Silicon Valley Is Flooding into a Reluctant Austin
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
On a related note, we live in an age of mass communication. Cities that become cool become migration magnets due to widespread knowledge and relative ease of relocation. See:
Boulder Portland asheville nashville bend boise missoula Austin tacoma, others I'm sure.
I view it as a net negative because part of the reason these 'weird' cities came to be was the needs of the locals who already lived there. Nowadays some liberal musician will just move to city X instead of giving their personality to the area around them.
Without liberalizing zoning laws, Austin will likely continue to see the exact same effects as California. This can be changed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16704501 if enough people want it to change.
Can you give examples?
Nothing to do with rent seeking. The only thing increased property value does is make property tax and excise tax go up. Nobody cares about that. We don’t want a condo building dropped on both sides of us. Who would?
But if you do allow job creation, while not creating housing for the people working those jobs, that absolutely is rent seeking.
Copenhagen ist built almost completey like that and has a population of about 800k. It feels great: Quite urban, with many cafés and small shops, while still feeling friendly and human. Much of Berlin is also like that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tallest_buildings_in_A...
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/miami-is-the-most...
> Miami Is the "Most Vulnerable" Coastal City Worldwide
The local and county governments, unlike the SFBA, are not completely dysfunctional and TBH I trust Miami city and Miami-Dade County to handle global warming induced flooding more than I trust the City of San Francisco to handle a sunny spring day with no issues.
Also, the Dutch figured out how to live with cities below sea level 300 years ago, we'll manage.
Until you see how other state, county and municipality governments function, you can't really appreciate how well Florida gov generally works. When growing up in Florida, I was led to believe it was the most backward ass state in the country. Didn't help I also lived in a rural county. After living in half a dozen states in a decade (and visiting many more for long periods)... no. Florida has its shit together compared to most other states. Are there problems here, absolutely. But no where near as bad as other states. Especially when it comes to environmental planning and protection. Still some problems in the Everglades area with some fucktards, but on a whole, environmentalism is more active here than anywhere else. Just the news coverage is dismal.
While I'm on the Space Coast, you're right to not be that worried in Miami. Plus, there are massive seawall projects that are supposed to start soon if they haven't already. I know they were planned for 2020, but the whole covid thing through a monkeywrench in that. Last I read, there's some $20b being spent in the Miami-Dade area in the next decade all in response to climate change. A lot of the infrastructure is getting reworked, along with water management.
It's like people think we're surprised that nature can kill us. We "worry" about it half of the year, every year. We welcome the challenge... as long as we stock up on alcohol. Then bring it on. But if those liquor stores close, it's panic time.
311 type issues in miami are handled pretty quickly, same day in some cases. In SFBA you could go months before seeing public safety issues addressed, if ever.
More importantly, the efficiency with which the state handles DMV appointments is not necessarily correlated with how well they will handle rising sea levels for (probably) the rest of the century. Miami already suffers from regular flooding that causes a mixture of seawater and raw sewage to flow through its streets. I don't buy that a massive public works project is going to make all these problems go away.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2019/08/08/analysis-s...
I'm sure a liberal application of SF/NYC money will solve any governmental competency that Miami has build up over the years. Look at how places like Boulder are faring.
They also paid for this infrastructure over the course of 300 years on a national level. How this will work for a single city in a huge state in a short amount of time is unclear to me, besides the fact that Amsterdam was built at the end of a bay, which the Netherlands then closed off using floodgates. Miami is facing open water. Lots of open water.
Uh, yeah, Miami’s a bigger (but poorer) metro than SFBA and doesn't have the seismic issues of the Bay Area, so it would be weird if that wasn’t true.
I was tired of the cost and dysfunction of the SFBA.
Shift towards remote work makes me far less dependent on physically being in the SFBA.
The nice parts of Miami, relative to the SFBA, are shockingly clean and safe feeling. Even the rough and dangerous parts of Miami are still cleaner and feel safer than SFBA. Miami has its share of crime but it tends to be organized and less random and to be blunt, if a bit amoral, far less likely to affect me.
