Last week, the Vanguard covered the presentation by Dan Ramos and Prakosh Pinto of the Mace Innovation Center. You can read the Vanguard synopsis – here. To watch the video of the presentation – see Proposed Mace Innovation Center Presentation – Jul 28th, 2014.
As Dan Ramos explained, there are really two key drivers for this innovation park – (1) fiscal benefits to the city and (2) the expressed need to keep Tyler Schilling and Schilling Robotics in Davis. Mr. Ramos talked about the economic driver in terms of high-end use buildings, where the combined property tax and sales tax revenues exceed $4 to $7 million. This, he argued, would be instrumental in generating tax revenue to help fund city services.
“The location of the project is ideal from a standpoint of access and visibility to I-80, and will have a meaningful impact on the perception of the City as a technology-driven, high-value locale,” he stated, noting that the project will play a key role in the Davis real estate market, affecting demand for residential, commercial, and office/R&D property.
He stated, “The real estate markets in Davis will be redefined by the project, as the City historically has been held back by a dearth of clean, developable parcels by sufficient scale to accommodate campus users. The setting of near key services and amenities addresses the needs that have been well documented by the Brookings Institute and others regarding quality of life factors that are increasingly important in competing for talent.”
The second driver is Schilling Robotics. Dan Ramos laid out, and Community Development Director Mike Webb clarified, an aggressive timeline that he believes is tight, but can succeed in keeping Schilling Robotics in Davis.
Both Dan Ramos and Mike Webb expect that, sometime in September, the project will make a formal application. There will be an extensive outreach process, and the city has recently solicited requests for qualifications from consulting firms or teams, to provide planning project management and CEQA services for multiple development applications proposed for review by the City of Davis. The deadline for those requests is August 11.
They talked about, by this time next year, having the project ready for the city council to take action, as there are city, state and county deadlines. For that to happen, Mike Webb explained there needs to be a lot of outreach, even before they get to an application phase. There is scheduled at this time another outreach meeting on August 23.
The goal is to get this to a Measure R vote by November of 2015. If that vote is successful, the city would work with LAFCo (Local Agency Formation Commission) to initiate formal annexation proceedings. Mike Webb went on to explain that the city would be engaging LAFCo throughout the process so that once the project is ready, LAFCo is aware of the situation and ready to begin its process expeditiously.
Dan Ramos explained that his goal is to have the site ready for Tyler Schilling as early as winter or spring of 2017 – and he seemed confident, with Tyler Schilling sitting in the audience, that this timeframe would work for Mr. Schilling.
He said that they will do what they can to accommodate the use by Tyler Schilling and make sure they have the Schilling site up and going.
David, do you know if the city currently has any plans on what they would like to do with their parcel on the project site?
I don’t think they have gotten that specific. The original idea was an urban farm, but that may change.
I just hope they don’t put a strip mall or something of that sort in there.
That would be a recipe for Measure R defeat, imo.
So are you saying the City’s parcel will be subject to it’s own Measure R vote in addition to the Project site’s Measure R vote or will they both fall under the same vote?
If they attempt to use it for urban uses. An urban farm would not require a land use change.
Addition of any significant retail component would certainly lead to more opposition, and probably to Measure R defeat for this site. Retail for a peripheral site should be geared to the business users on that site; i.e., small convenience store, coffee shop, etc.
This is the perfect place to engage the citizens. What would they like to see for the city parcel? We have a lot of brilliant people in this town with fantastic ideas. I’d like to see a process that captures these ideas for consideration.
I think the Anderson family needs to negotiate with the city to relocate Davis Ace to that site surrounded by community farms (instant customers), expand their garden and building supplies (there is plenty of demand in this town… Redwood Barn and Hibbert Lumber will not be harmed), and then redevelop all of G street between 2nd and 4th.
How can I help make it so?
I like it.
Frank Lee:
A couple of years ago, before the teachers decided to get rid of the state’s RDAs, a developer approached Jennifer Anderson and the City of Davis with a proposal to redevelop the block of G Street from 2nd to 3rd back to the rail line, save the Chen Building. His proposal, if I recall correctly, was to build a 3 story building all along G Street to 3rd, with ground floor retail (including space for Davis Ace) and office/residential on the upper floors. He then would use some RDA funds to build a 4-story parking garage (plus roof parking) on the east side of the parcel. It would have provided more net new parking spaces than the 3rd-4th-E-F parking garage proposal. And it would have provided more retail square footage than is not on the site.
AFAIK, Jennifer Anderson was not interested; and perhaps because of that, no one on the city council supported it, either. But I think the idea, of having more density, more height, more street fronting retail and more parking, especially parking in the back, is sound. Of course, it’s not my property. Jennifer and Doby have to do what makes sense to them. And RDA money is now going to fund teacher pensions.
Rich – I had heard this story before. And I certainly understand why Jennifer and Doby would decline when they are well supported in their current business design. I was just thinking that the 25 acres that the city owns is a new chip to consider.
They can even retain a satellite Davis Ace retail location downtown if they wanted. I would do this and expand housewares if I were them.
They also have the rock yard that could be relocated to the Mace location. That would be a nice space for new retail expanding east.
I am seeing big dollar signs here. I would love to help with a feasibility study for this. I am guessing I will hear from Doby soon either telling me to go away, or that there is a sliver of interest to pursue.
They’re doing fine where they are. Why would they bother?
I think that is their mindset.
That is the problem with “just doing fine”. They could do much better but not unless they are motivated to do much better.
Yes, a community farm with a nice Ace Hardware facing the farm with a huge section out front showing off their plants. I was recently back in Fairfax VA and there were a couple of hardware stores that had huge plant areas out front that were very enticing to not only look at but also shop. You could hardly tell it was a hardware store from the beautiful way the plants were positioned out front for sale. Talk about a win-win for the city.
“David, do you know if the city currently has any plans on what they would like to do with their parcel on the project site?”
Perhaps a chemical factory which produces single use plastic grocery bags would be a winner?
LOL. Or better yet, a paper bag factory. Then those plastic bag banners can really see the environmental impacts of the alternative they demanded.
The paper bags should come with eye-holes in them. Then we can reinstitute plastic shopping bags for the 90% of Davis people who like them, and let those lefties, who are embarrassed to be seen toting plastic bags, wear paper bags over their heads.
http://static.sportskeeda.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/paper-bag-fans-2092174.jpg
LOL Too funny!
Rich, you made my day, LMAO.
We could call the new eyehole paper bags the “Brown Bagophobes”.
