the border. (Like his cousin: staying out of debt). The other twenty-somethings are living with their parents & trying to solve impossible math problems in real life: how to pay school debt? How to pay rent that represents half their paycheck in non-tech, non-financial jobs? My youngest spent years volunteering at national parks & doing everything right to build the career of his dreams. He's now procured seasonal work in tenuous, low-paying, bureaucracy-choked wildlife biology jobs that the current administration hopes they can eliminate and so declare the NPS failed and auction off the land to the highest bidder. If my son & his dedicated, bright peers could have an actual career path, they'd live in the smaller communities near their work. Instead, society would value them more if they became day traders in NYC.
28
It boils down to two things: jobs and housing that's affordable if you've got a job. Unfortunately, I've spent a huge chunk of my life fleeing from gentrified cities when the job I did (social sciences) could no longer pay the most modest rent in that city. And I'm talking NYC, SF, Austin, and more. Move to a third-tier city and you risk not being able to find a job at all. No job, no housing.
Now, would someone please figure out how to get the pay scale/housing cost thing solved? Running from city to city just to exist is no way to live.
18
City and state governments kowtowing to corporations, along with popular distrust of government, has made it increasingly difficult to address the many problems facing rapidly-changing urban communities. The market and corporations won't solve our problems. People, not just corporations, should be the main concern of city governments. We need more equitable solutions to our problems. We need to come up with alternatives to the enormous handouts we give to corporate titans, which result in a boon for a few and a race to the bottom for the rest of us.
5
I live in Seattle area and I am one of the fortunate ones to benefit from the tech boom. However it was due to hard work getting a good education (my parents never went to college and my dad worked as an administrative assistant) in maths and computer science. For all those who feel left out I feel bad but don’t agree with the degree of spitefulness they spew against those who work in the IT industry or their employers who provide them with the opportunity to be successful in life. Those people only have to remember that they too (or their ancestors) displaced native Americans whose land was taken away from them. Or when industrial revolution displaced so many others who didn’t get appropriate education. Of course if presented with that argument, there will always be a ‘valid’ reason why this is different and that analogy doesn’t apply.
8
It's not rocket science - people are bailing the heartland and moving to the coasts. No city from San Diego to Vancouver, BC is affordable. Portland lost that distinction over a decade ago but is still the cheapest city on the west coast by a significant margin so we'll continue to see robust influxes of people determined to live on the coast. And, because of those high costs, second-tier cities inland from the coast such as Spokane, Boise, and Reno are also seeing an increasing flux of people.
7
The author seems to put a negative spin on her article right from the get go, including this title. There’s never going to be a perfect city! I lived in San Francisco for a number of years before moving to the outskirts . I love the city because of its diversity, the vibe, the openness and it’s beauty. I visited ALL the cities mentioned in her article, and I like them all.
9
@Sk Tomczak
So, why did you move out?
Having recently returned to SF from Moscow, I can say Moscow feels like a better controlled and definitely cleaner city than SF. The level of maintenance in most American cities is pathetic and sad.
Homelessness is a rare sight in historical Moscow as well, though I admit I don't know what they do with these people.
1
@nikita, it was the weather.
First off, Seattle is a wonderful city. For the last 30 years, I’m happy to have called this city my home. Slightly over a year ago I dumped my car. Depending on public transportation (throughout downtown and greater Seattle) often has me out and about amongst the homeless population. The one thing your article lacks is a reference to the opioid crisis. I cannot stress enough how significant of a factor addiction and opioids are in creating a substantial homeless population. I might even argue more so than income disparity due to tech salaries.
11
As a native Denverite, I can say that no one who has lived here over five years is befuddled or just now realizing their city has completely changed to the core due to over-development.
An ugly gold rush has hit us, everyone scrambling to take a piece, although very few are truly invested in this community - everyone's out to make a buck at the expense of this city.
It's painfully and clearly evident in home prices, now-horrendous traffic, ever-increasing taxes, the price of anything and everything.
I don't mind density but the city of Denver has put forth nearly no effort or budget to expand transportation options beyond chalking in 'bicycle lanes' --this is our answer to congestion. Oh, and the argument that millennials don't own cars.
8
I agree with you, having lived in Denver from 1983-2015. Luckily, I got to live 25 years of that in the foothills outside of Golden.
I know light-rail is not the answer to all the transportation problems, but it is helping. The line from Denver to DIA is now open, as well as to Golden
1
I have lived in NYC, Seattle, Boston, and Kansas City. I currently live in Minneapolis and have to say this is easily the best place I have ever lived. The cold doesn't bother me. We have a strong arts community, incredible theater scene, a big LGBT community, affordable living, a well-read population, and not much traffic by most city standards. I look at people in places I used to live and feel lucky to be here.
35
@tintin: Ssssssh! Please don't tell!
1
The Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area really is a hidden gem. Excellent employment opportunities, one of the best states for quality education, and decent commuting times.
I grew up there, and I often hear people say that Minneapolis is a very nice city except for the weather. That was certainly true when I was a kid in the 70s and 80s. But a simple check of the weather data for the past 20 years shows something different. Winters have become much warmer, and the summers are awesome.
I’m sure the residents of the Twin Cities prefer that those outdated impressions continue to keep others away!
16
@Big e
Shhhhh. The winters here are just awful. Awful I tell you.
:)
The problem is that the US has a shortage of interesting urban environments or locations. So college educated twentysomethings and thirtysomethings all flock to the same old cities that were mostly built up in the pre-auto era or the other few big cities close to mountains and/or the coasts. Then other newer cities just build bland suburban sprawl. So either build more cities like we used to build cities(actual cities with tall buildings and density as they build in every other place in the world) or convince people and companies to move to those old Rust Belt cities that never recovered from white flight and abandonment.
18
This is exactly what is happening to my town, Sarasota, FL. The middle class are being driven out by low wages and high housing costs. It used to be a nice place to live, but the city fathers have made all the choices of increased density, luxury housing, etc. that are talked about here. We have rents that are comparable to Boston, and yet, we have a service industry economy. Go figure. I'm glad I got to live here while it had a "small town" feel, but we are looking for some where else to live at present as we do not like what the town has and is continuing to become.
4
The title, A Tale of Two Cities, is I think the way that is really growing towards, more so than already the cities of haves and have-nots. For the affluent and wealthy, these cities are often wonderful, offering the best of urban life. For those within this bubble, life is probably nice. For those that have to deal with the poor and homeless, or have to suffer small homes and low wages, life looks different. It is not so simple since many of us are aware of both sides, and as with many situations there is both a continuum and multiple facets.
I work in technology for the finance or medical industry, but I'm not so enthused about Amazon coming to NYC. I think it will disruptive for many NY'ers. The real estate industry will love the new growth and tech people will probably like the increased recruitment and opportunities, but anyone not in those worlds, or unable to benefit from it, will likely suffer in a number of ways, the usual fall out from gentrification, only worse with increased problems for transportation.
Will this discussion solve anything? Unlikely. Do we even think that local solutions are really the issue, or is it broadly problematic, a society pushed by Reagan, the result being a crumbling welfare state? Sure, some cities will find solutions, but the problems we complain about have causes that are far wider than a city can solve.
4
The problem isn’t cities per se, it is the number of people in them, the density of those populaces, the fact that civics and citizenship are no longer inculcated in any meaningful fashion - into children or adults - and that wealth inequality is breeding a new feudalism. Cities were marvelous within living memory. They are measurably less so. Yet, somehow, they remain far preferable to parochial and regressive rural America.
9
I’m not sure of where these ideas about rural America came from but they are entirely false.
4
It is true that rural places that are settled by hippies going "back to the land" (and their offspring) tend to be more progressive.
Would this be a good time to point out the San Francisco, city and county, was one of only two counties in California to vote in favor of Proposition 10 that would allow LOCAL authorities to establish rent control measures? Note that Prop 10 would have allowed each jurisdiction to decide for whether rent control was appropriate for that jurisdiction. If Modoc or Santa Clara counties or cities within those counties didn't want rent control, they wouldn't have to enact it. As it turns out, the citizen of Modoc and the other 55 counties have decided San Francisco cannot establish rent control in their city. Do the landlords of Modoc County own residential rental units in San Francisco?
4
@Anon N 1
What is remarkable is that Prop 10 squeaked by in San Francisco with a mere 52.97% of the vote in November. With that anemic performance in a City largely rent controlled, it makes sense that the measure failed in all but one other of California's 54 counties.
The housing advocacy and development nonprofits that dominate "progressive" housing policy and helped put this on the statewide ballot have failed to make themselves relevant to an increasingly less progressive population that they hold in contempt as "rich." Activists have been domesticated into nonprofits as advocates dependent on City funding which requires them to buy into the corporate growth machine.
The collapse of broad based participatory political organizing, since the often city funded nonprofit staffers sucked all of the oxygen out of the activist space in the 1990s, has transformed a politically mobilized city into a tamed, domesticated opportunity site ripe for the picking by neoliberal corporate Democrats.
That we were inhibited as residents from organizing politically by activists coopted into compensated advocates has a lot to do with the collapse of effective resistance to the changes San Francisco has been through since the 1990s.
3
SF already has rent control.
FYI, San Francisco HAS rent control but it is limited to buildings constructed before 1976. If I didn’t live in one such, I couldn’t afford to stay here.
1
People are free to vote with their feet. I moved from LA to Portland for job reasons, but if I valued getting away from LA's congested freeways and smog for Portland's friendlier vibe I could've moved sooner. But I was fine living in LA.
And if Portland has become too expensive and crowded then people are free to move to say Eugene or Astoria or Salem. Similarly Seattleites (where I grew up) can move to Tacoma or Bellingham or Mt. Vernon. Or to the midwest as some commenters have said.
But people have voted with their feet. Over 80% of Americans live in an urban area (albeit with a low bar for what "urban" means, towns of 50,000 or more count as urban). More tellingly, more than half of Americans live in one of the largest 48 urban agglomerations, according to a CityLab article.
If you don't like your crowded city then move. Some of the commenters to this article have. Most Americans though have decided that the benefits of urban areas outweigh the costs.
15
Ahhhh! Such a simplistic answer! Just move! There are many people who can not, for various reasons, simply vote with their feet. People are often tied to the communities that existed before gold rushes occurred. Perhaps they belong to a church or have family they are close to or simply enjoy where they live and what it once held. Perhaps economics or a job or this heals forbid them from just moving. The answer is not as simple as just move.
6
Most people can’t afford to move, so this perspective applies only to a minority population, one with the means.
6
@mkt42 People were unknowingly manipulated to vote with their feet by big investors, developers, and suppliers that make money off of big development and favorable governmental policies. Don't love a lot about smart growth.
1
We do want to live in places where young people want to live. Cities have something going for them and that elixir, in balance, is what we all seek.
9
The financial boom in San Francisco has spread in many directions and ways. I live nearby in Sonoma County, and some of the wealth in the City has found its way to my town. As a homeowner, this is a good thing- like free money- a house that has doubled in price in 20 years, just for living in it. All of my new neighbors sold in San Francisco and came here, where the $1M dollar homes look like a "good deal". Combined with the housing lost in last year's fire, for renters and others, it has been a disaster. I know that I wouldn't put up with it if I wasn't already "in the game".
Nice places, such as coastal Northern California, attract many people who want to enjoy their amenities, with those of greater means often causing economic displacement. At the same time, we have legislated restrictive land use regulations (which I support) and created a heavily tourist/service-oriented economy locally, with no ability for those staffing this economy to afford to live near their jobs (not to mention teachers, administrative workers, etc.), causing increases to traffic. Sometimes, I think that we are our worst enemy.
All in all, though, this is a pretty tough place to beat...
7
Boston is already there. So much of you well you can live depends on when you were born and when you were able to buy a house, even if you do make a decent salary.
My husband and I are in our mid-thirties. Both with graduate degrees and make a nice enough 6-figure income that puts us probably somewhere in the top 10-15% of households nationally, but that's not as great in the Boston area, though it does provide some sense of financial security.
We bought our small, in-need-of-much-re-modelling house about 10 miles north of the city in 2012. The people we bought it from were an iron worker and a cafeteria worker that raised 2 kids there. Now, in 2018, we could not afford our own house, as our incomes did not grow as fast as the prices.
If we have a child, it will cost 20/k per year to get day care. Right now, we can at least enjoy some of the things the city has to offer like dining, art and theater - but day care would kill the discretionary income.
Being 10 miles from the city may seem great, but during rush hour that is a 1.5 hour commute on a good day. I work in a nearby suburb now but if I lost my job, my quality of life would greatly decline if I had to get one in the city, where most good paying jobs in my tech-y industry are.
But at least we got into some sort of housing. What are people 5-10 years younger supposed to do? And people our age with smaller incomes, or with a couple of kids...I have no clue how they manage a mortgage.
19
This seems to me to be a pretty superficial assessment. It barely touches on the features about the local culture and history that attract people to places like Austin or Portland or Seattle rather than to Milwaukee or Cleveland or even Chicago. Dig deeper or further back and you will discover the appeal of the natural environment or the progressive local culture or even the opportunity to explore and extend the frontiers of the urban imagination—elements totally unavailable in cities like Chicago and Milwaukee. Local culture and politics matter too!
9
@Anthony Orum, culture is never static. That's the point: the culture of these cities is inevitably changing with the rapid growth and wealth, and often not for the better. So you come for the twee and the quaintness and for the artsy neighborhoods and the diverse population, for the independent businesses and the local scene. But these days, you are increasingly finding mostly white male tech workers and fewer artists - the artists cannot afford the rent. You're finding glossy buildings where once stood quirky shops , and big business like Amazon instead of innovative marketplaces of ideas. And believe it or not, local politics change too. Where I live, 10 years have turned the city from deep red to blue.
Frankly, I am surprised this is not obvious. If you can say things you say about Chicago with a straight face, you really need to travel more.
3
Make your city great again. Build a wall.
5
The population in the US has doubled since the 1995. The cities with the culture, the geography, the history, they are popular, and more people want to be there, and so they get crowded, gentrified, sprawled, CHANGED. As long as the population continues to increase, via immigration (as our birth rate is not even at replacement level), demand on cities will increase. But then other cities will "rise" and change as well. Denver, Portland, Knoxville. Towns will become cities. As if it's just the rich vs poor, tech vs no jobs. It's inexorable demographics.
3
@Jenny K - The US population hasn't doubled since 1995. 1995: 266M vs. 2018: 327M (approx.) It has doubled since roughly 1955, and most of the growth in that period has been in the west. Since the end of WWII, immigration peaked in about 1990 and has been steadily declining since then (with a bump upward around 2006).
Also, it isn't simply that "people" in a broad sense want to be in cities, it's that increasingly only certain categories of people can reasonably afford to live in these more desirable cities. That's the issue.
9
@Scottb Sorry, I meant 1955. So the number of people who want to be in certain cities grows while space doesn't so that only a subset (the wealthier) of the increasing population get to live there. It's the same as top colleges. More kids want to get in, enrollment and "top colleges" don't increase at the same rate, and admittance rates go down.
@Jenny K
"The population in the US has doubled since the 1995."
1995: 266.28m
2017: 329.10m
Do you mean 1955?
1955: 165.93m
Well, I really can’t dispute what is written here about Seattle, but I have to say I still love this town (and am secretly dreaming of retiring in Mexico).
11
I spent the last 18 years living in an upscale suburb of San Francisco. In 2005, it was a joy to commute and work in the city. Living costs weren’t low, but available to more people than just the uber rich. The homeless population was also better. Yes, there were always homeless people around as I got off BART, but they were like regulars, the same people in the same places, and without a lot of fear for my personal safety.
Fast forward to 2017. I returned to work in SF after a 10 year hiatus. The building and congestion is so bad that it can take over an hour to travel one mile by car. The BART system is breaking down and is not nearly as safe as it once was. And the homeless population has exploded. No more “regulars”, just a lot of out of luck and much more dangerous people walking next to men with $7,000 Brioni suits. Most common areas of the city are littered with human filth and used needles. Don’t take your kids on a vacation to SF to ride the cable cars or take in the Wharf. It’s simply too dangerous.
The once charming skyline is now dotted with new skyscrapers with skyscraper prices. San Francisco has large areas that were developed on landfill or sand, making them deathtraps when the next 7.9 or greater quake strikes, as it inevitably will.
Even if I could afford to live in that city, I wouldn’t. We retired and moved back to the Midwest. Slower pace, no serious traffic problems, and a seriously lower cost of living. And a greater sense of safety.
30
A much recommended read for a long-term, prescient (1982), and highly literary/literate analysis of the Faustian bargain that cities make: Marshall Berman, "All That Is Solid Melts Into Air."
3
Move to Orlando! While the roads have been perpetually under construction causing huge head aches, the New Sun Rail train line was completed. Not only that, but the government has even made these cute little designated areas in downtown for the homeless to beg! Be careful when walking to the train station - Orlando is the deadliest city for pedestrians in the nation. But, even the grossly under payed Disney employees find a way to make it work... or perhaps they all live an hour away and drive in, who knows! Nonetheless, Orlando has trendy bars a plenty, the nations largest University, and thus many, many wild parties where one can forget the tragedy unfolding around you. But please, do move on over here! When one walks around the malls of the area, you won’t hear a word of English. The area is flush with super wealthy European and South American tourists, all spending a fortune at the Apple store and on designer clothes. I can’t ever tell where all the money they spend ends up! Well, it ends up in Disney’s coffers of course, but it is shocking that all the major roads are still continually “under construction” with so much international cash floating around. With the University of Central Florida churning out STEM graduates like no tomorow, more tech is finding its way to Orlando with NASA/Space X being a short drive away. But one only has to cross the Sun Rail tracks to see that all is not well or equal in the City.
4
I grew up in the 50’s and early 60’s at a time when the majority of Americans had secure employment and could afford to buy homes in decent, stable, uncrowded neighborhoods. We knew all of our neighbors and socialized with them. Our cities were not garbage-strewn and overpopulated. A homeless person was a ‘hobo’, usually by choice. I never saw a begger holding a sign on a street corner.
At that time, Americans voted liberal or conservative, but we didn’t have the extreme, divisive identity politics that we have now. And we certainly didn’t have millions of foreign migrants illegally flinging themselves across our borders, with their army of lawyers, ambulance-chasers, and ‘activists’ gleefully cheerleading them on.
Despite the social problems of those decades, I’m actually nostalgic for the relative calm that brief period afforded us as children of the middle class, growing up in America. Our country has dramatically changed since then, and not necessarily for the better.
15
@Shenoa
We had both major parties rooting for the everyday worker then. Now the Hard Left obeys whatever the uber-rich tell them so Democrats have forgotten the workers.
The Republicans were backed into becoming the sole cheereader for the working poor and the middle class by the liberals going full-bore socialist.
2
The Grifters, Oligarchs, and Plutocrats say there are for the workers, then pass massive tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy while our taxes went UP.
1
I live in Portland, Oregon. Gotta say that I've never heard the "Portland is too twee" argument before. I'm thinking that it's mainly aimed at the many local, unique businesses here? (What else would it be?) And how can THAT be a bad thing?
If you want to shop at Walmart and eat at Applebee's, go elsewhere. If you want to support local businesses - with all the profits staying in the community - try Portland or Seattle or another "twee" city. Or Portlandificate your own town.
14
What is “twee” anyway?
20
@HeyJoe "excessively or affectedly quaint, pretty, or sentimental." I don't think that describes Portland (and definitely not Seattle) but both are pretty.
@Marie S I thought the whole premise of the tv series, Portlandia, was based on the city being too twee, no?
2
The idea is that everyone 'deserves' to get in and there are a lot of them.
3
Yehh, like this article said, "stay out of San Francisco!" We SFers love where we live and are doing great w/o any newcomers. We prefer to have this piece of God's land all to ourselves! :-)
7
@Dolly Patterson
Silicon Valley isn't SF. Where do you really call home?
I don’t really think you want Minneapolisization. It’s too cold. The good thing about Portland is the year down of disheveled properties that have been filled with homeless squatters. The mayor and city council are working hard to deal with homelessness and mental illness and much needs to be done with drug addiction. I love Portland and I love Oregon, with any luck the governor will ilprove public education and we won’t die early deaths from wildfire smoke.
5
@Juliana James less cold with climate change (sadly), about 20% less expensive to live in Minneapolis, 2.1% unemployment
LA's problem isn't that it's too dense, it's too dense with too much violence. Los Angeles is the most violent place I've ever been or lived near.
In fact, all of Southern California is too violent. It matters little if it's Beverly Hills or Compton.
The density may be a factor, like too many rats in a small space they tend to eat each other, but LA was violent long before it became over-crowded.
Seattle is crowded too but I've rarely felt threatened and even New Orleans is safer that LA.
I lived in Santa Barbara for 25 years and I grew up in Santa Monica plus I did business throughout the area. Santa Barbara started to become so much like LA that I left.
You can expect the cops to ticket and or tow your car while you're getting mugged in Southern California but don't expect them to help you. They're only interested in enforcing the status quo.
8
@lightscientist66 - According to the FBI, for 2017 LA doesn't even crack the top 20 for murders in the US per 100k residents. Stockton CA is 15th, however. New Orleans ranks 4th. Statistically, you're more likely to be murdered in Cleveland or Tulsa than LA.
1
@Scottb
He wasn't specifically taking about murder. There's a lot of crime that doesn't reach that level.
Minneapolis is bitter cold, even in summer. And in winter, the lows exceed even Antarctica. It would be very very unwise to move here.
15
You are so funny!
If you don’t want your city to become the next New York or San Francisco take this bit of advice: don’t elect duplicitous politicians to run your city who promise one thing, like affordable housing, but then turn around, hand over the city to the likes of Jeff Bezos, and cry “there’s nothing to be done, we had no choice”...
19
May your city never become St. Louis, Baltimore, New Orleans or Detroit. All four were on Wikipedia's list of 50 murder capitals of the world for 2017 (ranked by murders per 100,000 residents). My guess is that they will make the list in 2018 as well. SF, NY and Seattle are in some ways victims of their own economic success. Perhaps some of you would like a federal housing czar with sweeping powers to override local Not in My Backyard zoning restrictions (NIMBY). SF could accommodate a lot more residents if it adopted Hong Kong style zoning.
If you think the problem is bad now, wait until our southern border is totally dismantled and immigration restrictions are swept away.
6
@Howard Jarvis
Calm down - nobody is calling for dismantling border controls. Immigrants, documented or not, go where the work is. Not to peddle in anecdotes, but there are many small towns that have been revived by the influx of local plant or farm workers and their families. Not everyone is destined for big cities.
7
What about Detroitification, where real estate company block busting, corporate emphasis on short term profit for share holders (the auto companies) and racism hollow out an entire city?
Guess that's old hat now. Won't ever happen again. This time it's different.
7
A solid and valid argument/point. I am a Detroiter by the way.
1
@Elena Rose
Thanks. I grew up in the old Dexter-Davison neighborhood. My parents helped organize the UAW and worked for it most of their adult lives. It's nice to hear from a fellow Detroiter who doesn't blame the unions for the city's troubles. Go Pistons, Red Wings, TIgers & Lions (god help us).
1
Seems as if this is yet another negative piece about living in or near coastal regions. Understandably, it is difficult for some to afford living in desirable cities, but I think this has always been true. I would very much like to live in San Francisco— what a beautiful, magical city, but I cannot afford to. So, I visit and enjoy. I do not believe I have I am entitled to live in San Francisco, nor do I believe I am a “victim” of “the rich” or “the techies.” Nonsense. I can afford to live in Portland, Oregon, and I do enjoy it. I feel as if people, both working-middle and retired, have access to the city’s wonderful amenities. I see no “dystopian” nightmare in coastal cities or growing urban areas, but, then again, it’s not a claim I would make, or a thesis I would attempt to prove. I am thinking that Emily enjoys living in Bismarck- perfectly affordable and pleasant. Oh. Sorry about that.
4
All true and hey, Portland is a beautiful city.
For all of you who like living in big, noisy, polluted, congested cities, I say; good for you! Please stay there! I live in a rural area near a small town. Low cost of living (other than property taxes), low crime, clean air, clean water. I can sit on my back deck and see dozens of different animal species. I've recorded over 100 different bird species at our bird feeders. I can see dozens of different tree species, hundreds of different plant species. I always laugh when I hear city dwellers brag about how 'diverse' their neighborhoods are. Yeah, that's true, if you're only talking about human diversity. But what arrogance to think that human diversity is the only kind. I've often thought that humans lost some of our humanity when we decided to live packed together like rats in a cage, but obviously billions of people love it. Or maybe they just endure it and don't know any other way?
21
@Dave Living with your fellow humans is like being rats in a cage? Not my experience, and I've lived in rural and city centers. But humans better get used to it, because there isn't enough land to support a growing human population predicted to be 8.5 billion by 2030. Consider that we city dwellers aren't doing so bad given the average carbon footprint of a New York City dweller is about 30 percent less than the U.S. average weighted by rural dwellers. Doh!
4
@Dave Thankfully in this country we are free to do as we please! To each their own.
1
@visualplant
The diseases they we see immigrants dying from on their trips north are our clues to why the population bomb won't really amount to much.
Note how little is being invested in developing new antibiotics and how often we use the ones that still work....
I have lived in Oakland 45 years. I use to go to the city to play, roam around, shop... often. Now I dread the less than monthly trek to visit a few remaining friends. Use to be an adventure. Now just awful walking around between the dirty streets, homeless and the mindless tech folks... in the shadow of that awful Salesforce Tower. Why has SF let itself be ruined? too many new young rich folks who have no sense of place..
12
And whose fault would it be that they have no sense of place? The American Dream while somewhat common in the past, has become elusive at best. Maybe Baby Boomers need to take a mirror and hold it up for a long while and see what they created and what part they have in this mess.
1
The most recent U.S. Census Bureau Supplemental Poverty Report shows California is by far the poorest state with 19.0 percent of resident living below poverty level. The national average is 14.1 percent.
https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2018/demo/p60-265.pdf
@William Case - Having the highest percentage of persons living below the poverty level doesn't actually make you "the poorest state" overall. As is often pointed out, if CA were a country and not a state, it would be the 6th biggest economy in the world.
The wealth of the upper end of the 81% of CA residents that you are not taking into account is the reason for this.
1
@Scott
China is the world's largest economy. It people are poor. A greater percent of California residents cannot afford the basic necessities of life without government assistance than any other state. That makes it the poorest states.
Oregon doesn't have a sales tax .. That would be a start!
1
@Aaron - OR fills in that particular hole by imposing a sizable personal state income tax as well as sundry absurd "arts taxes," recreation fees, and what not. It talks a progressive game, but then squeezes the working poor at every turn. It's increasingly and almost exclusively a playground for displaced SF tech-moneyed folks who think that 1,000,000+ dollars for a two bedroom condo in the Pearl is a deal--and I guess it is compared to Palo Alto.
And don't forget the ubiquitous human feces on the bike paths and sidewalks, the literal piles of used syringes everywhere downtown, the 103-degree summer days, and the homicidal, often-rioting white supremacists who call Portland home. Paradise indeed!
The food carts are really awesome though; I'll give you that. But then again, the justly famous 10th St. pod is about to be run out of the hood by . . . wait for it . . yet more upscale development!
3
Welcome to Atlanta, the Los Angeles of the East, where our downtown connector can go toe to toe with the 405.
1
These are conditions that breed Bolshevism. Wealth inequality will destroy us; just ask the Romanovs.
7
Another thing all these cities have in common is too many rats in the cage. This rat wishes he escaped many years ago when he was younger.
5
Sydney, Australia, has been San Franciscoed. ruined.
5
Portland is too "twee"? What's that in English?
6
@Randall Pouwels
twee
Something that is sweet, almost to the point of being sickeningly so. As a derogatory descriptive, it means something that is affectedly dainty or quaint, or is way too sentimental.
@Randall Pouwels
Twee: So sweetly harmless that it is obviously faked, like the person you broke up with being perfectly charming to you as long as The Crowd is watching; depth-free.
diabetic coma-inducing.
Like the old Brit group ''Heavenly.''
1
Does the author wish all cities to be Peoriaesque?
4
I used to like to visit Seattle once in a while. Portland used to be a great smaller city. Both have become expensive, dirty and traffic clogged. I was in Seattle three months ago and was horrified at the downtown area, which I had not visited in a while. Dirty, congested, every underpass and slope occupied by tents and garbage (and feces no doubt). Yes, the tech industries brought high paying jobs, but the majority of jobs still pay the same. The cost of living is high and property taxes make it difficult for retirees on fixed incomes to stay in their homes. Seattle and it's vista of Mt. Ranier is iconic. Unfortunately the first thing you notice now are the tent cities and garbage piles.
9
Last night I wrote what I thought was a funny parody of a cranky old man that -- now after reading countless comments here-- I realize expresses the true feelings of too many who think life has passed them by:
"I live in San Francisco, raised a family here, and I can tell you that life is hell. My house is worth a million but I can't sell it because I don't want to move to Modesto. Everything sells in one day for cash and there's multiple offers so good luck buying a new place. My grown up boys will never move out because it's too expensive, and my neighbors are inconsiderate techies who collect old Teslas taking up all the parking. All the old dive bars now sell avocado sandwiches. The stop lights are set at 17 mph for bicycles. I'm trapped here until the day I die and my kids can sell the house tax free."
Once there was a girl from Kansas who got it right: "There's no place like home."
8
San Francisco occupies one of the most spectacular scenic places of any city. It inspires grandly all hours day and night. If you have had the pleasure and thrill of living and knowing this great city you have accomplished something important in your life.
9
@macbloom As a 20+ year resident of the Bay Area (and 10 years in SF proper) I am always amazed by the self-righteousness of San Franciscans. Sure it is a beautiful city, but the last ten years have been an embarrassment if you want to talk equality and quality of life. I say that as a tech worker who has to regularly step over heroin addicts shooting up in broad daylight on my way to the office. The wife and I are currently planning our escape.
17
San Francisco was my favorite US city in the 80s and 90s. I moved there in 2000 for work. In 2005 I worked in the city and it was a joy.
Not any more. The homeless population has exploded, skyscrapers have ruined a beautiful skyline, and used needles and human filth can be seen in many common areas.
It saddens me greatly that such a still beautiful city has been so marred. I moved back to the Midwest this year and I doubt I will ever see SF again, simply because it has grown so ugly and unsafe.
This didn’t have to happen. And those new skyscrapers have not been built to withstand an inevitable and large earthquake, ala Loma Prieta in 1989.
Another Paradise lost in CA. Tragic.
14
@macbloom
Unfortunately, the city’s scenic beauty has been progressively cancelled out by human-created urban blight. If you love nature with a backdrop of homeless encampments and piles of garbage, San Fran is your kind of town.
12
"There are, in other words, multiple models to creating what others see as an urban dystopia. It’s much harder to point to cities that have gotten all of this right — the growth without the congestion, the tech jobs without the homeless crisis, the affordable housing without the sprawl."
Tokyo has it figured out. Over the last 20 years the population has grown while at the same time prices have fallen and space per person has increased. There is also no traffic. Lax zoning and ample public transit seem to work great.
2
I left LA six years ago and never looked back...I bought a mid century tri-level house, two blocks from Lake Michigan, with a mature forest for a backyard, that costs less than three years rent in LA. I have a coffee house and microbrewery down the street, good restaurants and amazing neighbors. I'm forty minutes from Chicago, but don't have to pay the high taxes that Chicagoans do. There are so many beautiful places to live in our country, it amazes me that so many people are willing to give up so much just to live in a crowded, expensive city.
23
@Natalie Gaza
“If you'd like to have a logical explanation
How I happened on this elegant syncopation,
I will say without a moment of hesitation
There is just one place
That can light my face.