I really enjoy the vibrance and density of coastal Miami. Reminds me of Singapore.
I love warm weather and beaches. The Pacific Ocean is prettier than the Atlantic, but the Atlantic is far warmer and swimmable most of the year.
I grew up in Philly, Miami isn't quite Philly / NYC / Boston but still has more of an East Coast vibe.
Tax benefits to Florida.
My 81 year old mom lives in Boca, so this is far better for family.
My fiancée is Brazilian so this is closer to her family and there is a huge Brazilian population here.
Even though I've always been politically active, the last few years have been exhausting. Miami's dominant political culture is pure apathy and its nice that not every aspect of has to be dominated by some political issue or another.
As for Brickell, its a great way to "start" in Miami. For us, we wanted a simple move where we could rent an apartment for a year before figuring out where to settle more permanently. Its incredibly walkable, safe, etc.
Also, bike lanes have been improving significantly.
> tacoma
This is a joke, right? I mean, the phrase "aroma of Tacoma" is popular for a reason.
If you asked someone to build a list of cities where a massive inflow of outside money has screwed things up for everyone the list would look very similar. But nobody moving in notices the decline because the all things considered state at any given time is always better than the state of the place they're leaving (or they wouldn't be relocated).
That being said, I can't deny that I've been thinking about moving to Austin myself. The job ecosystem is there, housing prices are still cheaper than NYC, SF, or Seattle, and I personally like warmer weather.
The main solution people propose, building more, has a very high likelihood of turning it into a suburban hellscape that people refuse to move to even at gunpoint.
We have plenty of places like that. If the option is just build more without an extremely careful plan, then just move to another city where it’s like that already. Phoenix is a nice sprawl.
In the Western US, certain ability to massively expand a city's water rights is really a prerequisite for insane real estate profits. SF was a mining town before Hetch Hetchy, and LA didn't blow up until they robbed the Owens Valley.
Edit: yep, Truckee River is 100% allocated as of 2015
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truckee_River#River_modifica...
But a lot of this is network effects. University of Nevada doesn't have the CS strength of University of Texas, so you don't have such a strong tech scene.
On a different note, I'm up there to visit family frequently, and despite being proximate to incredible beauty (Tahoe, Truckee, skiing, etc.), Reno itself is pretty Wal-Mart suburban hellscape. There are some nicer pockets but overall very meh. Reno was hit VERY hard after the Recession and there were a lot of empty business fronts downtown for a few years; it has cleaned up and brought some new blood but it still has a way to go.
The casinos are still ever-present. Some are charming but others and are still pretty gross, gaudy, and old-school, in a bad way.
All that being said, I think Reno still has a lot of opportunity. The city owns the hot and cold seasons well. The downtown area and the river could be very cool. I'm also surprised some tech-social-gaming startup hasn't attempted to reinvigorate the gambling world to take on the absolute relics that are the casino industry. PM me if you'd be into that sort of thing.
Strangely, Boise _does_, but comes with state income tax.
Reno had never been immune to “Californication” though. Resistance to it almost defines the local culture.
Another is that locals would love to know that they can afford a mortgage payment in their own hometown sometime in their adult life.
How is this measured? Any should someone born in a community without access to high paying jobs or less desirable weather/amenities not be able to move elsewhere?
Do these tech companies realise what's going to happen, or is it going to be wrapped up as part of the cost of doing business, before they move on to someplace else. I'm now imagining a tornado of tech companies travelling across the country ravaging economies in its wake, with a periodic exodus of tech folk travelling in a procession of Teslas slowly making their way in Boring tunnels.
Maybe all that is just extrapolation and there are examples of tech friendly cities which haven't been affected in the same way.
You know, a lot of us are just people in their late 20s/early 30s, looking for a place to settle down and raise a family.
What ravaging is happening?
The current landlords and property owners get massive revenue from the young people moving in, while grumbling about loss of culture.
