Hacker News Reader

> Saying something is slow is meaningless if you don't compare it to something else.

I think an obvious comparison is between Tillman's project and the (still abysmal) averages listed later in the article. I.e. Tillman's approach turned out to be slower (or a dead end) for his project; lots of projects are "faster" but still ridiculously bogged down relative to other cities.

> But eight years later and after countless community meetings, hearings, appeals, studies, a legal challenge and a court settlement—the site of the former laundromat at 2918 Mission St. still sits empty.

> That timeline is far from unusual in San Francisco, where it takes more than two years on average to permit housing projects—an unusually slow pace compared to peer cities, according to a draft study published last year.

So his approach was at least 3-4x slower than average.

> What avenue for reform in SF would be faster?

A legal challenge might be a pretty good way to achieve some reform! I also think criminal cases for corrupt city officials are appropriate. But the article isn't claiming to be about how slow it is to reform city government -- it's about how slow it is to build housing. But it picked a project to highlight which seems to have tried to do a little of both.

Per the embedded chart (1/2 way down, "CA Housing Development Average Permitting Timeline"), San Francisco takes an average of 975 days for a project to go from submitted to permitted.

2.6 years to get permitted is not a good faith effort on the part of the city.

That's 'if you're really serious about housing then cut NIMBY rights back to a reasonable level tomorrow' levels of fucked up.

Yeah, I'm no lawyer, but there are many many cases of court orders leading what would otherwise be monumentally long legislative actions. Slavery, voting rights, eminent domain, asset forfeiture, and tons of others.

Housing isn't in the bill of rights directly, but equal protection is.

Basically, SF housing comes down to a battle of:

- I have a right to defend my housing equity/wealth (currently winning and will continue to win legislatively because the money is here)

- I have a right to a house (the moral choice, but far and away the less-monied, and therefore zero chance of legislative redress)

It isn't just SF, this is fundamentally a generational war across the entire US, practically everywhere.

It’s more a fight between “I want my area to stay the same” and “I want to develop my property” - those wanting housing have effectively no say at all.

> those wanting housing have effectively no say at all.

One of the points that William Fischel makes in Zoning Rules! is that when a developer responds to the profit motive from the market, he is representing the interests of future tenants who need housing. Conversely, when San Francisco Leftists oppose developments because they oppose developers making a profit, they are unwittingly opposing the interests of future tenants. This is part of what makes housing in San Francisco such an unsolved problem: those who claim to represent tenants seeking affordable housing (such as the trade group CCHO) actively fight private development.

Saying something is slow is meaningless if you don't compare it to something else. What avenue for reform in SF would be faster?

Huh? The article headline and the article are about the speed of housing approval, not about the speed of "avenues for reform in SF".

The reason he can take the issue to court like this is because the city's "process" is illegal.

That may be true but that's a different issue also. The original claim that SF's process is slow, not that it's illegal (even if it is illegal).

He's an activist. His objective is to affect change in the system, not to get something built. Trying to build something is the pretext for a lawsuit that aims to change the system. The proper comparison is comparing his method of activism to other methods of activism.

If he simply wanted to build something fast, then he'd bribe whoever needs bribing and nothing would change.

I mean, I think he did originally _also_ want to get something built. But your point is exactly why I think the obstacles to building in SF are better illustrated with a project that was just trying to get something built.

We can have separate opinions about whether Tillman's efforts were good versus whether he's a good illustrative example the obstacles in the system.