Silicon Valley is hiring but is hundreds of thousands of dwelling units short of honorably housing the vast number of new primary and larger number of lower paid local serving jobs needed this century. Our urban sprawl-based land-use patterns, based on the mid-1900s highway systems, will quickly reach terminal gridlock if that housing is accommodated by unfocused opportunity housing densities. Yet, as a Mercury News April 20, 2016 oped stressed, focused transit village in-fill atop the valley’s 60+ rail stations and parking are a win, win, win, win for all.
The rest of the world, especially Europe and Japan, accommodate large populations per acre yet have more open space. They use high rise transit villages to cluster growth atop transit, protect open space and capture the added value in riders and land use for the transit systems.
Silicon Valley companies seek top talent, our children and the best from afar to envision, design, build and distribute the world’s most advanced products. That next generation must be welcomed to live in our “valley of hearts delight,” and we are all thankful for the vibrant economy they create. But every time one of those “primary jobs” is filled, Economics 1A reminds us that between seven and more than 10 “local serving jobs” will also be created. That multiple of added police, firefighters, medical staffs, teachers and many more needed to serve those new primary employees must be housed and served by a city, school, county, transportation system, medical care and commercial vendors of all sorts. Those support folks, often with modest incomes and less mobility, must also be accommodated with dignity.
That means Silicon Valley must create hundreds of thousands of affordable dwelling units in the next couple of decades while not allowing urban sprawl that denigrates precious open space and water shed lands. And the majority of the current voters, who live in single-family homes, will be the first to remind us that it also cannot be done by opportunity housing’s general densification that threatens gridlock for suburban neighborhoods.
And it is neither ethical nor functional to force Silicon Valley’s future to commute from farther away. Remote communities do not have the commercial tax base to pay for the added services, and the highway commuter congestion will be intolerable again after COVID-19.
The rest of the world accommodates much larger population per area by clustering transit villages atop rail stations. That means VTA’s light rail, the Caltrain, Altamont Express and Capital Corridor commuter rail lines, and BART, Amtrak, and high-speed rail in the future. Silicon Valley has more than 60 of those stations with more than double that planned. Many have large, adjacent parking lots.
Asia, Europe and other more advanced areas build high-rise dwelling units, some aided for those with modest incomes, in the air rights over each of those stations and parking. The high-rises are juxtaposed to protect views and buffered from the neighborhoods with surrounding parks. Those air-rights leases, from the transit agencies over the stations and parking, create revenue for the transit agency and feed riders directly into the transit systems. The riders and the revenue from those valuable leases reduce the tax dollars needed to operate the transit systems. And, unlike the rail station and parking, the transit villages are subject to property taxes, creating new revenue for the cities, schools, county and special districts already serving those locations.
Our transit agencies and cities must become aggressive in promoting that creative land use quickly to avoid a high-tech diaspora, unavoidable if we cannot house and transport employees to work with dignity. The COVID-19 respite, by having more working from home, will help for a short time, but a world-class land use disaster (think, Detroit!) is awaiting unless we demand urgent action by the cities and transit agencies. The need and opportunity are obvious. Do we have the foresight and courage?
Rod Diridon Sr. is chair of the Silicon Valley Ethics Roundtable and past chair of the Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission.