I have a philosophic question that I would like to ask that I think needs consideration. I do not know what I think about this question. I am ambivalent at best and am only posing it for the sake of discussion. I have the utmost respect for Mr. Schilling and his work so I am going to say up front that this is not a personal or business attack, nor is it an argument for no change.
The question is should the city be making sweeping plans with multiple implications for change ( freely admitted by both sides of the growth issue that dramatic change will occur , seen as desirable by one side and unwanted by the other) in order to accommodate the needs of any particular business ?
We have heard in past discussions the argument that downtown businesses have been artificially protected by not allowing peripheral business development. We have heard arguments that downtown is the major draw of our community outside the university and as such should be supported. It seems to me that the current discussion encompasses changes that could have equal impact on our community and that this concept of the picking of “winners and losers” in this is not being addressed at the most fundamental level.
This is not the first time we have heard pleas for the city to intervene to “save” a particular business. We have heard pleas to intervene with Davis Diamonds and with the laundromat that was being forced to close. Is it the role of the city to intervene for every business ? Only when specifically asked by enough residents? Only when the business is large enough to generate significant money for the city overall ? What standards are we choosing as a community for when to intervene or should we be taking this on a case by case basis ?
Again, no agenda. Just soliciting thoughts.
Schilling Robotics doesn’t need to be saved; they need a place to grow. The City of Davis needs to be saved fiscally, and building an innovation park is the most effective way of doing that. This isn’t about picking winners and losers, it is about creating a City with a broad tax base that helps pay for the amenities that we all love while at the same time keeping our tax rates at a more reasonable level. Some people are happy making Davis a more expensive place to live, but the way to make all of us winners is by reducing our taxes while still providing the services that we all want. That is what economic development will do for us.
I agree with most of what you say here.
Which parts do you not agree with?
The only part I didn’t really agree with was “some people are happy making Davis a more expensive place to live” – I think for most people there are critical trade offs there between affordability and other issues.
Interesting… I sense that you are uncomfortable with the idea that there are people living here that could really give a s _ _ _ about anyone not living here today, and happy that their property values are kept high and that the riff raff cannot easily afford to live here. I think this is absolutely spot on.
i don’t see property value as a driving force for people. for instance, i am happy with my home in old east, not interested in selling. my slow growth tendencies come from community concerns.
When demand for housing is rising, as it generally does in Davis over time, and you have people who oppose new residential development–“I want to keep Davis size it was when I moved here; I don’t want to live in Vacaville; I am against sprawl, and turning farmland into housing is sprawl.”–those people inherently are happy to make Davis a more expensive place to live. In other words, if you hold down supply while demand grows, prices go up, making Davis more expensive.
There is also another aspect of the “more expensive” calculus. Another large segment of people who live in Davis don’t want any more retail which tends to serve lower income consumers. They don’t personally need to economize, so they don’t give a sh**about people who do. So they fight all proposals to keep out big box stores which offer poor service and low prices. They might make up other excuses, about how this will affect downtown–never mind that downtown is mostly a restaurant and office district today–but the effect of their anti-competitive retail views is to make Davis more costly for poorer people and students.
We have retail that serves lower-income consumers, right here in East Davis. I don’t recall any objections when they went in.
What “community concerns”?
mr. rifkin – i think a lot of people in davis consider big box stores like target to be counter to good planning principles, harming the community, harming community retail, etc. you can disagree with them on this point, but the people i know who like myself voted against target did it out of those considerations.
i don’t see the need to vilify those people who like the community small and home grown.
Yes, a lot of us do hold those views.
DP, those are all fine excuses. Bottom line, the people who think that way don’t give a sh$* about poorer people who need to pay less for retail merchandise.
Rich RifkinWDE 73/ Davis Progressive: instead of focusing on Target, how would this work out, theoretically, if a Costco were to locate in Davis?
My search said that an average Costco location does $100M a year in business, a staggering amount. They are known for high quality and good (sometimes cheap) pricing. On top of this, their sites seem to be rather compact. And they pay a decent wage and benefits ($20 an hour for seasoned workers).
How many dollars per year would $100M a year in retail bring to city coffers?
And some of those that are opposed to big box stores have a financial interest in keeping them out whether or not they are willing to admit their conflict of interest.
i agree with both views here. ultimately we need to have good projects and rushing through to save schilling might kill the project. so let us do it right and if we can keep schilling here – great. if not – we’ll create space for new companies to develop and grow.
“The question is should the city be making sweeping plans with multiple implications for change ( freely admitted by both sides of the growth issue that dramatic change will occur , seen as desirable by one side and unwanted by the other) in order to accommodate the needs of any particular business ?”
the answer here is no they shouldn’t. the city should do this regardless of the status of schilling.
freely admitted by both sides of the growth issue that dramatic change will occur
I think this is a bit of hyperbole and I disagree that both sides agree that “drastic change” will occur.
“Drastic” as an emotive word that demands definition. And should deteriorating roads and parks and reduction of services for seniors and kids be considered “drastic” by comparison?
I was thinking about this position from you and others more inclined to be against peripheral development, and I keep coming back to an opinion that your concerns are largely irrational. Let me explain.
I think most of the people that are on the no-growth, or slower-than-tar-growth… other than those 10 or so greedy Republican types that just want to jack up their property values… are mostly focused on the downtown core area. Developing on the periphery does not change the downtown core area, does it?
Now there are certainly going to be some that oppose peripheral development because they already live or work adjacent to the new proposed development and are concerned about impacts to their lifestyle and property values. But again, a lot of the people I hear opposing new development are people that live in the core area. So this point that “drastic change” will occur, or that negative impacts will happen… it is irrational from the perspective of the downtown.
If we are not going to expand peripherally, and we agree that we need to develop the economy, then the alternative is to increase the scope and density of the downtown business capacity. Now, that would surely impact the lifestyles of the people living in the core area or that live just outside of the core and frequently visit the downtown.
Here is what we are missing in our valuation of impacts: neighborhoods.
Travel to S.F. or Boston… two of the best examples of dense walkable cities. The key is neighborhoods. They become self-contained “core areas” where residents can enjoy similar amenities that our single Davis downtown core area provides. The neighborhoods are all well-connected with walkable and bike-able roads and paths, and there is ample public transportation. Parking is constrained, but this then supports more people using public transportation.
My point is not that Davis become S.F. or Boston… we will never reach anything close to either… ever. My point is that we can open our minds to creating new residential/commercial “core areas” that are well-connected but allowing each to retain their special charm.
In cities that grow outward, often the downtown is branded “old town” and it retains its premium value. And by allowing peripheral development to create new core areas, we help retain the old charm of the old neighborhoods.
And let’s not forget the increase in the number of customers that would help all Davis retailers.
