Frequently Asked Questions

General

  • The LCI advocates for a variety of reforms in housing, urban development, and transportation. The LCI envisions a holistic plan to address our housing crisis that will also address equity, transportation and sustainability in the places we live. We advocate for policy solutions that would enable 3-5 story buildings of gentle density, car-free or car-lite housing above small retail along commercial streets that are transformed to be walkable, bikeable and livable.

    It is a vision for “15-minute” walkable communities in LA, neighborhoods where residents’ daily and weekly needs (groceries, errands, jobs, schools, parks and leisure options) are located within a 15-minute walk or bike ride.

    We also advocate for policies that would facilitate the beautification of our city, and allow for smaller developers to build homes to fix our housing crisis.

  • Acknowledging that traffic concerns are a top priority for residents, we advocate to have LCI implementation on:

    1. Existing Historic Main Streets and Vibrant Historic Villages with established walkability.

    2. Commercial Streets close to job hubs, transit options, or both, to provide housing for workers.

    3. Corridors where new development would have minimal traffic impacts, such as dead-end streets, low-traffic areas earmarked for improvement, or partially constructed freeways slated for removal.

  • The LCI advocates for 3-5 story buildings with higher safety and construction standards, suitable for smaller lots (a narrow lot can have 2 units per floor, and a wider lot 4-5 units per floor.) The goal is for these buildings to be built by smaller mom and pop builders, property owners, community land trust, affordable housing developers, non-profits, co-ops and Bauguppens (a family or group of friends who work together to finance and build a building).

    In addition, we advocate for policies such as “Standard Plans.” Standard Plans are low-cost architectural drawings specifically designed for the standard parcel size on a given block. Right now, we have Standard Plans for ADU’s but we don’t have any Standard Plans for apartments in the city of LA. Commercial boulevards are designed so that parcels have a consistent size. Encouraging the city to support well-designed building floor plans that match these parcel sizes can lead to more attractive buildings and improve the overall quality of urban design.

  • For the most part, big developers are not interested in buildings under 50 units – We are trying to expand the diversity of building types in our neighborhoods, and give smaller apartments an opportunity to compete with much larger half block or full block projects.

  • The best part of the housing in an LCI is it's free to taxpayers and saves money in the long run. Builders and banks pay for the construction, and then sell to home buyers (or rent them.) The cost for street changes can come from existing pots of Federal, state and municipal funding (Active Transportation Grants, Metro first mile/last mile funding, Caltrans - which has a budget of $16 billion -- bigger than the state budgets of 14 states). Bike infrastructure is cheap compared to the cost of freeways: one freeway interchange costs more than a bike network for an entire city. With temporary materials and “Quick Build,” it can be even cheaper and practically overnight – specialized trucks “scrape up” existing paint and repaint as they go; planter boxes and bollards can be dropped in quickly, as we saw with the overnight transformations for al fresco dining and parklets during Covid.

    There are also significant savings from 15 minute communities: it costs less than half as much per household for a city to provide services like trash for apartments versus single family homes. For local retailers, business goes up 30% on bikeable streets (which also increases tax receipts and reduces unemployment). Less driving reduces levels of air pollution which lowers healthcare costs.

    In 2011, Lancaster, CA used $11 Million of state money to redesign, rezone, and re-code their downtown thoroughfare, Lancaster Boulevard. That investment paid off tremendously, as it brought in a huge amount of private investment, a large amount of housing was built, and the street was made greener, cleaner, safer, and less congested. Some highlights:

    • Retail sales increased by 57%

    • Revenue has increased 119% from 2007 to 2012 from the downtown area

    • 57 new businesses have opened on Lancaster BLVD

    • Pedestrian involved collisions have decreased by 78%

    • Motor vehicle collisions decreased by 38%

    A true win all around for the residents and business owners.