Gary, Indiana,
Gary Indiana,
Not Louisiana, Paris, France, New York, or Rome, but--
Gary, Indiana,
Gary, Indiana,
Gary Indiana,
My home sweet home.”
5
Agreed. After 18 years in SF, I recently moved to WI. I breathe easier, and I can afford to live here. My most serious commute lasts all of 20 minutes. And even if I had the great amount of money it costs to live in SF, I wouldn’t.
10
So why then in this obviously "built out" in regard to housing, no green spaces near were most people live, polluted rivers and oceans USA do papers like the NY Times and their economist priesthood, 1% business leaders and their bought and paid for political class continue to defy the democratic majority will and interest ... with their greedy 1% rigged immigration policies of 1-2 million legal and illegal immigrants/year with their larger than 2 children family sizes that are by our "leaders" admission calculated to add 30 million more 'bodies' a decade?
3
Everyone wants their city to fix some sort of individual utopia. In SF, it's less expensive housing, less congestion, clean streets, clean air, no homeless. more services, lots of jobs that pay well, great transportation and a rich variety of arts, entertainment and people. Sounds like a clash of interests, eh? Either stay and work to make your city better or go somewhere else. This is America, no one is forcing you to do anything. So stop whining and get to it.
9
@Rajiv And some of us (as in not everyone) only ask for our tax dollars to be spent responsibly by grown-up leaders. We get none of that in SF yet the same inept folks continue to run this city into the ground. And, no, I didn't vote for them.
5
I don't think it's fair to say NY built itself there given all the regulations limiting density and slowing construction rates.
It's a bit unfair to put all of Seattle's problems on Amazon. Sure, the company has had a major impact on the city, but here are a few counterpoints. Amazon employs about 40,000 in Seattle, population 730,000, or roughly 5.5%. Not exactly the only gig in town. Most of the impactful effects described in this article, such as increased housing costs and traffic, have more to do with poor urban planning and zoning than they do with Amazon. If Seattle had mass transit connecting it's various neighborhoods, and if they would have been a little wiser in their planning and allowed for significantly more multi-family structures in places outside of downtown, then the massive rent hikes and traffic issues would have been greatly minimized. Anytime you have that many people moving into one area it's going to have an impact, some good some bad, but Seattle dropped the ball in planning and adjusting to the growth. It's not as if they haven't been forecasting growth here for decades; they just failed to plan.
Then the city, feeding off of public anger and resentment, tried to create a new 'headcount tax' which would help fund homelessness measures. From the city's perspective, the homelessness is due to the high cost of living, which is Amazon's fault because they pay so well. That whole debacle is what brought about HQ2 in the first place. But I digress...
Yes a company like Amazon brings challenges, but there's plenty of cities that would love 'problems' like that!
7
@RS
Do a search on how much per homeless person San Francisco manages to spend. It would be cheaper to just buy them all homes in ... Peoria.
1
Circa 2018, additional everything is environmentally damaging. Additional jobs probably aren't as bad as additional housing. Housing is a bit like the beginning of the end.
5
50+ years ago I arrived in NY from a small town. The only way I'm going back is in an urn. You can keep your small towns and rural paradises, I like noise and grit and life all around me. The more the better.
39
@AMM
What grit, except for more traffic and construction.
The cultural and neighborhood grit left Manhattan awhile ago.
7
Dear readers, please stay away from Bethlehem. Though we are only 72 miles (as crow flies) from midtown Manhattan and ample ground water equalled only by San Francisco’s Hetch Hetchy and New York’s Catskills supplies, we have problems with being the distribution center of the northeast which provide moderate-paying jobs. We also have two major hospital systems, a research university and a fine college, as much history as Williamsburg, and a great series of brownfield properties steadily being repurposed. Rents are still reasonable, property taxes high (mostly for the school district), and plenty of places to plug in electric cars. Plus we do the Christmas thing really well AND have a million-visitor, 10-day music festival in August. We’re the Portland of 40 years ago. So please stay away.
14
No fair making me homesick! Bethlehem is a welcoming, charming city year-round, but I love it most in winter. Bethlehem was settled on a Christmas Eve, as was its neighbor Nazareth, and both celebrate the holidays with gorgeous traditional decorations honoring their Moravian heritage. Well worth the drive down 95, New Yorkers!!
3
@Kim S "Well worth the drive down 95"? It's 78.
While the portrait of New York that's painted by this (and similar) pieces certainly rings true for some, it does not for me. I've long been a member of the rising middle class: a professional employed as a public servant. I serve the underprivileged in my job, and am hardly out of touch.
What a city! Warts, diamonds and all. I am endlessly grateful for the exposure to varied cultures, public art, free admission to some museums, an incredible library system, and the neighborliness on my block.
I'm not aghast at the massive income discrepancies in my neighborhood: mine goes from blue to white collar in a 3-building span, with plenty of in-betweens. I LOVE IT.
I manage to get by by grocery shopping where the prices are GREAT, belonging to a $10/month gym, thrift shopping with my kids, and chasing them through every park I can. When they were young, on cold weekend mornings I'd even ride the MTA with my now-teenager, who loved the subway system. (As I still do -- for all its faults. The longest single-fare, yadda yadda...all true.)
Is it all roses? No. But I guess for those who are brimming with complaints there's always the suburbs or the woods. I love those places too. But here I'll stay.
21
@Bryan Right On! The "Big Apple" is incredible and beyond comparison, it's the absolute G.O.A.T.!
SEATTLE WA: Homelessness is not due to high high-tech-bro salaries and skyrocketing rents; it's about addicts, abuse victims, the mentally ill, and others who are on the streets because there are no longer enough in-patient mental institutions.
A mild climate and permissive law-enforcement are unfortunate magnets.
45
@RLB Swap the city names, and this would apply 100% to San Francisco as well.
4
@RLB I agree that the less fortunate are vastly underserved, but you’re wrong, it has lots to do with sky rocketing rents for most Americans stuck in dead end low pay jobs now that our once good paying jobs, even in retail are a thing of the past, all sacrificed to the tax avoiding tech Gods like Amazon, Apple and Uber. BTW Seattle a mild climate, you try sleeping on the street in the rain and 40 degree weather.
11
@Jeff: You’re even less right about San Francisco, the gentrification and shoving out of those with less began long before the techies showed up, or St. Ronnie closed the mental institutions. In SanFrancisco in the sixties East Coast hippies with daddy’s credit cards began showing up in The Haight, some were just looking to escape the draft, a handful really were seeking to change the world or at least get stoned and talk about it, but mostly by the seventies they had decided to become the doctors and lawyers their parents wanted them to be and the bank of mom and dad showed up to buy them a place to live while going to Stanford or Berkley, lower Pacific Heights was the first casualty and the African American community was the one shoved out to make room for the little worthies, this was followed by the next wave which was gays with money or talent deciding to make San Francisco Mecca, and with good results, the Polk Street area became the in shopping and bar scene street and Pacific Heights the preferred address soon to be followed by Church Street and the formerly Irish working class neighborhood now known as The Castro. The eighties arguably began the tech invasion although IBM was on First St. in San Jose in the fifties, we all know H.P. started In Palo Alto and Dalmo Victor in San Carlos earlier, but it really wasn’t until the nineties that the housing crisis began and most of the discouraged natives decamped for places more like what they grew up with.
6
You left out geology. Seattle, Portland, San Fran, and LA are all potentially devastated by a big quake. Portland and Seattle are built in a way that they can't really prepare effectively.
Eastern and Western Coastal Cities: what will sea level look like in 25-50 years?
Fortunately for us in the midwest, nobody wants to move here.
15
@GREG Tamblyn Don't forget the volcanoes! Seattle could be leveled by at least six I'm aware of. And yeah, the fact that Denver, Minneapolis, Dallas and Austin are "flyover cities" situated well above sea level likely means they'll eventually see an exodus of refugees from areas destroyed by rising seas. (And Houston is the lone flyover city of size in the same boat as the East/West Coasts.)
As for (fresh)water, I think it's much more likely California will suffer catastrophic harm from drought well before global sea levels rise. This will affect the entire West, but California in particular given that it's by far the largest state population-wise and almost entirely reliant upon snowpack inflows from the Sierra Nevadas for both its municipal and agricultural water supplies. Our warming Earth is the culprit for the rapidly dwindling snowpacks seen most years over the past decade, and the problem is effectively certain to worsen as the years pass, even if some winters aren't as bad as others.
While California has at least some aquifer water it could additionally use, at present it has few controls in place to prevent it from being sucked dry by Big Ag - which is precisely what happened at the peak of the state's last drought, after their state-allocated supplies were cut off in order to preserve water for municipal use. As The Times reported at the time, some areas in the Central Valley subsequently saw their elevations drop by a foot or more as a direct result.
3
@Jeff
Good points!
In my younger days I lived in Miami, Kansas City, Los Angeles, Atlanta, the San Francisco Bay area, and Memphis and I have visited the other cities listed here. All of these cities have grown in opposition to the fact that they are located on a living, breathing planet and therefore they were doomed to become the unlivable, unbreathable monsters that they now are.
Until humans wake up to the reality that we must live in conscious concert with the source of our lives we will continue make our places less and less worth living in.
12
It's not 'them' vs. 'us' as in rich vs. poor. The international investments and ownership of our most desirable lands and resources is the key driver these days. And these 'companies' are foreign and pay little to no tax. This means it's about the international elites, especially Chinese, Indians, and Russians, that are adding to the high cost of living. Perhaps globalization and diversity are not the ideals we should embrace. Or, embrace them but face the consequences. And, there are consequences.
11
@Ma, you are right about that. Chinese and other foreigners have been buying residential properties here in Seattle, with cash, helping to drive up prices for the rest of us. So the local economy, like in a growing number of places, is becoming unmoored from local middle and working class wages. Since I already own property I'm a beneficiary of that trend, but I worry about the ability of my kids to afford Seattle in the future, and certainly worry about their whole generation. Maybe it's good that the foreign investment trend has moderated somewhat, as China clamps down on the ability of its citizens to send cash offshore.
14
@Ma Thanks in significant part to heightened exposure of the ownership structures behind these foreign investments, especially of high-end residential property, its use -- at least in the U.S. -- is significantly on the wane, as demonstrated by the considerable declines for the past several years in the highest ends of the Manhattan real estate market. Crackdowns on Communist Party corruption in China (and specifically unjust enrichment), as well as the general decline in oil prices for much of the past decade (thus damaging the finances of Russian oligarchs), have played a role as well.
That said, the vastly bigger problem with "elites" is American conglomerates funneling their profits through offshore tax havens in order to avoid paying corporate income taxes on them. Apple (still valued at close to $1 trillion) was paying essentially zero income tax for a while by channeling profits through its Irish subsidiaries. Plenty of other companies do the same -- legally, I'd add, thanks to copious still-abused IRS loopholes.
Finally, American elites can (and do) avoid paying taxes in myriad ways, including funneling income through the same offshore havens used by corporations. Some of them simply cheat the IRS, with nary a scintilla of remorse, by lying about their actual income and/or asset values -- as was (allegedly) the case with President Trump, whom The Times revealed as having obfuscated over $400 million in earnings / inheritances from the IRS for tax-avoidance purposes.
6
I have mixed feelings about Amazon moving to LIC and feel that the city has paid too much for this to happen but on the other hand I don't want to see the opportunity of the new economy pass us by. We are too dependent on the Finance industry where I worked in Technology and every time the stock market gets hit the city's economy pays the price. Hopefully this move will create some jobs for low income NYers who aren't high tech but who have an opportunity to increase their standard of living.
7
Haven't seen or heard "twee" since living in Scotland decades ago. Twee Portland may be in some "artisanal" (is that really a word?) sense but think about this: much tamer traffic than the other cities named, the best public transportation system in the US, flourishing colleges and the largest, most dynamic and urban public university in the state, with the most diverse student population (Portland State), a flourishing art and music scene, all in walking distance if you live downtown, and lots of friendly, civil people. We also keep the snow mostly where it belongs, up on the beautiful surrounding mountains. Yes, we have problems, but having lived in the East, the Midwest and Europe, I prefer Portland to all the cities named (even to Minneapolis).
17
@Old growth, that's good to know because I've been thinking about moving to the Pacific northwest to escape the political and social elitism and entitlement that is SO present in the Washington, D.C. area (that nobody talks about, yet it's absolutely horrid - people here just don't know how to get along).
3
@Old growth While I personally love Portland - and completely agree that it has the best public transit in America - I've nonetheless routinely discovered a frankly shocking level of willful ignorance amongst its populace about problems that "don't fit" with its image. Like, say, its sizable white-nationalist population:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/04/us/portland-protest-patriot-prayer-rally.html
5
@Jeff That NYT article was VERY poorly fact-checked. Portland does NOT have a sizable white nationalist population. The Patriot Prayer folks are from Vancouver, Wash. - across the river from Portland. They schedule rallies in Portland because they know they'll get publicity (and counter-rallies far larger than their group).
1
Until the economy can support more living wage jobs, urban homeless encampments are now a fact of life.
The only other solution to this problem was proposed by the 2013 science fiction film 'Elysium', where the wealthy relocated to a space station to get away from the great unwashed.
7
Thanks for not mentioning Asheville. We're trying very hard to stay under the radar, although it may be fruitless.
10
@Barb Campbell
Too late Barb. I have spent lots of time in Asheville, Black Mountain, Ridgecrest, Hendersonville and Waynesville since 1950. Soon it will be one big congested, overcrowded mess like the rest of these human anthills and I will find somewhere else to hang out.
2
Ugh! Visited Asheville 3 months ago. You can keep it. Its attraction totally eluded me.
The problem is that real estate price growth has outpaced real wages. The only saving grace for most families was a two-earner income and education.
Education allowed people to find high(er) paying professional work; two incomes are required to overcome the gap between real wage growth and year over year real estate price increases.
Education is clearly a problem given that the cost of a college education has risen by 500% in the last 25 years.
Another silent ‘market killer’ that no one wants to talk about is population growth. U.S. population has increased by 75 million people in the last 30 years. That’s a 34% increase - in 30 years. Where did all of those people come from? I assure you that it is not a 2nd Baby Boom.
So you have rampant, uncontrolled growth in population, debt, and corporate profiteering that represents real barriers to wealth accumulation, and negative real wage growth - all great for building businesses and collecting tax revenue, and all bad for you, the citizen consumer.
Our country’s economic infrastructure wasn’t designed to support this kind of expansion. 1950 was its peak, and everything since has been a series of Band-Aids to enable corporate hegemony and prevent collapse.
Capitalism is about commerce, and it rewards people who are commercially successful.
The truth is, your government doesn’t want you to succeed. They are only interested in growth, not balance. Elected officials are the new feudal lords of the 21st century.
20
@Chris H. FYI, the slope of the US population growth curve has remained pretty linear and fairly consistent over the past 100 years or more. I'm not saying that growth doesn't have consequences, I'm only saying that you've made it sound like the growth rate over the past 30 years was much higher than historically. It isn't.
10
In cities it it’s a huge difference, offset by the death of small town America. It might average out to be the same number but in terms of rate of change its nothing like the 50’s.
3
So true Chris! I’ve been bringing this up for years-as a real estate agent the first thing you learn is that only one third of the land mass of the lower 48 states is close enough to utilities/water/cities to be worth developing and we now have 75 million extra people fighting over that 3 bed/2 bath home on a quarter acre lot-instead of helping young American students get the education that would allow them to fill all the tech jobs, we allow a lot of immigration and we also fail to secure our southern border, resulting in even more immigration- the US doesn’t need 330 million people, and our depleting major aquifers proves that- allowing more mega cities only makes all of this worse. @Chris H.
5
The answers are easy. It's the political will that's hard. Build affordable housing for working and middle class families (and yes the poor) and improve public education so our kids can get those tech jobs. Tax all those incredibly rich people so we can get the city services we (and they) need.
42
It's already too late for Portland. 100k new units in the past decade -- nearly none of it for people making below-median income. You gotta make $60k to live here reasonably, which is nothing to the tech bros but too much for baristas, retail clerks, wait staff, even beginning teachers. I may have to retire back to the rust belt that I escaped to make the most of my nest egg.
11
@Kilroy71 I hope if you do have to go back to the Rust belt, you will make it a better place to live and raise your family. That's a hard challenge but the way to go, rather than work at derailing the monolithic corporate culture that is destroying civilization in the cities.
While this article highlighted an increasingly common anxiety amongst lower and middle class urban dwellers it lacked any substantive analysis. What about the policies that facilitate and privilege particular urban development patterns?
I appreciated the author's calling out that while displacement and gross disparity are very serious problems - particularly when school teachers, civil servants, and the working and middle class can no longer afford to live in the cities they serve - each of these cities has also benefited from their economic growth. We all know what the downsides are. What we need to better understand are the policies that not only enable but both directly and indirectly promote gross disparity in the pursuit of growth.
14
When I lived in Washington, D.C. in the 1970s, the great fear was that D.C. would somehow mimic New York (no way, I said--different culture and economic structures entirely). Then I moved to Anchorage, and people feared the influx of Californians, even though as soon as a recession appeared, many of same complainers fled Anchorage for California--that's where the jobs were--and never returned. Then, in the mid-1980s, I left Alaska for Southwest Washington, just West of Portland, Oregon, across the Columbia River. Oddly, many in Southwest Washington are alarmed that its growth will attract people from Portland, and some in Oregon complain publicly that too many Californians are migrating North to Oregon. I've heard identical complaints since 1984.
However, these fears of becoming like someplace else are illusory and the complaints about people from other places migrating to their nests are either just a way for some to blame others for something they do not want to be accountable for themselves or, in some cases, to affirm their purity of purpose, that only others from those "other" places could do such objectionable things, while they, the natives, could never act in such a vile way.
It's all kind of a round game, of course, a way of letting each other know what we like and don't like about where we happen to live at the moment.
23
More confirmation for me that small-town living is the way to go. Friendly people, a strong community, and a safe environment to raise my kids.
12
@boognish, I have lived in the city and in rural areas. I always had more stupid problems and neighbors in the rural areas. The provincialism (localism) is the worst.
2
Los Angeles is unlike all of the other cities named in this article and doesn't belong here. It is merely described as "congested," meaning I suppose our traffic problems and lack of extensive public transport. But that does not tell the story of this city or county or part of the country at all. There are at least 20 different ways to live in the County and City of Los Angeles. The County is an amalgam of smaller cities and unincorporated suburbs of every income level. You can ski in the morning and surf in the afternoon. Live in the mountains or the desert. There is nothing la la land about the hardworking diverse population of native born and immigrants who strive for a better life here. More languages are spoken in our schools than in any other city on earth. As for our homeless, I'd rather see them happily housed but wouldn't want to force them into shelters - their numbers have as much to do with climate as with income inequality. They don't freeze to death sleeping outdoors here. This is a place of world class cultural institutions, not just the movies or the Hollywood sign.
Come on down and lose your stereotypes. I live in the best little city in LA County. No, I won't name it.
12
@hazel18 "Los Angeles is unlike all of the other cities named in this article and doesn't belong here."
I agree: its problems are exponentially worse than any others mentioned.
I find it interesting that you chastise others for harboring stereotypes, and yet fail to mention that your "ski in the morning and surf in the afternoon" cliche is effectively impossible to perform. Even assuming the beaches aren't closed due to fecal pollution and the like, have you ever even *tried* to drive back from, say, Big Bear during the morning commute to make it back to L.A.'s west side in time to go surfing? (And btw mornings are nearly always a better time to surf, thanks to the tide.)
Also:
1. Yes, L.A. is a cultural melting pot, but much like NYC it's a ruinously expensive one in which various ethnic communities are a) predominantly ghettoized and b) nearly always at risk for gentrification-based displacement. (See, e.g., much of South Central L.A. at present.)
2. I'm flabbergasted that you rationalize the city's chronic inability to do anything about its homeless problem -- by far the worst in America -- by noting that "they don't freeze to death" there and are "drawn to its climate." Just FYI, Houston (and Austin) have climates similar to L.A.'s - as do a number of other cities in the southern U.S. - but harbor homeless populations a fraction of its size (by any measure), so this claim is specious at best.
P.S. I used to live in L.A., so no, I'm not stereotyping it.
10
The kitsch Salesforce tower ruined The City's skyline. And, please, spare me comparisons to when the TransAmerica tower was built. Completely different. One is kitsch; the other is elegant. As a commercial photography, my days of photographing the skyline from Twin Peaks are over. I will NEVER take a photograph of the tasteless, vulgar Salesforce Tower.
12
You can see it from Lakeville highway in petaluma. Otherworldly.
1
Well at least they gave it a classy, tasteful name. Um, er...
2
@Glenn Franco Simmons
I could not agree more! It is an abomination that graceless dominates every view like a giant phallus erected through sheer vanity. With all the money spent, why was not a world-class architect charged with designing a worthy addition to the skyline? The mind boggles.
5
Cities used to be places where people who were born with nothing could work hard to become (and also contribute) something.
Cities are now places where people born on third base (utterly clueless as to how their food and creature comforts are produced and arrive on their doorstep) see it as their right to displace and/or yoke to their service any who are not.
13
"Some" people in New York don't want to be the next Seattle; "numerous" writers warn.... etc. There will always be the 'some' and the 'numerous' to bolster any argument but that kind of rhetoric is useless. Without the spark, vibrancy and power of New York City, Seattle, Boston San Francisco and Portland, this wonderful country would be part of the 'developing world' ( i.,e.,the flyover part of the US) rather than a beacon for creativity . As many have noted, there are few more left wing cities in the US than the five cities mentioned above. Not sure why that is the case, but I am sure why the author didn't add that piece of information to her flawed analysis.
9
Please don't come to Minneapolis or St Paul for that matter and ruin it for us. And you won't like the weather anyway.
16
@Arthur H: It keeps out the riff-raff. Unfortunately, thanks to global warming, we will live to see date palms growing along Hennepin Avenue.
3
As a Manhattanite, I worry about Manhattan becoming London, a city where the global rich own real estate but don't live. Many of the old established high end coops want people who are making these apartments their primary residence. The new condos can be bought be shell companies with unknown, foreign ownership that wants a NY base. These buildings (e.g. the Plaza) are mostly empty thus destroying neighborhood services.
19
@CDN Have no fear, London will die very soon. Once the British are removed as the major money launderers of the world, there will be no reason for oligarchs to be there.
1
I’ve had the pleasure and pain of living in or very near SFO, SEA, LAX, NYC and just to give it a whirl, a city in Kentucky and a town in rural Oregon. Everywhere there are problems and there always have been! Cities are crowded and overpriced- nothing new there. Suburbs are boring and monochromatic, nothing new there. Rural life has charms, but most of the smart kids leave town and don’t come back. There’s plenty of available space in the Midwest. Perhaps tech companies should create their own new versions of what they think towns should be. Take over a few depressed areas in the Midwest and make them into shining cities. A requirement to train and hire people from the local population and retain the manufacturing jobs that have been lost to China. Why not?
43
There's always been unfettered development with little regard for esthetics or long term infrastructure ramifications but what really cooked our urban suburban 'gooses' began in the 1970's
when everyone, and his brother, decided they too, could make a killing in real restate. We've cannibalized ourselves for profit. Austin TX, Santa Barbara, Brooklyn, Nashville, Seattle, Atlanta, San Francisco, Tucson. Once so inviting now going going, gone.
6
Big cities will always grow and become more expensive. Reading the comments, one of the concerns that stood out was the traffic. Just yesterday I think I read this article here about fast speed trains coming to US, in year 2018, when most of industrialized countries have them for a long time, and just now we are seeing them here. I live in the Bronx, I would not mind to live outside the city, but how can I do that if transportation here is horrible. Trains are slow, traffic is bad, subways are disgusting. I love going to the city in the weekends but I rather drive and pay parking than taking the subway on a weekend (which runs so so slow).
Bottom line, problem is federal and local government. Somehow one of the richest country in the world cannot find a way to improve transportation, to bring public transportation to the 21st century. This has to be done not only for the reasons people are mentioning here, but for the environment too. Besides these big cities, you go to another state or city and you better rent a car cause you won't find buses or trains to move around. That's so bad for our planet. Everywhere you move, you have to drive, even to buy milk.
16
@John, We are living in the 21st century with 19th century infrastructure and transportation systems.
When there was about 76 million people in the entire country.
4
Cities must provide housing and services for those who work at the low end, keeping the cities running.
Higher taxes are the key.
13
@William very true. Yet, the pervasive attitude in Memphis and TN, continues to be to keep cutting taxes, which exacerbates a poor quality of life.
Amen. I was one of those who thought the tech-boom of the early 90's was a good thing for the San Francisco region. Others saw what was coming and they were right. It has been a disaster. It's not just about money--- it's also about culture--- the Bohemian San Francisco of the past--- the thing that made San Francisco San Francisco--- is now long gone. No Bohemians can afford to live anywhere near here.
26
@Philip Tymon, Most of the artists, movers and shakers and creative types left SF before the 90's.
2
The core issue,briefly touched upon is that cities have become paradigm dramas of late stage capitalism. Enrichment of the wealthy at the expense of a rapidly shrinking middle class has turned our cities into theatrical stages for highlighting the vast and rapidly growing income disparity and inequality as once proudly middle class members - public school teachers, social workers, government employees enter the precariat class and the bottom of the food chain reaches new levels of barbaric homelessness conditions.
For class confused posters who would seek to frame this as the fault of Democrats. It’s actually the result of capitalist system working its invisible -hand greed and purchasing elected officials from D.C. to local city council who cut funding for urban development. Providing tax giveaways for the wealthy and gutting public education and transportation.
Conditions represent the results of decades of ignoring, and slashing budgets for mixed and low income housing. And still many persist by removal of rent control, lifting of zoning laws that would protect working class neighborhoods from predatory condo development.
Our major cities are the canary in the coal mine dying. Saving and restoring them will require a boldness and fortitude not seen since the New Deal. First we must see that the problem is Predatory Capitalism then insist that the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. The healing begins with heavy investments in public housing, schools and transit.
15
@Progressive Power
Twitter in SF and now Amazon in Long Island City not only do not pay their fair share of taxes-- they're getting subsidies from all of us property tax payers to entice them to locate in the city. Turns out that Twitter and all its Market Street tech neighbors have done nothing to improve the street conditions surrounding their offices because they all have in-house restaurants and other commercial services for their employees. They don't have to mingle with the homeless or spend money in any of the nearby restaurants.
9
Who are the people in SF who ride those electric scooters? Are they homeless or tech millionaires?
4
I live here in the bay area. Let's be perfectly clear, no one is held here against their will except the folks in San Quentin, and even they have million dollar views.
The bay area is incredibly beautiful, I can be in summer weather in the spring, travel three hours and go skiing in Tahoe. Even in June. One of the best places to sail in the world. 8 of 15 three star Michelin restaurants in the country are in the bay area. Amazing foody scene. Oakland supposably has the highest artist population per capita of any city. There is a beach and surfing right in San Francisco. In the city. One of the best wine locations in the world is one hour away. Rand Mcnally rated Oakland best weather in the country... no mosquitos. Views from the hills are spectacular at night. If you like coffee, every third building is a cafe. Fresh air off the ocean every day. There is a reason people are willing to pay ridiculous amounts for rent or a house.
36
@leftcoast, I remember having a nice meal in a very nice restaurant near Pacific Heights and every time the door swung open the establishment was filled with the smell of a clearly mentally ill homeless person just outside. Yes, there's a reason people move here and stay here, but I question the morality of the inhabitants who are able to over and past scenes of human tragedy on a daily basis on their way to their next artisanal pizzas. I know I questioned mine...
12
@leftcoast Shhhhhhhh!
1
@leftcoast - and you just listed all the reasons why the people who staff your foody places, marinas, wineries and coffee shops cannot live anywhere near where they work. Nice.
5
Trust me, NYC can handle the Tech Bros! It will absorbed them with no problems and will little notice.
11
Seattle has two things going for it, that is all it has.
It has drop dead beauty and a great climate.
Nothing else.
I grew up in NYC.
People in NY are real. What you see is what you get.
Seattle is the complete opposite.
The Nordic culture is such that no one ever says what they believe. Also, there is always an attempt to try to impress others.
There is also an inferiority complex that drives everything.
There is not one great piece of art in the entire city, no great museums, horrible transportation, incompetent leaders, and
horrible problems with homeless people. Most of them are not homeless because of the increased costs to live here, but because they are opiod addicts. They have moved here from West Virginia and Oklahoma because they have heard that Seattle people are gutless and will not make waves. They are given free reign to do whatever they want.
Oh, there is one more good thing in Seattle besides the beauty and weather. The University of Washington is one of the best universities in the world.
6
@bigdoc My goodness. I've lived in Seattle for 20 years and I disagree with you on nearly every point, well except that UW is a fine school and the outdoor beauty here is splendid.
I moved here 20 years ago at age 35, from the East Coast. I had no trouble making friends; people are the same everywhere: if you're interested in them, they will be interested in you. I grew up in South Carolina so I'm familiar with friendly folk; there everyone is outwardly friendly but not as welcoming of neighbors from other parts. I have always felt welcome in Seattle.
Most of our unsheltered citizens were born in Washington state, and most do not have a substance abuse problem, although about a third of them do and there is a serious lack of services for them. They are one of the most studied unsheltered groups in the nation; I work among them every week and have gotten to know many quite well. Most lack shelter because they cannot afford it, and due to what is usually a series of unfortunate life events have difficulty finding and keeping work; even when they do it's not enough to save what you need to get into an apartment here. You probably have no idea how many mothers and children are sleeping in cars every night and looking fairly normal during the day. I would suggest that you volunteer at a local shelter to learn more about this situation and how you might be able to help.
And I'm open to visit an art gallery with you anytime!
12
@bigdoc. I have family in suburban Kirkland, WA. It rains, not quite non-stop, eight months of the year. The other four are incredible, however. I'd need a shrink to live there.
12
@Sherrie B
Well said, thanks--
2
Context: I am a Brooklyn native and my husband third-generation Seattle, both veterans of East Village and Bushwick of yore. We now choose to look out upon cow pasture, and the nearest "culture" of any sort is at least an hour drive away. Leaving NYC post-Xmas visit via the Lincoln Tunnel, the apparent mall-ification / theme-park-ization of our former town is complete.
Have been reading Kerouac recently for light diversion - reams about Denver, San Francisco, elsewhere - and thought to write down the references for eventual bucket list tourism, but whatever. We begin to sound like ex-urban versions of Edward Abbey.
All is gone. Only memory and imagination remain.
13
No question. The problem in New York City is the amount of development that is directed solely at the uber wealthy. People who can afford $100MM residences that are never lived in but only places to park money. 57th Street is becoming the center of billionaire country.
The biggest problem is the degree that a significant majority of us, accept this as worthy aspiration.
21
Are any urban planners thinking about water in California? All this growth after a serious drought. The next drought will be telling. Growth in California is not sustainable without water resources.
23
No one seems to care about
the homeless, a huge and growing issue in many of these cities.
In LA approximately 55,000
people live on the streets
downtown and more in other areas.
LA...”fantasyland” of show-biz and Disneyland...the city of multimillion dollar homes & limos. The homeless human beings have no access to toilets or showers...there is typhus, hunger, mental illness. Where is the city & business leadership? Would it be so difficult to install open-air showers and a waste management system? Surely some brilliant “techie” has an idea? Maybe when the typhus reaches Beverly Hills & Brentwood....
15
Each time a city or state politician offer tax incentives for a business to move into their location, it is the property tax owners who get stuck paying the bill. Instead of giving all those tax credits to filthy rich Amazon, maybe give some of the residents who will be paying higher property taxes some relief.
24
How is Dallas connected to this story?!?