Frankly
‘drastic change”
I agree that “drastic”is an emotive word. The interesting thing is that I didn’t use it.
You did.
Tia said:
“The question is should the city be making sweeping plans with multiple implications for change ( freely admitted by both sides of the growth issue that dramatic change will occur , seen as desirable by one side and unwanted by the other) in order to accommodate the needs of any particular business ?”
dramatic vs. drastic
po-tay-to vs. po-tah-to
You are correct.
But if I could edit my post, I would just change the word “drastic” to “dramatic” and every point would remain the same. “Dramatic” is just another emotive.
I would say that Davis is guilty of a history of dramatic restrictions to growth.
Frankly
“That is the problem with “just doing fine”. They could do much better but not unless they are motivated to do much better.”
I agree with you that “dramatic” is an emotive. But it can be either a positive or negative emotive depending on perspective. I think that “drastic” would be agreed to be a negative. I find this particular misquote very telling about our differences in perspective.
I feel fundamentally different about your statement that there is a problem with “doing just fine”. Why is it a problem to be satisfied that your current business is enough for you and provides enough for the community. What I feel is a problem is the relentless belief that more must be better. If money is not your highest value, perhaps less will sometimes be better is it allows you more time or balance or peace in your life.
I believe it was Rochelle Swanson who stated that the first rule of community / city development was to keep the business that you already have. Business retention.
Let me ask the same questions on the opposite side of the equation: if Schilling Robotics exits town, how will you replace those jobs and revenues? What businesses do you envision that are as good as, or better than, Schilling Robotics? And, how many more pollutants will go into the air from citizens of Davis commuting to West Sacramento or Dixon? How will the families and children cope if their family moves to Dixon or Elk Grove?
I guess the biggest question is how much more are you willing to pay, per year, in property taxes, so that Davis adds few or no new businesses, yet maintains basic services? (Street repair, etc.) You may be willing to pay $1,000 or $1,500 per year more to maintain the status quo, but I don’t think most residents are willing to do that.
You know, its not all bad. New businesses, new restaurants, a hotel (or two) can ad to the vibrancy of the town.
so here’s a point and i’m not conceding that we lose schilling by any means. but let’s say we rush the process and can’t get the project to 50% and so in trying to rush to save schilling, we get nothing?
I don’t know Mr. Shilling, but my guess is that he is a savvy business person. If he sees the discussions making progress, if he sees city leaders being supportive and constructive, if he sees the ball rolling in the right direction(s), I don’t think an extra month or six will tarnish his views.
In contrast, if he sees the opposite, I’m sure he will consider his options, and neighboring communities will welcome him with warmth and open arms.
To Tia: I am a bit puzzled by your question. How is the city making sweeping changes to accommodate Schilling? As Mark West has noted, for the purposes of generating tax revenue there is a move to create innovation parks at three different locations. Schilling would like to move into one of the innovation parks, because it needs the additional space. If the city fails to create that additional space, Schilling will move elsewhere, Davis will continue to have its reputation of being anti-innovation park, other businesses will shy away from Davis and head for more fertile ground, and the city will have to continue raising taxes and/or cutting services as the only way out of its fiscal mess. Not accommodating Schilling has a cascading effect that could be very detrimental to Davis as a nascent center for start-up R&D business. As Chief Innovation Officer Rob White commented, it is all about “branding”. The city of Davis needs to “brand” itself as a welcoming community to tech businesses, otherwise these companies will go elsewhere where they are wanted if Davis shows no desire to house them. Schilling represents a first step in setting out the welcome mat and indicating Davis is open for tech business.
“I am a bit puzzled by your question. How is the city making sweeping changes to accommodate Schilling?”
i think from her perspective putting huge business parks on the periphery is making sweeping changes.
“Davis will continue to have its reputation of being anti-innovation park”
the question is going to be: will davis have space. if davis has space, its reputation is irrelevant.
Davis has the space, in fact there are 4 different spaces thus far. The question is more correctly, are citizens willing to open up Davis for R&D business? Davis’ reputation is hardly irrelevant. If Davis shows itself unwilling to accommodate existing businesses, what chance do you think Davis has of attracting more business? None. Tia particularly talked about making sweeping changes to accommodate Shilling specifically. But that is not what is going on here, as I mentioned in my previous post. I would assume Tia will let us know if she is opposed to innovation parks on the periphery of city limits in general.
if davis has the space – then we wouldn’t need to go through this process. davis doesn’t have the space and will have to anex the land and pass a measure r vote to get it.
Davis has copious space surrounding it. Annexing land is not rocket science. Cities do it all the time… especially when they are blessed with a new business park that will bring jobs and revenue to the city.
Man-made constraints are not absolutes and should not be talked about as being absolutes when there are simple man-made remedies.
Now S.F. and Santa Barbara… those are two cities with absolute space constraints.
davis has more constraints than you think. it can’t go much south, can’t go much east. it could go north or west. but that wasn’t my point. my point was that land is not available now.
Davis can grow east, west and north. There is plenty of land. All cities have to annex land to grow. Your point does not make any sense.
davis really can’t grow much to the east if at all.
You need to explain this. We can grow out to the causeway.
i don’t believe we can grow to the levee.
Anon
DP actually answered for me. We’ll and concisely. I don’t know if the addition of one or more innovation parks to Davis would be a net good or bad, or indifferent. But I do certainly see it as sweeping change. We don’t have any now. Therefore building one is certainly change. One can always quibble over the use of adjectives, but I don’t think that sweeping is all that hyperbolic when taking about doing something of this magnitude.
Tia, I have no numbers one way or another, but I do have two questions:
1) How many acres do you think are encompassed by the Second Street corridor from Target to the Pole Line Overpass?
2) Did that Second Street corridor also represent sweeping change for Davis?
I have a favor to ask.
Those in favor of innovation parks being built have stated their reasons:
1. The number 1 reason is to increase the revenue to the city so that we can pay our bills and continue funding all the amenities we all demand. Business is the only net-positive city revenue generator. Residential tax revenue eventually turns negative as the cost to service the residential area exceeds the tax inflows. Davis has significantly lower business tax revenue than any other comparable city. It has been proven that the rate of tax increase required to adequately fund the city and pay for our amenities will significantly economically harm many residents. And it is unlikely that the voters would vote to tax themselves at the level required.
2. Support the university that provides us so much. UCD is way behind on its public-private partnership development when compared to other comparable universities. UCD has rocketed up to the top of the list for ag and food science, and the convergence of the historical business development deficit and the reputation advance has led us to a point where the demand for innovation park land is here today. There is a window of opportunity to support the university and it is now. If we stall or reject, then we miss the opportunity to support our university and the university will go elsewhere.
