Ignorance is Bliss: Everybody Talks about Development, Few Know What It Is

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PLATKIN ON PLANNING-A reporter’s question about real estate trends in Los Angeles led me to ask and hopefully answer two questions. 

Q:  What do we mean by “development?”

A:  Development includes the entire built environment. It is not strictly private speculation in real estate projects by individual and institutional investors. 

Q:  Does Los Angeles need more “development?”

A:  LA absolutely needs more development, but it should be the right type of development. When it comes to private investment, density is not an issue, as long as it is it planned development. When it comes to public investment, development should also be linked to the City’s planning and budgeting processes. 

Now, the longer version: 

Development is a misleading term for all investment in the built environment. The term is intended to give private real estate speculation a veneer of respectability. The role of this euphemism is to camouflage the impetus of private development: speculative investment with a high rate or return regardless of adopted laws or neighborhood context. 

In contrast, when public investment creeps into view, whether water mains, fire stations, schools, or hundreds of other municipal facilities, “development” suddenly goes missing. Apparently the primacy of the public sector in planning, implementing, and maintaining this part of the built environment does not generate enough return on investment for the private sector and our public officials to consider these projects to also be “development.” 

Most of what they consider to be “development,” probably around 90 percent of private projects, straightforwardly complies with the City’s legally adopted zones, building codes, and General Plan land use designations. But, some of these projects are not consistent with zones and plans. They require a special review by the Department of City Planning.  Most of these cases are small, such as over-height fences. But a tiny fraction is over-sized mega-projects. They are straightforwardly illegal, and only the City Council can legalize them through special ordinances that change the underlying General Plan designation, zone, and/or height district. These legislative actions are the spot-zoning cases that the Neighborhood Integrity Initiative intends to stop. This Initiative would spell the end to parcel level projects that get approved because of slick lobbyists and lawyers, AstroTurf organizations, political contributions, and unverifiable promises of jobs, transit use, air pollution reductions, and off-site quasi-public improvements.

Los Angeles needs much more development: As for the developments that Los Angeles needs, investment in the city's public areas should be the highest priority. (Photo above: My Figueroa, a new public development, ready to break ground.) These developments make the most difference, especially for mitigating and adapting to climate change. This is where Los Angeles is most vulnerable, especially when compared to the unconvincing need for more luxury high-rise apartments serving occasional ultra-rich visitors. 

This is why Los Angeles needs many billions dollars in public development, and why it needs investment in projects that can dramatically change the character of the entire city. While the following list is hardly definitive, it should help you understand some of the investment that our elected officials should proactively prioritize, instead of unplanned, ad hoc mega-projects hawked by private investors wearing expensive tailored suits. 

In my list I have focused on public investments that are low hanging fruit and that will either slow climate change or help us adapt to climate impacts already underway. 

• Los Angeles urgently needs a drought tolerant urban forest in its public and private areas. Median strips, sidewalk planting areas, and parks are in dreadful shape, as well as most yards. Many of the city’s trees are dying because they are not drought tolerant, and in to many areas there are long, bare stretches without any trees at all. But, Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, Santa Monica, and Culver City have all demonstrated that a drought tolerant urban forest is possible. Therefore, the only question is how to make trees, not real estate speculation, the priority of our elected officials. 

• In conjunction with a drought tolerant urban forest, Los Angeles urgently needs to reinstate and upgrade the LADWP program to replace lawns, whether in parkways, front yards, or back yards, with drought tolerant gardens.

• Decentralized rooftop solar is begging for a massive roll out because of LA’s sunny climate. It not only makes houses and businesses energy independent, but excess power flows back to the LADWP’s grid, reducing its need to burn highly polluting coal and natural gas in distant power plants. 

• Natural disasters, whether fires or earthquakes, are waiting to happen. Our vast network of overhead utility wires and aging underground water, gas, and sewage lines are highly vulnerable. It might be expensive, but LA needs an integrated public works program to underground above ground utilities, while replacing and upgrading the systems that are already undergrounded. If streetlights and gas lines are already buried, why not electricity and telecommunications? 

• METRO’s plans, now on the ballot through Measure M, will go a long way to accelerate the transition from private cars to many alternative transportation modes, including repairing LA’s beat up sidewalks to promote walking. But, why should these improvements depend on a regressive sales tax, when trillions have already been thrown down the rat holes of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya  – with no end in sight, regardless of who wins the Presidential election?

Of course, none of this public development happens by itself. We cannot depend on a private tycoon to knock on the door of your local Councilmember with an offer to repair miles of broken sidewalks on his dime. Instead, it requires a rigorous planning process, including taking LA’s old infrastructure and public services General Plan elements out of mothballs so they can be updated. It also requires an annual monitoring program, and finally it requires that these plans be integrated into the City’s annual budget. 

It might also require a few fiscal changes, such as fixing Proposition 13, reprioritizing the City’s budget, and reinstating many Federal urban housing and transportation programs that slowly bit the dust during and after the Vietnam War. The money is undoubtedly there, and our elected officials need to tap into it.

 

(Dick Platkin reports on local city planning issues for CityWatch. He is a veteran city planner and welcomes comments and corrections at [email protected].) Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.