February 20, 2006

Eastern Neighborhood Rezoning Represents Opportunities and Obstacles

By Alison Fromme
Special to the Neighborhood Newswire

San Francisco is growing, but its land area, obviously, is not. As a result, there’s increasing pressure to make the best use of available space. The challenge is, what constitutes “best” depends on who you are, where you live, and what economic interest you represent.

The Bayview-Hunters Point, Mission, Potrero, and South-of-Market communities are “ground zero” for efforts to determine how best to direct new development. Since 1998, neighborhood activists, City planners, developers, and others have been hammering out a master vision for future development-- known as the Eastern Neighborhoods Plan.

The Plan is supposed to provide a systematic guide for development; a way of dissuading piecemeal projects that don’t meet the neighborhoods’ needs. However, over the past seven years, while various stakeholders grappled with how best to accommodate growth, a significant number of development projects have been approved – more than 1,000 rental or condominium units are currently being constructed on or adjacent to Potrero Hill alone.

“Basic land use decisions have to be made, and this issue is becoming more and more urgent,” said Amit Ghosh, San Francisco’s Chief of Comprehensive Planning. “Right now, everything is uncertain and that’s not a good way to be.”

Optimists, such as Potrero Hill resident David Kerr, believe that new development will bring improved infrastructure, expanded open space, job growth, affordable housing, and other valuable enhancements. “I'm very excited about more residential development in and near Potrero Hill because I believe density creates more opportunity for transit and nice quality of life,” Kerr said. “I've been opposed to those who really want to limit new development. I don't think underused or empty warehouses contribute more than new housing and businesses will. And I think more people living here will add vitality to the existing businesses and street culture.”

But there are obstacles to achieving Kerr’s vision. “We're known throughout the world for our diverse neighborhoods, mixture of demographics and incomes, neighborhood owned stores, views and vistas. All that is set to be lost without guidance from the Planning Department. Not only don't I see that guidance, I see instead a land grab that includes densities and heights that conflict with common sense urban planning concepts,” said Potrero Hill resident Kepa Askenasy.

The Eastern Neighborhood Plan represents a giant step forward, according to Joe Boss, the Potrero Hill Boosters Neighborhood Association’s recording secretary. “Over the past eight years there has been a lot of development in the industrially zoned land, with no effective way of ending up with a complete neighborhood. Without planning and the identification of the impacts and fees to pay for those impacts, we will end up with a lot of new residents that have no normal services nearby, who ultimately drive to get to those services,” he said.

As part of the Plan, the Planning Department has proposed zoning changes that would allow residential buildings on land that is currently designated as “light industry”, a catchall category that includes caterers, animal boarding facilities, taxi services, furniture production, clothing manufacturing, and even “big box” retailers. Under one option, industrial land along Mariposa between De Haro and Arkansas would become residential mixed with light industrial or commercial, as would the blocks bounded by Vermont Street, Division Street, De Haro and 16th, and the area west of Pennsylvania Avenue between 22nd and 23rd.

Market demand for light industrial land is expected to continue to decline over the next 25 years, mostly due to the high cost of doing business in San Francisco. As a result, even with the proposed changes, the remaining land zoned for light industry should be adequate through 2030, according to a study by Berkeley-based Economic and Planning Systems commissioned by the Planning Department.

Approximately 20,000 light industry jobs are currently on land that under the Plan could be zoned for other purposes, mainly residential. More than two-thirds of those jobs, particularly associated with publishing, audio-visual, and design, are expected to be displaced over the next quarter century regardless of changes in land use policies due to market forces. The City would have to take affirmative action, as it’s done to recruit biotechnology to the eastern neighborhoods, to retain this employment base, which so far it has declined to do.

The Planning Department’s rezoning proposals are limited to addressing the balance of land for commercial and housing uses, according to the Department of Public Health Eastern Neighborhoods Community Health Assessment, a project that aims to predict the effects of rezoning on community health. The proposal excludes visionary planning for public spaces, schools, transit, and community services.

This concerns Potrero Hill resident Marty Wall, despite his excitement about neighborhood development. “Lack of funding and after-school programs are a big problem. When kids get off school and there are not very many parks or activities for them to take advantage of, it can cause them to be restless,” he said.

Residents are also concerned about a host of other land use challenges, including a lack of affordable housing, and displacement of existing residents and businesses. But according to the Plan, “many of these concerns do not address changes in the physical environment… and therefore are properly addressed in another context.”

The Eastern Neighborhoods Plan won’t move forward until its environmental impact – including potential effects on visual quality, transportation, noise, air quality, and contamination from former industrial sites -- is assessed sometime later this year. In the meantime, interim zoning controls -- measures to prevent any zoning changes until the Plan has been adopted -- have already expired. New controls will be considered by the Planning Commission later this month, but even these short-term measures are controversial, with the Potrero Hill Boosters Neighborhood Association calling them “dangerously vague and ill-considered.”

One way or another, City planners and community activist hope to finally get ahead of the development deluge before the end of this year. “The world changes by the time we’re ready to approve changes,” the Planning Department’s Ghosh said. Potrero Hill residents are hoping that these changes will be for the better.

For more information, visit the San Francisco Planning Department’s website: http://www.sfgov.org/site/planning_index.asp

The Eastern Neighborhoods Initial Study can be found at http://www.sfgov.org/site/uploadedfiles/planning/EasternNeighborhoodsIS.pdf

This is the second of a series of three articles focusing on land use changes in San Francisco’s eastern neighborhoods.