The problems in SV, Austin, Seattle, etc are caused by failures of local governments. The success of big tech certainly fuels the problems, but it is the poor decisions of local citizens and their governments that resulted in the traffic, housing and cultural isssues.
lol everyone realises what's going to happen
why would a tech company care at all or more than any other entity
a quarter of these tech companies are just real estate plays any way
The issues with Austin developing many of the same housing/diversity issues as SF, isn't going to be solved, and I don't think they expect it to.
It's the 2nd largest state in the Union, has a decent set of universities, warm (hot) weather, and several large, wealthy cities, like Dallas and Austin. Houston is set to overtake Chicago as the USA's 3rd largest city before too long.
But as a neutral person, the west coast just seems so much better in terms of nature and stuff to do. I get the austin makes sense cause it’s cheaper, but after a few more years of 10+% growth it won’t be
Guess the grass is always greener
Gonna miss it when I leave.
Also things like power grid failures are good at keeping things afforadble.
I was taking him seriously until that line. This is such a pipe dream.
disclaimer: I have lived in Austin for 5 years now
:)
what's the water level like in austin? I know some places in texas you dig down and you hit groundwater.
The line between west Texas desert and east Texas just-about-Louisiana, moves back and forth over the years, and the reservoirs (and ultimately the groundwater) levels move accordingly.
I lived in the south SF bay for 20 years before moving to Austin 17 years ago. One plus is the dramatic lightning and rain -- it is quite a treat compared to the milquetoast weather of San Jose. One negative that many Californians might not be ready for is the heat. I hope you like sweating and damp underwear. Before moving here, spend a week in July or August to figure out if you really want to spend 3 or 4 months of the year like that. The food situation here has improved a lot while I've been here, but it isn't anything like San Francisco.
Things I hate about Austin:
1. PACs keep shouting down mass transit every time there's a ballot measure
1a. takes forever to get across town at 8 and 5
1b. I hate driving. I have worked in Chicago, and I'd like my commute time back for reading email, etc.
2. Housing and schooling are wholly inequitable
3. Broadband access is wholly inequitable
Think about it this way. There are about 100 busses in Austin right now.
The $7B rail network could easily buy 10,000 new busses, fully-loaded cost of 10-year service life.
Or put another way, free bus service for 100% of Austin’s commutes, forever. Maybe block off a special lane for busses and you get pseudo-rail at 1% of the cost. Maybe think about rail when the demand is proven. The pneumatic tire is an amazing invention for flexible human transport.
Light rail is almost always a waste of money, and it will probably never even get built, and if it does, it will take forever, and create more traffic than it solves. But if you can credibly suggest otherwise with a single example of a low-density light rail system in any comparable city that got better ROI than busses and bike lanes, I will consider that I may be wrong.
The political terrain means that BRT will fail. Any road will have to be shared. However, if road space is not threatened, certain political enemies won't be enemies.
So sometimes worse is better because you can assure some people that your solution is Pareto-optimal for them.
So, yeah. I think people underestimate the amount of people who believe the contrapositive of "if you build it, they will come." I have SMDH every time a big group has argued that more/better roads will just attract more new residents and we're already too stretched.
Not sure if California or New York gets to claim the Midtown Uniform as its own.
In all seriousness, Austin has its charms, but the city has done a terrible job keeping up with infrastructure (especially compared to the DFW Metroplex.) It's also very isolated and its hipster (+ tech-bro) culture can be quite suffocating, especially as there is little else nearby to escape to save San Antonio (which, granted, is a great town.)
The airport, while it's been expanding, is also problematic in that it's a hub for no airline, while two of the largest airlines have hubs just 200-300 miles away. This means that flying to/from Austin takes an unusual amount of connecting (unless you can time your schedule to make the smaller number of non-stops.) It's especially problematic flying to/from NYC, where there are a gazillion flights to/from Houston or Dallas, but only 2-3 from Austin.