We’re getting there! Dallas proper is riddled with crumbling streets, a growing homeless population and housing has been rising dramatically for the past 5 years. Everything is now “Luxury Leasing”. Wages aren’t keeping up since companies moving here think labor is much cheaper. The amount of construction is staggering to me. Who can afford all this? While there’s no state income tax, property tax is 2 % the value of your home. My taxes have jumped 35% in 2 years.
8
That tax rate is double what is allowed in California, and ours is usually much less than 1% as the assessment can only go up by 2% a year until the property is sold.
Pure capitalism is not sustainable.
30
@Wayne Doleski Capitalism is many things, but it’s never pure.
1
There is nothing about San Francisco that a little ZPG couldn't help. The influx of incremental jobs that are equal to the prior existing population without any regard to their soft side: housing, infrastructure, social stability, transportation, etc., are a bonanza to real estate speculators, foreign money, and greedy landlords whose depredations stall the 45,000 housing units in all forms of realization, from stalled plans to unoccupied buildings. The wave is evictions followed by sale in a bubble of price driven by artificial scarcity benefitting only real estate interests and landlords.
Solutions? Rent-equivalent fines for unoccupied rental housing, no jobs or commercial building unless housing is available, infrastructure funded, and transportation assured. All 45,000 housing units realized, rents stabilized, low cost housing a percentage of any building, no foreign ownership of housing real estate, no ad hoc evictions without review.
Now, with these remedies, talk to me about San Francisco-ization. By the way end the red state emigres back to their red states to vote Trump and Republicans out of their states. We have sorted out ours and like the quality of life we created.
9
@live now you'll be a long time dead Right. That’s a long paragraph of solutions. Go girl!
@live now you'll be a long time dead
So, your remedy is more regulation? That's hilarious! It's the choking off of land and housing development by idiot politicians and neighborhood advocates starting in the 1970s that has created this housing mess in SF! Rent control protects only the ones who already have a place and not anybody who needs one. And it's the well off who hold on to those forever in more than one city! Fact is that cities with the most restricted rent and development laws and have the highest average rents! It's (the lack of) supply and demand! Look it up!
1
@live now you'll be a long time dead
Your provided a pretty good list of solutions to the housing crisis in San Francisco.
As you observe, one problem with housing in some cities is second and third homes of the very wealthy that remain vacant for much of the year. Maybe instead of a fine, an income tax is assigned to non-resident property owners, and proceeds returned to the affordable, or better yet, social housing market.
I like the idea of resisting "opaque" real estate ownership; human owners only, no LLC's or corporations, will limit ownership. Apparently, the London real estate prices are expected to decline due to aggressive policing for criminally laundered money. (Imagine if NY, NY, and Palm Beach did this??)
Finally, San Francisco and other cities could take revenue directed to the homeless and build housing and social services in the towns the homeless originally hail from, and provide a high quality of life there and still have money left over to foster a jobs program as well.
5
Here in Portland, Maine, a city which locals regard as "booming," the shorthand is a wish not to become another Boston.
I suspect this is a widespread phenomenon in any city with sufficient growth to be disruptive, and then a search for the nearest city to use as a negative model of the impact of growth.
5
There is no US city that has “got it right”. I fear for those who want Seattle’s “success” as we have the third largest homeless population in the nation, unaffordable housing, unbelievable traffic congestion, and a widening divide between the rich techies and the middle-class, poor. Our solution to traffic congestion is to build horribly expensive light rail systems that haul a handful of people at 10 mph. I would dare you to try and ride a bike in Seattle (though some do) safely, with no bike routes or poorly designed routes that would challenge the fittest mountain bikers on typically slick, dark streets. And to top it off, we have built “express” lanes on our main freeway (I-405) that have tolls, and only add to the congestion (few want to pay, especially at peak times) and create added fear in the commute (poorly designed, drivers jumping in/out of the lanes, dangerous merge lanes). And why aren’t the tech companies paying their fair share for the infrastructure? Because, like Boeing, the threaten to move away. Maybe that wouldn’t be all bad......
16
@Steve
You are totally correct. I own several houses here and can not wait to get out.
All of the problems in Seattle are because of the inept government. The worst leaders anywhere on the planet.
Horrible transportation, gutless leaders who give drug addicts more import than the tax payers. If you want to live off of the public, move here and do whatever you want. You can throw your garbage in public spaces, but the taxpayers have to pay huge fees to dump their garbage. You can pitch your tent in front of the Space Needle for the world to see. The reason why we call it the Space Needle is because we love needles. They are everywhere on city streets. I hope the leaders of this despicable place see this!! Oh, I forgot to mention that the city council is made up of proletarians.
3
Most of these cities are strongholds of the Left.....hence the homeless encampments and ‘sanctuary city’ status. What the likes of Gavin Newsom did to San Francisco, he will do to the entire state as governor of California.
Most third world countries exhibit the same kinds of disparities between rich and poor living side by side amidst the urban blight. Without a stable middle class, the US is well on its way to becoming just another overpopulated, garbage-strewn, third world country.
17
@Shenoa The polices of the left are not causing the problems. It is the right-wing's pushing robber baron type-capitalism, which has allowed ever more power and money to be accumulated into the hands of a very small number of people.
14
And what would the Right have done? They propose even less help to the homeless, even less help to the jobless. Free trade! Capitalism! If the rich have the money to buy up downtown, it is the right who says “let them!” Are not the barons of Wall Street the free trade gurus and intellectual elite of the Right? Is Trump’s economic team not comprised of these cities’ most elite economic fraternity? These problems are inherent to highly dense populations, and wealth inequality is inherent to capitalism. Many on the right don’t even want any rent control for crying out loud. And don’t forget that New York was led by a certain Republican mayor for many years who helped start this whole problem. Just because these places are Democratic doesn’t mean the problems are inherent to Democrats. If Republicans were in charge, they would do nothing but cut taxes, open up zoning, cater to big business, and not bother to invest in any public infrastructure. There would be zero help for the homeless etc. you can say Democrats are already doing this, but The philosophy of the right literally proclaims that they are opposed to any government based solutions to these problems, especially if they involves taxing the wealthy fairly. Things would be even worse with them in charge, unless you’re a billionaire like Trump. Just the fact that the Republicans elected a BILLIONAIRE should say all there is to say on this topic.
5
@Shenoa
Accumulation of money on the wealth page is barely an idea of the lefties. On the contrary.
--
Fact check:
20% of your us fellows own roughly 85 per cent of all assets.
(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_in_the_United_States)
--
Millions of your fellow citizens can't merely effort to live in an orderly way. Not with one job or even two to three posts.
Nothing about that is "great". It's sad.
--
This enormous unfair distribution of assets is the very reason for most of the problems described in the article.
--
GOP won't fix it. GOP made it.
----international comparison----
Berlin/Germany (3.5m citizens) has a lefty government and
(1) a reliable and fast public transport system
(2) apartments from 400,- bucks/month in the centre of the city
(3) far less homeless people
(4) An asset distribution as follows: 20% own roughly 63 per cent of all assets.
--
You can't finance a civilisation without money.
It doesn't make any sense to give tax money away to the wealthy.
That should be obvious. It seems it isn't.
1
Ms Badger, I have to say first that I am fully aware of the flaws of the city of my birth. However, that being said, I have to admit that your piece is, well, a bit insulting. It kind of reminds me of that well-used but nevertheless universally correct statement, "I can criticize my own kids, but don't think of going there yourself."
Yes, San Francisco certainly is unaffordable for most of us. I myself now live in Sonoma County. And its homelessness is a scar upon this City on the Hill that absolutely must be remedied for the sake of morality and our souls as well as the affected. It is indeed shameful. But I can not imagine any other place in these presently not so united states where I would want to call "home." My heart will never leave Fog City, the sounds of fog-horns lolling one to sleep or looking out a window to see the spires of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Marin Headlands when that morning fog lifted every day of my young life. And the wonderful diversity! My New Year and the New Years to come will always smile and be thankful for the City.
16
@Kathy Lollock
I lived and worked in San Francisco throughout the 1980’s, Whenever I return for a visit, as I did recently, I’m always shocked to see what was once a clean and beautiful city grown ugly, dirty, overcrowded, and absurdly expensive. You couldn’t pay me to live there now.
5
@Kathy Lollock have you been to San Francisco lately?? The diversity is at an all time low as the entire city has become a gentrified haven for east coasters looking for tea time. It was an amazing city-WAS. I will always have a special place in my heart for SF but it’s not the same as when I first moved here.
I think she hits the nail on the head when describing the city of your birth. Why be insulted? It’s exactly has become what the tech Indy wants. Totally unfortunate
6
@Joe Valencia Actually San Francisco is still much less white than it was in 1970. The Asian population along with the Hispanic population continued to grow, only the black population has shrunk. Some parts of The City have become less diverse recently but as a whole and much whiter.
2
Most especially San Francisco or West Hollywood!
1
Once again, many ignore the important role of supply and demand in causing these issues, and the role it can play in solving them.
Lots of people want to live in cities. That means cities get expensive if their housing supply remains limited. Long-time residents want to stop new development because they don't want their city to change. Low-income residents don't want the middle class taking advantage of the lower rents in their corners of the city. So we have two forces restricting supply and movement.
The answer is not rent/price controls, $100/hour minimum wages, or banning home-sharing...it's simply to allow enough housing to be created to meet the demand, and to reduce disincentives for developers to do that. But unfortunately, that's not as satisfying to explain to the downtrodden as "we'll cap your rent at the expense of everyone else who wishes to live here."
4
@Not Surprised
I think you are right about supply and demand, to a certain extent; it is logical and true, people love cities for opportunities and for fun without more housing the cost to live in one will go up.
Portland, Oregon city planners have deeply drunk the density kool-aid and as a result sections are unrecognizable due to thick nodes of massive 5 story block apartments to meet regional growth goals. And now traffic is like other metro areas, miserable.
We don't have rent-control, but it is on the horizon. I am waiting to see if all the new apartments cause rent prices to hold stable, or decline. It remains to be seen how this will play out in the impending recession.
Finally on rent control, I know people in San Francisco who have lived in a rent controlled apartment for past 20 years; it is the best real estate investment they ever made.
1
@Not Surprised- Portland was behind the curve on supply but has built about 100k new units in the past decade. Unfortunately, few are affordable by those making retail wages. Great for tech bros, lousy for baristas, wait staff, even beginning teachers. So it depends on what KIND of supply gets built. I don't expect developers to make lower profit on purpose, it's up to cities to incentivize affordable housing. Lord knows, they are ready enough to incentivize stadiums or big hotels to draw conventions.
1
@Kilroy71 I would respectfully disagree. Any supply is beneficial - if high income earners are vacating formerly 'high end' units for the new 'luxury' units, then the price on the older high end units will come down. And the trickle down effect continues from there as people upgrade their housing.
Cities can best incentivize affordable housing by making it cheap to build new micro-units (as many can fit in one building - land is scarce), but using taxpayer dollars to keep rents low for a select group of 'lottery winners' assigned to these affordable units only exacerbates the problem.
Actually a very appealing photo accompanies this article--a sculpture of the New World. We just had that low band of clouds at mid-level to the bridges and buildings, and a few days ago the largest rainbow that i've ever seen that stretched all the way across the bay. Birds still sing on Mt. Sutro, and Golden Gate Park and the natural areas that extend north of Marin are perhaps the best city planning in the world. The park recreational centers here offer swimming and basketball, and also badminton, but on a limited scale. Bend, OR has perhaps the best outdoor swimming facility, 3 Olympic pools with sauna, Jacuzzi, and steam room.
About those downtown buildings, one of them in the middle is leaning 14", and there has not been a major earthquake to test them since 1906. A recent bridge project went $5 billion over budget, and people here sit in traffic because easy road expansion--building a duplicate San Mateo Bridge and widening 80E along the bay have been passed up since the 60s. On a recent visit to Nancy Pelosi's office on 7th, there were homeless people sleeping on the sidewalk outside the building. As the new housing for immigrants around the border has shown, the government has the means to build shelters and permanent housing for the homeless if it wants to. San Francisco through a new ordinance is trying.
Most problems like homelessness, traffic, and environmental catastrophe would be solved if we had government by the people, instead of corporations.
18
This piece reminds me of a variation on something Yogi Berra once said: These cities are so popular nobody goes there anymore.
17
As others have stated, the problem largely centers around growing income inequality. Massive wealth is turning our great cities into glittering centers, interfingered with desperate enclaves and surrounded by struggling peripheries. The working and middle class populations have to live ever farther away and experience more and more arduous commutes. The delights of the city centers are remote, occasionally visited prospects for them.
If wealth were more evenly and fairly distributed then obviously there would be a wider range of incomes represented in any city center. The growing disparities of wealth and income are inevitably producing more dystopian societies and cities. Once economies start to fail as climate change takes hold and the pipe-dream of eternal economic growth evaporates, then our cities are going to face massive challenges. That time could be one year or five decades away, but it is coming.
12
I grew up on a 100 acre farm in middle of the country.
After my military service, I went to New York City with $2,000 and a resume. All my family and friends said I was nuts.
Was the best decision I ever made.
17
@Transplant Great story if you arrived in NYC in 1983.
4
What on earth is wrong with being too twee?
10
@CPlayer I can hardly believe I'm saying it, but I actually miss the hipsters in Portland. We haven't been twee for years, now.
The problem is that all those “good jobs” are not for the low income not well educated folks. And like the elitists who gave us NAFTA, today’s city leaders want to believe that any American can learn to code and wants to code. Truth is, we have an education crisis in the country so that people are not living up to their potential, and many of them don’t have the mental capacity to do tech work even if they had been properly educated. Those “good” factory jobs that we exported to developing countries allowed average people to feed their families and house their families. Trump gets this. But the elites are still waxing poetic about tech. And the unintended consequences fall on average people because the elite run the country and her institutions. Until we face these facts, we will continue to devolve into a two class system rivaling those of South America. China understands this which is why today China is a country that makes things - like we used to. Duh.
6
@Kathie Verderber
We can live just like China if we want and have a per capital income of $10,000.
China makes things because it is poor enough to make things. Americans making socks and towels and working for $1.25 per hour is not the answer.
We need to spend more on education and make college free for those with the ambition and brains.
14
@Kathie Verderber Trump gets it??? Was he one of those making things in China and also his daughter? All their stuff are made in China. If he "gets it", he would have made all his merchandises here in the US, the same for the daughter. But he does not get it the way you do. He makes you think he does, but reality is different. Trump like any corporation wants to profit and they do not care how and they do not care if they are helping or not US citizens. Do like I do, I try to buy and support a lot of things made in the US. That's the best thing we can do. But complaining about the past won't solve anything and lastly, Trump wont get those jobs back.
15
@Kathie Verderber Please list for us the wonderful jobs that Mr. Trump has created since you voted for him. Please list for us the things he's done for the bottom 99 percent. Thanks.
2
I think what everyone is missing amongst the 'success' of technology, economics, internet, gentrification and $5 lattes is nature, community, connectivity. I've heard people say one of the biggest afflictions in the country is now loneliness. These super 'successful', polished steel and glass cities where everything will be done autonomously with instant drone delivery and downloads of every need are simply lacking soul.
There's an alternative idea embraced by many which has long been a counter culture story line of slow food, locally harvested food, community, cooking together, sharing meals you've made and having a smaller impact on the planet.
We see the success of the of these gleaming, wealthy overwhelmingly 'successful' cities but somewhere inside we all sense what we're losing. Maybe a few generations away that longing will disappear as we the culture shifts to fully digitized and connected only through the 'cloud'.
These cities show the stunning result of humankinds endless curiosity, creativity and industry but it's not often we slow down enough to consider what so many of us are looking for when we are in 'pursuit of happiness.' It's probably unrelated to the industrious pursuits of these 'successful' cities.
10
After living in San Francisco for 32 years I have seen enormous changes to my beloved city. But a few things have remained the same all these years: lots of homelessness, skyrocketing rents and home prices, and gentrification. When I moved into the Mission District nobody walked on the street and there were virtually no restaurants or coffee shops. Now Valencia Street is vibrant with lots of young people. Walk one block to Mission Street and it still looks largely as it has with check cashing joints, abandoned theaters, etc. South of Market was a warehouse ghost town and now there are shiny towers. Mission Bay pretty much didn't exist. There are costs to gentrification, but I welcome not walking through a ghetto and having a large selection of wonderful eateries and shops. Many wish we would go back to the days of shuttered store-fronts so that rents would stay low. Not me.
20
@Terry Campbell I dint think they want what you described. “They” want to have diversity back, culture, and not see tech bros on every corner sipping on a chai tea and eating a vegan burrito, bro.
San Francisco has become too white. The mission as become Uber white. I think it’s what people are saying...they dint miss the crime..just the diversity
6
Simple solution for cities like SF where the non-wealthy all have to commute a minimum of 1.5 hours each way: $40/hr minimum wage to compensate their time spent commuting, and to share the wealth that its inhabitants enjoy; god knows they can afford it. And if that's just the last straw for some of its inhabitants, and they move out, then this policy is also working by driving down prices.
7
And please, don't come to our wonderful Minneapolis! You'd hate the cold, anyway.
8
@Susan Narayan You're right to worry. Humans descend like locusts (or, well, like humans) on tasty locales now, ever since the interwebs.
In Boulder, CO, in the ‘80’s-‘90’s, we called it simply Californication.
5
Welcome to Austin, TX. With all of the implants coming to Austin, we are a developer's dream and a tourists' toilet. We are NOT managing growth well and the growth is way out of control. Unfortunately, the people who come don't like Austin so much as want to bring their previous cities to our hometown. We are on our way to the very same place as the cities you list. Most of our city no longer looks (or acts) like Austin. It looks like a Vegas version of NYC or LA. We've lost most of our personality (or at least diluted it so it could be anytown, USA). Traffic is horrible and apartment buildings are everywhere. The cost of living is shooting through the roof. Every time another company moves to Austin, we groan. Austin really was a great place to live. RIP Austin.
17
@Peg Gibbs As a native Austinite, one who still lives there part-time, I'm afraid I have to take issue with this depiction of it. Yes, it's obviously experiencing growing pains. No, they haven't been managed at all well by the city. But a "tourists' toilet"? A "Vegas version of NYC or LA"? I'm sorry, but that's a considerable exaggeration. (There's nothing remotely "Vegas-like" about Austin.) I'd also beg to differ that Austin newbies "don't like Austin so much." Actually, I'd argue the opposite: if anything they like it *too* much! (hence the reason they're moving there in droves)
In any event, I simply disagree that Austin has somehow been "ruined," despite its myriad growth-related issues. No, it's not as "weird" as it used to be, but it's still Austin, and plenty of the core elements that comprise its overall personality remain fully intact. As for its poorly managed growth and skyrocketing cost of living: perhaps ironically, a core reason for both is the city's overall failure to allow for construction of a sufficient amount of denser housing, in particular the apartment buildings you apparently don't like.
Finally, while I'm well-aware "developers" are often blamed for the city's woes, the reality of the situation is simply that Austin is a desirable place to live. (Note present tense.) And yes, that's both a blessing and a curse.
P.S. I don't know how long you've lived in Austin, but traffic in its central core was nearly as bad 20 years ago as it is today.
5
I couldn’t disagree more. Austin is still a wonderful place to live. We have wonderful parks and trails to bike/walk/run. You can catch a great band any night of the week, and enjoy some of the best bbq anywhere. The economy is booming and how many other cities would die to have 2.7% unemployment in exchange for more traffic(which isn’t that bad).
1
I have to agree with you on many points. I’ve lived here 20 years and housing prices have gone through the roof. You can forget buying a home in town unless you make well over six figures. Average people, like in San Francisco are relegated to the suburbs.
Also the traffic is a nightmare. It takes more than twice as long to go anywhere than it did 10 years ago. There is very little public transportation either. We have busses and one rail that is extremely slow and goes almost nowhere.
And the city is being ruined by too many condos. Everywhere you look, old landmarks are being torn down to build more condos. It’s sad, the city is losing its personality and it’s turning into a mini California. And who is buying these condos? Transplants from other states, trying to escape the same problems they’re creating here. Not long from now, Austin will be a mini Seattle or San Francisco or Houston or all of the above.
1
We moved to Indianapolis eight years ago, fleeing the congrestion, increasing cost of living, and stress of the Washington DC area. Our friends were shocked that we were leaving the “center of the universe” for flyover country. They asked what it was like, silently fearing we would miss indoor plumbing or some other modern convenience. What we found, we told them, were people who were relaxed, happy, friendly, and used all five fingers when waving at us as they drove by. The cost of living is much lower, we have a diverse population, professional sports, outstanding museums and entertainment venues, an international airport with non-stop flights to every major city on each coast and just about everywhere else, and rush hours where the traffic can actually rush. We are not lacking for the good life here in the Crossroads of America.
12
@Brent Bahler
We now live in Michigan after 6 years of the Bay Area. We can go to the local park without waiting for a parking spot, get to the airport on a weekend without traffic jams. We have a house with an acre plot to garden in a quiet, peaceful rural setting, 10 minutes away from the college town where we work, and 1/2 hour from a major international airport. Yes, our cars rust out after 10 years, but no fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, etc. it is a great place to live. After looking at places to retire, probably will just stay put.
7
@ctsrp.... enjoy the blizzards, bigotry, and tornados. I decamped for SF 23 years ago, best decision I ever made. No place is perfect.
3
@morgan d. As a lifelong liberal and Portlander, I'll take it at this point, which I know is saying something. I can't emphasize enough how just awful it's become to live here.
1
Let's all move to Spokane!
2
@Jennifer
I lived there (my husband’s hometown) for five years in the 80s. I thought (scornfully) I was living in Mayberry. We had just come back from Hong Kong. Now I live in NYC, raised my kids here and have two grandchildren. Mayberry looks pretty good now. And I’m one of the more fortunate ones.
6
@Jennifer. Spokane is very cold and conservative (although getting better). I mention the cold because I grew up there and I don't miss month after month of snow.
Everything "gets discovered, " then overrun in its own way, which pushes it "up and out" into Yogi Berra territory: "No one goes there anymore - there are too many people." That's the theme; the variations depend on the city, attraction, etc. I think the only solution is to not tell anyone about "it," lest "it" be discovered; but in this age of too much information that's probably not possible, especially since "too much information" is a major cause of the problem in the first place.
It's sort of a moebius strip, isn't it? (Other analogies invited.)
14
Come check out the beautiful serenity of college-town Claremont!
Wait...
8
Keep in mind for the future that Minneapolis is Very, Very Cold. Very Cold. Much too cold for giant tech companies and those millions of laptops ;)
19
@Jenny Zanner Rowe
Not true. Several large companies (Wells Fargo, U.S. Bank, Target, 3M among others) have a big presence there with lots of great jobs.
1
Nothing about Philadelphia? If you like sports, food, and American and local history on almost every corner, then Philly is a great city to live in. It's true that a few neighborhoods remain down on their luck, but much of the city has really blossomed in recent years. Been cleaned up, affordable housing, serviceable mass transit, truly great restaurants, close proximity to beaches and mountains, good jobs -- mostly in eds and meds, but other industries, too.
To be clear: It's not a perfect city, but is there even such a thing?
14
@Loyle
I agree 1000%. My family moved to Philadelphia from Queens, NY at the end of the summer. 4 months in and I've never been so happy or peaceful in my life. I didn't know this sense of calm or community could exist in a major city. I tell everyone I know that I'm never leaving.
My husband love sports, we both love food, and I am a history Junkie. The public transportation is amazing compared to New York. I can be in Center City or Penn's Landing in 15 minutes on the train. Bus stops on almost every corner.
And this city rightly earned the moniker of City of Brotherly Love. I've never experienced such kindness and general Goodwill from neighbors and even complete strangers. After living in New York City my entire life, I finally found a place that feels like home. A place where we feel welcome.
The utilities and property taxes in the suburban counties are high. But we had high taxes in NYC. And we were working ourselves into an early grave to afford a lifestyle we hated in NY.
8
@Loyle And Gritty! Philly still has a bit of what NYC used to be.
5
Extreme economic inequality damages our society. I’ve read the last time US was this extreme was just before the Market crass/Great Depression. The 1950s had the wealthy make less $ & the poor increase their income dramatically.
17
@Ole Fart
Don't worry, OF, in all of the social struggle we have recently seen, I predict the problem of economic inequality will be soon coming up, taking its turn to be dealt with. Yes, those 500+ billionaires, with their greed and power lust, are the problem. Hold on to your hats 99%+ folks, it's going to get unbelievably ugly.
7
Seventy years of building suburbs hasn’t helped. The American landscape is dominated by single family homes, roads, cars, and isolation. Rather than balance, characterized by mixed housing and transportation types, we chose the extreme, sprawl. The result is predictable, inevitable.
Our ability to successfully navigate the era of climate change is severely burdened by sprawl. The inefficiency created by sprawl is yet another unwelcome gift to future generations.
12
@Mike Byrne
Mike, think outside the box. All those lawns? Yah. Small-scale, sustainable farms, orchards and greenhouses.
4
It is time for people to stop complaining about other people’s desire to live in single family homes. Why is living in a condo or apartment better? Is it preferable to be able to hear your neighbor’s TV, music, and arguments? What is wrong with desiring a back yard where your kids and dog can play? A part of the problem, as others have pointed out, is unrestrained population growth. Another part of the problem is how we deal with it. The current model of businesses concentrated in a single downtown area, into which people commute, no longer works. Packing more people into the area will not improve things. Here in the San Francisco Bay Area, we lack natural resources such as water, and lack infrastructure including public transit, roads, and schools. Politicians who focus exclusively on adding housing are putting the cart before the horse. It is the opposite of “smart” growth.
Tax incentives and disincentives should be used to cause businesses to disperse. Jobs and reasonably priced housing will follow. But instead of this, many commentators urge that we cram more and more people into already crowded spaces. We are told that this is the price to pay for economic growth and technological innovation. Quality of life apparently no longer matters. But economic growth has turned out to benefit very few. Ask the middle class. And we are learning the downside of unregulated tech innovation. We should be trying to revitalize areas that are not already overcrowded.
1
Equity investment firms, where the landlord is an anonymous Wall Street company, have made life hell for tenants in all of these aforementioned cities who are trying to live sanely and create a sense of community in an affordable urban environment. And the wealthy who can afford these upscale condos are as self-centered, inconsiderate and vicious as any teenage gang of the urban 1960's. You'd be hard put to find a humanist among any of them. These gentrified inner cities become filled with androids, while the middle class and poor are pushed to the crowded suburbs, given long commutes, etc. A two-class society is being created, which will further erode any sense of "Res Publica" among the electorate.
18
@MickNamVet,
Best insight into plight of American cities and metropolitan areas.
Cities are being controlled by big money, foreign and domestic, who use America as a cash cow built for their exploitation and pleasure.
13
@JRS
Yep. I see fancy cars with darkened windows, from the burbs, zoom in to the inner city to hire a prostitute (buy a slave, for an hour). These poor souls have been human-trafficked in from all over the country. I think it's a perfect metaphor for what you describe: big money, exploiting for pleasure.
2
In 1968 the average house cost 15-20K, the average auto cost 3-5K. The average income was 7-10K. If one saved their money they could buy both by a down payment and financing.
Today the average income is about 50k, the same house is about 300k, a car is 25-40k.
So, a home was about two to three time one income, Today a house is about six times one income.
Even two household incomes today are stretched to afford the basic wants and needs of people.
If you think the times are better you are at least economically deluded. Too much wealth in the hands of too few is where we are.
32
@R L Donahue This explains many, may problems with the American economy these days that go well beyond gentrification, but you summed up the dismantling of the American Dream over past half-century accurately.
5
@R L Donahue...and you haven't even gotten to college and health care costs yet...
4
"We could use a word for the condition of becoming..." Cities are always in the process of becoming, but we struggle to understand how to cope with change, especially tidal change. It's an old lament, "Don't Californicate Oregon", said a bumper sticker on an Oregon friend's VW bus in 1970. While we debate a Salesforce tower downtown, the greater part of San Francisco is zoned to a 40' height limit. Is there any wonder why there is such pressure on rents and prices?
We create regulations to freeze urban form and then we are surprised when there are unintended consequences, tending to blame employers for all our problems. Perhaps we all have a part in this problem.
5
@C. Williams
That's right. We don't all have to live in San Francisco, do we?
1
The promise of the high tech movement was that it could operate anywhere thereby spreading jobs and population across the entire country. Instead it's concentrating in a few cities, changing their very essence and making it almost impossible for anyone making less than six figures to live there. I'm an SF native but will be moving away from the city I love because it's just too ridiculously expensive now. The tech giants have the opportunity to locate in less populated areas that need revitalization and away from the overdeveloped, obvious choices. They should do that.
13
@JVG,
Do *you* want to live in those areas that "need revitalization"?
I don't. I want to live where stuff is happening. A place with culture. A city.
7
@Benjamin Winchester Nothing is happening in SF. It has become a suburb and filled with the type of people you wanted to run away from. The techies are not progressive, not artists, not imaginative. I know I see them everyday.
14
@Benjamin Winchester
Stuff is happening where I live. The immigrants make it lively and vibrant.
5
There are small cities and towns with a low population density, but nobody wants to live in them because there are no opportunities. Currently visiting my small Kansas hometown, where there is no place to shop except Walmart, no decent restaurants only fast food, no theater, no bowling alley, virtually nothing to do unless you are involved with a church. Oh yes, and NO diversity, which makes life in a city rich and interesting.
30
Not everyone wants to live in a city. They’re very noisy. Congested. Chaotic. Too many people. Too much concrete. I prefer quiet and dark, among lots of trees and streams and greenery. So does my dog and cat and the animals that come around. I can see the stars. I have a porch to sit on. That’s the “culture” I want.
9
@Towanda
Hey Towanda, not sure where you are in the center of the US (Kansas), but unless a town or village has at least 3,000 people living there, it's extremely hard to get any critical mass. So, that's what the little towns in Kansas need to do, join forces, make a plan. Otherwise, it's just a slow and certain death.(PS: Wal-Mart is not the enemy. Be smarter than them, find the advantage.)
4
Chicago may be in debt, but 800$ apartments are still available here. Why? Because we don’t have NIMBY whackos stopping new construction everywhere. Chicago is wonderfully livable. And we can count ourselves lucky that we didn’t get the Bezos Abomination.
Here’s the thing. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t complain about homelessness in one breath and brag about your ridiculous home values in the next. San Francisco, New York, Seattle, DC et al are getting exactly what they asked for: a city where only rich people can afford to live. It’s funny but the appeal of SF to the techies was artists and the like. But they’re gone, never to return.
You want to know the vanguard of US cities? It’s the livable cities in the heartland. St Louis, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Buffalo, Indy, Pittsburgh, KC, etc. Why? Several things. Water, housing, and traffic-less-ness, higher education, lower overall cost-of-living.
American cities are much more homogeneous than people realize. You’ll find Starbucks, Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods in all the cities mentioned above.
So SF etc stop whining about your problems. In every case, they were self-created.
18
Chicago’s weather will always keep it less crowded with more available housing. I interviewed and was offered a job there but after stepping outside and walking down its windy streets where frostbite can freeze your face off, said California here I come and turned down the job. California is crowded because people want to live here. Give me a break. And Chicago is plagued by an epidemic of gun violence. Utopia is hardly the word I’d use to describe it.
14
@RodA I appreciate many things about the midwestern cities you mention (I love Kansas City) but their lack of access to outdoor recreation and terrible weather are deal breakers for me. Cities like Buffalo and St. Louis are relatively cheap for good reasons. Perfectly fine places to settle down and raise kids; not perfectly fine places if outdoor recreation is your thing.
4
@RodA
Thank you, RodA, for mentioning the beautiful city of Kansas City.
