Shopping for a Home in the Bay Area? Head to the Mall | Hacker News Reader

Shopping for a Home in the Bay Area? Head to the Mall

mercurynews.com

36 pointsprostoalex47 comments

That is great! I hate the car culture in the US. It is crazy that if you want to go out for an ice cream, or just buy something really quick, you have to drive in the horrible traffic most US cities have and find parking, which is sparse and expensive or spend money on an uber/lyft. It is just not worth it, since you might as well pay for two hour delivery on a ton of things. I wish there were more pedestrian zones, more walkable malls and less cars/traffic.

It's sad that oppressive zoning regulations are still so popular.

Not sure how that's car culture at all. There's nothing wrong with cars.

If anything it's how they're used and how the automobile infrastructure (roads/highways/etc.) is constructed.

I think that what would generally be construed as "car culture" would be "how they're used and how the automobile infrastructure (roads/highways/etc.) is constructed".

I think that's generalization, to be honest. The parent comment's intended (I believe) use of "car culture" implies anything that encompasses cars. When I wrote "how they're used and how the automobile infrastructure (roads/highways/etc.) is constructed", it was with respect to that parent comment's context.

In reality there are more purposes to cars. We shouldn't therefore apply some aspects of cars to the broad meaning of car culture.

> implies anything that encompasses cars.

No, I believe that they're talking about the ubiquitous need of a car for any given task. It would be nice if areas were designed such that a vehicle wasn't required to do more or less anything, be it restaurants, entertainment, general shopping, etc.

I'm not really sure what you mean by "We shouldn't therefore apply some aspects of cars to the broad meaning of car culture." It sounds like simply semantics at this point, that is, you infer a different meaning of "car culture" than the OP presents, but I don't feel that detracts from the point about the constructed necessity of cars.

There's not any transit around Santana Row that I know of, other than buses.

This blew my mind when visiting my brother in Texas. Want to do anything? Get in your car, get on the highway.

Santana Row is a mostly upscale shopping complex with hotel and luxury housing attached. On a nice evening, there are pleasant outdoor eating options and it generally was designed to have more of a walkable area than most complexes of this type.

But it's really not much like an authentic town center in the types of amenities it has and, while you can walk to a number of restaurants, I expect you'd still have to end up driving for most things. The area as a whole is not very walkable and there are limited transit options.

The Santana Row developers thought pedestrian areas were cool, but for whatever reason they built roads right through the middle of their faux-pedestrian zones. Because you can't make people to get out of their cars at the edge and actually walk?

I can't even begin to count the number of times i've seen someone almost hit in front of the container store / best buy.

The traffic in the faux-pedestrian areas (drivers) is even worse

At a minimum, some people aren't very mobile. Others just don't want to walk far. So now you have to run golf carts of some sort which many who would use them just don't feel like dealing with and which start to degrade a pedestrian-only experience. Just excluding people probably works for a city core where it's hard to drive. Less so for an upscale shopping area.

Santana Row is fantastic, I can imagine that it'd be a great place to live. That kind of mixed-use development is something that really ought to be more ubiquitous. It's worth noting that there are even companies, like Splunk, that have offices there. I considered living at Santana Row when I moved to San Jose, but I ended up a few miles further down Steven's Creek because I wanted to be closer to Diridon.

I like mixed use development, but I can't imagine a place much less appealing than Santana Row. Except maybe Valley Fair.

I'm with you. Every time I venture to either place, I dread it. One time it took 1hr+ just to get out of the parking garage at Santana Row because of a popup foodtruck that had parked itself outside (https://www.facebook.com/Hellokittycafetruck/).

Lots of these mixed-use real estate developments in the South Bay now. South San Jose has some apartment developments (Charlotte Park for example) that look almost European.

Sure, it's a Safeway, Five Guys, etc. across the street and there's little you would want to walk to or explore in the area but it's a start.

exactly. it is a mall, not a town

do you really want to live in a mall?

outside of santana row is winchester blvd and steven's creek blvd...aka nothing

Santana Row got it partially right. What it mainly got wrong:

- location right near an existing huge mall and very busy car centric corridor. How do I get to Santana Row? I drive to and fro...