3. The moral imperative to create more good jobs. This is both a local and a regional imperative. I live and work in Davis. It is a wonderful life. We have a moral obligation to help more people… especially UCD grads… do the same. Adding some more of them will not impact my life enough to justify me preventing them by rejecting economic development.
4. The benefits of local business contributing to the city. The owners and employes of the businesses will give back to the city. For example, Intel spends millions on Folsom schools and other programs.
5. The assist to the demographics of the city adding more young professionals and more young families.
Now we know that those against these peripheral business parks are citing one primary benefit: to retain Davis’s small rural town charm. My favor is to get a more detailed explanation of the negative impact concerns. Because the former is much too nebulous to be of any use in discussing. Anyone can always claim they are protecting “charm” and “feel”, etc. But what is it specifically that concerns someone that is more apt to be lined up against these business parks? If we can get more specifics, we can have a conversation about it. And then there are probably options we can discuss to mitigate these concerns.
Those against keep demanding that the proponents come to the table with detailed specifics. I think it is time for those against to do the same.
Well put. And the so-called homeless have already impacted what we previously had.
Excellent summation of the pros for approving innovation parks in Davis, as well as the nebulous reason given by those expressing “concerns” about an innovation park. If the target is made foggy enough, no one can hit it – which has been an effective tactic in this town. Vague concerns sow the seeds of dissension with hazy misinformation.
you’re assuming that people here are against peripheral business parks as opposed to having questions about them.
DP, are you or others that voice opposition afraid of commitment? There has been copious discussion on the topic already. You should have had your head filled by now with all the arguments for. If you are not yet completely on board and committed to approving and building these parks, then it is reasonable for others to ask you to detail your concerns. What are those concerns?
If you don’t like being labeled as NIMBY, or change-averse, or change fearful… then detail your concerns. This seems a reasonable request.
You see, saying that you are just protecting Davis’s small town charm, is in fact, a passive aggressive move. It is a strategic play to keep yourself out of the detailed conversation for fear that your arguments are baseless and you have really just dug in your heels from an irrational perspective.
It is fine having general uneasy feelings about change… we all do. But we have to do the hard work to qualify and quantify what it is exactly that is bothering us if we are to effectively participate in collaborative decision-making and progress. You can just keep hanging back saying you are uneasy and demand that others fix it for you if you.
But this is all besides the point…. I really want to learn about these concerns. Maybe there are things that I am not thinking of… things that might moderate my opinion and turn me to advocate for features that better support those not yet in support of business park development.
i want to see the details of the proposal before i commit, but i’m leaning towards supporting it. but that doesn’t mean that everyone who has similar views to me, will do the same.
DP, that is my view, too. I think one problem with past ideas for business parks, including Mace 391*, is that the proponents have not proffered solid estimates of tax revenues that should be generated. It seems to me that a third party needs to be hired to analyze the proposal for its revenue implications, explaining how much the City should expect in added sales tax, property tax for land and buildings, property tax for equipment and any other taxes (e.g., construction tax, etc.).
Only with that information in mind can residents decide if the proposal is meritorious or not.
__________________
* Mace 391 had one element within it which made in unique and inarguably a winner for the City of Davis’s revenues. The City owned the land. So even if the consequential tax revenues were nothing dramatic, a land sale should have benefitted the City of Davis by some $50 million to $100 million, depending on whose estimate of the land price you believe. … Instead, the City Council took the side of a small number of no-growth activists and locked its land in perpetuity into agricultural easement, effectively throwing away that $50 to $100 million. And even though such money was “one time,” I think a huge majority of Davis residents would have supported the land sale, if the money were dedicated to repairing our broken streets, sidewalks and bike paths.
I agree with this Mace 391 logic.
But we have people with absolute knowledge of the future that claim that a Mace 391 measure J/R vote would have failed. Personally I think it is their fabricated bailout excuse for costing the city $50 – $100 million only to satiate their selfish land preservation extremism.
You know what? You need to stop this. I don’t feel like having another long debate about Mace 391. But you keep posting your standard insults against those of us who supported the ag easement. Please stop. This thread is about what Ramos and his team are proposing for the Mace Innovation Center. It is not an invitation to rehash the Mace 391 debate.
We need a proposed design before there can be a comprehensive assessment of the benefits… both tangible and intangible and both short-term and long-term.
But, there has been plenty of general information provided about the fiscal benefits based on previous studies on existing university-connected research/business parks.
Here is what might sell a business park ASAP:
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Woodland+Sports+Park/@38.653895,-121.765791,3a,75y,91.5h,90t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sBnEJWEg26fYUaeyBtFcTiw!2e0!4m7!1m4!3m3!1s0x8084d1477f778325:0xd2c312e00e93b67c!2s1752+Lee+Dr,+Woodland,+CA+95776!3b1!3m1!1s0x0:0x17606aec2fb87cb7!6m1!1e1
http://www.cityofwestsacramento.org/city/depts/pcs/wsrc/default.asp
“It is not an invitation to rehash the Mace 391 debate.”
Don, you have the right to ignore any Mace 391 comments. No one directed anything at you personally. You have chosen, oddly, to ignite a debate by telling others they cannot debate. If you had better sense, you would just stop and be quiet and let it die without your further and seemingly endless effort to debate this.
The subject of this thread is the Mace Innovation Center proposal by Ramos and his team.
No, the subject is economic development, and the Mace decision was an important one, with both positive and negative aspects. Learning about the consequences of that decision will inform the debate on the current land use questions in front of us. Ignoring those consequences does nothing to further the education of the electorate in this matter and consequently would be a foolish approach.
Don’s efforts to squelch the debate are inappropriate, and have nothing to do with the ‘purity’ of the current topic, but are rather an effort to avoid addressing to his own culpability. In my opinion, this is an improper use of his position as Moderator on this forum.
Neither Rich’s original comment, nor Frankly’s reply to it, nor your further discussion of it, are doing anything to further the topic of economic development, nor of the Ramos team’s proposal.
Do you want to have a long, drawn-out debate about Mace 391 on this thread, Mark? Complete with all the usual insults by Frankly? Sure. I’m up for it. Or we could just post links to our many previous threads on the subject of Mace 391.
The thing is, Mark, that I don’t feel the slightest “culpability” in having helped — if by expressing my opinion I made any difference — to get Mace 391 put into a conservation easement. I strongly support that move by the unanimous vote of the city council. I am very comfortable having the support in that position by the open space commission, by many community members. I am not even slightly ashamed of staking out strong positions in support of wise land-use policies that conserve farmland. I am not embarrassed or ashamed to support balanced development policies, including the new proposals for business parks adjacent to the city.