4
As I read this article and the comments, I had to chuckle. I wonder how many residents of Youngstown, Ohio or Scranton, Pennsylvania would love to have the "problem" of tech jobs, increasing property values, and a booming economy. Somehow we've come to the point in this country where we want the perfect community while forgetting that "perfection" comes with a cost.
8
To all the complainers who dislike living in the tech driven cities that carry the price of congestion, high prices, etc, just head out to rural America where the economy has disappeared, and where you will find horrible social problems, most notably lack of jobs and drugs abuse. I assure you you will beat a fast retreat to Seattle, Austin, Denver, or Boston, and thank your lucky stars to be back at the local Starbucks.
It's so true that the grass is always greener.
18
@robert
Robert, you're wrong. Rural America is where it's at. All of y'all are going to be trying to move here once your city is flooded, or you can't afford the flood insurance anymore. And by then, we'll hopefully have sound agricultural policy and you won't be able to gobble up the food-growing areas for planting houses, streets and lawns. The millennial generation values farming, for which we can all be thankful.
2
The correspondent has articulated and updated a pervasive and persistent theme, comparing and contrasting great cities. It is a great and timeless sport, but I can't help but observe, after reading this essay, that most urban dwellers on the planet live outside the borders of United States. I would wish therefore, at some point, that the Times could also pull back the lens a bit and look at urban growth problems that affect the real majority of city dwellers on the planet, especially as more of us come to realize how climate change will affect city living in wholesale fashion (especially for those unable to live in temperature-controlled bubbles all the time). https://www.iied.org/can-one-billion-people-informal-settlements-be-protected-climate-change
2
The elephant in the room is overpopulation, which no one speaks about. Funny, it was the main topic in the late 60's and early 70's, but it seems to be a taboo subject now.
I live in San Francisco. The entire Bay Area was such a wonderful area to live in. A short drive to the wine country or the ski slopes, so many things to see and do in the East Bay and Peninsula. Now it is one big traffic jam. Most of the interesting area and shops are gone. Progress? I don't think so.
29
@FB
So FB, move.
2
really? you want to have three kids but don't want your city to grow bigger. We live in an age of total cognitive dissonance.
9
@Zenster We live in a Dickensian world of the have and have nots. The dissonance is not just cognitive.
8
Perhaps an oversimplification, but seems true: So many who came to San Francisco in the 1960s were so taken by what they saw that the impulse or reflex became “don’t change or build anything” - heaven forfend our little city should be like the place I hated before I moved here.
This impulse is at odds with the fact that cities are dynamic. Without continual reinvention they (best case) become museums of a moment in time (Venice, Dubrovnik); or worst case get hollowed out and wither (Bridgeport, Hartford, and New Britain, Connecticut).
10
@John Cook, several thoughts in response. San Francisco is built on a fault line which has opened and torch the city just over a hundred years ago. So why are there huge Towers which will topple in the next earthquake?
As a longtime resident of Connecticut, I must agree that the state's major cities have indeed been hollowed out. However, reinvention is possible, although it takes time. Case in point: Newark, New Jersey where slow and steady is finally accelerating. Of course, it is now going to be discovered and no doubt a cycle similar to the ones described in the article will ensue.
Everything changes. It's natural, but it's not always for the better.
2
Despite the need and moral necessity for reasonable immigration - it is hard to understand how we can allow in millions more people when many of our own citizens live on the streets. Do we want to become India? We're well on our way.
5
Affordable housing is a real concern and younger generations wonder when they'll have enough money to afford a down payment on a modest home in many metro areas. My son lives in L.A. and tells me he'd spend at least $600k to get a small house in the area. New York City real estate has become an investment for the wealthy and higher prices have driven out younger people looking for more affordable neighborhoods.
Add in the high property taxes in many of these cities and you have an affordability crisis. The result? Lower-cost cities once overlooked like Philadelphia are more attractive now to Millennials and growing. Neighborhoods once down on their luck are coming back - think of the Bronx. Sadly, some cities seem to be left on the side of the road, like Detroit.
4
Interestingly enough, even cities that were as troubled as Detroit, Baltimore, and Oakland are “rising from the ashes” as well. As a native Detroiter, I have seen how the influx of different companies and money into the city have truly accelerated its resurgence, which in turn has drawn more people into different parts of the city.
What is also interesting is how this will affect housing prices throughout the city. As of now there is a housing shortage, which, when combined with other changing aspects like the gentrification of many neighborhoods, has dramatically raised rents and house prices, though not to the extent of cities like New York or San Francisco. Nonetheless all cities are affected by the problems outlined in the article, and with an increasing population and consumer rate it will take creative solutions to alleviate them.
5
Here in East Resume Speed, UT, we worry about becoming The Next Moab. Sigh…
8
@Miss Anne Thrope
Moab is a wonderful place to spend Thanksgiving! Dress warmly for Arches and Canyon Lands and enjoy the place to yourself. (And no family arguments).
3
Last Christmas coming home from the standard family visit, the freeway view of the local riverbed showed it was populated with the homeless living in tents and under blue tarps.
This Christmas, not a one. The riverbed was a riverbed again. Did the local police just chase them all off to a different riverbed or other encampments?
Nope. A Federal judge ordered the county and its cities to open shelters and open them quick and coordinate existing services for the homeless. Which the various municipalities largely did. It seems to be working. There is still a problem, of course, but suddenly a whole lot more of the homeless are being safely sheltered and eased back into a stable life.
Super-cities can be made to work. It takes political will and prioritization. Maybe if our country focused on our own problems instead of waging war all over the planet, and if the Congress could be wrestled away from billionaire control, even SF, LA and Seattle and so forth would work a bit better for everyone who lives there.
9
@The Poet McTeagle: I’m not sure where you are in California but a friend in L.A. just sent me photos of a recent open house in a new condo built by Chinese developers to sell to Koreans across the street and with a view of tents along the onramps housing the homeless, you think you would get a bit better view for seven figures. Also the much wanted commuter train seems to be working, same friend sent me a picture of an obviously disturbed Hispanic man covered in filth an inexplicabley with a Starbucks attempting to board in his underwear, when the conductors wouldn’t allow this he promptly discarded the underwear as well, ah diversification and growth to the Golden State, so glad I left.
1
It's not just San Francisco, it's everywhere. Here, they just busted the zoning policy and built a five-story hotel downtown. And the last time I drove in for the opera (it's a bit too far to walk from my place), another car went by on the same street. I was put out, I can tell you!
2
I have always had the impression that we (the US) had it really good. Most of our cities appeared to have been right sized compared to the various mega-cities of Asia and South America, with their vastness containing vast poverty along side ridiculous wealth. So, I guess now it is simply a matter of scale. We have achieved similar divisions without the favelas, rampant crime and the vastness. Well, maybe LA and NYC are a bit vast... Housing costs and the resulting homelessness are the payoff for this headlong lunge into the American Dream, Futurist edition.
3
I do think it's wrong to conflate "tech jobs" with "the homeless crisis". Both San Francisco and Seattle had very visible issues with street people going back to the 70's, in my experience. I don't know why this was so, but the problem existed long before the transformation of those two cities.
11
@David Godinez Good observation. Cities like NYC have done a better job with providing shelter because they have "right to shelter" laws. Seattle does not have such a law so despite the fact that many millions are being spent on the problem, now that it is a national embarrassment, the core issue was around long before Amazon.
just spent 4 nights in Austin over Christmas and the recurring theme from pretty much every local I talked to was that the same thing is happening there; housing prices up, population up, living expenses up. a lot of people worried about losing what makes their city what it is.
5
We all have our fears; we talk about it in forums but rarely, if ever, we act on it.
1
I remember San Francisco in the good old days before it was Silicolonized by techie millionaires. I now live 100 miles from Seattle which also has lost whatever character it used to have, becoming just another overpriced, overcrowded, overrated megalopolis. The traffic is a nightmare, even on the freeways that pass around the city. Seatac is likewise nightmarish, which is why Alaska Air now flies out of suburban Everett as an easier alternative to Tacoma's congestion. More people mean more pollution. The salmon runs in Puget Sound are dying off and with them the orcas. Sad!
8
@Christy I fly Alaska Airlines all of the time, out of Sea-Tac, same as always. I've never flown out of Everett in my life. Talk about a traffic nightmare. Seattle is changed in many ways but is still unique and beautiful. I can't wait until the viaduct comes down and we see Elliott Bay free and clear at last.
All of these urban nightmares were started, and encouraged by greed and ambition that didn't take into account basic human comfort. There was no smart planning, and no care given to what it would be like to actually live there as a normal person. That is sad. Grotesquely tall buildings look aggressive and hostile. They are not for people, they are symbols of money.
14
A big problem with cities is the well-to-do move in and gain control of zoning laws, which they then wield arbitrarily and use to limit density, which is good for their home prices but bad for society at large, as it drives up housing costs. Take zoning out of the hands of the locals and have a state level push to increase density near transit hubs that would allow eash commutes to cities and inside of cities.
4
There is the issue of getting enough food and water for all of these folks in the coming years never mind the infrastructure and energy needs to deal with increased population. We aren't prepared to deal with the future and the ramifications of climate change
9
We seem to want uncrowded, low cost, charming cities with booming economies.
Maybe it’s us and our contradictory expectations that need closer examination.
32
@John Cook Some of us grew up in charming cities like Boston without booming economies. It seemed to work. There was room and affordable housing. I don't remember homeless people anywhere. (Alcoholics asking for change, yes, but that's another issue). There were wealthy, middle class and blue collar people spread throughout the cities. The burgeoning upper class with their sense of entitlement really does seem to be the problem.
5
All of the column, including many comments, points to the real problem by avoidance. How many people would leave any of these cities for the rural areas in-between. Minneapolisazation sounds good and is in many ways good. There are problems like in other cities, but there are also solutions constantly in the works. The growing problem for Minnesota is the divergence between the Twin Cities metropolitan area and what we learned to call "Greater" Minnesota in a former surge of propaganda. Rural areas of Minnesota ;have many of the urban problems, such as homelessness, drugs, and lack of quality affordable housing, but also have an acute problem of insufficient income and wealth. Rural areas educate their children who then take their talents and skills to the urban areas. The divergence grows with no end in sight.
7
@Karl
Moved here from someplace else. What has impressed me about both Mpls and StP is that city government actually works hard at these solutions; they take maintaining growth AND livability seriously.
I have noticed this for a while. Every city seems to have another city that they don't want to become like. Here in Phoenix they talk about "becoming the next L.A.". When I lived in Raleigh-Durham, NC, it was "we're becoming the next Atlanta."
4
I am reminded of an (alleged) quote from Yogi Berra. "Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded". It's a matter of perspective. After growing up in Calcutta and then spending 30 years in the trip-state area. we moved to Dallas. Our first reaction was "where is everybody?" We then spoke to folks who moved to DFW from Memphis. Their reaction was "it's way too crowded and hectic"
13
"San Francisco has unemployment well below the national average and household incomes among the highest in the country."
Yes, because we have pushed all the poor people out—or else forced them to piece together several gig economy jobs to hold on by their fingertips.
"San Francisco has become equally expensive, but it has arrived there by not building much for decades (its present construction boom is too little too late)."
No, San Francisco arrived here through blinkered neoliberal, "business-friendly" policies that openly invited dozens of companies here (some with crucial tax breaks) without planning for the crush their (rich) workers would cause re: housing, infrastructure, community, culture, history, etc etc. Those problems were left to solve themselves—peak free market thinking—and only now, with initiatives like Prop C which taxes huge tech companies to help with the homelessness problem they cause, are leaders waking up.
14
I am so happy and really grateful that I lived in San Francisco in the 70’s up until the mid-80’s. It was cheap, fun, and as a young person, noticed that me and my friends worked but still had a lot of time to hang out in cafes. There were no cell phones, answering machines were the new thing. We talked till closing time and argued about the merits of Dostoevsky over Tolstoy and about movies ( there were scars of great movie theaters). I wandered the streets walking to my favorite bookstores, reading most of the greatest books by the time I was 28. We had fun!
17
A unique time in history! I go between Sausalito and Napa, SFO to travel. Rarely to San Francisco. Nothing to miss, and for years I lived on the crooked street! I feel so blessed to have lived in many of the city's most magical neighborhoods. Tragic what happened to Baghdad by the Bay.
7
So, the takeaway is that we shouldn't worry about how our particular city might end up like other cities? That we common-folk should just leave it up to the mayors, business elites, and urban planners because they are the ones who understand all the variables? Is the point that the middle class will end up eating the cost no matter who is in charge? "Just put your head down and leave it to experts!"
Because I've been flying back and forth to Seattle for over ten years and can tell you what a shock it is watch was essentially once a "living wage" liberal paradise where people could work in a coffee shop or retail and go home to a cute, affordable apartment to seeing expensive apartment buildings popping up in small neighborhoods and watching more and more homeless and meth heads on every street corner. Every street corner.
8
As I read I became thankful that my city does not struggle Appalachification. A city is only as strong as its resident's willingness to care for it. And Seattle is in a good place to become a better place to live, despite its growing problems.
10
The population increase is part of the problem. The population has grown by 10 million or more with every census, and much of it is driven by immigration, not procreation. Since 1940, the population in the West has grown by 400%, and the south by almost 180%. More to the point of the article, in 1940, there were only 14 cities with a population above 500,000; now there are close to 45.
All this is to say that as long as the population grows this quickly (for whatever reason, no judgment here) without being more evenly distributed throughout the vastness of the US, even the best city planning will be barely enough
9
It is capitalism that drives everything. It will provide trappings but not the core essentials needed in a stable equitable society.
Wake up.
18
American cities can become much more livable for a wider diversity of income earners if they had invested more on urban rapid transit systems from subways, monorails, bike paths, etc.
Many of their current problems can be traced to excessive reliance on auto traffic. It is time for all urban planners--American as well as Africans--to study urban rapid transit in Europe and Asia.
Fifty years from now, you will wonder why you did not realize this earlier.
33
1. Cities = civilization. This is a good thing.
2. The bad epiphenomema is the result of private collection of land rent.
The remedy: land value (not the buildings) taxation.
Henry George figured this out a long time ago in his seminal book, Progress and Poverty (1879).
3
San Francisco, after the war,
was America's best city.
Rents were cheap and you did not need a car.
Little Italy was actually full of Italians and lovely cafes.
I used to walk all over the City
catching fine views of the Bay and Golden Gate
and Bay Bridge and East Bay all the time.
Now it is ruined.
Rents are outrageous,
Traffic is contagious
Skyscrapers abound
blocking the views.
Save that people would be killed
and lose their jobs and condos -
I wish a large, safe quake,
would reduce
any buildings
over four stories to rubble
to be
carted away.
Don't even get me started on Portland
I used to roam through as a boy.
11
@John Brown Bravo.
3
@wuchmee
New York in the early 1950's
was far more fun
( and cheaper than today )
not to mention you could watch
the Yankees, Dodgers and Giants
all play
in one day.
4
Minneapolis constantly compares itself to Seattle. And now, Seattle is saying they want to copy our 2040 comprehensive plan, which gets eliminates single family zoning to allow for more density. There is a common denominator in all of these references. Density. Wonder when we will look back and say, what were we thinking? This is all brought to you by the progressive wing of the Democratic Party. They will eventually kill the goose that laid the golden egg. I moved to a town on the outskirts of town as I got sick of it.
1
@betsy No, no Betsy. Lay these types of urban planning at the feet of greed. Money wins every time. The other pox on liveable wage cities is overpopulation. Overpopulation on this planet has ruined your ideas of Utopia. And, as the big city dwellers get sick of what they allowed to happen in their big city, they move out and go overpopulate the small quaint towns of this country and complain that there is nothing to do in the small quaint towns. They then start demanding to have Starbucks and such like they had in th big city they abandoned.
4
Supply and demand drive the markets. Tech salaries drive up
prices so people really are keeping their inflated salaries. Food, housing, clothing. All major cities are congested and dirty. Skyscrapers and tunnels - until the next earthquake. We see tech arrive and cringe. The simplicity we crave gives way to
status stores. I was fortunate to live in these cities before money mania hit. The small shops of Venice Beach are gone - who needs another Prada store? The bubble will burst, the infrastructure fails, people suffer. The wealthy few move on.
8
I lived in San Francisco for 8 years, then New York for 10 years, and now Seattle for the past year.
All 3 of these cities have become unlivable for the middle class. Buying a 3 bedroom 1.5 bath is just out of reach for a household income of $200,000.
People in this bracket typically buy farther out (West Seattle, way out Brooklyn, shady parts of Oakland) and they have to still find deals. Like an old couple retiring and you write a letter to them convincing they should give you a deal on the house. Usually the home still requires a lot of work. Or the condo building has 3 middle class units in it and you win the lottery out of 2,000 applicants for the unit. Nice.
How is this sustainable?
Taxes need to be placed on foreign investments on property in New York. All cash deals need to be heavily taxed. That’s pure shady foreign money. Zoning laws need to be ripped up and massive middle class affordable housing needs to be built in SF and Seattle. The Not In My Backyard supposed-liberals need to be overridden. Enough!
18
@Manish West Seattle is part of the city, not a suburb. It is expensive not cheap and not considered "farther out." That would be places like Auburn to the south and Everett to the north.
Read "A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens. When the heads start to roll, it's no "Christmas Carol".
8
Being a Seattle native and having lived through the rapid destruction its affordable, diverse, egalitarian, green and laissez faire quality of life, I never felt that the tech industry itself was to blame for its veritable demise, but rather gross mismanagement by fascistic government policies, with a closed-door, secretive city council that allowed corporate lobbyists to write the development rules only to favor corporate profits-- in complete disregard for the city's incumbent population, infrastructure and natural environment. Growth can be healthy, or at least a mixed blessing, but in Seattle, it was all curse. All the money and jobs in the world cannot change the fact that the quality of life for resident Seattleites was annihilated and replaced with incomprehensibly high rents and the strange, overcrowded and generic vacuity of an airport mall. It didn't have to be that way, but greed overruled.
16
The problem with San Francisco is the housing supply doesn't meet the need. Unemployment has been low for some time due to the diversified economy. Tech is booming and the pay is good, driving more people to the city. The city itself is only 49 miles round and there is no more room to spread out so we must go up, just like Manhattan. San Francisco's population is expected to hit 1 million people in the near future. I am very lucky to be able to live in this international city. It has problems but what large city doesn't. The city is trying to address the housing crunch. Anyone who comes to San Francisco will see all of the construction taking place. More than I have ever seen.
5
I have never been in a big city that didn't have traffic congestion, anywhere in the world. If you think Minneapolis doesn't have it, you haven't commuted between there and St. Paul at rush hour, or tried to make a left turn off Hennepin Ave.
High housing costs and burgeoning population are the best barometers of quality of life - they prove people want to be there. I've enjoyed living in some of the cities profiled here and would be happy to live in all the others. There's never been a day I woke up and wished I were in Tulsa.
13
Here in Nashville we worry about becoming “the new Atlanta,” by which we mean extremely rapid growth that outpaces our ability to expand the infrastructure by years or even decades. (If you’ve been here you know that our fears are quite justified.) This kind of concern knows no regional boundaries.
5
Look at the bright side, SF offers some medical insurance to the poorest citizens, keeps expanding services like library, parks, free city college. We are also lucky to have many generous people like the Salesforce and the Facebook couples gave away so much money to our hospitals and alike, funded public arts like the SF Bay Bridge lighting, hiking trails along the coast, & museums. I wish NYT reporting can inspire more do the same. The IT jobs in cities like London/Paris, e.g., pay much less than SF’s. But their comparable real estate prices are not any cheaper. One can afford a dingy place in East End there instead of a nice place in SF, with views if lucky. Why surprised by the homeless problem, after all the tax cuts for the rich and reductions in services to the poor and mental patients? Sad, but how are other cities doing? According to The Guardian, London has 160,000 homeless - about the same number of the whole CA’s. Many things in SF don’t work right. But I am grateful everyday while enjoying the parks, public arts, clean air, snow melt tap water, Bay views with fog & sun... I just wish we had subway networks like those Asian & European cities. It costs 5 times as much to build subways in US, comparing to Asian & European cities. Why don’t NYT dig more, perhaps inspire some solutions instead? Thanks.
12
Well, maybe Minneapolisization. {Minneapolization?) It’s a terrific city. But we do live with a legacy of discrimination that has led to one of the worst racial disparities in the country as shown by statistics about white/black education and incomes.
The other drawback to Minneapolis and environs is, of course, our near-Siberian winter. But as I write it is 36 and raining, so maybe climate change will fix that. Then we’ll be in trouble.
4
Portland Twee? Maybe 20 years ago but Portland is a pit now. Camping on the sidewalks, trash all over the city, panhandlers always wanting money, bad traffic congestion, road rage drivers...I never go to downtown Portland to shop it's just not worth it for me. I'd recommend all people looking to move here or visit, to go somewhere else. You're not going to like what you see...
9
Just be thankful your city doesn't get tarred with the Vancouverisation handle. Then you're really in for it. The San Francisco syndrome is unfortunately hybridized itself up here in Vancouver. We bought our modest 1920's home in 1984 and have watched our lovely neighborhood morph into behemoth homes that only a very rich can afford with average lot prices hovering at 3.5 Million. It's now unfortunately an off shore boutique Manhatten Style.
4
Cities that do not grow and evolve, die. The fuel of growth are waves of innovation. All the cities you write about were founded in the billow and breeze of sailing ships, exploded with steamships, rail, and industrialization, thrived in communications, and now in the 6th industrial wave, have mastered adaptation. The challenge for all of them is layering increasing density and modern systems into older frameworks. That takes political will and capital. What is at work in most of these examples (except Boston) is the politics has not risen to the challenge of raising the capital from those who benefitted to rest paybfor the quality of life for the rest of us.
2
"Once you let tech giants in the door, you have a homeless crisis".
For further proof of this, if proof were needed, one need only visit Dublin.
5
Denver is the largest city in a radius of 600 miles, or over 1 million square miles, 4 times larger than France.
The growth that Denver is experiencing now is just as conscious as when the city was founded in the 1850's, driven by greed and chutzpah then, with diversity and technology now adding to the drive mechanism.
Colorado has been borrowing legislation and culture extensively from Texas and California, but as the 1st state to legalize recreational marijuana, we clearly know how to cut our own path when we want to. We didn't want the Winter Olympics in either 1976, or in 2026. We didn't really want Amazon HQ2, although the consensus on the street was that we can probably deal with it if we have to do so.
Gentrification is a problem, but we will not solve it by stopping the relentless growth. We also will not solve it with rent control, another useless solution we will not chose from East and West coast cities.
Kansas City needs to get to work taking note of it's enormous population living below the poverty line, and/or working in dead end jobs and dying industries. Stop whining, KC.
4
as a seattle native who has watched the city change i can say with some annoyance that the know it all reporter who puts us in a nutshell of a few stereotypes doesnt understand our city at all.
10
All in all a rather depressing article.....sad way to bring in the New Year, pointing out what's wrong with everywhere.
I'm so ready for anything positive!
7
As to these cities, income disparity is a problem all across the US, It is more readily evident in large cities. In the country it is more demonstrated by people living in trailers or other minimal housing.
But a problem specific to cities is traffic congestion. If it takes an hour to drive a mile across the city, and if public transportation is not available or readily useful, then you move. Ironically, public transportation may be better at connecting the suburbs to the city than moving people on the intra-city system. And Uber and Lift have actually made the intra-city congestion worse.
The other problem with cities is the public school systems. In many large cities public schools are not acceptable places to educate your child. Thus the move to the suburbs. The ideal of a small city is great, many of them are now found in the suburbs of the large cities.
3
Some public schools in large cities are excellent. The main reason for the move to the suburbs is white flight and fear of poverty combined with no will to do something about it and help their fellow man.
1
This author is welcome to go move to any of about five dozen struggling cities in the Rust Belt, on down through Appalachia. The property is cheap because there’s no work. The only way to be successful is to leave when young. Spend about 20 years there before you complain about the curse of prosperity.
7
You had to use a slang term like "twee?" I had to look up its meaning on the internet. I will NEVER use it in speech or in writing, and neither should this writer. How disgusting that a supposed writer for The New York Times just had to prove how up to date she is by using a term that sounds as if it's somebody spitting.
2
Another indictment of laissez-faire ideology.
2
Born and raised in the Bay Area, I’ve watched it die a slow death of perpetually congested freeways, million-dollar homes the size of cracker boxes, polluted air, and status-hungry techies in ironic fedoras. So sad; this used to be such a nice place to live.
13
If San Francisco is so awful, why do friends, acquaintances, friends of friends, etc., always ask whether they can stay with us when they visit? Maybe a major world city with a world famous national park alongside it is not so horrible after all?
8
@Cal Prof
They have to stay with you because they can't afford any hotels within 100 miles.
9
The problem in all these places is the problem of ever growing population. If we reign that in then there will be enough for all and no need to keep cramming more people into the same amount of space.
5
10 years ago Gavin Newsom said San Fran. was an island in a sea of sanity. The open, liberal, experimental, free thinking, non-materialistic,prioritizing of ideas above status. That is what spawned silicon valley. Now it is just another materialistic, money grabbing, wall-streeted, boring, conformist, condomed, uni-mind.
The ideas have become more mundane. The admen have replaced the geeks, and the rents are astronomical.
6
The cognitive dissonance displayed is astounding - fear the skyscraper - fear the lack of housing - fear the disappearing middle class - fear the job creators who employ the middle class.
Close with that ol' nugget the slippery slope argument "Embedded in these fears is something slippery" despite the fact that no one really believes in the slippery slope argument - it is logically bankrupt except in tobogganing.
2
What "middle class" would that be, SteveRR? The people who have to drive 4 hours or more a day round trip to get to and from their menial "middle class" jobs in SF because they can't afford to rent a place in the city they used to own?
8
@Jan N
You may be ignoring my suggestion that the reason they don't have modest places to live downtown is because of the highly restrictive zoning laws that basically make it impossible to build vertically modest housing in multistory developments.
You can't have it both ways in any growing city
2
Maybe people wouldn't protest these huge employers if locals actually believed they would have a chance to be hired for these high wage jobs, or that their children would have more opportunities. From what I can tell, the big tech companies usually have to transfer employees from other branches or hire from other cities because their host cities don't have tons of people with the specific qualifications to do those jobs. So most of the native labor force is really only going to benefit from any taxes that the company might contribute, assuming local officials haven't offered too many tax breaks in order to lure the company there in the first place, or from training opportunities for students, assuming the local government has the leverage and grit to demand certain internship and apprentice opportunities as a condition of settling up shop. I think many cities would do well to consider large employers from industries that require different types of skills and education levels: that's the true key to diversity. And maybe we need to admit that some of these positions that supposedly require a bachelor's or master's degree really only require common sense and a couple weeks of on the job training. At the end of the day, people are trying to figure out what is being offered, who will actually benefit, and how well their local government will monitor the new development. The trade off described in this article is a little too simplistic to offer any real insight.
4
PDX, SEA, NYC, SFO. All suffer from a lack of available housing. We need massive investment in housing units. We need to make owning empty investment properties expensive and time consuming and “not worth it” in these over subscribed cities. We need to require Airbnb licensing and tax it, heavily. NYC should pass on Amazon. The US should make it worth their while to anchor the next great American city.....Detroit!
5
No worries. These fears shall come to pass—so long as America wants Social Darwinist Capitalism. No worries at all.
Viva Social Democracy. Force the rich to pay their fair share.
9
I recently visited my grand daughter who is attending a University in San Francisco for one year. I have never seen so many homeless people, one street is full of them sleeping on the sidewalks!
Same poverty if you go to Oakland where there are tents and mattresses under every freeway passes!
How can this happen in a country as rich as the US?
We have a few areas like that in Paris but what I have seen in San Francisco and Oakland is worse!
9
@Maurice, a lot of newbie engineers for the big tech companies on the west coast literally live in their cars because on $100,000 a year or more salaries they can't afford to pay the rents on what places may be available. There is no longer any such thing as "affordable" for most people in San Francisco.
11
You forgot Austin, TX.
5
I was in SF for dinner last night. The restaurants and bars were packed with more locals than tourists. SFMuni and BART running on time. Pairs of policeman were patrolling peacefully on foot. Those with good job skills seem to have good jobs. There are no assembly lines, but is that what you want?
2
The problems of New York, San Francisco, Seattle, and the like pre-existed Tech.
2
Ah yes... But San Francisco still remains that beautiful city to boast that I am from...
6
I visited a city in China recently that built 125 miles of subway in about 5 years. Here in Los Angeles, with the worst traffic in the nation, the subway line inching toward the Pacific is expanding at about one mile every five years. The problems of our cities have solutions. We simply lack the political will to implement those solutions. This is not a problem limited to our cities. It is a symptom of the illness that has paralyzed our entire nation.
26
@Victor James Bingo. Well said.
"Once you let tech giants in the door, you have a homeless crisis."
To take this statement at face value would be to believe that before the tech sector set up shop in San Francisco, there was no homeless problem there. But there was. I lived in SF from 1995 to 2010, and the homeless problems that I'm reading about in 2018's SF -- particularly in the Mid-Market area and the adjacent Tenderloin -- are what I read about, and lived through, 23 years ago.
Most of the tech companies that have located their headquarters in SF (as opposed to Santa Clara Valley) have done so in the last 10 years or so. Twitter and Airbnb didn't exist until 2006 and 2008, respectively. And while I'm no fan of either company, or tech bros, or high rents, I AM a fan of facts. And the fact is that SF had a really bad homeless problem before the Twitters and the Airbnbs moved in.
The overly simplistic sentence that I quoted is shocking -- and disappointing -- to see in the New York Times. The writer would do well to undertake some basic research. If she had, she would know that many, if not most, of the homeless people in SF were not working and paying rent one day and then shooting up on the streets the next day because they were displaced by tech companies. There ARE people who have been kicked out their apartments in SF, yes. It's a real problem. But the core of the city's homeless problem runs much deeper, and goes back much further, than the tech industry.
18
@David Becker Yeah, well, I lived in San Francisco from 1985 to 1994, and I can tell you that the homeless population was nowhere near the level that it is today. Were there homeless during that period? Of course. But "the problem" began to occupy attention front and center, and mushroom, during the second half of Art Agnos's term, continuing through to today. The Agnos administration had an integrated approach to the developing crisis, made worse by HUD's mandated reduced budget for affordable housing, and the Loma Prieta earthquake. Every mayor from Agnos to Lee (can't comment on Breed), has espoused a similar theme: Without combined state, regional and federal backing, any homeless initiative is bound to run out of available housing and money.
3
I believe you. But I’m not sure your comment addresses the issue I raised about the writer’s “Tech inherently leads to homelessness” statement.
Chicago has a lot of the things that people say they want; affordable housing, great public transportation, beautiful parks and lakefront, lots of immigrants, good jobs.
7
There are only three cities within the USA:
New York, San Francisco and New Orleans.
Everywhere else is Cleveland."
(Tenessee Williams)
12
And San Antonio.
@Carsten Neumann And Seattle.
There is an anti-urban bias built into the (originally) Anglo-Saxon settler nations (CN, Aus, NZ, USA) which can be noted by the fact that their capital cities are not the most populous cities in their nations. This is a situation that diverges from that found in most of the world.
This anti-urbanism is a factor contributing to some of the dysfunctional aspects of American cities. This is particular true in the case of San Francisco.
To accommodate the Bay Area’s Tech workforce in a manner that would cut commute times and rationalize (from a regional perspective) land use, the pre-freeway transportation spine of El Camino Real should be lined with multi-story dwelling from SF through Palo Alto and on into San Jose. This route would make more intensive use of both the existing road & rail infrastructure. This will never happen because this route passes through many suburban government structures whose elected officials will fight to the last to protect the status and suburban character of their homeowners-voters.
