TRANSPORTATION AND LAND USE: DOWNTOWN

Major issues facing San Francisco today in the area of transportation and land use planning coordination stem from its dramatic office growth. San Francisco currently has approximately 60 million sq. ft. of office space downtown. Current projections anticipate an additional 50 million sq. ft. of office development perhaps as soon as the next 15 years--or nearly a doubling of the existing downtown. While we maintain all due skepticism about projecting such trends, the problem remains that the marketplace does not appear to have an inherent wisdom that allows it to directly respond to demand. In this sense, office development is significantly different than manufacturing expansion in that an office developer is not developing for himself but for a client and must himself predict the future demands of such clients when the clients themselves may not know how much space they will need 5, 10, or 15 years from now. There is a lag between the development process and the effects of cumulative development that influence the location decisions of potential tenants of new buildings. While a developer is putting together the development-financing package, the demand for new office space may be different from what it is when the building's doors are opened. In many cities this has resulted in overbuilding. Two key factors--the availability of adequate transportation capacity and housing--may have particularly significant effects on office space demand, but, heretofore, these factors have not been addressed by individual developers. Development of in-city housing is very much a transportation issue in terms of being able to serve work trips from housing in an energy and financially efficient manner and, perhaps, in reducing the need to travel. Housing development in the past has not been done by the same people who develop office buildings; developers build what they always have felt comfortable building and what they then feel is a fairly safe way of making a return on their investment. Among the side benefits of San Francisco's new approval conditions is that traditional office builders may enter the housing development market. (Author)

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• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper appeared in TRB Unpublished Report No. 30, Transportation Energy Conservation Through Land Use Planning.
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001
• Authors:
  • Lubliner, A
• Publication Date: 1982-6

Media Info

• Pagination: p. 39-40
• Serial:
  • Transportation Research Board Unpublished Report
  • Issue Number: 30
  • Publisher: Transportation Research Board

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Central business districts; Housings; Land use; Land use planning; Transportation planning; Urban areas; Urban development; Urban transportation
• Subject Areas: Economics; Highways; Planning and Forecasting; Society; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00372919
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: Final Rpt.
• Contract Numbers: DTFH61-81-C-00031
• Files: TRIS, TRB
• Created Date: May 31 1983 12:00AM