But this thread was, in fact, about the Ramos team’s plan for Mace 200. It veered toward Mace 391 as a footnote by Rich, which Frankly picked up on and added his usual epithets. So as moderator, I sought to steer it back to the actual topic.
I know you disapprove of my job as moderator. You’ve made that clear. I know you disagree with my positions. You’ve made that clear. I take those criticisms in the spirit in which they are offered. But in this instance, I disagree with your particulars.
“I think one problem with past ideas for business parks, including Mace 391, is that the proponents have not proffered solid estimates of tax revenues that should be generated.”
Rich and DP, aren’t we falling into a “fox in the hen house” trap when we ask the proposer to do our calculations for us? Wouldn’t it be much wiser to decide what it is that we need as tax revenue from the subject property, and then tell the developer/proposer what the taxation hurdle is that they will have to factor into their own calculations of whether or not to move forward.
Don: No one is starting an argument about Mace 391. Rich made the factual statement that the City gave up a $50-100 Million asset at a time that we have an ongoing budget deficits. Frankly followed up agreeing with Rich’s assessment. Nobody insulted anyone (though Frankly did question the validity of a statement of fact that has been put forward by multiple parties regarding the results of a Measure R vote on the property).
You however did jump in to try to squelch the debate, just as you have done before (as Matt correctly pointed out a few days ago). I can infer from your other comments why you have made the choices you made, but you would be correct if you said I do not know why you act this way. The fact remains, you are trying once again to squelch a conversation that should be kept fresh in order to inform the current decisions before us.
I believe you are doing it, not because it is ‘off topic,’ but because of your own personal interests or point of view. As a consequence of that belief, I think your actions are inappropriate for the Moderator of this forum.
Matt: “Rich and DP, aren’t we falling into a “fox in the hen house” trap when we ask the proposer to do our calculations for us?”
I don’t disagree with you, there. I probably was not clear. Among my ramblings, I wrote above, “It seems to me that a third party needs to be hired to analyze the proposal for its revenue implications, explaining how much the City should expect in added sales tax, property tax for land and buildings, property tax for equipment and any other taxes (e.g., construction tax, etc.).”
I think a developer has too strong of an incentive to overestimate the benefits to the City of his project. Therefore, I see no reason to require him to tell us what those tax revenues likely would be. As to the City, I suspect they lack the expertise in-house to make a good revenue estimate.
I know the city has always made long term cost-benefit projections on residential developments, in terms of property tax (which is rather simple with housing) and things like future costs of public safety and public works. I have never been impressed with the cost estimates they make on such things, because they have a hard time accounting for politics. And when it comes to business development, I doubt they would get it right.
Rich, judging by your response I wasn’t clear in what I said. Let me try again. I see no reason that the City has to wait for the actual receipt of a proposal in order to develop the community’s fiscal expectations. Rather than being reactive, what I believe we should be doing is to proactively come up with our fiscal and infrastructure expectations for each site. Third party expert involvement is just as essential in the proactive methodology that I am proposing as it is in a reactive methodology. The big difference is that in “proactive” there are no proposal/project specifics. The question isn’t “What do we want from this developer?” but rather “What do we want from this community asset?”
David, you wrote: “where the combined property tax and sales tax revenues exceed $4 to $7 million.”
Is it correct to assume that you mean $4-7 Million per year?
Yes. Plus there are construction fees that are one-time
I know some really great people who work at Schilling, family people with 3 kids in our schools. These are well educated, tax paying, employed people although her job is in a different industry. These are people whose friendship gives me joy, who I could ask for help in a pinch, who tell jokes that make me laugh. In my mind the indifference to whether these people stay here or leave shocks me. Its disgusting. You value your process and deliberation and power of decision more than you value your sense of the human ecology of Davis. Why are you all so hateful and selfish. Yes I’m disgusted!
[moderator]Please avoid personal comments like this.
“[moderator]Please avoid personal comments like this.”
You cannot make a ‘personal comment’ unless you have directed the comment at someone ‘personally.’ Whom did Mr. Toad address personally with his comment?
His comments were judgmental, but they were not personal.
Your admonition is inaccurate.
If you have concerns or comments about my moderation actions on the Vanguard, you can contact me at donshor@gmail.com. If you don’t want to do that, you can discuss them with David.
To Mr. Toad: I do understand your frustration and totally agree Shiling Robotics should be kept here if at all possible. At times, I have vehemently disagreed with your positions on growth, only because I know residential growth tends to be a net revenue negative. And we already have a budget deficit, and don’t need any more of a problem. However, I have started to come around to a different way of thinking. If we bring business to Davis, that generates significant tax revenue, I’m okay with possibly generating more housing for those employees because then the city will be able to afford it. I tend to look at growth from a very pragmatic standpoint – growth is fine as long as it is smart growth that will be a net positive revenue to the city. But I also realize that sometimes it is difficult to plan growth that carefully. What comes first, the chicken or the egg? Do we build housing first or business? I tend to think business should come first, but I will be the first to admit that I’m not sure where the employees go if there is no available housing right away. So I am beginning to see your point. Nevertheless, as others before me have pointed out, an innovation park is a golden opportunity to do some smart growth in this city, including potential residential. This city needs to grow to remain viable economically.
Where will the employees go? Some to Davis, and some to Dixon, Woodland, and Sacramento. Many already live there.
Hmmmm, agreed, that could be where they would go. However, do you have objections to building more housing in Davis to accommodate new employees? The trend right now is towards work/housing arrangements.
Better late than never Anon.
To move this discussion forward and to answer Frankly’s question, some of the concerns expressed by those who are not sure about or opposed to an innovation park: 1) traffic; 2) need for more housing; 3) will not be a net positive energy producer; 4) need for a 4th fire station; 5) might open the door to the “wrong” kind of business, e.g. big box retail; 6) urban sprawl; 7) won’t generate tax revenue; 8) might become a toxic dump site.
Someone recently mentioned to me a concern that any development agreement would not be enforced or adhered to, or “the developer will just come back in a couple of years and try to change it.”
Don, yes another “concern” I had forgotten about. Very good.
I too would like to respond to Frankly’s question because it just came to me. Its pure and simple fear and loathing. They fear change so they loathe it.
To Mr. Toad: yes, that is another “concern” that has been expressed – it will change the character of Davis, which I take to mean “it will change Davis”. Very good.
“To move this discussion forward and to answer Frankly’s question, some of the concerns expressed by those who are not sure about or opposed to an innovation park: 1) traffic; 2) need for more housing; 3) will not be a net positive energy producer; 4) need for a 4th fire station; 5) might open the door to the “wrong” kind of business, e.g. big box retail; 6) urban sprawl; 7) won’t generate tax revenue; 8) might become a toxic dump site.”
