Quote:
Originally Posted by IMBY
I'm surprised, that a city like SF, doesn't have a much stricter Design Committee, to allow a building like this to be built!
I can understand other cities who are so desperate for any development that they'll approve just about anything so as not scare away the developer.
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San Francisco has a process that involves layer upon layer of bureaucratic obstacles to building anything, starting with a city agency—the Planning Dept.— made up of city employees of varying talents and training, followed by a Planning Commission made up of politically connected appointees and ultimately the elected Board of Supervisors. Any project can be ordered modified or blocked altogether at any of those levels, based on so little as a single citizens complaint or nothing at all. And any project that navigates all the levels can be stopped by a lawsuit, often over failures or deficiencies in the state-mandated environmental review process which comes before all the rest.
To suggest we don’t have enough bureaucracy or that the tripwires any project ust step over or that what we need is more design kibbitzing by non-participants with mediocre tastes is pretty funny. If we took it seriously we could find ourselves unable to build any housing at all.
Not every apartment building or even most needs to be an object or architectural beauty. They just need to provide places for people to live. Most, in most cities, are quite bland. But if we had less rather than more bureaucratic control, we might get a few outstanding projects, at least by some tastes (others would doubtless hate them).
As for this project, it will give some people a place to live. Just build it.