In SF itself, the juxtaposition of wealth and poverty is not due to wealth as much as it is due to a municipal legal code sustaining SRO hotels to serve a destitute population on very valuable city center land. The resulting human disaster that is the 300 block of Ellis St. is disheartening.
Nothing can be done because this is where Glide Memorial Church homeless programs are located and religious institutions are, by the Constitution and custom, above reproach.
2
Cities in the other countries do better because the countries they're in are vaguely less capitalist free fire zones. Thus, Berlin, Copenhagen, Amsterdam. No hope in the US, we're awful at community and housing.
6
In the 70's, bumper stockers in the Seattle and Puget Sound area read: "DO NOT CALIFORNICATE PUGET SOUND." That was 4 decades ago, long forgotten now.
@Morris G
It's been that way in Oregon for at least as long. The late Gov. Tom McCall famously began saying nearly 50 years ago, "Come visit, don't stay," a message directed at Californians in particular. Didn't work, of course.
1
My family recently left Seattle. It had become a nightmare of traffic, rude people, a dystopia exploded from a lovely livable city in the Pacific NW! They could often not use the local playground because homeless people napped in the children’s play equipment! Money ruled. I once had to stay overnight for a graduation ceremony and the AirBnB was $250!!!!!!
4
@Linda McKim-Bell
Yes, the homeless and drug addicted are on every corner now while corporate "fancy" types go shopping for $30 bars of soap and cashmere socks.
So sad to see a city I once thought was so "enlightened--with its liberal values and dignified living conditions--end up as the poster child for America's wealth divide.
7
After traveling around 7 Northern European cities by rail this year I can see that the reality of living in these congested places well is dependent on the transportation systems. Mostly electric non polluting trains that throughout Europe are powered more and more by eco friendly means, wind and solar. Too bad our stupid ex gov squashed the fast train from Chicago to Minneapolis and a train car plant in Milwaukee. My cousins I visited in Poland are doing well and some are working in a train car factory in Bydgoszcz. Hopefully change is on the horizon.
10
Ironic that the author suggests Minneapolis as a city that has gotten it right, given this Times article from four days ago about a large encampment of homeless Native Americans near downtown Minneapolis:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/23/us/native-americans-homeless-minneapolis-reservations.html
7
@lydgate The author seems to be writing an article about what she doesn't know and projecting that on to us readers. It's very weird.
3
@lydgate Did you read the article? They have a place to live now. This was news here, would it be in SF or Seattle?
http://www.startribune.com/minneapolis-homeless-camp-officially-closed-last-residents-leave-amid-massive-outreach-effort/503364632/
@lydgate
That's been addressed. Tribes, city and non-profits worked it out. A fair number of these folks found a place to live and the rest are being helped, as they want it.
Twin Cities have problems, of course. But they work on them.
Really. They work on them.
I drove around Minneapolis/St Paul once once. It struck me as looking a lot like Houston, Dallas or Oklahoma City - flat and sprawling. It's already been Houstonized.
3
Huntsville, AL or Tampa would love to have you - for being a medium sized city, Tampa is kind of sleepy (St. Pete has way more going on) and Huntsville needs a more cosmopolitan outlook...come and stay! Turn Tampa blue, and let’s try to turn Huntsville purple!
1
Henry George, Progress and Poverty (1879)
"Minneapolisization?" Is that when your residents argue about who had more authenticity, Husker Du or The Replacements?
7
@Dale Who would argue that?
It's the Replacements, of course.
Follow the Russian and Chinese oligarchs hiding their ill-gotten gains. That's what you want to avoid. Dark buildings and rich foreigners staking out condos for their infants to live in when they attend college are to be avoided. I understand the Russians are in San Diego as well, according to relatives who live there and see housing prices rise as a result.
12
Not to worry, New York. Liars for hire "Empty-suit Andy" and DeBlowsio, will continue to tell you everything is going to be great. As long as you don't have to spend two hours a day riding ten miles on the subway, and you can afford overpriced everything and don't have to sit on someone's lap in an overcrowded restaurant, you'll be fine.
2
You had me at “twee.” Rolling my eyes, that is.
2
When will overpopulation ever be mentioned and addressed in these articles. Why are people still encouraged and admired for breeding? Stop having all these babies, millennials. Adopt or foster, but more and more people are the problem.
6
@Mary Millenials are having fewer children than previous generations.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/05/17/birth-rate-u-s-drops-fertility-millennials-immigrants/618422002/
https://www.cnbc.com/2015/04/27/baby-bust-millenials-birth-rate-drop-may-signal-historic-shift.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/05/upshot/americans-are-having-fewer-babies-they-told-us-why.html
These are just a few of many articles written on the subject over the last 5 years.
6
You got here through breeding. It was good enough for your parents!
@Mary the native population is not replacing itself, it is maintaining by immigration. Look at the nightmare in Japan of having a closed society with an aging population. You do not want that.
2
We COULD improve living in all cities:
improve infrastructure; control rents; limit the heights of skysprapers, mandate parks and green spaces.... just for a start....
Giant behemoths like Amazon, Facebook, and so on could utilize at least some profit sharing....
Work from home plans could be prioritized whenever possible....
Oh, yeah, and Medicare for all....we could, like EVERY other industrialized nation, provide health care for people just because they are citizens.....
Lots of good idea, but no, just keep allowing low paying jobs, big cheap apartment blocks, lots of strip malls, fast food places, and so on.....and keep on scaring people with "socialized" medicine and such other boogie men....
17
In the early 1950s, the Embarcadero Freeway was shoved down the throat of San Francisco. We all planned to get together with wheelbarrows and picks some day to bring the beast down.
But, the Loma Prieta quake beat us to it.
The gorgeous pic of the Salesforce Tower brings back memories of those days. I've still got a wheelbarrow and pick. Give me a call when you set a date...
2
You can't survive sleeping on the streets in Minneapolis in the winter. No ameliorating coastal climate. You'd freeze to death!
5
These places are expensive because people prefer to live there. The infallible free hand of the marketplace has moved. SF and NY are wonderful and may have their problems but it's unlikely your neighbor there will be a bible thumping survivalist with a barn full of guns. The split between rich and poor in these cities is symptomatic of the entire US, it is just more visible in cities where you cant force to poor to live in the canebrake.
10
If you don’t want tech companies to come to your city and create high paying jobs for high tech engineers, then those kinds of jobs will be mostly created in the cities like Shenzhen or Shanghai which are eager to catch up with Silicon Valley by inviting such precious resources at all costs. Then, we will use all kinds of apps and services made in China and will be monitored and taken advantage of by Chinese communists everyday.
4
We don't want any more job growth up here in Seattle.... there's been enough already, thank you very much. My neighborhood has gone from "you are moving where OMG, don't walk around after dark you might get killed" to you might be able to buy a teardown for 1/2 a million in probably less than 10 years. And all the kiddies who now think this is a primo desirable neighborhood whine and complain that us who are are already here are selfish, rich (hah!) misers who shouldn't be concerned when they want to bulldoze our neighborhood to put up big, ugly boxes of micro sized apartments and condos that are 2 feet from our bedroom windows and will still be 10x the price that a part time barista can afford in any case.
10
@Mystic Spiral When did being a part-time barista ever pay well?
San Fran is horrible now. And it is sad. I was abroad recently and taxi driver asked me where I was from and when I told him San Fran he immediately told me about his visit there with some friends not to long ago where all their belongings and souvenirs they had bought for their relatives back home were stolen from their locked car that they had stepped away from for about an hour for lunch. Nothing was left out in the open and they were still robbed. This is how he remembers San Fran. As a terrible place.
5
@Sam And all of the stolen belongings and souvenirs are sold on the corner of 6th and Market or Larkin Street between Eddy and Turk or some other street in the Tenderloin.
That’s what you get in an economy flooded by ten years of absurdly cheap money.
6
Kansas City criticizing Denver. That's rich. You couldn't pay me enough to live in KC. You left out dozens of towns. Gary Indiana, St Louis Missouri, Dallas Texas. Typically Republican enclaves, but you knew that, didn't you? Homelessness and high rent is a nation wide issue. Based in greed. We can fix it if we choose to, but it requires effort and money, so it probably won't happen.
5
You left out the small city (29K) I reside in. Here the worry is "Queensification".
1
A third of a billion and reproducing like rabbits. In fifty years, folks will look back on us and say, "Wow! Those lucky dogs had it made in the shade." Now, isn't that comforting?
3
The article treats this as a localized phenomenon when these changes are, in fact, a holistic reflection of massive restructuring of the American post-WWII economy. Globalization and the tech revolution have routed manufacturing, factory farming efficiencies have devastated the family farmer and those who can are fleeing dying small towns for the jobs and lifestyle big cities provide. In a few decades, a map of the nation will feature nodes of surviving mini-cities connected to mega-metropolises with nothing but robot farmed wasteland in between. The suburbs are next to fall as housing values shatter and boomers die off in droves. If we could look forward as a nation, we could structure a future of high speed rail, solar and wind energy farms, and massive natural lands to fill the voids. By tapping the efficiencies of urban density and reaping savings from scaling down an outmoded interstate highway network, we'd have the money to reinvest in urban mass transit, collectively tackle homelessness, and by tweaking the tax system, generate dollars to subsidize affordable housing.
10
@ViggoM
We need to kick the Koch Brothers to the curb or they will spend oodles to stop just that. They hate anything that gets in the way of their oil profits.
5
@Michelle Teas
Also need to kick the Apples, Microsofts, Amazons, and many more to the curb. And/or have some kind of incentives for toobigtocareabouthumans corporations to locate in places that actually need the economic development.
3
Hey I've lived in 3 of those places!
1
Why live in cities when they're all bad?
1
I was disheartened you didn't say more negative things about Los Angeles. Please, NY Times, tell everyone how much they DON'T want to live here. Tell them they should stay wherever they are and not take advantage of our weather and beaches and something-going-on-every-night and the fact that we have amazing events and museums and restaurants and.... Look into my eyes: you do NOT want to live in Los Angeles. Leave it to us poor Angelenos, Angelinos, Angeleans and other Left-Coasters.
5
"Here locally, Sarasota, Fl. ( Insert any small town ) is unrecognizable from its welcoming and friendly self in the late 90's."
Maybe if everyone hadn't written those stories in the 80's and 90's trying to lure everyone with all the "charms" of the quiet life, etc ... ?
The NY Times itself is on of those guilty ones. There are stories every week about this great place. That "Secret" spot. on & on. Every time we see one of those Ads, oh sorry - i mean stories, we think "There goes another one. WHY did you have to write about it ?"
3
I haven't been to San Francisco in many years. The Salesforce Tower looks really ugly in the photo--ruins the whole skyline.
6
This is nonesense...I used to live in NYC,the greatest city in the world. I now live in Seattle and the fact that it is losing its "cowtown" attitude is a great pleasure. Does the author want us to become Detroit? Or Topeka? Seattle and all these cities are consistantly liberal and deep blue. That is what this is about! The author secretly wants to say what is bad about liberal voices because we are sucessful.
2
@ciggyMy scrappy, tough city is also "consistently liberal and deep blue".
@ciggy. Seattle was never a cowtown. It came of age during the Gold Rush. I can tell you're not from Washington State. But welcome! I like your positive attitude.
The Salesforce tower is a blight on the San Francisco skyline.
5
Try Montrealization: Hard times and the cost of separatist politics keeping most of these -izations in check. Pourqoi pas?
2
As TRUE New Yorkers knows, pining for the "good old days" is a stupid waste of time. And let's think about it for a minute: WHEN was it so much better? When they sent the National Guard into Thompkins Sq. Park (my current home) because too many used syringes on streets and murders in broad daylight made living here impossible? When gays were constantly harassed pre AND post Stonewall for "moving around" when Cabaret License laws were used simply to persecute? When subways were SO broken they didn't even make it to Rockaway or Jamaica or Parkchester? When Harlem didn't have a decent hospital above 125th St? When Crown Heights was in constant turmoil between Blacks and Jews? Yes rents were low but that was because unemployment was at 20% and if you worked large swaths of the city were simply uninhabitable anyway. No doubt there were pockets of creativity that, alas, have been gentrified. No doubt it still hasn't gotten easier for many to make ends meet BUT while thousands were dying of AIDS in the 80s and 90s, there were NO state subsidies for medicines or food for the afflicted. Fact is that the transitions that cities face, before when they were being emptied and now that they're being filled, cannot be artificially controlled, even in Socialist countries like France. Lamenting about the "good old days" is a waste of time and REAL New Yorkers know that with so much to do here the worst is to waste time on a fool's errand or kvetching about what you CAN'T have or do.
10
RTP here,
My two sons are with big tech companies; fly into Silicon Valley for meeting for a week, or to anywhere in the world, then return home to beautiful Carolina.
No more filthy cities, rats, nor congestion; there is a better way to live.
Kansas City is just fine, flyover and all.
2
Well, wingnuts insist so many people are fleeing CA that it's the cause of high home prices and rents. Wingnut logic.
My city of 80,000 has taken initiatives to encourage homeowners to create rental units on their property and for developers to build low cost workforce housing for workers in the hospitality industry.
1
I'm willing to bet that a lot of the stories about Seattle come from people who have never been here. I've lived in the city since 1984. Yes, there have been zillions of changes since then, and growth. I am not involved in the tech world and never have been. I can barely navigate my phone. Same with my husband. In fact, we live a world of low tech, and get by without a problem. We are middle class and have never paid $5,000/month for an apartment. Neither do I spend $20/day at Starbucks. I go for years at a time and Microsoft never crosses my mind, unless there's an article in the paper. Since Amazon came to town, my interaction with the company hasn't changed from occasionally ordering online or watching a video. These companies are like the Seahawks--if
you're a fan, they're on your mind a lot. But, if not you barely notice them. And, I'm sure there are people who live in San Francisco or Los Angeles or Manhattan or anywhere else that could say the same kind of thing. The stereotypes are often invented by outsiders. Seattle is still the beautiful, friendly and vibrant city it was all those years ago, and I can't imagine living anywhere else.
5
Let’s make rural, small-town, and small-city America great. (Again). Then we don’t all have to share the tiny footprint of our great cities. Which, let’s face it, have all these problems because 1) they’re also great (museums! Education! Music!) and b) that’s where ALL the jobs are, so we all gotta jam in here together.
Stupid.
1
What is the point of this article? It offers not even the slightest hint of solutions to the problems the writer bemoans and instead comes off as pretentious and smug while simply presenting a litany of observations on inequality in 21st Century America that we were already aware of.
5
@Tony C -- true. No solutions found in this article. I have a solution: Demand that the tech companies that bring about all this negative change, to pay for remedies.
1
Climate is missing in the writer's model.
3
Minneapolis? Are you kidding? We are on the same path is all those other cities that are run by Progressive liberals who have taken them straight to the toilet! What do all those cities have in common, ask yourself! They've all been Democratic run for decades. That is the huge problem there. Minneapolis is right on track to go straight into the toilet. The mayor and the city council are ridiculous.
3
@Jim Right, because those Conservative bastions of Alabama and Mississippi are thriving!
It’s not about Democratic governance, it’s the realities of cities period.
8
What was the point of this article? Regionalism is not a good thing and I think maybe this article made the world a slightly worse place.
1
"Portland (too twee)" Huh? If that is Portland's image, it's both funny and absurd. There is nothing twee about what you see walking the streets of downtown PDX. It's a gritty hard life in tents and sleeping bags out there. Sure we've got moneyed people with good salaries, but there are stepping over drug addicts on the sidewalk. We should be so lucky as to qualify for "twee."
6
I'm not sure that having the majority of jerks in a few select cities is all that bad. Just don't live there. Perhaps these monstro-cities will give rise to a rebirth of smaller and more rural ones? A slow return to the heartland.
I used to live in Frisco. Now, you couldn't pay me to live there. Even if you actually paid me enough to live there.
I can easily see a third generation of city dwellers, saying, "Enough! I'm out of here!".
3
Savage Capitalism.
3
I'm tempted to taunt you all about “Omahazation” — people here are complaining because their average commute time is edging toward 30 minutes — but trust me, there's a downside to living in an intellectual desert of paternalistic plutocracy and Huxleyesque blandness.
7
Baltimore baby!!!! Low cost, fun, great food, great cultural options, and any uppity attitude is immediately quashed by the gritty character of it's populace. If you think I am nuts for even suggesting Baltimore, we are fine with that too. Keep driving between DC and New York and do not even stop in our city, we like it even more with those types not in it.
6
Big cities offer high risk and high reward. There used to be one American big city, NYC, now there are a few. The plight of the nativists in these cities sounds similar whether it’s NY 1850, or Seattle 2020. Nihil novo sub soli
New York City has become terribly crowded in the past couple of years. What was once a lovely city and fun is now expensive and very congested. I would much prefer a less wealthy city and one more livable. Everywhere you walk you must dodge those who are glued to theIr cellphones. They are a menace to the city as is the reduced quality of life. I want out.
4
The World is too much with us!
2
If you get priced out of Denver, remember....Wyoming is just up the road a piece.
1
I grew up in and around NYC and have become happily Minneapolized over the past forty-five years, and.....
No, wait, that's not what I meant to say.... it's terrible here, too cold, too windy, snow up to your eyebrows, too far from everywhere else, museums are zilch, music scene nonexistent, no dining other than lutefisk bars, full of crazy Norwegians and Swedes. It would be an epic mistake for any of you to move here, so please, for your own welfare, go live someplace else. You'd hate it here; you'll thank me for telling you this.
5
I’ve been to nearly all of these Cities. It’s always a trade-off, a give and take, a Yin and Yang. Just ask yourself, how would you like to live in Wichita, Kansas ???
Yeah, thought so.
3
If you want it become remote and boring, then THAT is Minneapolisation.
4
Can you imagine how expensive San Francisco would be if there weren't homeless encampments and excrement on the sidewalks?
1
The Author should add Boston to the list. Our City Council is a disaster and useless.
You don’t want to become Manhattan (too dense)...Manhattan and NYC's problem is its crumbling mass transit system.
Houston (too sprawling)...plus flooding and pollution and a general lack of regulation. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12/26/us/politics/donald-trump-environmental-regulation.html
Los Angeles (too congested)...plus high taxes, illegal immigration, gangs, graffiti, pollution and pension debt.
Chicago (too indebted)...plus corruption, high taxes and declining population.
1
For insight into some of the reasons for the relative success of Minneapolis and its surrounds see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_Council
Many commenters have voiced the desire (or need) for well functioning mass transit systems. Many others have also noted how staggering sums of money impact zoning, real estate prices, and a host of other decisions which do not necessarily support the greater good.
A case in point is the Koch Brothers successful efforts to thwart Nashville's initiative to build a light rail system. Now if one has a genuine opposition to mass transit - fine. But in the case of the Koch's it was a combination of financial self interest and ideology. Why are we allowing billionaires with no stake in our lives (and who have spent oceans of money denying climate change) to control our lives? Why?
This is going to take more work than we thought.
26
How progressive!
Well done. You can go micro, into neighborhoods as well. The Soho-ization of Chelsea. The Chelseafication of Hell’s Kitchen. For those who get in on the ground floor there’s always a fear of losing something they just got. Conversely it’s frustrating for those who come later and struggle to get in. Still others come later and waltz right in with big money. Everyone eventually looks at everyone else as the problem. And nobody want to be like the next neighborhood over.
4
30 years of living and loving the Bay Area. But aghast at the dichotomy between rich and poor (Bentley turns right at Mission and 24th,
rolling past homeless in the bus shelter) and the changing landscape (ghost ship fire next to the Wendy’s on Fruitvale...25 years ago the only white non-Latino people in the neighborhood were people like me who worked at La Clínica). Aghast to the point that I leave the beloved Bay and move to ATL to find the same thing happening here. But without the panorama of the hills at sunset, the sparkling bay and Acme French bread. Damn I miss that bread.
8
They got that lunar object half skewered on the Transamerica building or whatever they call it nowadays; Homeless people perishing in the streets aside, that’s just a horrible photograph… shame, shame on you, who composed a very dramatic photo,!
End heartless and unfettered capitalism and you will end all of this ugly -izations in one go.
9
SAY WHAT........
"Heartless unfettered capitalism". you forgot to add predatory and parasitic . I might also add that our nation our cities our citizens suffer from a lack of any sense of consciousness of a higher good for the society. The modern American city has become the symbol of the triumph of greed and self interest, they are big dead and ugly places where the ultra rich live and profit serviced by worker drones.
8
Why is Dallas bad? You say it is in your subhead but unlike with all the other condemned towns you do not elaborate.
2
No one considers Fargo, ND, for a thousand reasons.
Please, keep reciting those reasons to yourself.
3
Philadelphia>
3
The Jazz Loft Project has yet to release recordings made by E. Eugene Smith. And you don't know about it because what was and should be the most noted chronicles of New York City's history by the world's most distinctive and recognizable photographer of the 20th Century struggles to be heard, smothered by the infestation that will obliterate that loft building in the Garden District as it disappears amongst the damning sprawl that began with Madison Square Garden.
The Garden District is about to go the way of the Hudson Yards. If New York City is the preservation of the new it is burying any connection to so much that made New York City and us interesting.
Even after 2 World Wars you can travel and find all the places where Beethoven lived, but also where his music was first performed. Here we tout so much but give as much regard as a child would to cheap toys.
The United States doesn't reflect New York City or San Francisco, it doesn't reflect on itself so it reflects upon a savage base that at its best occupies only for tourism between meals or in this case Taco Bell Cantinas.
2
I live in San Francisco, raised a family here, and I can tell you that life is hell. My house is worth a million but I can't sell it because I don't want to move to Modesto. Everything sells in one day for cash and there's multiple offers so good luck buying a new place. My grown up boys will never move out because it's too expensive, and my neighbors are inconsiderate techies who collect old Teslas taking up all the parking. All the old dive bars now sell avocado sandwiches. The stop lights are set at 17 mph for bicycles. I'm trapped here until the day I die and my kids can sell the house tax free.
2
@george
Do you hear yourself? Take a stand in your own one life and leave if that's what you want.
Nice example you're setting for your kids.
@george
You own a million dollars in real estate in a city where thousands sleep on the street but your life is "hell." Hell because you don't like the stop lights and avocado sandwiches? You need to get a grip.
4
@george -- Why don't you ask five million for your house, which some eager fool will snap up, then move to another state? Why continue to live in hell?
2
This story adds nothing new at all. The "San Francisco sucks" narrative is incredibly tired.
1
San Francisco saw this coming from a looooong way off. We have huge departments, planning, transportation, homeless outreach, housing, but for some reason when a 1 bedroom in poor neighborhood starts renting fro $3000/month, no one except everyone can see that this is going to be a problem in 10 years.
I could have told anyone 10 years ago the bart trains at rush hour would become unbearable, I could have told anyone parking and housing would be a problems. It’s been talked about here at parties and dinner tables for years. Let’s be honest though, no government will spend millions in anticipation of something happening, they wait until a crisis, at which point news outlets start going on about how complicated this is, and everyone wonders why the taxpayer should have to pay for overcrowded trains and unaffordable rents. In other words, nothing will happen because the system is crappy. If you don’t want to be the next San Francisco do what makes sense when it makes sense, and realize you’ll never be able to afford that.
5
I had to move out of Seattle 10 months ago, the cost of housing is offensive, I lived there 17 years when I first arrived from NYC it felt like a small town and was fun and affordable it's a nightmare now, unless you bought a house 12 or more years ago you are screwed.
3
Concur but all the hand wringing flies in the face of two forces that are not going to stop, demographics and desire Demographics because more people are living in cities than ever and the population continues to grow and desire because people want to live there which increases demand, prices, etc. It is where the jobs are. Jobs are not in rural america, they are in urban and suburban america even in the most deeply red state. Most cities become magnets for new residents and you are not going to stop it.
3
As a former land use planner I must say, "We have seen the problem, and it is us." Or more accurately, a series of decisions we have cooperatively made. Too many people still view land-use planning as "socialism." When the average person views community planning as a foreign agent, the wealthy (aka corporations) do it for them. Land use decisions are made by default (as in who has the most power) rather than what is good for all, the environment, for sustainability in general. Yes, population growth needs to stop. I am almost convinced that is happening naturally. But as a whole, humanity must agree to protect vast swaths of green space within cities and around them. Cities should be walkable, enjoyable, clean and safe. There is no reason this cannot be achievable. First, WE must want it. We must be certain we DESERVE it. And we must be CREATIVE enough to make it happen. Cars and private landownership at all cost are not conducive to happiness, nor are they contributors to healthy, thriving, communities. We must rethink how we live. All of us. Or it will be done for us.
8
I wish, I could make a lot of money, but have very flexible hours, take off Monday’s and Friday’s, leave at a moments notice when my kids want to play. But, I dont want the stress and pressure, the responsibility of managing others or owning a part of the business. But I do want to make a lot of money and I would like to live in the center of the city, where the night life is and I am walking distance to my home. But I don’t want to pay a lot in rent . . . But I want plenty of living space . . . Perhaps a little green space . . . But did I mention, I want to make a lot of money, pay little in rent, have very flexible hours and very little actual accountability.
You must have listed 15 different cities, they are all troublesome places to live? It’s called trade offs and growth. Seldom can you have it all and even when you have most of it, there is some time required to get there.
6
Once baby boomers start dying off their properties will go on sale and perhaps housing prices will go down. (I'm a boomer and hoping for a few more decades).
1
Thank god I live in Bloomington, In! Top 3 music school, Big Ten sports, low cost of living, and diverse restaurants. College towns are where it’s at, but don’t tell anyone!
9
So agree. IU Bloomington is a charming college town and so is beautiful horse country Lexington, KY, home of the University of Kentucky. College towns in many places offer diversity, affordability, and investment in community. These places are the new “Athens” of America.
3
Minneapolis is a little more vibrant but we chose Salt Lake City as our urban home. SLC also ranks top ten in the Harvard-Berkeley mobility study. Not that I read Harvard's study or any other study before moving out here. The decision was highly intuitive. You could just tell. To hackney a somewhat controversial phrase: This is the place.
I experienced enough of the Brooklyn hipster thing to recognize the scene was already lame and commercialized. This was almost a decade ago. Additionally, nothing is worse than an aging hipster who won't admit the better part of their twenties are long gone. The New York job market wasn't especially appealing to me either.
There are good reasons I wouldn't touch any of the other cities on this list either. Out of all the options, Denver is probably the closest alternative. They have some good things going. At the same time though, you get the sense Denver is trying a little too hard to be hip. Denver is therefore decidedly un-hip.
I wouldn't want to live in SLC as a young twenty something. As a long term plan though, I enjoy the somewhat sleepy feel of this urban/suburban hybrid. They're building condos and apartments all over the place. Not my problem though. I have a backyard within walking distance of downtown. The mortgage was cheaper than renting.
By the way, I don't need to travel for vacation either. I live where New Yorkers and Californians go for vacation. Have fun on the subway.
1
This loss of charm and character is not just in the big cities. Here locally, Sarasota, Fl. is unrecognizable from its welcoming and friendly self in the late 90's, much less those lucky enough to be there in the 80's or before. Its condo canyon now, the grid has been disrespected, congestion everywhere, built for wealth. Once a place has become popular, its a matter of time before they say "nice place to visit, wouldn't want to live there". Sarasota has no master plan, other than what the developers want. Sad.
2
Unlike many other cities, Portland is experiencing an explosion of new dense rental housing. Will rents decline? if they build it, will they come? It's an interesting experiment in urban design which is worth watching over the next couple of years.
3
The tech industry in our area has ruined every vestige of a small, urban, cultural center of San Francisco into a high stakes riverboat gamblers scenario. Paying 20 % and more over any asking price on a piece of property in the entire bay area. Food in the trendy stores is 5 times the cost of the same food in other towns. It's like a gold rush boom here and many if not most are waiting for the bubble to burst and have all the carpetbaggers in the tech industry find another place to ruin.
2
You avoid -inaction when your state and local governments take an active role in growth up to and including taxation or making the big guys pay the same rates and the middle class, i.e. no special deals that give $100k tax breaks per job created. It’s unsustainable as many of these cities are discovering.
1
I live in Manhattan (rent-controlled apartment) but came originally from Boise, ID, one of the fastest growing city in the country. Traffic congestion and sprawl now rivals L.A. Natives there blame Californians moving there though I saw a local survey that showed more come from Seattle/Tacoma. People who lament the loss of their small town could move to the many farm towns in Nebraska that are dying. We've got freedom and feet.
5
I visited San Francisco in the early 1970's and felt at home for the first time in my life. That visit lasted 33 years. I left as a stranger. I wouldn't live there now if I could afford it, especially having known the beautiful, colorful, rhapsodic, quirky, poetic town it used to be.
Herb Caen had a great definition of a yuppie. They're like finely sculpted Wonder Bread; all form and no substance.
Dotcom yuppies and millionaires own the town now. I'm glad I knew it when.
47
@Ralph AverillAgree, Herb Caen's time was a good time to be there, he used to warn "the hard eyes are coming". It happened, I was there in the 80's. Herb was a treasure.
9
I arrived in the 60s - San Francisco for me was like being Alice in Wonderland. I lived/worked there for 50 years. Don’t recognize my beautiful City by the Bay anymore- and Herb Caen, he was a treasure, and crazy Don Sherwood on the radio; oh yes, those were the days, my friend!
3
@Ralph Averill ...I had the good fortune to reside in SF from 1969 to 1984 where I married, had a child and was employed in a well paying job with generous benefits
by the same firm for much of my stay. We lived in an affordable spacious two bedroom apartment a stone’s throw from the magical green space, Golden Gate Park, and the nearby elementary school which my son attended was one of the best in the City, diverse and progressive. All in all, it was a good time to be living in the city by the bay if, like myself and my family, one was white and middle class or wealthy. For the poor and minorities it was another story, as it was, and still is all across this country.
When I read about, or see footage of San Francisco today, I hardly recognize it and am grateful to be back in Maine where I was born. Indeed, Herb Caen’s prediction that “ hard times are coming”, has clearly become a sad reality, That a corrupt, ignorant and venal real estate developer and obnoxious reality show personality inhabits the White House, is to my way of thinking, a stark reflection of the dark times in which we live.
9
ATL gets my vote for potential. And it’s not even mentioned once, that’s not a bad thing. Excellent food, great airport, beautiful little neighborhoods close in to downtown and an underutilized metro system which could eventually help solve the traffic issues. Never gets as cold as the northeast. Clearly diverse and within that diversity a truly thriving community both financially and mobility-wise. A lot of my NYC peers don’t “get” it but if they got to know it, they would.
6
@NYCgg Shhh... please don't tell anyone else what a great town Atlanta is - we're full now.
@NYCgg Don’t encourage them. We are full.
@NYCgg I left Atlanta for NYC 20 years ago and am now considering a return. Atlanta is on fire and maturing in a way that is very appealing.
I hitch hiked to San Francisco back in the 70s when governor Moonbeam in his incarnation as Gov. Jimmy Carter was president and San Francisco seemed the embodiment of living the communal life. Slums were there and rip offs lurked about looking for suckers. Downtown SF though started to turn downtown into a giant construction site. Jerry Brown was the living embodiment of anti gentrification i.e. letting wealth chase all else out of the city. I lived in Arlington VA for years and watched as real estate prices sky rocketed and public housing and the poor where chased out of Roslyn and Clarendon. Urban sprawl that consumed the Northern VA was largely based on the exclusivity that wealth could create.
2
Part of the cause is population growth.
Approximately 60 years ago the USA population was half of that today... Yes half. And all those new people need to live somewhere.
For some magnet states, population has doubled more quickly. For example, in Washington state it took only 50 years.
The USA population is projected to exceed 400M by 2050, so expect more competition for the "best" places to live.
