High-density housing

Mr. Remington hits the nail on the head. As long as planning staff and elected officials continue to drink the kool-aid served up by developers and large land owners, traffic congestion will continue unabated and our quality of life will keep declining. Am glad to see that at least one person "gets it."

As long as city leaders say yes to thousands of new jobs, then thousands of new housing units will be needed. The root of the problem is city leaders allowing too many jobs to be created in an area where infrastructure is already overloaded

Jim: The Bay Area in general, and the Peninsula in particular, has a severe shortage of housing. Where are teachers, infrastructure workers, store clerks, restaurant workers, and others who keep things going supposed to live? The answer is that many of them live east of the bay and then clog Highway 92 going westbound every morning and east bound every afternoon. And all the approaches to Hwy 92 are clogged too, including Hwy 101, El Camino, and Alameda de las Pulgas. That is the biggest traffic problem we have in San Mateo; and the only real solution is to build more housing on this side of the bay.

Peninsula cities are hemmed in by the bay to the east and mountains/watershed to the west. The perfect place to build more housing is underutilized land such as strip malls with huge parking lots that are close to public transportation. That perfectly describes the Concar shopping center site. Residents will be able to walk to Trader Joe's and 7-Eleven and to restaurants and take Caltrain to work. And even if they drive, the distance driven will be far less than coming all the way from Hayward or Tracy.

Thanks for your post Jim, there are many who feel like you do. If we can ever get a contingent together to go against city hall, many would join immediately. It is how you say however, the city council uses deception and procedure to confuse the public. Sad.

I agree with Ray. We don't have a housing shortage, we have a job overage. A smart employer would build their campus in a region where their employees can afford to live comfortably - it makes for healthier employees. There are vast tracts of underdeveloped land at the east foot of the San Mateo bridge just crying for redevelopment.

Lots of Kool Aid Drinkers around this area!

I haven't been to a supermarket in months. I use Amazon Fresh and Farmstead to have virtually all of my groceries delivered. Retail as we've known it is dying. What we need is more housing, the housing stock is not sufficient. Homes are unaffordable, rent is over 50% of net income and people are commuting too far for work. Forget the NIMBY people and build housing stock.

The battle is between those who are newer to the area and want more housing, and those who have been here awhile or a long time, and don't want more congestion and all the other problems that go along with more people and housing.

I'm glad that local residents are speaking against this awful project. Jim is right about the ongoing construction that had made traffic on Delaware St. much worse, high density housing projects adds more crowded neighborhoods and lack of available parking. The gentrification of Bay Meadows, added lots of housing projects and I don't see lots of people taking public transit, because they don't go to certain places. These developers are making things up, just to get approval from the gullible city leaders, who have been bribed by big developers. Our shopping center just needs a major renovation, and minimize the housing units to a more reasonable plan. The city should be listening to lots of local residents and their input, because they should focus on quality of life.

Beyond the point of City Councils doing what they please by expanding housing for higher tax revenue to grow their fiefdoms. A big part of the problem in the bay area is that 70% of the developable land is tied up in open space. Freeing up some of that space for housing would help alleviate the problem. Citizens need to start putting pressure on their Councilman to advise the one assigned as the ABAG rep, to give up voting for The One Bay Area Plan and the U.N. Agenda 21 framework. This is all about surrendering Local control to Regional bodies of unelected officials that you will have zero control over even with you vote. They act with impunity and the stack and pack homes going up and the deteriorating roadways are part of their plan.