An old Navy base presents the San Francisco suburb of Alameda with a great opportunity. However, a long-standing city policy that prohibits high-density development could quash that opportunity.
"The choice is a 1950s-style bedroom community, all houses and cars and little else, or a mixed-use community in the style of the early 21st century, where higher densities are the trade-offs for premiums in open space and historic preservation," writes CP&DR's Morris Newman.
"One can almost imagine a public hearing, in which half the room is filled with people who look like the parents in the Dick and Jane books, and the other half resembling the hip, high-tech parents of the 'Spy Kids' movies.
There is nothing necessarily wrong with single-family suburbia, Newman writes, but it's not necessarily appropriate for a prime infill location such as this one.
Thanks to Paul Shigley
Read the full story: Alameda Point: Nostalgia Confronts 21st Century Plan
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