And while Texas can be pretty in places, Texas-style sprawl (marked by non-stop big box stores and car dealerships lining the freeways for miles and miles and miles on end--as far as the eye can see) is inescapable even in Austin. The downtown is pretty to look at, especially from across the river, but nothing special once there (except for 6 street, which is tourist central.) Then there is North Austin, and the monstrosity known as the Domain (a complete failure of scale, design, and well--basic wayfinding.) The Less said about that (except that it looks and feels just like every other life style center that sprouted up in America in the last 15 years,) the better.
The population boom in Austin is not new, and Austin's biggest problem is it's inability to build infrastructure to keep up. For years, traffic has been snarled on 35, 183, and Mopac. In the time it has taken for the DFW Metroplex to build two rail-lines to its airport + a whole network of express lanes on it's highways (including the wonderful sunken portion of I-635,) Austin adds a single lane express lane on 7 miles of Loop-1. Oh, there is SR-140, but it's so far out of the way, the 85 mph speed limit rarely if ever makes up for the time getting to or from the road. (And if I recall, the private company that funded and built the road as part of Texas's favorite public-private-partnership system went bankrupt.)
So yeah, SFBA > ATX.
In the end, if you think SFO is great, you are a certain type of person that is allways going to find something wrong with a place like Austin.
6th street? That's a running joke and has been for years. Everything that is happening is south of sixth, or across the river on Rainey, South Congress and Auditorium Shores.
The city already survived the oil booms of the past and retained a unique feeling -- the injection of tech money isn't going to change that. Between NASA's JSC, Rice University, and the University of Houston, there's a half-decent talent pool to draw from. For a deeper talent pool, it's just a few hours away from all of Austin, Dallas, and College Station.
"Houston is a cruel, crazy town on a filthy river in East Texas with no zoning laws and a culture of sex, money and violence. It's a shabby, sprawling metropolis ruled by brazen women, crooked cops and super-rich pansexual cowboys who live by the code of the west—which can mean just about anything you need it to mean, in a pinch." - Hunter S. Thompson
Sooner or later, it will be Austin’s turn.
"Life's too short to live in Houston"
Are there any other large cities without zoning laws?
I've been to Houston once. It was definitely weird, sort of as if all the different types of buildings you'd find in a normal city had been shuffled like a big deck of cards.
The arrival from the Valley only looks like a flood because the Austin region is still a small place. Net migration from the Bay Area in 2020 was about -0.16%.
Even though Austin's property values are lower than California, the percentage is much higher (California is approximately 0.7%). This is a large annual burden, especially since property values are re-appraised annually, so as property values keep going up, your taxes go up as well.
There is no state or local income tax though, so high income earners save on that.
Taxes go up because government spending per taxpayer goes up. I have some properties where the values go up and property tax rates to go down, resulting in declining property tax paid. But it’s rare, and doesn’t last for too long.
Rent is 1/2 as cheap for 2x the sq ft, and property values still currently with in the stratosphere (unlike the Bay Area). No income tax.
Hopefully Austin acts quick and starts building new/upgrading existing buildings to accommodate the growth that's happening.
Plus for someone like myself who is pretty thrifty and doesn't buy much "stuff" I don't get badly penalized by the slightly higher sales tax.
As a WA resident, I would not bet on the state long term. Housing is expensive, tons of crime, tons of homelessness, and our politicians are almost as dumb as those in CA/OR.
As a few others have mentioned, Miami is an interesting bet if the whole "everybody goes remote" doesn't happen.
The long term care insurance benefit amount is pathetic too, so for any WA residents reading, you should buy LTCI ASAP by Jul 20 something so you can opt out of having that premium deducted from your pay.
I would budget paying WA at least 1% of W2 income in tax, and it’s not deductible from federal taxes in any scenario since it’s not classified as a tax.
It's weird right now due to Covid, but obviously incubators like Capital Factory or (if it's still going) Tech Ranch.
Apart from that, well, culture is online now.