22
@TomD Agreed. Another cause is cars and the post WW2 boom in ownership, which made sprawl, malls, and vast asphalt wastelands possible.
4
@TomD
And boy has Burlington changed and grown since the early 90s.
I miss the days when my totally non-ritzy, boring NE Seattle neighborhood had people of all income brackets living cheek to cheek. No one cared what you did for a living and people watched out for another. Now it takes two $100,000+ incomes (or lots of family money) to buy a starter home here (assuming a contractor doesn't get to it first, turn it into a tear-down, and build a $1 million, too much house on our small city lots).
Even the well-to-do families who have lived here for decades shudder at what happened to our friendly neighborhood. When someone buys a house here, neighbors will stop by and introduce themselves. Either no one answers the door or they say hello but say they are too busy to talk. Walking my Lurchers was always a great way to meet people (especially ones walking their dogs) but now folks I don't know cross the street when anyone comes by and avoid eye contact. The new neighbors don't want to join our block watch or participate in any of the neighborhood activities. They've told other neighbors that they have car alarms and a monitored home alarm system and that will protect their family.
Personally, if housing prices dropped by a decent percentage (like the 10% they did between 2008 and 2012), I'd be very happy.
Need I say more?
20
The present character (or lack of character, in the moral sense) of the places you describe are the result of choices; they aren’t facts that washed up on the shore. Here in the Bay Area, the giant tech corporations have avoided paying the taxes that would have supported the infrastructure to make the area liveable. Cities develop petty punitive responses to the problems corporations are creating. They have offshored both profits and jobs so that poor and working-class kids growing up are rarely hired. When everything is mobile, places are not meaningful. And the young people working in tech should long ago have fought for unions w/an 8 hour day. There is no reason that people who aren’t in life/death jobs should work w/o pay after eight hours. Often these companies make technologies solutions to problems that require human solutions. “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.”
36
Although my address appears as San Francisco, I left the beautiful city after living there 40 years. Too techy, considerably too wealthy, with a terrible homelessness and poverty problem. Government and NIMBY prevented any meaningful change. We once feared Manhattanization but now the city has its own attendant moniker. I'm happily retired overseas where people still speak to one another, prices don't control your decisions to the same degree, and the quality of life is superb. Do I miss the beauty and friends? Absolutely, but I'm infinitely happier with less here. Tech destroyed my town. Beware.
35
where did you go?
NJ is nice.
@David Ainsworth Doesn't anyone wonder who is going to be the next fool that will pay $1.75MM for the condo or house the seller paid $1MM for? I think the number of millionaires and billionaires is finite.
my wonderful city of Portland Maine is more than half-way there already. We are flooded with tourists wandering the streets not even knowing what they are looking for but told we are a trendy city. Our affordable eating establishments are rapidly being replaced by over-priced, "fine dining." People are being priced out of homes they've lived in for years and in some cases a couple of generations. The flavor of the city is/has been downgraded to bland with many original shops now part of the vast network of chain shops.
29
@Mcacho38, I am a fellow Portlander and couldn't agree with you more. It's a difficult transition to witness. I raised my three boys on the West End, none of us can afford to live on the peninsula now. The city's poor planning has exacerbated the housing and education problems facing the city, too.
10
@Mcacho38 - I grew up in southern Maine and lived in Portland after high school, from 89 to 93. I recall Congress Street in 1990 being largely boarded up and deserted. Only the Old Port (where I worked at a very popular and recently closed bar) had any economic life. When I go back to visit now it hardly seems like a utopia, but there's definitely more of a civic life and a greater sense of opportunity. That said, I'm sure that gentrification is the same two-edged sword there that it is here in the Pacific Northwest.
1
My perspective is pervasive change. I've lived in the country as well as suburbs and small cities, so big cities are partly a generic experience -- mass transit, for instance. Much of this experience can be shared among the metro area -- living in Berkeley meant sharing the SF slow mornings and long evenings, living in Quincy means riding the red and silver line to Logan airport to the world. I've also lived in NYC, Boston, and Denver and agree with most of the comments about their differences and developments. When I returned to the twin cities, I was shocked at how much had been paved over.
The developments that preoccupy me are the decline of Detroit and the disaster and rebuild of my long-time residence of New Orleans. Cities can be fragile, and even more, the experience of a city -- the now diminished black, catholic, middle-class New Orleans with St. Aug's marching 100 -- can be transient. When I visit my son in the Spring Valley area of DC, the residents seem to be in international flux while maintaining a monoculture only a few decades old. Detroit's car culture of my youth -- eagerly identifying the new models each year from my post as a safety boy -- is gone with the auto industry but an islamic-American metro experience has been born and raised in the ashes.
3
Is there any City that gets it right, and if there is almost surely its success will be cause of its eventual downfall as people stream in for better places to live, developers endlessly seek out new places of opportunity, and local politicians are forever on the take when it comes to fanciful notions of money, jobs, and so-called opportunities.
We are a nation built on robbing from the future to pay for the things we think are valuable now, while exploiting any one and any thing we can. With every new development we fail to consider where will the workers live; how will the transportation system and infrastructure support them; who will pay for the schools, police, fire and other essential services; and who will pay to repair all of it as it breaks apart under its own weight.
The wealthy will simply move on to other places while the rest will watch their City eventually crumble all around them.
No one can claim they did not know what awaits them; or there were no solutions (there are in appropriate zoning and impact fees); or there was nothing they could do. The failure to act will not be because of a lack of political will, but a willfulness not to act.
34
@zb Sadly, our culture has evolved from those values described in "The Greatest Generation" (Tom Brokaw) to those of self & money above all. Religious leaders have failed miserably, as they also have far too often become about self & money, forgetting the most important things to embrace: humility and the greater good. "Love thy neighbor as thyself" (and by doing so, whether you believe or not, you honor God) pretty much says it all. Capitalism & the corporate culture have become aggressive malignancies. Top that with TRUTH being "optional" and you have this mess of a world today.
4
I live just 15 miles from central Denver. I was there tonight. Zero traffic. I am almost walking distance from the mountain parks. Mt Falcon Park. Red Rocks Park. Laire of the Bear Park. Reynolds Park. Look Out Mountain park. Windy Saddle Park. Green Mountain. Myers Ranch Park. Have I made my point? There are hundreds of miles of mountain hiking trails nearby, and 50 miles away is the 14,000 foot Mt Evans with trails to 12,000 feet and higher!
What more can you possibly want?
Yet there is no traffic after 7pm, and this neighborhood has houses in the $300,000 range. Wine Flights, a delightful local wine bar, had to move out of our town because there is no traffic in the winter months. An area set up by the county for growth, with a roundabout at Sims and 285... is still in the middle of nowhere. So... do not include Denver in this list.
8
All of these city failings have one thing in common — the destruction of our middle class. The path to restoration of our shattered middle class starts with reinstatement of competition, a required component of capitalism.
What we currently have is not an “end-stage of capitalism” but predatory monopolies which have gamed the system in order to restrain trade. They are currently diverting $10,000/year for every full-time employee into their own pockets and those of their owners.
42
@Robert Goldschmidt
In addition to the destruction of the middle class, these cities (and most others around the globe) have another thing in common: an economy built on MORE--more buildings, more roads, more industry, more selling, more buying, more people. What is desperately needed is an economic model which promotes prosperity for all AND is sustainable on this planet. One element of such a model would surely be limiting the human population.
Is our imagination big enough to conceive of such a society? And are we courageous enough to act in time?
19
Yes. As a culture, we need to find it acceptable to have 0 or 1 children, and 2 children if a couple absolutely must, and not acceptable have more than 2. Actually all cultures around the planet need this. Can the media start this conversation? Can media do investigations to start awareness of the impact of bigger families on the environment, on all of us?
I mean, some people find Doritos and Cheetos desirable at eat. So with good PR, anything can happen.
For the record, I have 0 children and am at the stage of life where it's not possible. I'm not bitter. I'm free and happy that I don't at all have to worry about what the selfishness of others is leaving our young generations. I am not the one who was selfish, or sad, from not having children. However currently our culture frames people like me as selfish or sad. That's a problem.
18
I am a Puget Sound native, a UW grad who lived in Seattle for over 30 years. I loved the old Seattle of the 80's and 90's with its mix of income levels and rough edges, still small town feel with incredible nature only a short drive away. Seattle is very different today, not all of it for the worse of course (more racial diversity for example). IMO, it's not that great though to live in a city where every other person is a highly paid tech worker and the tech giants thoroughly dominate. And the growth and change the last 10 years has been overwhelming. Everything seems so... corporate now. I hardly recognize it when I return for visits, many of the old landmarks are gone, replaced with shiny new buildings. Full disclosure: I also worked for Microsoft for many years and benefited so I share in the blame for what the city has become
22
Nicely presented. I live near Portland, and have lived in Seattle and Sacramento. My small farm is within what was supposed to be a new planned city. After 13 years of trying to agree on a plan we threw in the towel and are now in development limbo, not quite rural, urban or suburban. We are like a fancy meal someone ordered that never got cooked or served due to chefs, waiters and customers fighting over the presentation.
6
This is national (and global). The economic decisions that brought the country here are are over 60 years in the making. Also, as a frequent traveler between NYC where I am from and LA where I live, I'm often struck by the amount of empty real estate that is used only as investment by the 1%. Can we not change some legislation around this?
51
I would prevent central bankers from lowering the cost of money every time there is a slight hint of a recession.
1
What the article fails to mention is that wealth inequality in these cities driving up living costs is a symptom of a much larger problem, not the disease itself. Capitalism, aided by States, had reached a point where automation and technology can replace a large portion of the work force. This has happened before in many industries, but now people can be replaced. Agriculture was mechanized, forcing an exodus to the cities. Now manufacturing is following. This is not an American phenomenon. Many other industrial countries are facing the same challenge. France is an excellent example. Free health care, good education, high taxes, and short work day area the norm. Yet, they still have inequality now worsened by global competition. The yellow vests protest despite all of the benefits people want here in the US. We need to get the correct diagnosis before we can attempt to form policies.
Also, Paris is also very segregated city. The wealthier live in the center while the immigrants and poor are relegated to the outskirts. You can get there on transit, but it takes a while, and you still have to walk. Whole small towns are dying as well due to competition as I wrote above. This is truly a global event.
49
@Steve
Like the cities mentioned in the US, Paris is run by Progressives, who seem to think that the city should be redesigned around the needs of their well-heeled electorate (i.e. gentrified). The city is bordering on bankrupt thanks to mismanagement, but costly infrastructure works are everywhere to unnecessarily widen the sidewalks and create empty bike paths, in order to get rid of automobiles through attrition (of space). The thing is, these bike paths serve the younger adults rich enough to afford to live in the center, close to work. In fact, most of these people could walk there. For the rest of the population, those who serve the gentrified areas through low-wage jobs and are priced out of the center or even Paris, biking to work is not an option, and the mass transit system is crowded, dysfunctional, polluted (more so than the traffic jams above) and can be dangerous. The only option left is using a car, and adding to the manufactured congestion.
You might wonder why, if the city is run by idiots, do people elect them? Because most of the people who must choose between mass transit and a car don't live there, hence aren't registered to vote in Paris. A majority of Parisians don't own a car, so those able to vote in local elections either don't care about the plight of the majority of people driving with no other workable choice, or actively dislike them, following in the toxic rhetoric devised by the current administration demonizing drivers as "lazy polluters".
1
Amazon will not make a dent in New York City. It is a tiny drop in a bucket full of water.
7
@SweePea
Not true! Many NYC residents, as I am, are convinced it will add mightily to the already squeezed middle-class situation, and overdevelopment, gentrification of most of the city. Its really become unafforadable over the last decade, and too much building of glass towers has made it corporate and cold. Amazon feels like the nail in the coffin.
7
I wonder, in all the calculations that go into choosing to live in one of these megacities, does peace ever get considered? Or is that even worth discussing?
17
@Thomas
There is no peace in the country.
There are lots of great American cities that just need love and energy. There you can be part of the change you want to see; you can help build cool instead of just consume it.
26
I hate to break it to you all, but life in Seattle is not all that bad. The city is clean. The food is delicious. Rents are still manageable if you live within your budget. Please don’t tell anyone.
22
@shaun
I was there last December.
It was camera-ready gorgeous. :)
The one thing all of these cities have in common is far Left local government. Excessive regulation drives up the cost of housing, while generous handouts (Seattle hands out free needles and has proposed free drugs) attract the homeless. Want cheaper housing: Stop containing growth with zoning and get rid of onerous regulations like CA's recent rooftop solar requirements. The free market can and will take care of the rest. As for the homeless, by all means give people help to get off drugs and back on their feet, but stop coddling drunks and drug addicts.
9
Solar rooftop requirements are not going away and that’s the way we want it. My electric bill in Southern CA is minimal and that’s fine with me!
23
@I want another option there is no available land in San Francisco. It is supply-demand, not regulation driving up costs. This is the free market
22
@I want another option The free market has run mostly unchecked in the Seattle area so I'm not sure what you're going on about. Urban sprawl now stretches into the foothills, traffic is horrible and housing prices are high as far as anyone is willing to commute. I live in a city now where the "left" government actually does regulate development, holding a firm zoning line. Housing prices are high, as in every other major Western city, but with really good public transportation and unspoiled, accessible nature all around, a healthy middle class supported by a generous social welfare system... I think Oslo compares favorably to any city in the U.S. Certainly the metrics tell that story, including overall "happiness" scores that exceed any in the U.S. People who espouse these extreme libertarian policies cannot point to a single city where that is working.
29
I remember sitting down in a dentist's chair for my first visit after moving to San Francisco. "Where are you from?" she asked. "Moved here from Tennessee three months ago." As the drill kicked into high speed, she muttered, "Go back home." There was truth in that. Folks just loved the city to death.
16
@DC
The last one in loves to shut the gate.
I know the perfect city, an antidote to all this. But I'm sure you'll understand if I keep this information to myself . . .
14
@Lotzapappa
It's Lincoln, isn't it?
My plan is to live in Michigan and visit Seattle, San Francisco, London and Boston every year. Savings in living costs more than pay the bills.
15
Our bosses should not be complaining when we stroll in to work late because yet again - our Subway was delayed. De Blasio to write my excuse note, thanks.
12
@Sara
Actually, Governor Cuomo should write it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/25/nyregion/who-runs-new-yorks-subway.html
The image accompanying the article is simply stunning. Bravo Noah Berger.
6
@SFBayArea Scientist
How can anyone not love it? :)
@SFBayArea Scientist I love this city with all of its flaws and beauty, it is unbelievable every single day.
Of all the points made among commenters, the most concerning is the lack of mobility, the shutting of doors, to young generations because it costs too much to move to and live in these cities - unless you have a high paying tech job, which is exactly why these cities are no longer affordable. Talk about a rat race!
Would love to read articles and comments about a few spin-off topics:
1. “Hacks” for living in expensive cities
2. Which of these pricey cities try to accommodate young non-tech workers and retirees, through policies, planning, whatever means possible?
3. What kind of city is next, beyond the tech crazed, over-gentrified version? Any hope for urban life not destroyed by the tech industry?
4. Are there any healthy blue-collar cities today?
Thanks!
21
I commute by rail an hour each way to work in Seattle.
It’s worth it.
5
Greed lives here, the most corrosive thing there is. In Portland, density and infill do NOT include anyone who cannot finance a half million dollar oversized home or pay thousands a month for rent. Only laws will force equitable development and emphasis on modern, efficient mass transit as a way to expand where people can live and work. Twee? Yes, they do have a lot of shops and restaurants here now that are pricey, precious, and pointless. But the unfettered greed is not twee at all. It’s the same dark heart of America, however much Portlanders want to imagine they are exceptional.
17
@Miller Burn! Many Brooklynites I know (natives, stunningly) are moving to Portland because to them, it's a relief. However, your point stands. As does that of the author. It's a global issue.
Too many people. Not enough affordable housing being built.
The majority of immigrants, both legal and illegal, cluster in the coastal cities. Anyone else notice the roads becoming more clogged? Or public transportation too crowded? Well take a look around and you will see too many people. I am trusting it is only going to become much, much worse.
18
@kim--I agree with you that the population increase is part of the problem. The population has grown by 10 million or more with every census, and much of it is driven by immigration, not procreation. Since 1940, the population in the West has grown by 400%, and the south by almost 180%. More to the point of the article, in 1940, there were only 14 cities with a population above 500,000; now there are close to 45.
All this is to say that as long as the population grows this quickly (for whatever reason, no judgment here) without being more evenly distributed throughout the vastness of the US, even the best city planning will be barely enough.
5
@kim Tramsportation clogging has a lot to do with Uber & Lyft. On an average NYC clogged street, if you look around, about half the vehicles are Uber & Lyft. I’ve stopped using either of them as much as possible and focus on using Taxis when necessary. That is, when I’m not walking or using the subway or the bus.
3
Austin was a dream come true, we did not have a ton of every single thing, but we had enough. Great music, Barton Springs, UT. We all lived here because it was an easy place to be, no hassle what so ever. Now it is Ruined, Ruined, Ruined.
18
The article has got it right. Minneapolis/St. Paul may well be the best places in the nation to live.
11
@William O. Beeman Agree - it's a really beautiful area, and the food and culture are outstanding.
2
@Annie No no, too cold, don't go there.
@Emily Badger, we are skirting the main enablers of this type of a problem. 1) Nimbyism of the people living in the Tech corridor from SF to San Jose and on the other side from Oakland to...San Jose and Milpitas. Those who moved there don't want more dense housing.
Then we have politicians who have gotten used to the drug of higher property taxes and the power of the building industry. More property taxes, more paychecks for the Government employees (including the people who run them) and more OT, bonuses etc. It would be interesting if some group did an analysis of the city pay grades and the funds spent on them annually.
There is zero incentive to change anything except sit back and wallow. Please tell me if I am wrong.
Two examples: all the "bedroom communities on the Hwy 101 corridor fight tooth and nail against highrise apartment building, high speed subways (BART) or rail (Caltrain.).
After the tech boom of 2010, 2011 etc the mayor of San Francisco, then one Ed Lee wallowing in huge property tax boom, claimed the city was running a deficit?! How is this possible. Sadly Ed Lee passed on but the problem remains.
There are solutions but regional government will not touch it. This is one "shining" example of issues facing NY, Seattle, Denver and other cities.
8
If you drive around the west part of the city of Berkeley and look at the license plates of vehicles that people are using to live in (many RVs, vans, converted buses in the west part of town) you'll find license plates from many other states. News stories have appeared in the local media, about homeless who've come to Berkeley from Las Vegas NV, Orinda, San Leandro, Richmond, Albany, San Francisco and the San Francisco Peninsula, Placerville, and Santa Rita jail in Contra Costa county dumps a lot of criminals out onto the streets in Berkeley.
Yes there may be some people who ended up homeless because they could no longer afford rent -- but I think that as a sole cause is quite rare. Apart from one "high functioning" camp in the south of town, which succeeds because it has rules and keeps out drug users and criminals, in Berkeley, homeless camps are repeatedly closed down when they end up immersed in garbage, taken over by drug addicts or bike thieves. Substance abusers and the seriously mentally ill, as well as criminals, count for a very high number of homeless. It's common to read a story of an assault, burglary, or other street crime, and read that the perp described as "homeless." So I think we need to put to rest this delusion that most of the people who end up homeless got priced out.
Normal people, when they can't afford to live in an area any more, move to where they CAN afford to live -- they don't throw up their arms, and set up a tent on the sidewalk.
43
@Oakbranch Santa Rita jail is in Alameda County, not Contra Costa.
1
San Francisco could never have built out sufficiently over the past several decades. The construction capital was never there in advance because nobody anticipated the sources of hyper-demand: highly profitable global tech enterprises headquartered in the region, Venture capital funded tech startups and the liberalization of global capital flows seeking safe haven in urban residential real estate.
The epic level of municipal corruption has delivered continued pro-cyclical economic policies during an economic boom with predictable results along with a raft of public projects that are potentially deadly: Hunters Point Shipyard's radioactive condos, Cracked steel beams in the new Salesforce Transbay Terminal, Cracked steel rods in the new Bay Bridge, tilting Millennium Tower and a Treasure Island redevelopment plan that faces contamination and sea level rise.
The public transit system is locked in a steel cage death match with the TNCs, Uber and Lyft, a downward death spiral of transit as every desperate hack from the surrounding counties drives in to San Francisco daily, extruding the piece work sweatshop floor into the congested public realm. Most tech brats cannot be bothered to mix with San Franciscans on surface transit.
San Francisco has developed an immune response against long term residents. Many were forced out, most who could leave have, many of us are making plans. Like NYC, SF is like an old relative who is losing it, too painful to bear its company.
21
Add Miami to that list. In many respects our situation is worse. Most of the cities that you list have some semblance of a true public transportation system. They might have problems such as those in New York, but they can be fixed - the basic infrastructure is there. In Miami we have essentially nothing. We have an elevated metro system built over 30 years ago that essentially runs a north-south line with a spur to the airport. And a failed bus system. So its cars, cars, cars - and more cars. Horrible! And housing is astronomical. The real estate market is fueled by dark money fleeing South America and the Russian block. Even Amazon was scared away from Miami by this mess.
16
Yes! Rent and real estate is very expensive and wages are relatively low.
1
I just hope what happens (or more accurately doesn’t happen) in many flyover states doesn’t happen in San Francisco. The racism. The opioid epidemic. Lack of cultural attractions and natural beauty. The lack of decent restaurants. The awful weather. Lack of entertainment options. And so on.
I’ve lived in the Midwest, the South, and in San Francisco, Santa Barbara, and the L.A. area. Despite some problems San Francisco and California far exceeds other states in the things that make life interesting and rewarding.
25
Sitting roughly two hours from New York City to the north and Washington D.C. to the south, the Philadelphia region is a amalgamation of glitz, urban blight, picket-fence Americana and old-school city neighborhoods. Like our more glamorous sister cities, we claim a tristate area as part of our bedroom community stock - southern New Jersey and Northern Delaware and if you look at Census data, a sliver of Maryland.
We were on the 20 city shortlist for Amazon and I’m of mixed-mind as to the benefits vs. pitfalls that such a civic/corporate marriage would bring to my neck of the woods, time will tell.
Gentrification is the yin and yang of early 21st century American metropolitan life. It can be both horrendous and wonderful. I love that I can walk or use transit to shopping, dining and entertainment. Living in the city limits allows for this and for now, property values are the most affordable in the entire area and taking these factors into consideration, buying my first home here five years ago, was never in doubt.
But as I alluded to earlier, the bad is, well, quite bad. City schools, while on the mend due to the recent reestablishment of local control, are still underperforming. Property values, are skyrocketing - a major concern for the elderly who’ve owned their homes for decades and are in the crosshairs of rising property taxes, all due to rampant speculation and demographic changes. Crime and substance abuse driven by poverty are seemingly without answers.
3
New York is fun no matter what.
People come here because we have everything here, it comes with a price.
The variety of cultures, the intellectual stimulation, the big shows, the big personalities are all here.
I would never live elsewhere.
Despite the downside. Pick your happiness.
12
All this handwringing is getting tiresome. LA has been a congested gridlock for decades. Parts of Manhattan have been a pricely haven for weath with skyscrapers for a long time. Seattle used to be a quite regional town, but it is becoming a big city. I don't understand why growth in well paying jobs is considered bad. It must be a backlash against technology - after all only businessmen, bankers, and financiers are supposed to make a lot of money in America. Despite the fact that technology actually does things, while banking and finance just move money around.
17
Most of what makes a city a nice place to live is the people you live with. People can move. Young people who want to raise a family will find places where there is room to live, and they will bring the culture with them. The US is full of cities and towns with reasonably priced housing and good schools. All it takes is to stop listening to the bi-coastal snobs who comment in the NYT and overcome the fear that you might end up living next to a Republican who likes to go hunting on the weekend. Do you know what that neighbor represents? Diversity. A diversity you won't find in San Francisco, Seattle, or New York, where every coffee shop is filled with exactly the same people, regardless of their skin color or background. Most of the cities mentioned in this article are already dying. Nancy Pelosi's San Francisco district has fewer children per capita than any congressional district in America. It has already become Venice, a scenic museum piece (with homeless people), not a living community. Where you find the children you will find life. Look for the real playgrounds, not the playgrounds of the rich.
I've recently moved to South Jersey to teach after raising my kids in Ohio -- there are plenty of great, affordable places to live and work in the US -- you just have to be willing to leave the bubble.
25
@Tom
From the Rust Belt to the Exodus State. Just wait until you see that first real estate tax bill.
@Tom
Actually, Seattle’s school system is growing quite rapidly. And you can go elk hunting an hour or two from here. Lots of folks do. Maybe you should come and visit!
For many of us the weather is one of the draws to CA
1
Reading this article and the comments, it strikes me that so many of our societal problems these days are caused by income inequality. In the heyday of the 50s, when the middle class dominated, taxes on the rich were much higher and unions were more powerful. CEOs made smaller multiples of the workers’ salaries. Campaign finance did not favor the corporations like now.
I think this all had reverberating consequences across the structure of society. And cities were more liveable.
33
When I was in the workforce some of my best days were spent telecommuting. I am very thankful to be out of the road rage when I couldn't telecommute. Working at home a long way from decaying cities was salve for my soul. I have never figured out why anyone would want to live in the heavily congested cities in the article. The pace of performance anxiety in those cities exceeds the speed of sound. In addition to Mach one there are the too common Machiavellians one encounters. So much for overgrown, underserved wastelands that seem to result in widely read articles like this one. I had enough problems working quietly at home.
8
Good for you! You must realize we can’t all work from home.
1
As an ex-Seattleite (and ex-New Yorker), I can attest that there are still cities out there that are very much as exciting and dynamic as Seattle was in the early 90s (with all the restaurants and quality of life). I live in one.
Fear not, these economic megacities will become much less lovely places (perhaps from the slow erosion of quality of life, perhaps by natural or other disasters) but then people will move and other parts of the country will shine. The movement is a key part of mixing the peoples of our vast country and re-strengthening our sense of unity and opportunity.
Silver linings, and all that.
10
@Julian I live in Seattle and it's actually gorgeous and getting more so. We can't wait until the viaduct goes down very soon and the beautiful waterfront parks start going up. ON the other hand, small town life has much to offer. You are happy where you are and that's great.
11
@Julian:
OK. Tell us where you live!
It should be painfully obvious that gentrification paranoia is an increasingly national phenomenon. Pointing to a blame game of tech bros, environmentalists, preservationists, NIMBYs, people "lucky enough to get in on the ground floor," California investors, etc., etc., etc. ad nauseum neither suggests solutions nor highlights real causes. In fact, this phenomenon is international and occurs every single place where wealth in disproportionately concentrated among the very few, either as owners or investors, and where the politically powerful have forsaken any responsibility to safeguard, protect and cultivate the core values that make cities attractive, functional, affordable to a wide spectrum of people and just plain livable. We see it in paces as disparate as London, Hong Kong, Venice, or Abu Dhabi. We live in a world where some people literally have so much money they don't know what to do with it. They have run out of safe places for investment or even storage. Real estate (what used to be quaintly known as "homes and neighborhoods") are the brave new world of investment. Fellow citizens, welcome "home" to Planet Earth.
37
As a young professional couple with kids we were priced out of the Bay Area for several years. Young families can not compete with international investment money that pays cash to the tune of millions for a shack. We threw a dart on the map and moved to a place closer to family with natural beauty, friendly families, good schools and affordable housing. This allowed us to save money and come back to the Bay Area with the 2008 downturn. In the end the mountains, ocean, weather and beauty beckoned. But all is not bliss and we’ve come to appreciate there are many places of beauty that are also affordable and they don’t have the problems, taxes or filth (knee deep trash along the highways) the Bay Area has.
10
I grew up in Seattle but now live 280 miles east in Spokane. Visiting for the holidays, I’ve been regaled my son with tales of what used to be. 2nd Ave north of downtown has become a canyon of condos. Belltown is no more. While there are some improvements, given the increased congestion and unaffordable housing, I can’t say there’s much ch I miss.
10
@Bradley Bleck what exactly are you nostalgic about? I lived in Belltown 10 years ago. There was a ton of homelessness, one street filled with restaurants that attracted drunk twenty somethings on a weekend. I also recall a gang shootout of some sort on 2nd and Cedar. An elderly lady was murdered by a vagrant at 500 wall street when the place was still an old folks home back in the 90s. Belltown was never exactly a gem. Otherwise the city was dead. A provincial outpost for the most part other than the bit of culture that peaked with Nirvana & Subpop era.
1
@Bradley Bleck Belltown, no more? It's full of restaurants and bars. Sure, there are condos, but having people live downtown is a good thing for a city. Spokane is just now benefiting from that. It's a nice place. I agree.
@Isabella I agree that downtown living is good. Seattle's downtown used to be dead at night. But what's down there now, and I was just there yesterday, could be had anywhere. Nothing "Seattle" about what's left but the street names an d the snippet of view that hasn't been blocked.
A lot of people, who rightfully bemoan these trends and point to the culpability of our politicians in them have their money directly or indirectly tied to real estate funds driving this divide, sometimes through their pension funds.
9
The cities that will win the future are the ones that successfully build visionary transportation networks and prioritize pedestrian-first planning, and get people out of their cars. Density works only if people are not car-dependent. This is where Denver — which has done a lot right, and finally has a real arts and culture scene to balance sports and beer — is far behind. Also, there’s a lot of really ugly and badly designed housing being built to accommodate the newcomers.
13
Another important aspect that has impacted development in CA and is overlooked in this article is CEQA. While well intentioned to protect the state’s environment, it’s often used as a cudgel by NIMBYs.
3
It's as good a time as any to whip out one of my pet theories: in a highly mobile society urban areas inexorably trend over time toward an general average of cost and quality of life. A place with a good quality of life and low costs will attract new people until the cost rises to a competitive average.
That's what happened to Seattle, which was charming and cheap until about 1990. Then the great influx accelerated. Older dilapidated neighborhoods in the city center began to gentrify, driving up housing prices and driving out the poor. The same thing happened in the Western Addition neighborhood of San Francisco in the late 60s, with a big boost from forced eviction of poor minority families courtesy of your friendly local redevelopment agency.
This tendency toward equalization born of mobility also helps explain why programs to eliminate homelessness never quite get ahead of the curve. A city that unilaterally institutes a humane policy for assisting the homeless simply becomes a magnet drawing new homeless folk from other less generous areas, whose increased numbers eventually overwhelm the expanded resources. Ultimately, regional solutions will be required if cherry-picking social benefits is to be minimized. And as others have noted, there is no real prospect of solving these problems in a society which both tolerates huge income disparities and underinvests in its community infrastructure.
40
I lived in both New York and San Francisco and left for the reasons stated. I returned to my home, Chicago, which is the best of the big US cities. There are serious infrastructure, racial and economic problems but despite the cold winter, Chicago has the most robust art, music, theater and culinary scene, the best in the nation.
Please, stay away.
24
@Jake News
But you’re now in Abiquiu, a slice of heaven.
I have home in Santa Fe; if health care we’re better I’d change domicile in a heartbeat.
1
I've lived in all of the cities listed in the headline, and left all three due to an inability to find affordable housing and having to constantly worry about money despite my incredibly low overhead (single, no kids, no major health issues). After leaving the bay, and before coming to China, I lived in Indiana for five years, getting a PhD. I loved the low rent, ample space, and ease of living. Maybe not as many food and entertainment options, but I highly recommend getting out of the big cities.
19
I live here in already gentrified Portlandia. There are 400 units in my 40 year old complex in the south end of downtown (built to only withstand a 6.5 earthquake when a 9.0 is now expected) and another 525 going in within a block on two different sites next year. Ironically the new ones may keep my rent from going up due to increased local supply.