That is a good start. Let’s wrestle with them a bit.
1) Traffic — Bike lanes, sidewalks, and bus connections will be provided; however, business creates human activity. The site of the proposed Mace Innovation Park is less than 0.5 miles from Interstate 80, so any employees of that Innovation Center who are coming to Davis from other communities will add less than one “car-mile” of traffic each day to Davis. Further, there is no housing anywhere in that half mile distance. The Davis Innovation Center is also less than 0.5 miles from CA 113. Here too any employees of that Innovation Center who are coming to Davis from other communities will add less than one “car-mile” of traffic each day to Davis. There are residences south of Covell that might see some marginal traffic impact when entering Covell from the south, but John Paul Jones Road, which quite possibly will be the primary access into the Davis Innovation Center is to the east of virtually all those feeder streets. Shuttle service from the Amtrak Station to either of the Innovation Parks should add very little incremental traffic.
2) Need for more housing — As noted by Rob White in several of his presentations, the issue with respect to housing and the innovation parks is really subsumed within a much larger housing issue … rental housing for UCD students. If Davis and UCD addressed the substantial use (misuse?) of single family residences as mini-dorms by building additional rental housing (e.g. at Nishi) then the need for additional peripheral housing would be substantially mitigated.
3) Will not be a net positive energy producer — this issue isn’t even being talked about at the valley Climate Action Center. it is assumed that with all the rooftop space and parking shade structures that can support solar, that any Innovation Center will be a net zero energy consumer.
4) Need for a 4th Fire Station — The East Davis Fire Station is less than 1 mile from the Mace Innovation Park. Is that not close enough? davis Innovation Park is similarly close to the West Davis Fire Station.
5) Might open the door to the “wrong” kind of business, e.g. big box retail — That issue is very easy to totally and completely defuse with zoning regulations.
6) Urban sprawl — At its core this is a “gut feel” issue … or if you will, a tradeoff issue that revolves around tow questions. (A) Is the use of the land to produce jobs and taxes an appropriate use? and (B) Will the use of these lands to produce jobs and taxes result in further expansion of urbanization beyond the borders of the Innovation Park? For the Mace Innovation Park, the fact that the Mace 391 conservation easement is in place means that there is an expansion-preventing boundary on all four sides of the Mace Innovation Park parcel.
7) Won’t generate tax revenue — Rob White has discussed this issue by sharing the frequently used assessment district mechanism. An assessment district with its attendant annual recurring fees establishes an early and permanent revenue stream for the governmental entity that is independent of the build-out schedule of the Innovation park itself. Our community needs to decide if we want to go the assessment district route and lock in the guaranteed revenue streams that would come as a result.
8) Might become a toxic dump site — That is a question that we will need to pose to Franklin Roosevelt.
9) The development agreement will not be enforced or adhered to, or “the developer will just come back in a couple of years and try to change it — While I don’t share that concern, it can be dealt with through appropriate legal documents, as well as the aforementioned Assessment District approach.
10) Fear that an Innovation Park and/or the employees that come to work at the innovation park will change the character of Davis — In many ways this is like the “urban sprawl” question. Davis is going to change no matter what we do or don’t do. The question really is what are the trade-offs associated with the different change alternatives.
Okay Frankly and to whoever else would like to take a crack at it, more specific concerns have been listed. How do we address them? How well founded are they?
I took a first pass at it above.
With regards to housing, in a sense we have already built it. Over the past generation or so we chose to build houses rather than develop our local business economy, and as a result we have an imbalance between housing and jobs. I recall seeing an estimate for the jobs deficit, but I do not recall the actual number, but it was a significant difference from the number of jobs we should have for a city of this size. Building an innovation park will increase the number of jobs in town and help to bring the jobs to housing ratio into better balance. It will also increase the demand for housing, but as that demand is already outrageously high, I don’t think the additional impact will be that significant. In other words, we already need to build more housing in town so adding more jobs will not materially change that fact.
Here is a small idea that may be naive, but just a thought beyond the “we want an innovation center” with no specifics.
Can some of the new development be live / work? That was a mantra in San Francisco for years.
Or, could housing be incorporated into the upper levels of some portions of the development?
While this won’t appeal to most families, I can see it appealing to those in their 20s or 30s, and it also might add some life (and security) to the innovation center after the typical 8-to-5 or 7-to-7 business time frame. Fifty or 100 upper-floor residences or lofts, as an example, might add a little life and lifeblood / nighttime foot traffic. Many business parks are desolate at night and on weekends, and can lead to other problems.
It can be done if the zoning is flexible. I mentioned once before that I know there was a residential unit built onto the top of one of the commercial buildings in east Davis between 5th and 2nd (near the Trokanski Studio). The owners of the business lived atop their business. They had a great view, incredible breeze through the residence, and wonderful passive solar just by having all windows on the South side. And it was very, very quiet at night.
I had a friend who lived in an apartment atop a new business facility in a small town, which was brand new. It had parking, with a few attached ground-level retail spaces. The units on top had nice views, were quite, peaceful, and central.
Bring in the new jobs first then when the demand picks up housing will follow.
Dear Anon, I will write a frank response to your concerns. The primary purpose of the “innovation center” will be to generate revenues in the most responsible way possible, without onerous demands.
Concerns:
1) Traffic – bike lanes, sidewalks, and bus connections will be provided; however, business creates human activity.
2) Need for more housing – most people who work here already live in Davis, Woodland, Sac or Dixon; however, some onsite upper levels apartments / condos units could be considered (see my previous post); say live/work or upper level apartments.
3) Will not be a net positive energy producer – buildings will be well-insulated, and use common-sense energy features, where appropriate; however, onerous demands should be avoided as this is not an energy project. Natural Gas can be produced at 2 cents or so a kw/h, and solar can’t compete with that. Look into energy rebates / incentives.
4) Need for a 4th fire station – I believe the current station can cover the added buildings. The land is contiguous.
5) Might open the door to the “wrong” kind of business, e.g. big box retail – I would not lump all “big box” retailers together – if an REI or Costco were open to a new location, I would be all ears considering the $100M a year in sales revenue. That would be a bonanza.
6) Urban sprawl – any development will be tabbed with this; we have open land all around us, this is not Orange County or San Fernando Valley. We are talking about 2 or 3 developments, not unending tract homes.
7) Won’t generate tax revenue – the city is looking at innovation / business parks, not a giant Goodwill. Crunch the numbers, and verify them with an outside, independent source.
