So a compliant result that makes none of the involved parties truly happy and produces an outcome that no one would have ever asked for. California is very good at this.
And, is this development really so bad? There's a bunch of additional housing created; Costco gets their store built; we have mixed use, where a lot of people aren't going to need to take a car trip to do their shopping.
It depends on how it's managed. If there _happens_ to be enough demand that people will accept it and pay a profitable rate, it might be just fine, but the cart is before the horse on this, so I wouldn't necessarily expect that outcome without other evidence to support it.
No wonder why soviet union buildings looked like a bland block of concrete.
If this is not a cautionary tale on the dangers of regulation, I don't know what is.
Congrats to Costco for finding a trick and getting things done, despite the government.
But it fools most people, and if you're wealthy you're going to move to a newer area before that 15 years is up anyways.
There were many awful things about Khrushchev, but at least the housing policy appears to have been a genuine attempt at improving things for ordinary people. Even though the housing was poor quality and ugly, it was a step up when they were introduced.
That heritage will show inside, though: there's probably not going to be any rooms that are really wide. But modern apartments tend to not have too many of those anyways.
more seriously, it seems mobile homes nowadays come in 14, 16 and 18' widths and 66 to 80' lengths.
It seems shipping containers are 8' wide and usually 20, 40 and 45' long.
I suspect there are ways to make multiples of these dimensions.
I also wonder why you couldn't just take a truck and load it up with a stack of walls that are laid out with a crane.
How you're assuming that there is a difference in how it will "enrich the city and the lives of tenants" based on that render is beyond me.
You decry regulation in the same sentence you wish buildings were beautiful and life-enriching. You wildly overrate the style, comfort, and safety of stuff that gets built in countries without the sorts of regulations that the US has today.
Probably in part because modular construction isn't uncommon with those 5-over-1s, it's not some hack specific to this law; surprisingly enough, most projects can't get away with paying below the local prevailing wage whether or not there is a specific law requiring it, so if modular construction enables a net cost reduction where there is a prevailing cost regulation, it's going to be a net cost reduction for most similar construction without the regulation, too.
Getting housing built is the purpose of the law; modular construction is a common way to build in urban California even where the builder isn't using this law, and still involves local labor (the modules don't assemble themselves) to which the prevailing wage requirement applies.
There's no trick here, they are doing exactly what the state government was trying to get done when it wrote the law bypassing local government power.
Costco seems okay with it. Housing gets built that circumvented the NIMBY's. The development is mixed use with a grocery store in walking distance instead of driving distance. Local labor gets paid an appropriate amount instead of being undercut by illegal labor (a HUGE problem in California). And it's not like current 5 over 1 construction is particularly aesthetic.
Where's the downside?
I suspect Costco, being a "big box/warehouse", is squarely in their crosshairs; combine with any purported anti-union activity and they're quite willing to run an article that deliberately distorts what the housing is going to look like.