There is an article in the October Le Monde Diplomatique about France spending $38 billion euros to expand the light rail in a ring around Paris doubling the length of the current metro subway line, purposely putting stops where there are now few people in order to spur development in those areas. It seems to me city governments actually want this kind of growth.
8
I wonder if this is the process that will slow down the increasing concentration of people and wealth in large cities, away from mid-sized and small ones.
Some say: "yes, the cost of housing is crazy in these great cities, and the traffic is really bad, but there are many benefits and we gladly pay the cost." But who are the people who can say that? Are they young teachers? Or are they people who have already made it, who are comfortable enough, who own the roof over their head and are extremely unlikely to ever become homeless or broke?
If cost of living is unmanageable for too many, people will eventually settle elsewhere. They will take with them their creativity and innovativeness, which is often more present in those not very well-off and comfortable. This just might result in more economic equality across the landscape. Some wealth would be pulled away from the cool big cities, but that might result in gradual adjustment of incomes and wealth. If the income inequality is truly unsustainable, something will eventually disrupt its propagation. Maybe the worsening living conditions in large cities will be part of that process.
I write this from a little known blue-ish city in the very red heartland, 300K people and growing. It used to be boring, but it is changing. Lots of innovation and creative, independent, young businesses. It's easier to start something here. Great housing at median-US prices, no traffic congestion. It'll be interesting to see how things develop.
12
@Jane I agree. It seems that every time I leave the Bay Area, I'm impressed by the livability in places with staid reputations--they have artists, musicians, brew pubs, independent films. And the Bay Area does risk becoming creatively stagnant, as creative folk are out-priced. Other places don't have the Bay Area's physical beauty: hills, bay, forests, ocean. But to this California snob, it's heartening to see vibrancy and creativity growing elsewhere.
24
NYC was a great place to be in the 1950's when I was a kid with a large Italian immigrant family in Corona. It was a great place to be when I attended college on Staten Island in the 1960's riding into Manhattan for a nickel on the ferry ( which is now free!) and now that I am easing into geezer hood it is a great place to take Amtrak to from upstate once a month or so to visit museums, eat good food, people watch and just walk around. There are ups and downs to the relationship but I would never even consider divorce.
41
I moved to the Bay Area in the early 70s to go graduate school at UC Berkeley and enjoyed every minute. Eventually I moved to San Francisco and have remained, with some dual living in New York for a number of years. San Francisco is a wonderful place to live then and now. There is lots to do, the “high culture “ institutions of art and music are actually that, terrific places to eat on every level plus most people can also cook, and do it well. People are intelligent and do interesting things. The city is evolving into something even more nuanced and splendid. I love it and glad I said it...so there!
63
@JLxx5 With due respect, doesn’t the life you describe capture SF’s problem? You mention splitting time between the Bay and NYC, the plethora of high culture institutions, and people doing interesting things. These things require a certain wealth and (often) education level inaccessible to most, particularly because most people can’t afford to live in these places. I don’t begrudge your good fortune, but as long as we emphasize the things you listed over building housing and good public schools in our nation’s “star” cities, these amenities will be accessible only to the rich.
86
@JLxx5
SF is absolutely wonderful for those who can afford it. The same can be said for Seattle, New York, Boston, etc.
Here's the thing....increasingly fewer can afford it. People who can't afford it are having to commute further distances just to get to their lower paying jobs in those places. When you frequent your terrific places to eat, you might ask yourself how the waitstaff live.
"So there!" reeks of elitism and a distinct lack of caring about anything other than your own needs. So typically American these days. Sad.
12
The comments — and, of course, the original column, are interesting. As a fifth-generation California , I am particularly amused at the notion that we are somehow dependent on Kansas, Nebraska or anywhere else for food. I belong to a local social network, NextDoor, which, of course occurs throughout the country. Local members became curious as to the origins of the homeless here. Close questioning revealed that many of these folks came to San Francisco because they had heard about the availability of free food and health care and, then,of course, there’s the weather.
Mass, obvious homelessness is a relatively recent phenomenon here as is the gross disparity in income. When I was a child, San Francisco featured the full range of incomes but also a population less than half the current one. It has never been cheap to live here but it used, at least. To be possible to do so. Rent control has allowed me and other retired people like me to remain in place. Once we die, rents are likely to become astronomical. The likeliest scenario is that the hilltops become akin to a gated community and the valleys between, a lawless no-man’s land of the homeless and desperate. This will be a tragic end to a once-great city.
16
@Jackie Mayhew
Another SFer now an expat, love my city but stressed.
You may want to read Chris Hedges, America: The Farewell Tour to see why it's happening, and SF still not too bad as it goes. Still a proud place in the American landscape -- such as it is.
5
@Jackie Mayhew
Unless you were born in 1900, the population of S.F. has not doubled since your childhood. It was 775,000 in 1950 and is about 870,000 now.
I grew up on the east coast, and lived in NYC, Philly and DC -- great cities all. But I moved to SF as a young adult and have never looked back. Yes, the dirty streets are a big, embarrassing issue. Yes, like everywhere else, there's wealth disparity and drug-fueled homelessness to a frightening degree. Yes, housing is too expensive and development is a constant battle. Yes, the Salesforce tower is an ugly and symbolic blot on the landscape. SF isn't Atlantis. We can and should do better.
But people young and old keep wanting to move to this tiny, water-bound tip of a peninsula, a place that has always had physical room for fewer than 1M of the metro region's 10+ million residents. Why? Because this is a city where just walking out your front door nourishes your eyes, body and spirit with incredible beauty. Where your neighborhood abounds with families that confound the "norm --across gender, age, nationality, color, sexual preference, religion, dress, lifestyle--and no one lifts an eyebrow. Where ever since the gold rush, the most basic "SF value" has been a deep respect for the rights of individuals and a core belief that those rights include the right to openly be exactly who you want to be. SF's popularity is a tribute to the fact that art and commerce both thrive where human rights are cherished and freedom of thought is a given.
Anyone who thinks their city is "becoming SF" should count their blessings. After 30 years, I still do, every day.
423
Families? There are no families. We recently moved back to SF after 30 years in the suburbs and have been struck by how the population has aged since we last lived here in the 80’s. SF has the lowest percentage of children of any major city in the US. There are kids in Chinatown but nowhere else that I can see. And any apartment building of any size north of Market was built 40 years ago. The City is killing itself by clinging to the past.
60
@Anna Have you ever been to the Noe Valley or Bernal Heights neighborhoods? I live in Northwest Bernal Heights and am a parent to a toddler surrounded by a community of parents with young kids. Obviously you haven’t visited these areas if you declare Chinatown to be the only enclave of children in SF. There is a community of young families here- a thriving one that I’m thankful to be a part of.
39
@AJ I love the neighborhoods you describe. But it's hard to believe that the families you describe, are able to afford them. I don't know any non-techie who can buy there; and the only ones who can rent, are over 45 and dependent on rent control for places they've had for years, if not decades. Or they share, where their bedroom is a closet or a dining-room or a blocked-off part of the living room.
Those neighborhoods have been changing for decades.
38
How about another term ,Waterburyization.90 miles from New York City ,my hometown,A hard scrabble Oldmill town with not many prospects,Sees a constant influx Of New Yorkers who could no longer afford to live there ,all though they might still Travel there every day.The way things are going in New York,Over 100 miles from the city may well become the norm for people to live who have Been driven out of the cities by the high cost.The average home price in Waterbury is 113,000$,I hope no one living in New York has a heart attack when he sees this figure.they Probably wouldn’t want to live here anyway if They could help it.
5
Unlike Manhattan which is bedrock, San Francisco is mostly fill so the higher it builds up the deeper it sinks. Sort of self regulating.
6
Here's the thing: this expands so much further than cities and into the areas where the tech people want to play and retire. Bozeman, Montana has Denver-level rent prices, with 1-bedroom apartments going for $1200/month in a city where people are lucky to make $50k/yr.
My old haunt of Boulder, Colorado is astronomically overpriced. And really, any town that people like to recreate in has San Franciscans buying up all the property and renting it out at huge costs to locals. Just today my building in small-town Butte was bought by someone in San Diego. If they raise my rent, I'm leaving. To where? Not sure. Butte isn't exactly my dream town to begin with. Not after living in places like Boulder and Bozeman, that's for sure.
The Californication of the West via tech bro money is imminent. It makes me sick to my stomach. Good for them, I guess. And terribly bad for the rest of us.
61
Oh, please. "Gentrification" is what happens to cities over time, if they're lucky. If they're unlucky, they empty out like Detroit. We have half again as many people in the US as we did back in the golden age, yet we're surprised that the most attractive cities are "too expensive"? I knew when I first visited SFO in the 70s that (1) I'd love to live there and (2) I'd never be able to afford that, even with a professional degree. We all make choices. My forebears moved from the inner city to the outer city to the suburbs, driven by the the deterioration of housing stock and the then-current American dream. We moved back into the inner city and "gentrified" it (made it livable) and their grandkids are back in the outer city neighborhoods, doing the same thing. Should people have a right to live where they want? My first preference is Montecito (or at least it was, until the fire/mudslide cycle intensified). Can I get a house there, please?
12
@Malby "Never be able to afford it"? I lived in San Francisco from 1969 to 1983. I had a flat in Cow Hollow. Two bedroom furnished, with a garden in back. I paid $175 a month. You could walk to Chestnut street for shopping and you were at the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge for getting out of town on the weekends. Before that, I paid $125 for a studio near the City Hall. You should have looked around.
12
You've changed the definition of the word "gentrification" to suit your world view. Where I come from, it means the pricing out of communities so developers can build cookie-cutter condos.
1
The San Francisco I grew up in didn’t have skyscrapers, and was a place where one could aspire to upward mobility, with a place for the middle class. My stomping grounds ranged from Lake Merced to Golden Gate Park, and included romps at Stern Grove and soccer games at Beach Chalet. And that was when I was in elementary school at St. Gabriel’s on 42nd and Ulloa, in the Sunset District. It was perfect. I would watch sunsets from a favorite bench on the Great Highway.
Then it all changed. The building height limits were eliminated and the first thing I remember was the TransAmerica Building going up. It was only a matter of time before the banking and development interests that the Pyramid represented took over. Unbridled. Suddenly, my boyhood paradise exploded into the multi-millions of people that came flooding into all the new development. People talked about the “Manhattanization of Downtown”, but that’s all it was: talk. What was once a “long way to San Jose” and miles of orchards has become a corridor that now resembles more a parking lot than a highway. The only industrial building I remember on the old 101 was the Ampex Building, near the airport. Now, tech company buildings sprawl everywhere, and the quality of life is absurd.
I don’t know what could have stopped it. But because it couldn’t be stopped, the hills have been raped, the orchards plowed under, the middle class have fled, and there’s little water to go around. My Bay Area is now only a memory.
18
@Robert Grijalva Hey, I lived and worked in that San Francisco for 12 years. Wages were low until high tech arrived. My salary quadrupled after that. God bless the new San Francisco. Yes, it got more expensive to live there. No kidding?
@Robert Grijalva
"Those were the days, my friend...."
It's called P-R-O-G-R-E-S-S and you can't stop it. My mantra, when asked for my feelings about living here (or there) has always been, "I focus on the good about a place and try, as much as I can, to improve the bad."
1
@Shirah Kovnat "It's called P-R-O-G-R-E-S-S and you can't stop it."
-------
“Progress might have been alright once, but it has gone on too long.”
— Ogden Nash
4
Luddites.
I remember when my godmother, living on 49th Street & 8th Avenue, had to take out a PO Box at Radio City Station, because her mail got stolen every day.
I lived at 52nd & 8th, and I'm SO GLAD those days are gone.
6
The root of the problem: In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crises resulting from the massive fraud perpetrated (by easily-identifiable) Wall Street criminals, the U.S. government facilitated the transfer of trillions of dollars (from the Fed) to these banks (so-called "Quantitative Easing").
Much of that money flowed back into speculative financial investment companies, including private equity firms who proceeded to buy hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of properties (homes, etc.) at fire-sale prices.
Other players got into the action, including anonymous LLCs, many of whom buy real estate as a money-laundering "strategy."
This situation, coupled with the artificially-inflated salaries of "tech bros" resulting from (again) huge amounts of "investment firms" monies flowing into worthless apps and fake "gig economy" businesses, but capable of wiping out any potential competition (because of predatory pricing, and market practices), and the fact that it seems that ALL politicians at the local (city councils) and state levels seem to be in the pockets of real estate cartels (which explains the lack of rent control regulations, and other tenants' protections), are the root causes of the current housing crunch, and resulting homelessness crisis.
This casino capitalism game is not sustainable. This latest House of Cards will collapse again, and the results are likely to be worse than what happened in 2008.
35
This comment warrants more recommends.
1
@Luis Mendoza "...artificially-inflated salaries of "tech bros"... Name me another industry that inflated workers salaries. Apparently, it bothers you that workers are getting more money than ever before. Want to go back to the old system of low paid workers with no chance of a raise, ever? Yes, you do I am guessing. Higher wages keep people off the streets. It is despicable to have homeless people on the streets but the best answer is wages high enough to allow change.
1
I am opposed to growth, yet this is exactly what all governments and businesses desire. Isn't there a way to slow the earth's growing population? How about support for global contraception and abortion--the very things governments and businesses probably oppose.
20
It would do a lot of good to the cities mentioned in this article if they could be Fargo-ized a bit.
3
I'm not as concerned as to how these major money making residents of these cities are doing. It's when they take some of that city money and buy up the country side and small rural places and destroy them for locals who can no longer afford to live there. From Maine to the San Juan Islands, Cape Cod to Florida, the second (and third) homeowners from the big cities are gentrifying and destroying 100's of formally affordable places to live. Where are we, the lower crust, going to live? Can't afford the big city and now we can't afford to live in the country.
26
Re: It’s much harder to point to cities that have gotten all of this right — the growth without the congestion, the tech jobs without the homeless crisis, the affordable housing without the sprawl.
Can't think of one in the US, but outside the US
The city that got everything right: Vienna (Austria)
I
6
I have been in Seattle, WA , since separating from the US Navy in 2008. I have watch the streets fill with homelessness, human waste, meth, heroine needles, and crime. Their are more tents on the side of the roads in some neighborhoods, instead of actual homes. Our properties have been brought out by noncitizens, which caused bidding wars and high asking prices, since their children are attending the University of WA. In returned, 1 bdrms =2000, 2 bdrms =3000 and so on. The consequences of no rent cap. Also the tuition has risen at the University of WA, since 90 percent of the students are not from this country. Food banks help more people to the point, a Safeway went out of business in my neighborhood, because of the cost for groceries no one can afford. I was taxed out of my home in Seattle May 2018, and had to sell and repurchase in Everett, WA, which is 20 minutes north. My commute now is 2 hours in the morning to work in Seattle, and 4 hours home, due to the congested traffic of families who also fled north. Thank you Amazon, Facebook, Expedia, T Mobile, Microsoft, Expedia, Nintendo, University of WA, and Starbucks for damaging hard working families, to the point of stress being at an all time high in hospital emergency rooms in this city. New York and Virginia get ready for the destruction that Jeff Bezos is going to bring to your cities.This city is a play ground for the rich, and they step on the necks of us poor people everyday with a smile on their face.
49
@Martha Richardson I lived in Seattle 18 of the last 24 years, and just recently moved. It has certainly changed and the rents are as high as you listed, depending on the neighborhood, of course. But your statement that 90% of students at Univ of WA are "not from this country" is simply untrue (it's more like 17%, if you check the facts). There are international university students, but please be sure that when you build an argument you refer to accurate figures. To do otherwise, in this case, contributes toward the flawed understanding that the University is being taken over by students from outside the US.
14
@Martha Richardson Seattle has always been riddled with homelessness and crime. Back in 2005 I recall vividly watching homeless addicts shoot up in broad daylight from my office on Elliott Ave. Let's not pretend that somehow it got worse. Sorry to hear about the loss of your house, hope you had a chance to look into tax exemptions.
1
@Martha Richardson. Foreigners do not make up 90 percent of US students. It's actually 30 percent. Many hardworking people work at the companies you mention and Seattle is lucky to have them. I remember the days of the Boeing Bust, when everyone was leaving town. Any city would love to have Amazon, Facebook, Expedia, T Mobile, Microsoft, Expedia, Nintendo, University of WA, and Starbucks.
2
Dear Emily, thanks for your article, it made me feel so depressed and hopeless
14
@Common Sense Guy
Cheer up. You could live in Manila or Mumbai, Delhi or Dhaka. Count your blessings.
1
The author should fact check the eye-opening earnings and pensions of San Francisco firefighters before including them as an example of middle-class workers that can't afford the city. If they live outside of the city, they have that option because of their compressed work schedule and their ability to arbitrage their expenses. In fact their total compensation contributes to the taxpayer expense of living in San Francisco.
15
New York City has a bigger population than Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Denver, Portland, Boston and Washington COMBINED (Google it).
Yes, housing is insane here, but Amazon and the Google expansion are blips. The city will change fractionally at best (and high-paying tech jobs represent a much-needed balance for our dependence on Wall Street).
You can have quality of life or you can live in the greatest city in the world. But you can't have both.
6
@Sparky
"New York City has a bigger population than Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Denver, Portland, Boston and Washington COMBINED ..."
I'm not sure this assertion has apples to apples significance. The population of the metropolitan area of San Francisco is about 4.6 million. The slightly larger area which also includes San Jose and Oakland has a population of 8.7 million. The population of the metropolitan area of Seattle is 3.9 million. The city limits of both these cities enclose areas (and populations) that are quite small. The area of San Francisco proper is only 15% the size of New York City. The area of Seattle proper is about 28% the size of New York City. In both cities, much if not most of the growth and activity has taken place outside of the city limits.
I understand why you like New York City though I think the quality of life there now is very high. When I lived in Manhattan in the 80s, the quality of life was not so nearly so high but I still loved it.
7
@Sparky LA county alone (not the surrounding metro area) has over 10 million people. That said, I agree, the entirety of the city will not change. But Queens, a bastion of lower priced housing where a lot of cab drivers and "regular" folks live, sure will. Not everyone will move to the easily-commutable Upper East Side. Maybe just the executives.
This article and just about all of the comments share the same short-sightedness: future solutions or perceptions of ye goode olde days are expressed using short-term language--mostly 50 years forward or back.
If we stay with the current system of counting years, one day we will give as birthday gifts calendars with the numbers 22018 or 32018.
It will happen, but we are incapable of contemplating or planning for something that far away.
The four most important words for our world and its inhabitants:
How much is enough?
Lindy
this discussion doesn't end with the US. Look at Europe. Look to Canada. Here in Amsterdam the problems exist, but not nearly at a scale they do in the US. Why? Capitalism has run significantly less amok here. Will the US eventually swing away from prioritizing business over the quality of life of it's citizens? That I don't know. But I definitely don't want to live there myself. (and yes, I am an American.)
37
@Michelle
Amsterdam is one of the birthplaces of capitalism and THE BIRTHPLACE of STOCK OWNERSHIP (can you say tulips?).
The Dutch created NYC's still mercantile culture.
LOL.
2
San Francisco, my adopted city, was ruined by tech and real estate investors. The tech companies may not even be profitable, but continual rounds of venture capital allow them to pay their staffs the big bucks. It's all a kind of funny money, but it pays the rent on those $5,000/mo apartments. Real estate shills cry for more building, but the majority of the new housing is being bought up by real estate investors, most of them absentee. Who else can afford $2 million for condo, or $4 million for a house? (average price).
14
@Bob G.Costs are indeed outrageous; my search found t the median price of a SF single-family house was $1.7M, and the median 2 bedroom condo price was about the same as of last July (MLS data reported by Paragon Realty). Just the $300K downpayment would buy the property outright in most parts of the US and the world. But not to worry - Newton's third law of gravity's about to kick in in tandem with the Fed's rate raises. This will not last forever.
1
@Bob G.
You might want to do some fact checking before you claim that $4 million is the “average” home price in San Francisco. You’re only over 100% too high (median single family home price is about $1.5 million). Maybe you are thinking of the Sea Cliff neighborhood.
1
Having lived in the Puget Sound area (greater Seattle MSA) for 28 of my last 40 years west of the Mississipp (not 28 consecutive) I can tell you that this area has changed immeasurably over the last 10-20 years. Right or wrong, good or bad, it's crushing a lot of good folks.
The charm is long gone.
14
@J Darby. The charm is gone for you, but lives on for many of us.
Indeed, it is all about perspective. Used to be a Seattleite, now a Manhattanite, and having visited Seattle this Christmas time after almost 15 years, the city's progress is remarkable.
Housing prices will always go up in cities with a strong economy, its basic demand and supply.
The real concern with these cities is the infrastructure - public transportation is crumbling, traffic is bad, these cities are not being prepared for protection against natural disasters, airports are showing their age.
Density is tolerable when public infrastructure is good, not otherwise.
6
Bringing in too many immigrants too fast creates homelessness. Plus tourism, with the invention of Airbnb where residential buildings are turned into commercial accommodation. Airbnb pays 5 times more and they're only short term stays. NZ never had homelessness until the last government let in too many immigrants and NZ discovered Airbnb for tourists. NZ has the highest rate of Airbnb in the world per population ratio. Our new government is doing something about it by building more State housing and cheaper accommodation.
Lots of new immigrants don't rent out properties and just hold on to them as 'ghost' houses until the value goes up. Probably cheaper to do that than rent to tenants because of the NZ tenancy Act. New immigrants and migrants bring new ideas and we have ended up with homelessness in NZ since the last government opened the flood gates and didn't control migration.
7
@CK blaming the poorest people for problems created by the richest corporations on earth seems rather callous and far-fetched.
1
There’s an awful lot of speculation here and little evidence cited.
1
Amusing article. I've lived in the Bay Area for over 30 years, having spent time in New York (Queens and LI), Miami and DFW Metroplex. Emily writes about rich and homeless, expensive rents and long commutes, and other big city woes (San Francisco is not a big city, much smaller than Portland or Seattle) but she neglects to mention the reasons why many people live in these cities. Yes, we can be dirty and the homeless decorate out streets, but we are tolerant, cultural, scenic and in the west, great weather. And we have the best economy (and creativity) in the world. Why would one live in Topeka, or Kansas City or, God Forbid, any city in Alabama when one can live here in the Peninsula.
56
@GEO2SFO The Bay Area is like any luxury item--great if you can afford it. But unreachable to most.
The average income is the US is around $50k/yr. That won't buy any housing in the Bay Area, or rent for a garage apartment.
Why would anyone eat beans, when they could have filet mignon?
The answer is that they can't afford any better. And that applies to most people in this country.
19
@GEO2SFO
KC is a fantastic place to live to raise a family there. There are options for affordable housing, plenty of dining options, (Brazilian, Ethiopian, Spanish, Hungarian, Indian, Kosher and of course BBQ) and high end like the capital grille.
There are 3 pro sports teams, performing arts center, concert venues, museums, which are affordable to those making $50k/yr.
One can find beauty in 50 miles out of town in the rolling hills of sunflowers in the summer. Never thought I’d miss snow, but it can be beautiful and even fun to play with in a yard instead of a dirty eyesore from plowing it from the city streets. Beauty can be found all over the country you just have to appreciate it.
Having moved to the south I’d gladly move back to the semi harsh winter of KC to raise my child outside of a region that has still has very good ol boy mentality from yesteryear and the confederate mentality is still there. But the cheap property taxes here provides my family with a greater opportunity to travel, one thing KC couldn’t offer my family. Now we can afford to visit these places that you are so fortunate to live in.
The quality of life when comparing KS/AL to these cities is too disparate unless you’re wealthy. It’s about what you want in life
Every city has their own problems. it’s about what those problems are or your personal views of the city’s shortcomings you’re willing to live with or can afford to. Check your privilege.
6
@GEO2SFO
I moved from San Francisco to Kansas City a few years ago. Yes, I miss the weather. I miss Zante's Indian Pizza in the Mission & etc.
But in Kansas City I can actually afford to buy a home and have done so. I can still enjoy the cultural amenities of a city without having to pay more than my mortgage for a studio apartment. And the BBQ is pretty darn good.
Not everyone shares your same goals so perhaps don't look down on those of us who have chosen differently. It makes you look like a San Francisco arriviste (which you probably are).
2
I am in SF. Firefighters live two hrs away? Are you kidding? They start at six digits with overtime. As much or more than Google kids.
They can retire 20 years later and get paid for the rest of their life including health care.
Don't weep for firefighters, they work maybe 10 hrs a week and sleep and make feasts the rest of the time.
56
@leftcoast
And will still risk their lives saving you despite your unflattering and overly simplistic view of them.
6
@leftcoast
Firefighters in San Fran start at over $100k? I don't believe you.
They have big bellies. Most of them.
1
So let me get this straight, we don’t want to be like successful prosperous cities? I thought we were complaining about cities that were losing jobs to China. Seems like businesses are moving to where the people they want to hire are living. The problem is planning for affordable housing. Cities focus on attracting businesses, without considering the necessary infrastructure. Unfortunately, free markets left alone seek only immediate profits, not long term standards of living.
25
I'll go out on a limb here and make a prediction regarding these "great" cities. If you think they are expensive now, I predict that they will get much, much more expensive in the not too distant future. The crux of the situation pivots on the fact that none of these places produce their own electricity, grow their own food, produce their own oil/gas/fuel or even provide their own water. Those, somewhat essential commodities, are going to become much more expensive and costly to supply to the big cities from the small towns and flyover states. This, to say nothing about the off-shore factories that supply most of the products, clothes and consumables that the cities need everyday. Not only are these resources becoming more scarce but the logistical costs are phenomenally low currently. So, enjoy your crowded, expensive, fragile and polarized meccas while you can. Before long many will be motivated to live much closer to the necessities... The climate is calling!
1
The Twin Cities have sprawled over so many apple orchards and so much other farmland--how can you cite them as a good form of urbanization?
4
San Francisco has had a homeless problem LONG before the tech boom—even long before people had personal computers. It’s also been expensive for a really long time. My parents bought their house here for $60,000–when houses in the suburbs were only $40,000.
10
@Scott D
How right you are! I live in Oakland. Looked at moving to SF 25 years ago when I was offered an excellent job but did not want to commute. Decided I could not afford to live in SF and have worked in the East Bay since. Guess what? Property values keep going up. I could have afforded it but didn't know it. "Too expensive" is a relative thing. But you have to be a risk taker. It looks to me as tho Berkeley and Oakland have just a big a homeless problem now as SF.
7
@Scott D
That was a long time ago, now a reasonable house is 2 million and family size house in the burbs is 1.5m?
Two million in Arkansas will get you a mansion, a pool, a guesthouse. As well as the rest of the neighbor's houses on the block.
1
@leftcoast But to accomplish that I would have to live in Arkansas. 'nuff said.
2
People in Texas have been imploring for years: " Don't Californicate Texas "
But it is really difficult to distinguish Atlanta from Dallas from Phoenix from Houston from Kansas City from Tampa if your whole life is measured out in freeway commutes and visits to attractive but indistinguishable vaguely Mediterranean/Spanish, nicely landscaped shopping plazas. Your choice is apoplexy from the freeway or terminal ennui from that plaza with ample parking but no soul. I have lived in NY City, Houston, Dallas, Austin. I have also lived in Fairbanks and Albany. I regularly visit Seattle , Austin and Houston. I currently live in a midwestern city of about 600,000 people. Please let me end my days here. As a lifelong , mostly Texan, I have certain loyalties and memories. But as the population expands everywhere it is becoming less unique and provides the same frustrations. But we don't have the open sidewalk toilets the Times described in San Francisco, or the rents in Manhattan which require educated, hard working, normal people to live like rats in boxes. Overpopulation and competition for resources is here. Nice places to live are one of the most fought after resources. We are not yet Mumbai, or Rio or Mexico City , but the writing is on the wall. We can talk about it, wring our hands, try to stem the tide. I don't see a way to plan around it.
16
While SF is the focal point, be aware it really started south of SF in Santa Clara County. SJ was the sister “sh_thole” city. Now it’s pretty nice, but the whole peninsula is expensive. With a high speed passenger rail coming to my town it will spread to me. What are the solutions? Higher density, much faster rapid transit, that puts outlying areas in completition. As people say supply and demand. Housing is or can be highly competitive.. regulation won’t fix it.. good policy and density rules will
5
There is an ebb and flow to all this. In the 60s and 70s everyone wanted to move to the country. Then as we baby boomers settled into family life it was the suburbs. Following the great recession older urban areas were back in vogue, especially among the young.
Now those cities are running up against their limits and both employers and workers are looking elsewhere, to the interior of the country, to second and third tier cities, to inner suburbs. The recent booms times are exacerbating this by increasing the pressure everywhere. The new "receiving" areas are likely happy about the added prosperity that seems headed their way, but also anxious about running up against limits themselves.
I'm a retired urban planner and one thing I learned in my career is that no matter how hard we try to anticipate and plan for what we theoretically want we can't come close to the power of the market in a free economy. We can control some things around the edges but the economy will have its way. And we adjust.
I think the foreseeable future will be a good one for small to medium sized cities and some towns as working from home becomes more feasible and more necessary. If a larger older inner city is too difficult people will demand the freedom to adjust to some outlying area but without the daily commute. And the urban culture of the city will follow in small, manageable doses. And that will make for many good places, until they too reach their limits.
15
@Terry as working from home becomes more feasible and more necessary
Go on dice.com and select (as I do several times a week) the jobs that allow telecommuting out of the 10,000 or so total available. It is never more than 250. Companies even in this networked time want to see people sitting in seats so they can look over their shoulders and control them, even if it means making it harder to find qualified people. That includes all the jobs in Nowheresvilles that no one wants to live in or move to.
7
No one has mentioned the actual problem of population pressure. It certainly Is not just happening due to the recent tech boom. It’s happening due to millions more people being born daily, all of who will eventually need somewhere to live and work. Maybe it’s just too frightening to think of how unsustainable it all is. That Cities are getting way too top heavy is just one problem. Suburbs are sprawling all over the outskirt of all cites large and small alike, and natural open space are being greatly altered for extractions. It’s a big problem no one likes to talk about. We just go on on fiddling while Rome burns.
13
@Sue
Thanks! No one dares question the doctrine of limitless growth.
Avoid rent control, wage controls, government handouts over charitable ones, and remove barriers to building housing, and the "problems" will only be those of our preferences and realities, not of corrupting tyranny.
8
I moved from NYC to a European capital with rent control for a long term project. Incredible way of life.
4
I am willing to take up on this philosophy if I could see a working example of this philosophy, every city in the history of civilization has had to grapple with problems that arise from distributing limited resources.
@David
WE can do that! By forcing the rich to pay their fair share!
Whereas in Kirkland it's Social Darwinism Uber Alles.
1
I think that a quick look will confirm that the supply side of the housing equation in most of the cities mentioned is constrained by geography. There is really no solution except to make it easy to commute.
13
Too some extent, geography is a constraint. But the unwillingness of NYC to build sufficient housing is more constrained by policy. If you can't build out, build up.
3
@Alan Yup. Politicians in NY pander to their base by beating the rent control drum, and then pretend to be perplexed as to why no 'affordable' housing gets built.
1
@Bob McConnell You can build up, replace old housing, etc. Instead, we're told about "out of character" or "old (aka "historical" when no history was made there) or "subsidized"....
Would you rather be in dayton? despite its woes, San Francisco is blessed with incomparable beauty; near perfect weather ; and is surrounded by escape opportunities: hiking, beaches, mountains for skiing, wine regions, lakes, rivers, redwoods. Not sure what this author is saying.
71
@karen What's wrong with Dayton? Cost of living is probably 1/10th of SF. One can escape easily from Dayton every weekend with the money saved from paying rent in SF.