8) Might become a toxic dump site – this is what city inspectors are for. Please. No one is proposing toxic storage.
9) Development won’t deliver – I’m sure experienced City managers, Inspectors, and City Planners can hold them to approved plans.
It seems to me these are factual issues. In other words, they are provable or falsifiable, up to a point.
I know what the response to this will be:
(1) City staff typically side with developers. And
(2) the owners of Second Street Crossing got the development agreement changed just a few years after Target opened. And there’s another development agreement change in the news right now. You need to make the development agreement pretty ironclad.
“You need to make the development agreement pretty ironclad.”
No you don’t. You need to make the development agreement in such a way that it can be altered to address changes in the economic environment. We cannot determine in advance what the situation will be during the actual build out of the parcel, so putting unalterable restriction in place in advance is entirely short sighted. Yes, there should be restrictions that make changes dependent on the advice of our commissions and vote of the CC, but ironclad agreements up front are downright stupid.
Case in point, the developers of Second Street Crossing were unable to fill their space given the original developers agreement and several years of trying. We agreed to change the agreement, and low and behold the site is now filling up. How much better off would the City be today if that build out had occurred three or four years earlier? How much worse off would be we if the adjacent sites were still vacant?
In the end, if we do not trust our elected officials to make good decision on our behalf, we should not have elected them.
Don wrote:
> You need to make the development agreement pretty ironclad.
Then Mark wrote:
> No you don’t. You need to make the development agreement
> in such a way that it can be altered to address changes in the
> economic environment.
I have to agree with Mark since if we still had “ironclad” development agreements from the early days of Davis every business would still have to have a place for customers to tie and water horses and homes would have an area for horse barns and buggy parking areas…
LOL Good one South of Davis!
TBD
“Urban sprawl – any development will be tabbed with this; we have open land all around us, this is not Orange County or San Fernando Valley. We are talking about 2 or 3 developments, not unending tract homes.”
You may not be aware of it, but this was basically the same thing that was said about Orange County. There is lots of open land around us. A few housing developments won’t change that……until they did of course. There is only lots of land around Davis because previous inhabitants made keeping Davis small a priority.
Can’t you celebrate 3000 acres of preserved open space in and around Davis?
Geeze… what do we have to do to get everyone to stop with the urban sprawl myth?
Excellent discussion. And for the record, the “concerns” I expressed were those I heard from those questioning an innovation park or are opposed to an innovation park, but do not reflect my views at all. I think the responses to those “concerns” have been well thought out here, and pretty much express my feelings about such “concerns” – I don’t think most of them are well-founded assuming the innovation park is well planned. Altho I do agree with Mark West that ironclad agreements that are inflexible are not a good thing. Sometimes circumstances change, and there is a need to amend contracts. I also like the idea of developing some work/living areas within an innovation park. I believe that is the wave of the future – large cities are doing it right now with work lofts and that sort of thing. For younger folks it is a perfect arrangement.
” I also like the idea of developing some work/living areas within an innovation park. I believe that is the wave of the future – large cities are doing it right now with work lofts and that sort of thing. ”
I am also very much in agreement with this thought. Does anyone know if it is on the table with any of these projects ?
In the private sector, a lot of tech employee just sleep in their office so they can work late and get to work early the next day.
So we will have some live-work going on.
Tia, I believe the proposals are very specifically and explicitly saying “no housing” so that the Measure J/R dialogue is simplified. Simply the whiff of housing on any of these sites is considered to be a political poison pill.
Residential housing is certainly not a poison pill at the Nishi site! I see no reason why some work lofts or something of the sort might work at other sites.
Very good point Anon. One of the interesting idiosyncrasies of the whole Innovation Park discussion(s) has been the separating off Nishi-Gateway off into its own trajectory/process/timeline. Each site has its own characteristics. Nishi is very small when compared to the three RFEI respondants. Nishi clearly will have a substantial housing component … oriented toward students given its close proximity to the UCD campus. Ideally the provision of student-oriented housing at Nishi will reverse the mini-dorm conversion trend for single family residences in Davis … thereby freeing up housing for some of the employees that come to work at the non-Nishi Innovation Parks, when and if they get approval from the voters.
I don’t disagree with you that work lofts could work at the other sites, but for now there are more central/core issues to wrestle with in getting to a point where an informed electorate is going to the polls to vote on a Measure J/R for any of the peripheral sites that responded to the RFEI.
Good list Anon and others!
1) Traffic –
Second to concerns over property value impacts, I think traffic concerns are at the top of everyone’s anxiety list. They top my list. Trying to get over the causeway at rush hour and especially on Fridays is a real pain. I see one or more of these innovation centers causing more freeway traffic at rush hours.
But as other posters have pointed out, I don’t see these generating much more city traffic. And we can mitigate it with smart design in bike and pedestrian connections, and some investment in better public transportation.
But, it general I would certainly concede that more traffic is always a downside of new development. It comes down to how creative we can be with road design, parking and connectors.
Are we not the most creative people on this topic?
2) Need for more housing –
I agree that adding business parks will put pressure on housing growth. But note that the pressure will also increase property values. So at least if we build more housing it can still be at equilibrium with our expected property values.
I think the housing demand will be mitigated by a couple of factors:
1 – A percentage of Davis people currently working out of the area will find jobs in town.
2 – Building more apartments on campus and off campus to house more students, combined with a scale back on multi-unit rental permits for single family housing.
3 – Better commuter connections with West Sac, Woodland and Dixon. The business parks can even run their own shuttle services.
3) Will not be a net positive energy producer –
There is no reason that these parks cannot be very, very green. It depends on the business energy needs, but achieving net zero energy use is certainly feasible for most tech business.
4) Need for a 4th fire station –
All three existing fire stations appear to provide adequate coverage for the three proposed innovation park locations. Maybe the university needs to step up its fire department to help cover the need.
5) Might open the door to the “wrong” kind of business, e.g. big box retail –
Zoning would prevent that. And I’m not sure how approving innovation parks changes this point. The voters approved Target. The voters might approve a future retail location also.
6) Urban sprawl –
This is nebulous term. Davis is less than 10 square miles. It has a population density that is closer to urban areas than rural areas. So claiming that Davis’s charm is that it is a rural city is actually incorrect.
The term sprawl was initially used to describe cities that connected along major traffic arteries without any open space buffers. Davis is many decades away from any concern about connections. We cannot connect with West Sacramento because of the causeway. Dixon and Winters are far, far away. That leaves Woodland. But even Woodland is separated by miles and miles that are not along a main freeway.
We already have about 3000 acres of preserved open space around Davis. The demand for Mace 391 was in part to make sure we did not have continuous development.
