No Parking Minimums and Also No Housing Development

Steven Sharp reports on an effort in the city of Los Angeles to update the Cornfield Arroyo Seco Specific Plan (CASP), approved in 2013 and "billed as an innovative approach to creating affordable housing and lauded for dropping parking requirements in new developments."

Despite all the hope and hoopla surrounding the plan at its inception, "the CASP has yet to produce a single unit of new housing - market rate or affordable," reports Sharp.

This is not due to a lack of demand: residential projects that were entitled under pre-2013 zoning regulations are proceeding within the CASP area, and other large developments have been announced on adjacent blocks. The problem seems to instead be an imbalance between policy and market conditions, which Councilmember Gil Cedillo is now looking to address.

A Proposed amendment would adjust the formula for the floor area bonus allowed by the CASP.