- no real public transportation near the development (this should be #1 for everything. The South bay really sucks for public transportation - especially considering how prime it is for it and how much of an impact it could have if invested in and implemented correctly. Being new to the area, I have no idea how they screwed up not getting light rail to the freaking airport... :(

- allowing cars into the development (I think it should have disallowed driving through the area - make the whole thing walkable with no cars...park in garages on the periphery only.

However, it is better than most developments we have around the South bay... at least you (potentially) can live, dine, shop and work within a 1 mile area. Well at least if you work at Splunk lol

This is happening in Austin, Texas as well. The development known as "The Domain" in North Austin first had malls, but also has residential apartments close by. There is also a street filled with bars and restaurants.

I was amazed at how it seemed like a different world when I was there for an a event last week. Does seem pretty artificial (i.e. man made), but hey, many people seem to love that.

Also around Denver. The most obvious current example is The Westminster Mall: https://goo.gl/maps/E3sJxEpMcCx

It used to be over a million square feet of retail space, but a few years ago it was almost completely demolished (only J.C. Penny remains!). Now they're working to redevelop it almost exactly like this article describes: http://denverurbanreview.com/2015/05/new-plan-for-former-wes...

The domain is so generic and fake feeling, it is just cookie cutter shops, apartments, and restaurants. Feels like "SoDoSoPa" from South park. There is even a place called "The Residences at the Domain" which is comical.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miXMWJyOdgw

It almost seems like it's trying so hard to be some place cool, I mean the "6th street" there is called "Rock Rose" lol.

Some people do seem to love it, but it doesn't appeal to me at all. Then again many people live north of downtown and it is way easier to get to than dealing with mopac or 35 if you're up there.

To each their own though I guess.

Its pretty cookie cutter, and also expensive. The one thing I do appreciate is that its free of the homeless/panhandlers that one often finds in Downtown Austin.

https://www.udr.com/austin-apartments/north-burnet/residence...

$1,266 for a 1 bedroom luxury apartment with parking included?!

For a normal apartment that'd be average here in not-that-expensive New Haven, CT. Luxury apartments are closer to 2k for 1 bedroom here.

I feel like I've been underestimating how cheap Austin is said to be...

There are more extreme versions of these all over Seoul. Usually there's a 5-story mall with grocery store, clinics, super market, etc. Then on top of that there's a 30-story apartment building with some outdoor grass area. You basically don't have to leave the building if you live there.

These might eventually turn out to be predecessors of future arcologies [1]. If you can work out the co-generation aspects, a hyper-dense version of these "malls" could yield significant energy savings over even conventional high-density megalopolises like NYC, Beijing, Tokyo, Mumbai, etc.

[1] https://boingboing.net/2015/04/16/arcology-cutaways-of-the-f...

A business on the first floor of a residential building used to be the standard. Well, maybe not THE standard but very common. Still seen pretty often in many cities with older construction. This is basically a 21st century version. Pretty good idea if you ask me.

Well, that's one way to convert suburban areas to dense and mixed use urban ones.

My first reaction to seeing these listings was to feel very disconnected from people who like the mall so much they want to live there. But it's a fantastic idea. You don't often get the opportunity to create new dense urban cores in the Bay Area.

It's an interesting solution to increase the supply of housing in areas that are already (relatively) dense and unaffordable, like the Bay Area, where it's already common for people in downtown areas to live above or adjacent to retail businesses, and where many people consider walkability to retail businesses a valuable thing. Santana Row is already designed and targeted at high-end tastes for retail, so it's easier to extend that to high end housing.

However, in suburban areas where housing is cheaper (per sq ft), unless denser housing at the mall provides other urban-style benefits (i.e. higher end retail, easier workplace access, mass-transit hubs, shared civic spaces, cultural event proximity, etc.) it may just appear like "living at the mall", with all the connotations thereof. Put another way, all else equal, most people don't want to live adjacent to the "Hot Topic" and the "As Seen on TV" stores. The balance has to be more toward feeling like a place to live and work, not a public shopping center. Dense cities, with all of their retail, still feel like places people live and/or work.

If, however, they are able to provide those other "public" goods along with the mall, then perhaps it is a great shortcut to reshaping the landscape of suburban america towards a more mixed-use and sustainable model.