Because we are already hyper dense, we have plenty of preserved open space and will acquire sill more, and because we are so many decades away from any concern of encroachment from another city, I think the use of the term is hyperbole.
7) Won’t generate tax revenue –
This is just flat wrong or a lie. If not this, then what does generate tax revenue? Where does tax revenue come from if not from economic activity from business? Why do you think every state and community in the nation is trying to lure business to it?
The question is not that it will or it won’t, the question is how much and how long will it take. In California today there is a huge under-supply of commercial property (let me know if you need a reference for this). Developers tend to lag behind the demand curve because of concerns about a false and temporary shortage. But now they are starting to build. If Davis waits too long to approve and start building then we might very well miss this cycle and have greater vacancy than we would like. But eventually another growth cycle will hit and we will fully populate the parks.
8) Might become a toxic dump site –
I don’t know what to say about this one. California environmental regulations are some of the toughest in the nation. I don’t get why environmentalists win so much and then still get to complain that the sky might fall.
The “toxins” are in the fear based arguments.
Note that most tech sector employees are liberals and the company will be as hyper about environmental concerns as are the citizens. Environmental correctness is good for business… helps the branding and prevents risks that some environmental mistake will destroy owner equity.
9) Development won’t deliver –
Contracts need to be drawn up including an ongoing conflict resolution process. The city needs to consider performance incentives to the developer. This is easier to do if we own the land… basically conceding some of the returns from the sale of the land… holding it in escrow and connecting it to performance expectations. If we don’t own the land, it gets more difficult. Once the developer starts the project, the plans are subject to change. I don’t know if the city can offer fee discounts as an incentive to the developer performing (including compliance with the original plans agreed upon).
But the bottom line here is that an effective project requires the developer and the city partner together. The developer is motivated to develop a showcase business park. That helps his ego, and also helps him sell the next development. The city should be motivated to reach those same shared goals. But there will be a need to discuss changes to the plan. There always is and there always will be. The city needs to be firm in certain requirements, and leave others as bargaining chips if and when conflicts arrive.
But there is always a risk that some detail or amenity gets changed before the final project is approved and completed. That is true for any development. And often times it is for reasons that benefit everyone.
I am adding this next one…
10 – Fear of political change to the city.
Like I pointed out, tech employees tend to be liberals. But uncountably, private sector employee are going to be less liberal than are university employees and students. So, eventually as more employees of these companies live in Davis, it might cause a slight red-shift in the local politics. Given the budget mess we are in, I think we should all welcome a few more fiscal conservatives.
Matt
I have no idea about amount of acres.
If you take out the word sweeping, which I admit is highly subjective, then my answer is yes. Of course the Second Street corridor represented change for Davis.
One cannot argue that change only has one effect. If there had been no anticipated change from any project, there would be no point in doing the project. Proponents of any project are going to argue that it will have desirable “change”.
Opponents are going to say that the don’t like the proposed “change”.
But to try to pretend that there will not be change is a little absurd. If change were not the intent, there would be no projects.
This would be the equivalent of me saying to a patient, “Just take this medicine which will provide a change in your body that will be all good. Side effects you ask?
Oh, no just trust me. You will get only benefits so don’t worry. I sincerely hope that my patient would ask questions, not just take me at my word. Often a patient will have a concern that is real that they are aware of, that I may not have considered, or more appropriately for this situation, a concern that they are unable to articulate because they don’t know enough about medicine, but which can have very real adverse consequences all the same.
Tia, we are in total agreement vis-a-vis change. My question really was asking why you felt the change would rise to the level of “sweeping change” and the first paragraph of your answer addressed that. Thank you.
I wouldn’t call Davis “hyper dense”. That’s Manhattan or West LA.
I also wouldn’t agree that most tech workers are liberal, but I could be wrong. Immigrants often have more traditional, conservative values, and they make up a big portion of tech workers.
One more thing to point out. If Davis does not approve these innovation parks, the county gets about $3 million in annual revenue from our pass-through agreement.
Since any one of these parks will generate more than $3 million in annual revenue to the county should the county go forward, then I think we might get a business park anyway less the ability to advocate so much for the design.
Would the current county supervisors do this to Davis?
This might be one case where a local politician pursuing a long term political career might help Davis.
I wonder if Davis refuses to build an innovation park on the periphery of Davis, if the county might do it anyway, especially if the innovation park garners the county more tax revenue than what our city gives in the pass-through agreement? To Frankly: nice summation of arguments to refute “concerns” to an innovation park.
That’s interesting, at 3:37 I wrote: “1) Traffic – bike lanes, sidewalks, and bus connections will be provided; however, business creates human activity.”
And at 4:17, Matt Williams wrote: “1) Traffic — Bike lanes, sidewalks, and bus connections will be provided; however, business creates human activity.”
Does this get me a free beer?
Matt will buy!
Frankly
“Because we are already hyper dense, we have plenty of preserved open space and will acquire sill more, and because we are so many decades away from any concern of encroachment from another city, I think the use of the term is hyperbole.”
As usual, I have a different perspective on your comment. I first want to thank you for the honesty with which you have written. You have stated “we are so many decades away from” encroachment from another city. This is the first time that I can recall you even admitting that encroachment by another city was a possibility. “Urban sprawl” is not a myth. It is a matter of time. So while it is true that I do not anticipate seeing connections between Vacaville and Davis or Woodland and Davis in my lifetime, that it is not the time span that I am considering.
So when you say “decades”, how many decades are you considering ? Are you postulating three decades ?
That would put my children in their 50’s and grandchildren ( if any) in their 50’s and if my family trend continues, their children still in the public schools. I would like them to have the option of the same distinct small city of Davis that my son chose to come back to precisely because he did not like the contiguous growth of the Bay area.
If you are thinking of four or five decades, you are still only talking about our great grandchildren. I consider it good stewardship, not selfish, to consider the experience of future generations and their preferences when making decisions.
Orange County, LA, The Bay area are real places, not mythology. For many, these are not desirable places to live. I have no fear that Davis will turn into these areas in my lifetime. But, we certainly, over the span of decades have the ability to turn Davis into that…. over decades…..one business park and one housing development at a time. That it not myth, that is demonstrated reality as your comment acknowledges is possible.
But what about the housing we need for the Open Borders you prefer?
Immigration is off topic for this thread.
““Urban sprawl” is not a myth. It is a matter of time. So while it is true that I do not anticipate seeing connections between Vacaville and Davis or Woodland and Davis in my lifetime, that it is not the time span that I am considering.”
i think what you’re really talking about is development and growth. so can we add onto the periphery periodically and not lose touch with our core nature?