Sounds like a revenue problem, then?
well, with GG park, we have ample open space in the 7x7, it is just that the hoods far from GGP are more impacted.
Having to book picnic/bbq areas in public parks is really common, in many places. And if itâs not booked, then itâs first come first serve.
Nothing to see here folks. Move along.
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Yeah; I live in a rural part of Illinois (which is what, 98% of the state?) and we have reservation systems in the parks. The whole idea is that if you want to, say, have a birthday party at the lake in a covered picnic shelter, you put down a deposit. If you show up and Cletus is roasting gopher in your spot during your birthday time, you can call a park ranger to tell Cletus to shove off.
Obviously itâs not nearly as expensive here, but itâs also not a highly-sought-after, highly-regulated city.
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You know where you are, right? Now heâs got to write a dozen or so more op-eds defending his premise.
San Francisco canât even agree to build actual housing for people. You think theyâre going to agree to make more public parks? 
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I donât think they will no⌠they should. All cities should. Parks are good for cities. But no, I donât think they will.
All of this is why I contemplate leaving California at some point (or at least the Bay Area). Iâve been here 10 years and it is a pretty mismanaged/uncaring urban environment. Unfortunately, Seattle, where I came from, has turned into SF since then.
Less messy, but the end result is about the same. Massive displacement of a native population in order to assist with colonization efforts of a more powerful group.
âNative?â You donât know much of SF history (or the Bay area) then.
I have people saying the same thing about my part of Oakland, ignoring the fact that 60 years ago or so, my neighborhood was Polish and Italian immigrants, not Black folks.
Are gay folks the ânativesâ of the Castro (who are now being displaced) or is it the Irish working class folks that were there before the late 60s and 70s?
The only ânativesâ in San Francisco were murdered by the Spanish.
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Where did I leave that palanquin?
1980 was almost 40 years ago. That is two generations, man. Itâs not an epoch but itâs long enough that being uprooted by gentrification sure as hell hurts the people living there.
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The Polish and Italian immigrants werenât priced out of the neighborhood, they just flocked to the suburbs during the heavy âwhite flightâ period from the early 60âs to 80âs. The non-white minorities moved in because that is where the cheaper housing was. I know nothing about the gay populationâs dynamic in SF. So I will not address it.
When talking about ânative populationsâ with regards to gentrification, one generation is about as far as you need to go. 
North Jersey, where I live, isnât much different in that regard. Same goes for Manhattan. Polish/Irish/Jewish neighborhoods became Black, Hispanic and Asian ones. Now they are becoming rich asshole neighborhoods.
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Youâre conflating gentrification and ânativeâ people of a neighborhood. Are you only the ânativeâ people if youâre poor and then later priced out? Those Italians were pretty poor when they showed up here.
There are no ânative populationsâ in a city unless ânativeâ means âmy grandfather bought this house.â
Actually, the non-whites moved here because of redlining and it being the only neighborhoods they were allowed to own homes in.
The gay folks in San Franciscoâs Castro neighborhood moved into an existing poorer Irish neighborhood and gradually took it over (with much loud complaining). I donât know a lot of the history but even the Harvey Milk movie discusses the lack of love from the locals when they did it. âWhy you takinâ over our neighborhood?!?â The Irish donât count as ânativeâ because they were white?
Is this really just a racial issue moreso than a class one?
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You arenât really being disadvantaged by gentrification unless you are forced out by economic/housing cost conditions. People who left to better neighborhoods do not meet that condition.
I agree with the rest of assertions of your post. But I went with ânativeâ to mean living there for at least a generation. It is admittedly purely arbitrary on my part. But it feels the best fit for the discussion.
Race does factor into it. But class is the primary conflict here.
Of course, race and class cannot be separated in America.
Black folks in my neighborhood that own their homes (and many do) are not negatively impacted by gentrification by your reasoning. Iâm not sure theyâd agree since they often feel âtheir ownâ community is being co-opted and invaded.
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I donât want to sound like a republican - I actually own a place in SF,
itâs to my benefit to keep prices high - but the only thing that can slow
gentrification is giving the more affluent places to live that arenât in
working class communities. For example, I have some friends, one is a
techie type analyst and her husband is a film maker who has been in the
city for a long time. On their combined salary they couldnât afford SoMa or
Russian Hill or anywhere else. So he, being the artist/pioneer type
convinced her to buy a place with him in the Bayview.
They bought a house from a widow, a woman who used to work as a secretary
at the DA. The house probably sold for less than 40k when it was new, but
they paid an order of magnitude more. And this widow took the money and
moved close to her family in Alabama, set for the rest of her life.
When they moved there, there were about 10 non-black couples in the area.
Now itâs probably 30 or 40. Thatâs gentrification. They would rather have
lived in a new skyscraper, but they couldnât. So they bought a place in a
poor area and are redoing it. You canât make laws about who moves where.
You canât restrict the profit of an elderly woman who wants a nice
retirement. Not too long from now someone will open an expensive coffee
shop there and it will become even more desirable. You canât restrict that
either.
We have an entire generation of college students graduating now that
doesnât care about cars. They all want to live in cities - not the silicon
valley suburbs. They want to bike to work and have nightlife options. So
unless we build more, gentrification will happen.
As for the greedy developers, thatâs just a red herring. Yes they build
bigger, faster. But you arenât going to build your way out of a housing
affordability crisis without them.
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In many cases they get to sell out to the people who are in a buying frenzy to take up properties before the big developers get there. However the costs of buying out residential properties to gentrify have caused many developers to simply try to get industrial or commercial areas rezoned and razed. This way they only deal with one owner or corporate owner instead of many small homeowners who can delay things.
The old scenario in 80âs action films and TV where the greedy developer uses his gangs of generic thugs to force the little old ladies out (which usually prompts the appearance of the A-Team or something similar) is becoming passe.
In many cases gentrification can also be done without razing residential property.
If a city has an old crumbling industrial/commercial zone it gets reclassified and destroyed in favor of high rises. This is how neighborhoods were gentrified mostly in Brooklyn, Manhattan, Hoboken and Jersey City. Warehouses, factories and storefronts were knocked down and high rises were put in their place.