Ultimately life is what you make of it where ever you are.
12
Our cites and towns put themselves "on sale" for corporations which promise to bring jobs but they do not also take the responsibility of building infrastructure to support growth, and, even worse, they give up tax revenue to do it. Of course people are afraid of growth. So why then do we operate this way: 1) Politicians getting votes for bringing in good paying jobs? partly 2) Poor government planning and negotiation. mostly. Lack of federal revenue-share to staff competent good local government. This is what Reganomics+ leads to. A mistake we need to correct. For the last 10 years interest rates have been near zero. Corporations are flush with cash. We should not be giving tax dollars to billionaires and corporations except possibly in a recession but only if the jobs are near term.
23
@philip These places are bustling with people and people love to move to them, and they have the best paying jobs. It's only when corrupt politicians pretend they can control jobs/wages, housing/rent control, and think transportation is provided by government rather than free markets that we suffer.
Check out the non-government run transit in Japan to see how 10 million move about; yes, build airports is fine, but don't run the airlines.
5
@David I am not advocating a 100% socialist approach, I am simply saying local governments have been stripped of their best employees because they cannot afford them, yet they are responsible for making decisions for all of us. This is a soft or covert oligarchy supporting policy started by Regan and his conservative "thinkers", which largely takes the decisions out of local hands and puts it in the hands of politicians and corporations. We could have beautiful cities that work, but all we have is beautiful corporations which we bow to.
16
@David One additional comment: If corporations are "people" let them provide for themselves, just like the rest of us people do, and pay their share of the tax burden.
5
Pittsburgh was courting Amazon and everyone who lives here was dreading the possibility of adding an additional 20,000 possible cars to our already outdated, overused local highway system.
A huge sigh of relief was issued upon our rejection.
11
It is just supply and demand. Nothing more. Unfortunately, times change and we can't all have what we want. There is too much of a sense of entitlement these days.
20
@John Visco
That is cold cold cold. Keep your Ayn Rand by the nightstand when you pray.
2
@John Visco:
Yes, those crazy people actually expect to have houses closer than 3 hours one way from their job....
1
@John Visco But corrupted government officials limit the supply, and limit low wage jobs, and limit prices.
1
The Bay area is expensive because of a lack of apartments but also because there is very little subsidized or public housing and no real regulation of rents.
11
@Anne - San Francisco has draconian rent control and no means testing. People do not move when they enjoy rents that are ten, twenty, or 30 years old. Small landlords cannot maintain their buildings on these rents. Many keep units off the market rather than allow the city to regulate how they run their businesses. Rent control has caused our "housing crisis." In 2017, 34% of new units built were subsidized/inclusionary. Developers take their projects elsewhere rather than deal with SF's onerous regulations (not to mention neighborhoods that demand affordable housing, yet fight it tooth and nail). Until rent control is ended or sharply limited to people who truly need it (not high-earning techies), San Francisco will continue to be outrageously expensive. We need to let the free market (supply/demand) work.
Getting rid of rent control will most likely displace the current resident and be replaced by a wealthier or if the structure is replaced by many wealthier residents, the infrastructure servicing the area like sewer and water lines, roads and sidewalks are not going to change/ keep up with new demands, problems will probably multiply, just the net worth of the resident involved will go up. Coupling the removal of rent control with property tax control will probably displace all older non wealthy taxpayers. Might be a undesirable but probably a better outcome as people with more resources will be free to make some pricier choices needed.
I'm in my 50's, a professional with 2 advanced degrees. I've been in the SF Bay Area since the mid80's and can attest both that I love it here and that it's always seemed expensive - except when a true recession hits.
I spent my 20's-40 living in group house situations or in very small apartments with high relative rent. Even then I knew only NYC, London, or Hong Kong would be worse.
I became a landlord and a home-owner in my late 40's after twenty years of saving.
Homelessness and inequity are so obvious but I can't say they're "worse" or even local issues. My city is dirtier and more worn and perhaps meaner.
So few homes hit the market here. It's too tax advantaged to rent them out post inheritance or when owners trade up/down but rent instead of sell.
Their children move in (as too many can't afford to buy where they grew up).
It seems "death with too many beneficiaries" is one of the few ways a home in my neighborhood hits the market...that and loss/gain in job or marriage.
I don't feel the city is overcrowded (by NY or Tokyo or Hong Kong standards) but real growth would mean changes at Planning and in all of the suburbs, and changes in infrastructure (mass transit, water, internet, energy, education) that seem beyond our political class's skill set or their voters' desires.
I have no children; so I guess my nephews will be able to live here someday, but ownership here takes an entire generation.
37
"Seattle-ization, meanwhile, is a particularly dire diagnosis: The high housing costs and tech riches there have remade the city with startling speed."
This is a misunderstanding of both Seattle history and the contemporary scene. Let's start over.
The growth of Seattle started with the Alaska Gold Rush, timber and coal mining, which made a total mess of the land and waterways.
The aerospace industry exploded with WWII and cheap Grand Coulee power for aluminum smelting, leaving a legacy of contaminated manufacturing quonset huts around the same waterways.
Boeing employment so dominated the Puget Sound by the 1970s that a downturn led to the billboard asking "will the last person leaving Seattle please turn out the lights".
But thanks to a world class university and other assets, Seattle grew into a hub for Pacific Rim trade, PC software, on-line retailing, cloud computing, biotech, mobile telecom and advanced medicine, while maintaining a vibrant manufacturing sector.
The waterways, once choked with boomtown sawdust and sewage, were cleaned up. Superfund sites were and are being cleaned up. An elevated freeway that cut the city off from a glorious setting on the Sound is being torn down. Nearly 40,000 units of dense urban housing has been built recently. And the region finally began a massive $56 billion transit project, if 50 years too late.
There are still urban problems and a major earthquake somewhere in our future. But I reject the "dire diagnosis" label.
125
@Look Ahead
Yes, thank you. I've called Seattle home since 1981 just after the Boeing bust. I moved from PA and never have regretted moving for a moment. No, the new Seattle certainly is not the same city as it was then and, no we aren't sure exactly what it will become but I would not want to live in any other city, warts and all. The most extreme complaining often comes from those who have spent a lifetime here and don't have the stomach for any change whatsoever and they have been griping about the loss of 'Lesser Seattle' for at least 20 years. Agreed, 'dire' is an exaggeration.
19
@Bailey
Ditto. I have lived in Seattle since 1992. I don't understand all of the consternation. Sure it would be great if it was cheaper but come on, does anyone believe it is possible to have great natural beauty, a high powered economy, and limited amount of space for housing, and have cheap prices? That is never going to happen. I feel 95% of the changes in the last 25 years have been positive.
16
@Look Ahead I agree as well. Yes, I have had a few friends leave due to unaffordable rent increases, but most have stayed figuring out either how to manage with the changes.
There are some things that annoy me about the growth, but I mostly feel that the city is more vibrant and interesting than it was when I moved here 20 years ago.
9
I’ve lived in Seattle for 15 years. I’ve also lived in every corner of the US. I’ll take Seattle over any place else. It’s hard to even know where to begin. The only city that even compares in all of North America is Vancouver.
56
Yes. Seattle and Vancouver! And Maui!
1
I grew up in NY and have lived in Seattle for 30 years. Growth and development are very different in the these two cities. NY grew organically, with development following transit north from the Battery, from horse-drawn trolleys along Broadway to the subway. Throughout its growth NY has always been heterogeneous and diverse. Development on commercial streeets includes local retail on the ground floor and residential units above. One can walk to the local grocer, drug store, cafes, restaurants, etc. Even with the post-recession flood of wealth upward, NY remains the most diverse city in the US. In Seattle, on the other hand, growth and development over the past decade has occurred without any master plan, and with little regard to transit, infrastructure, or maintaining diverse, livable neighborhoods. There has been a massive replacement of traditionally affordable rental and residential housing by shoddily built "luxury" units targeted at the influx of young Amazonies with disposable income. The homeless population has exploded. Developers build where they earn the greatest profit, and our politicos bow and hold the door wide open. Only now are we building light rail that is already inadequate. Puget Sound is polluted and beloved orcas are going extinct. Middle class communal character of Seattle is being replaced by Bezosian wealthy libertarianism. All this has happened without consultation of long time residents. Yes, may your city never become Seattle.
37
Couldn’t disagree more. Most of the communities on the sound have worked hard to keep the Sound alive. You can’t blame the Orca population issues on Seattle- rather look to the surrounding areas that have introduced non native species and oil terminals even as Seattle and the state fight both. It’s disingenuous and a bit hypocritical to say NY grew organically and then Seattle has no master plan. It’s true Seattle is replacing many single family homes and semi industrial areas with box house that are on smaller foot print or more people on same footprint. Most of the brownstones in NY would be impractical and too expensive to build quickly to house the booming population here. Yes it’s true that when new industry comes to town, like Amazon, it can change the character of the city and yes some get left behind and the city must work hard to help those folks. But compare Seattle today with the wide range of major employers- not just Boeing - but a long list of Fortune 1000.
15
@Marston Gould
True that Puget Sound's deteriorating water quality has many sources, but it is misleading to give Seattle a pass. The increased ground coverage with development has increased waste water pollution. The local waste water infrastructure is inadequate to process these higher levels of runoff. Many of the salmon on which orcas depend are dying in the waters around Seattle before they have a chance to enter their spawning rivers.
Pretty cold to say "some get left behind and the city must work hard to help those folks." Seattle has one the highest levels of unsheltered homelessness in the country. Unlike NY and other east coast cities, Seattle has no legal right to shelter. The influx of tech workers to Seattle has aggravated homelessness and wealth inequality. For all the pious talk from politicians and those benefiting from the economic growth, Seattle has failed over a decade to move the 8,600 homeless into stable housing. This in the same city that is home to several of the world's wealthiest families.
3
This is article offers useless and unhelpful observations of obvious drawbacks of large cities. This is not anything new and the principle won't change in 100 years.
I've spent my life living in places that are not "the cool place to be" and I'm tired of it and the boredom it brings. I want a city with vibrance and diversity and good (though in need of repair) public transit. I am moving to Harlem next year. I have the fortune of having an excellent job which I have worked to get for 15 years but I am excited to live in New York City. Sure it and all of the cities listed have major problems, but these things ebb and flow. There will always be Iowa for those who don't want to live in them which offers nice people and affordable housing.
70
Stephen, I would wager that 33% of Americans can't find Iowa on a map!
2
I can attest to the nice people and affordable housing Iowa offers. Having lived here for 13 years, I am torn on whether to stay or not. Once you get used to wide swaths of starry skies, 7-minute commutes, and helpful, friendly people around every corner, it's hard to justify moving to someplace where you can just feel the stress simmering in the air. But I miss the diversity of bigger cities, as well as the arts, restaurants, world-class museums, and shopping. For now, I can get my fix of those things a 1-to-5-hour drive away (1 to 2 for smaller cities with decent options; 4 to 5 for big cities), and still enjoy my cheap rent and backyard deer sightings. It's all about finding the balance that works for you. Sounds like you're ready for a Harlem adventure -- hope you enjoy!
8
I live in Seattle with my partner. We both grew up here. And we often find ourselves reconciling the good and bad impact tech has brought. We're lucky that we work in tech, but this is also our community. It's difficult to fathom people (including college students), attempting to get by on less than $40,000/year in a metro area, where more and more, it is being built for a $200,000+/year income.
13
What is this phenomenon other than projection? Whatever the fear, it seems the cities you spoke of are arguably safer, richer, more vibrant and more innovative than they were in 1975.
Would you really want cold, old, provincial beans and clam chowder and coal burning Boston to come back along with bigotry, racism, abandoned and neglected old neighborhoods?
I like the new cities even as I mourn the inequities. The solution is to regard this entire nation as well deserving of good jobs, good housing and healthy living and see if the whole US can come up to at least low income German standards of cleanliness, education and healthcare.
66
@Harding Dawson
And you know very well that your last paragraph is never going to happen in the U.S., where wealth and exclusivity matter more than the common weal.
Safer, richer, more vibrant.... you list these as if no one else has noticed them, but they have been noticed, by the residents of the cities listed in the article, and those residents are saying the cost of those achievements is an overwhelmingly bleak slide into eventual despair for everyone not on the gravy train of high-tech employment. The reason for that is implied in your final paragraph: The U.S. lacks the governmental motivation and the voter-base empathy to care for the fate of anyone not in the upper-level economic classes. The U.S. is a thoughtless, cruel country when it comes to self-assessing its own record on how it manages its immense wealth in terms of seeing to the needs of its residents and citizens. The sad irony of San Francisco makes it all plain enough: a sector of politically liberal techies build job campuses that require workers to bow down at the altar of useless political correctness and to pretend that their hearts and votes are all in the right compassionate places, and yet those same techies drive or bicycle home to neighborhoods where they have priced out life-long residents and where they--so they can sleep at night--have to ignore the homelessness they've helped instigate.
No wonder other cities are saying 'No! Thank you... but no."
7
@Harding Dawson
Cold? Sometimes
Provincial? Definitely
Beans? Never had them or seen them anywhere (except in what some Irish eat with breakfast, and it wasn't once called "Beantown" because of them)
Clam Chowder? Yes, it's a thing, everywhere along the coast, to NYC and yonder South.
Coal? Never seen anyone burn it around here, in my over-50 years of life.
White flight was a characteristic of every major American urban area in the 1960s. The thing is people want to live in the city again, and not in tenements with or without plumbing or only cold water & shared bathrooms, or in 100+ year old rickety balloon framed 3-family wooden houses. But, those houses are now 3-multi-million dollar condos in one building. It's crazy, I know but everyone wants to live in the city again.
2
Boston is a wonderful place to live. Top ranked schools; cutting edge hospitals and research; and of course, Red Sox, Celtics, and Patriots. It's a walking town. Cold? Yes. Racism? Yes. 2 things: down coat and good shoes. The racism is overt, so people know where we stand. Boston is unlike any other metropolitan place. Greater Boston is where people live. That includes Cambridge, Newton, Brookline, etc. We take the train everywhere. Cars are unnecessary. I've lived on both coasts. Northern CA is fine, but it's not exactly an arts mecca.
4
The real problem is the wealth disparity. It is the underlying problem for a lot of the nation's unhappiness and unrest. It's a cliche about which nobody seems inclined to do anything--the American Dream is out of reach for too many. Once too many people are no longer benefiting from the system, the system starts to fall apart.
179
@bounce33 100% agree with you on this. That is certainly the overarching theme with all of these cities.
7
Possible revolt or revolution?
2
@bounce33
Not only fall apart, but as it begins to fray, those benefiting from the system will try to cling to it as long as possible, and prolong it.
It is they who don't realize that things always work out better for everyone when the mondo-rich have a little less and everyone else has a little more. Not talking about give-aways here (although, inevitably, someone will say "seems to me you are....."). There are clear limits to opportunities in life thanks in no part to The Haves being allowed to run the show their way while laughing at the recourse everyone else has: Nothing other than flimsy laws and regulations that the rich won't hesitate to ignore. They don't want you to succeed, progress, rise, or prosper or live happy, content, safe lives. They want you to shut up and behave. They want you to be in fear. And they want you to pay their and your rent. They live for free while the majority struggles to make ends meet.
7
Seattle HAS changed, in large part because for the past decade the city's administration has been relying on developers to write the zoning codes that increased density, increased building heights, up zoned neighborhoods, and generally allowed developers build to some of the most poorly designed and cheaply constructed dwelling units the city has ever had. The city is complicit in building future slums under the premises of building affordable housing to solve a housing crisis. As these policies are implemented housing prices have not gone down, allegedly due to supply and demand. But it is actually a never ending spiral of greed.
If Seattle WERE serious about resolving a housing and transportation crisis, it would be working with neighboring cities to develop a regional solution, rather than working with developers within the city limits.
Growth has had some cultural benefits, but at this point the bad outweighs the good. The blame does not lay with Amazon. It lies with a city administration that has relinquished its responsibilities and transferred them to developers.
35
Cheap buildings would come crashing in a major earthquake. Which is overdue.
San Francisco is unique in that it can never increase in size. The tax base is limited, which means that city services are poor. Property taxes can increase only slowly because of proposition 13. People commute to the city to work and recreate, but they don't pay taxes. Regional organization and funding of mass transit and other city services is needed, but difficult to achieve. Apparently there is an unlimited demand for housing in San Francisco despite the high cost. Does anyone have answers to these problems?
20
@Toasted. Incorrect. SF has a annual budget of over $10 Billion, and climbing.
Austin is larger in size, population and infrastructure, yet gets by at roughly a third of SF number. By any measure, SF is swimming in revenue.
9
San Francisco is unique in that it CAN increase in size. It requires the unpalatable solution of tearing down low-density housing in the Sunset District and other areas and replacing it with ugly behemoths that can house a LOT more people. Couple that with vastly improved mass transit and it will work. It can (and will) be done.
1
@Toasted
Yes,
An earthquake.
In 1906, nearly half the population that survived left the area.
4
OK, move to Philadelphia or Baltimore. You can live well just across the river from Philly, too. I live in Boise, which has the odd distinction of being a small city with very modest, unimpressive houses that cost a third of a million because the Californians are arriving in droves. That's almost double the Houston median--and Houston's houses are much bigger and nicer. But then, you'd have to live in Houston. If you get a new job like my ex-wife did, it's likely as not going to be 40 miles away. She had to buy a new house just to avoid a horrendous commute.
16
Idaho has become rather popular. Must be the spuds.
@globalnomad
I've been thinking I should buy a place in Boise! Really? Only $350,000?
As a Seattle resident of the past quarter century, I can safely attest to the real down sides of our tech driven boom. Not only have more people brought horrible freeway and surface street congestion, but the tech wealth has driven up costs overall, from housing to food and everything in between, making it much harder for folks not participating in the tech economy or living on fixed incomes. Too much, too fast. Besides that, the city's culture has changed dramatically, from a much more mellow zeitgeist, to one of hard charging ambition and impossibly expensive avocations. This is where Ivy grads come to make their fortunes now. I'm frankly not sure how much longer I want to stay, the trends are not good.
101
I have lived and worked in four of these metros: Los Angeles, New York, Portland and San Francisco.
They all have troubles, sure. They are also great places to live and work.
It's much more difficult to advance your career and earn a good living from Bakersfield, Binghamton, The Dalles or Fresno.
If you aren't doing well enough to afford these superstar cities, then get a better job or move elsewhere.
Life does not promise us a chic, rent-controlled address.
132
And a home address in one of these cities is not de facto chic nor is wealth in and of itself. I've been a serial gentrifier my whole adult life and there is a way to do it that is far less disruptive than what is happening in Seattle, SF, NYC, parts of LA, etc. Contemporary tech gentrification comes with a banal workaholic monoculture that itself breeds a sense of entitlement and superiority and unfeeling libertarianism. It's quite the opposite of chic.
27
@Dave T. Unfortunately, "superstar cities" require janitors, garbagemen, waiters, etc. Where do you propose that they live?
27
@Darth Vader
Wherever they can afford. (In most cases, I think they're underpaid.)
Obviously, all these cities have these service workers and more, so they're living somewhere.
If enough people decide to leave a place because it's too expensive, prices will come down and salaries will go up.
But I haven't seen any population decreases in any of these cities.
5
Just another example of an out-of-control society that knows no balance, no happy medium.
Great for tech. Awful for everyone else. d, there could be bigger problems.
So let's see if these cities use their wealth wisely--with better schools, infrastructure, parks, libraries, public safety and affordable housing construction. Or indeed become even more expensive "playgrounds for the urban rich."
21
@dajoebabe---
We are in beautiful Boulder. It has become an all-you-can- eat banquet for the most greedy, evil, destroyers anywhere.
Tech is the monster chief in the destruction of our wonderful place. The self-centered come here, congratulating themselves on "discovering" our once wonderful town. They have no desire to fit in--they bring the blatant ugliness of where they came from.
Greedy & ugly billionaires build oversized residences and run around in huge SUV's honking at everyone, crossing double yellow lines to get ahead. Wannabe's come too, demanding rent subsidies--they also honk, speed, run red lights, kill bicyclists....
And we have an huge population of vagrants who contribute nothing to our town and demand hand-outs from those made rich feeding off the corpse of what we once loved and had.
We are the prime example of beauty soiled...a virgin spring despoiled, fouled.
3
Portland is a lot of things but it isn't "twee." But that's not the subject of my comment.
One of the major benefits of our American freedom is mobility. We can move anywhere in our country for whatever reason we chose. We move for boredom, for jobs, for scenary, for romance or to find a meaningful life.
We tend to stay in the place that offers us what we seek. We also are forced to leave when we can't afford to stay. Americans I meet seem to be migrating from higher cost of housing areas to cheaper ones, regardless of whether they make 250k per year or 25k.
The middle class and lower working class don't seem to be making any more income and get forced out of their perfect surroundings. I worry about my kids inability to afford to live in our Portland nirvana (sorry, but I love it here.) There are no decent jobs for English majors, no matter how great they are at Jeopardy. You shouldn't have to sell out and become an accountant like I did just to get into the food chain. Tax the rich, I say. Pay for kids college education so they aren't in servitude for 20 years after graduation. Cheap health insurance for everyone.
Is that twee? If so, call me sentimental.
353
@Coseo Thank you for nicely summarizing the out of touch sense of entitlement (usually white) that, among other things, made me happy to leave Portland. I know plenty of construction workers working hard for a one bedroom apartment for their families who would love to make the sacrifice of being an accountant.
25
@Coseo - If you had been reading lately you might have come across articles detailing the decreasing mobility of Americans. Even when the less affluent move, they have to move for cheaper real estate, and that typically means lower wages too. Americans are typically not capable of being mobile to solve problems - granted there are many that can, but even that can entail hardship - and equally fallacious as the concept of economic mobility in the US. It simply does not exist.
26
@Coseo - Pardon if I got your sentiment wrong, the bulk of it I like at an emotional level, although I'm not sure how realistic it will be in a country like the US.
Yes, we should make the wealthy and corporations pay more, we should have nationalized insurance, we should be able to pursue our loves in life without having to eventually cave to the crassness of merely making money, and yes we should be subsidizing education for our children, not allowing them to be squeezed by creditors and unethical educators.
20
When talking about San Francisco, it is important to note how small it is: ~49 sq. mi. and less than 1M people. In every other big metro area the central city is much bigger, both in physical size and population. In the SF Bay Area, (population >7M) San Jose has a bigger population and is much closer to the heart of Silicon Valley - the main driver of the Bay Area economy. SF is best viewed as simply one neighborhood in a much larger economic unit. Therefore, comparisons are difficult to make, and complaints about high rents in SF are like complaints about high rents in the Upper East Side of Manhattan.
136
@David
SF has 48.42 sq mi & Boston has 46.89 sq mi OF LAND, (not including water area) that's a difference of 1.53 sq miles. SF is a terminus. There's one way in and one way out by land or rail: to the South. The Port of SF declined before and after WW1 because of that. There's limited right of ways for rail freight and what ways existed were never expanded. Tunnels weren't enlarged or new ones constructed. The Golden Gate bridge wasn't built to accommodate rail traffic, the land to the north is hostile railroad terrain. The peninsula has deep water at its NE but that still has to be dredged. No where else for a port around there. All unloaded freight has to go south. It could take two days to ship to Oakland by rail. Solution: Build more bridges and truck everything. That clogs up roads, causes congestion, but in the meantime, the property owned by the port authority has now become way too valuable to operate as a port. The port goes defunct as Oakland and its deep port take all the business (The city is in a much better position to ship and receive freight and distribute it in all directions), the land gets sold, condos get built. The thing is, the UES of Manhattan isn't all of NYC. But from one side of SF to the other, rents are obscene. In this city, the "seaport" (another defunct entity) is currently being developed with malice and we all know the end of that story. Elsewhere in the city a one-bedroom will run you at least $1800 per month.
11
@David not quite accurate. SF city limits is more comparable to Manhattan island than the entire NYC city limits. But SF is in fact quite a bit later than Manhattan (about twice as big).
This really just goes to show how underutilized SF's land use is considering how many more people are in Manhattan vs. SF's city limits. We could certainly do a lot to smartly densify (think Paris vs. NY) in SF, and still likely be less dense than Manhattan.
Also, to your comment about economic power, that's also not really accurate. SJ really isn't the driver of that (it's more of a giant suburb). The true "economic center" is really more centered around Palo Alto. And SF itself has become increasingly more important in the tech space in the last decade.
6
@matty Shoot, we have river ports here in West Sacramento and Stockton that are more useful than a San Francisco port. As long as they can get to Oakland by the estuary, truck, or rail, we can do. An SF port would still be welcome, though.
1
I grew up in the now-affluent town of Manhattan Beach in Los Angeles. Later moved around that area. The elementary school I attended just three blocks from the beach is now offices. The high school near mine, both built when I was a teenager, was decomissioned ten years ago. These communities now house affluent career types either too busy to have kids and/or too wealthy to send their children to some rather nice public schools in the area. The old moviehouse in MB is now a corporate HQ for Skechers.
No way could I afford to move back -- the South Bay traffic is permanently paralyzed, wouldn't want to live there anyway. I was lucky forty yearrs ago to find a tiny shedlike old house on a hill near Dodger Stadium, where Mexican immigrants used to live. Now the slightly-larger ones are million-dollar purchases.
Too much sun combined with half the country freezing five months every year. Now everyone thinks they can move to the beach.
19
Alas, I think Seattle has become Seattle on steroids. And while it retains a trace of its former personalty as a seafaring, fishery, logging and farming hub, it's been heavily diluted. Generic office buildings and construction cranes now predominate with a coffee shop for every tree that once grew. Real people can't afford to live here anymore.
The problem, I think, is that everyone wants to move to the 'big city' now (the 'big city' means something different for everyone). Young people on farms see little opportunity in rural America. Empty nesters are bored with suburban life. And people all over the world, particularly in Asia, dream of a US west coast that probably doesn't exist anymore.
It may be better for the environment to have humans packed closely together (leaving more open space elsewhere), but it's going to take some adaption on my part.
16
@Justin
Tinder and other dating apps have a 100 miles radius. Twelve years ago, people used dating sites (not apps) that allowed you to contact anybody (even 500 miles away). I used Nerve/Salon to get dates in Chicago, Philly, Boston, and almost even Paris (I was in Brooklyn). I just searched those towns for kindred spirits and sent them a message.
@Justin
I am truly, madly, deeply in love with Seattle, from the first visit over ten years ago. We try to be “ good “ tourists, and not clog up the sidewalks. We never drive, but walk and take the Light Rail everywhere. You don’t know how lucky you truly are. Check MY address.
1
Back in the early 2000s I was commuting between Miami where I live and Mountain View, CA working on various tech companies’ Accounts.
I was offered a six figure salary increase and sign on bonus to match to relocate to Mountain View. My wife and I did the math and we would be worse off taking the move.
We stayed and I never regretted turning down more money than my dad ever made in New York working for the telephone company....
15
The days of moving on a shoestring to any one of these great American cities to try something new have long passed. Boston's famously bohemian/working class/affordable/economically diverse inner city neighborhood's like the South End, Fenway, Bay Village, etc, have been taken over by wealthy investors and residents who all look and act eerily alike. No experimental lifestyles going on with this well heeled bunch and conformity, not adventure, is at the center of the current urban experience.
213
As someone who grew up in Kansas City, I hope it never does become Denverized. The Denver metro is sprawling and the traffic is a nightmare. Folks move here from California because it is more affordable than San Francisco or Los Angeles but sexier (becuase of the mountains) than the Midwest. Rents are really expensive. Homelessness is a problem. And we live in a semi-arid climate that is prone to drought. We're experiencing a drought right now. Over-populating the American West is unsustainable. Droughts will only become more frequent due to Climate Change. No water, no life. If I'm ever able to afford to retire, I'm moving to Vermont. Or Kansas City.
30
@jay sexier? You’re kidding me right? San Francisco Bay Area is one of the most beautiful regions in the world. We have more than mountains, an ocean, a sunset, green hills in winter and golden in summer. And we are not in a drought. It actually rained more here in the recent 2 years than it does on average. Fires weren’t caused by drought but by faulty transmissions from PG&E since they don’t maintain their equipment. And “no water no life” complete joke. Look at Las Vegas and Phoenix.
As a Minneapolis resident, the end of this article brought a smile to my face. We are by no means a utopia, but our emboldened metro area has somehow managed a balanced set of attributes that is hard to find elsewhere in the US.
61
@Dave
Shhh... don't broadcast it! Indeed, I've been to most of the cities on the author's list and always return home to the Twin Cities with a sense of relief and gratitude. Great infrastructure (including for bikes), superb cultural amenities, an international airport, affordable housing, a strong education system, professional sports teams, a healthy local economy, respect for nature, and much more. As for the cold, we walk, ride, run, ski and skate in it, then sit in front of the fire with a cognac!
58
@Steven McCarthy
You had me right up until you got to the Winter. l grew up in Chicago and also lived in Madison, WI for 7.5 years and I just can't hack those brutal winters anymore.
3
@Dave
Such a classic Minneapolis comment! "Happy to be noticed, but aw, shucks, we're not really that great. All you other places are really nice, too, we just kind of, you know, try to keep things steady and even."
5
Urban housing politics in successful cities feels to me like looking into a local doppelganger of ugly MAGA nationalism. I won't pretend the NIMBY politics on display in the comments has the sheer and intentional cruelty of Trumpism, but underneath "overpopulation", "human scale cities", etc. and all the other euphemisms is the same selfish desire for possession and wealth that certain people feel they are owed by virtue of being the right kind of person who was in the right place at the right time, everyone else be damned.
30
@Scott Or perhaps they're the people who worked hard, got a good education, kept good jobs, saved their money and bought a house? Should it now be subdivided for several families?
5
Frankly, dear reader, you are not worthy of living in the paradise on the prairie that is Minneapolis. Do you always vote? Oh yes, you say. Does incurring more debt than you can reasonably service seem to you to be a moral failing? Well, perhaps not a moral failing, but certainly unwise, you claim. Can you ice skate? Once when you were 8, you squeak. Application denied! More Jucy Lucys for us. That's an inside-out cheeseburger, by the way. You'd know this if you weren't a foreigner - by which we mean everyone from Sioux Falls to Phuket. But I just got a job as a chemical engineer with 3M, you plead. Fine, you're grudgingly permitted. But your daughter better become the goalie for the U. of MN women’s hockey team, or so help us lord, we won't invite you to a party for the next 15 years. We will, however, grant you a respectful, though nearly imperceptible head-nod around holiday season. At first you will find this disconcerting, but slowly you will become one of us. Soon you will think it's reasonable to wear a T-shirt to run errands in the mid-30s. After that you will find the Szechuan green beans at P. F. Chang's to be 'a little spicy for my taste.' At this point, we have you. You cannot return from whence you came; nor shall you wish to. Fran Tarkenton will be your Hector. Paul Wellstone your Zeus. And many years from now, when your grandson marries a girl from New York, you will love her so much that you'll almost tell her. You will not, though. Better to not cause a fuss.
474
...tsk tsk, how long this lasts as earth warms and yet a Brookings Global metro? Hope for sustainable air conditioning!
1
@Hart Rosenblatt
I had to chuckle, a lot, when reading this comment. I am the daughter of two natives of your fair city. Father played hockey for Hamline, mother cheered (in uniform) for Hamline hockey team in the early 1950's don't cha know.
After being stationed in 29 Palms California and feeling warmth on their pale skin for the first time in their lives they never moved back. And my father never TOLD me he loved me, but he showed me everyday. He was never a talker.
We traded "don't cha know" for "Bless their Heart" although I have some cousins who stayed.
34
@Hart Rosenblatt
You do know that Fran Tarkenton lives in Atlanta, right?
8