Mixed use retail/residential is popping up all over the suburbs, at least in MD/VA. There are 10+ story apartment buildings around Annapolis Town Center, Reston Town Center, Columbia Mall, Tyson’s Corner, Dunn Loring, etc. They don’t eliminate your car commute, but at least you don’t have to get in the freeway to get a hair cut.

I've seen these developments, but they have been designed from the start with such use in mind, are in prosperous areas, and have (at least by US standards) decent transit options and civic facilities. They aren't so different from Santana Row.

I'm less convinced (though open) that suburban malls in economically depressed areas that are in the path of the retail apocalypse can be retrofit to this purpose.

On the other hand, if people do live there, stores that sell stuff that they actually buy should do somewhat better. It should move the mall at least somewhat in the right direction.

This is particularly funny to me because people in the South Bay typically use the big shopping malls as the landmarks (as in, “down by Santana row” or “head in the direction of rivermark...” where in other places people would say “head north” or “by the border of ...” or at least use an unbranded man-made landmark like “near union square”)

I don’t think it’s at all unreasonable for people to speak this way — between Mountain View and the SJC airport is a vast isotropic region that’s been rendered devoid of natural landmarks. But for the uninitiated it’s weird.

> between Mountain View and the SJC airport is a vast isotropic region that’s been rendered devoid of natural landmarks

Stealing that description. I'd extend it up the peninsula too, pretty much to Millbrae. Stanford and the bridges kinda count, but don't exactly interrupt the isotropicness much.

Palo Alto, Menlo Park and Mountain View have internal structure, perhaps San Carlos too, but otherwise, now you say it, for the developed part of the peninsular valley I have to agree.

There are a handful of these already in Philadelphia suburbs (King of Prussia, Phoenixville). The KOP development is a billion project with 300+ units. Nice counter measure to the millennial migration to the city. Most of the jobs are in the suburbs so if this catches on should ease some of the nightmare commutes in the area.

https://philly.curbed.com/2017/8/22/16084002/king-of-prussia...

This is great. One step closer to my dream of one day living entirely indoors and not owning shoes.

You can live the dream now in Whittier, Alaska at the Begich Towers.

> In addition to the residential areas the building contains the basic services of Whittier: a post office, general store, hospital, the Whittier Police Department, and the mayor's office. There is also a small Methodist Church, a grocery, laundry, a small hotel, conference room, and a play area with an indoor pool.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whittier,_Alaska

There is a "This American Life" episode "Glacial Change" that features the community.

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/555/the-incredible-rarity-o...

Live downtown Minneapolis and get a job downtown. There's skyway connected apartments, restaurants, bars, theaters, and grocery stores. Even a Target. And Target Field (baseball), Target Center (basketball, concerts), and US Bank stadium (football), if that's your thing.

Montreal offers an even bigger version linked by its metro system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_City,_Montreal

Still a bit too "luxury" priced for me (living at the mall that is), but I have to admit, it lets two problems solve each other, just by essentially asking "Why not?"

I think it was prev mayor mcenery who tried very hard, but ultimately failed at bootstraping this idea for downtown San Jose in the late late 80s with the apartments and downtown mall and transit known as the pavilion.

Looks like that vision, while an utter failure then, may finally find vindication.

If this helps the housing problem then it is a great idea. I have seen a few of these type ideas. There is something similar down the road from me in Mountain View.

This runs counter to all of my luxury aspirations in America

But I did consider doing a stint at the top of the Sony Center in Potsdamer Platz, Berlin

I think I'll stick to my existing aspirations of "get your funds up". Success for me will be getting called a douchebag because of my far-future son or daughter's car, without any further context of my character or in person actions. Then I will feel like "yes, I've made it".

Living in the carcass of a mall won't do that.

Somehow you've turned this story into something about your luxury aspirations.

Yes it was a comment about how unappealing this is, we do the same thing whenever somebody else here brags about the tech solution which lacks product market fit.

Shopping for a home has to appeal to people that are in the market for a home. The phrasing is not exclusive to buying versus renting, but colloquially thats what it implies. People in the bay area currently on the market wouldn't be looking for this, it would be the new and naive next year and the year after that may wind up considering this. The current market is people that can make down payments on million dollar+ mortgages and that doesn't include living in the carcass of a suburban mall.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com