Mobility

  • The market research says a significant number of people at different times of their lives. 92% of Gen Z will pay more to live in a walkable neighborhood; 24% of Americans will pay “significantly more.” Walkability is the #1 driver of real estate values. 50% of 20-year-olds do not have a driver's license, and 65% of Gen Z don’t want to own a car and/or would prefer to car share, according to Volkswagen. Seniors outlive the ability to drive by 7-10 years and can become confined to their suburban home or feel forced to move to a retirement community with just bikes and golf carts – which is the LCI model. Many people in LA already live without a car – 13% of Angelenos and 25% of Santa Monica residents. Los Angeles is the capital of film and television production – actors, writers, entrepreneurs, artists – who could greatly benefit from safe and reliable mobility options so they are not forced to own and rely on a car. There are people from all walks of life who don’t drive or can’t drive due to a disability, can’t afford it, or want to live their values of sustainability. Many people would prefer to live a “bikeable life” for health and mental health reasons. Creating spaces for people to live without owning a car profoundly benefits all of us – our air quality, traffic and climate emissions.

  • 15 minute communities have everything you need on a daily and weekly basis within a 15 minute walk or bike ride. Dan Luscher from 15 Minute Cities in San Francisco has created a matrix of what is needed in a week, including grocery stores, restaurants and coffee shops, a pharmacy, mail shop, bookstore, transit stops, parks, playgrounds, schools and preschools, and even a corner bar (people are happier if they go out one/week with friends for a drink). 15 minute communities are about a high quality of life – trading car ownership for a walkable and bikeable life.

  • We are advocating for rules for the LCI that would require Neighborhood Serving Retail on the ground floor – as opposed to inward facing businesses like storage units or big box stores that deaden the street. California and local governments can also create incentives and tax breaks for Neighborhood Serving Retail. There are models for a city encouraging grocery stores: NYC incentives grocery stores through a density bonus program - and was able to eliminate food deserts.

  • The LCI increases mobility for people with disabilities. LA’s car-centric mobility favors people with the resources and ability to drive a car. The LCI allows for all forms of mobility: transit, Meteor, buses, bikes, adaptive bikes, trikes, E-bikes, cargo bikes, Golf Carts and Neighborhood Electric Vehicles (NEVs), as well as cars and car share options. There is an assumption that people with disabilities need cars when in fact more people with disabilities can use an adaptive bike than can drive – so 15 minute communities open up mobility for people who are not currently being served.

    By slowing cars and creating a few car-light/car-free streets, cities can make it safe for golf carts and NEVs (Neighborhood Electric Vehicles) – another option for seniors who have lost the ability to drive (according to the AARP, we outlive our ability to drive by an average of 7-10 years, and many people become trapped in their suburban homes and it becomes a crisis of loneliness, or seniors are forced to move to a retirement community away from grandkids where, ironically, everyone bikes and uses a golf carts.) We can create cities for everyone.

Parking

  • If people want to live in an LCI apartment and still have a car, there are several options. There is ample, under-utilized public and commercial parking across the region – Westwood has famously built too much parking and 40% of it sits empty even on the peak parking days of the year. There are also effective models across the country where commercial buildings share parking with residential buildings because they have alternate use times (and LA’s commercial real estate has 50% vacancy rates.) And then there is employee parking: if someone works at UCLA and chooses to live a few blocks away in an LCI and walk or bike to work, they still have an employee parking spot to store their car. Residents who want to own a car can walk a few blocks to an existing excess municipal and commercial parking, like residents do in New York City or Boston. There is also room in the rear of an LCI building for two parking spaces for ADA and/or car share or a necessary work vehicle. 90% of LA housing has parking, so many people are forced to pay for parking they do not need. There is a massive shortage of more affordable housing without parking in walkable neighborhoods with Neighborhood Serving Retail, safe mobility, and jobs. There is also car share, Uber, and a growing number of peer-to-peer car sharing options like Turo or Getaround.

  • There is an increasing interest in car sharing as the “sharing economy” grows. It comes in two forms: Car share companies like Zipcar; and peer-to-peer car share apps like Turo or Getaround. How do they work?

    Car share companies like Zipcar own a fleet of cars and park the cars in a neighborhood, and members can reserve them. Peer-to-peer (P2P) apps like Turo crowd-source the vehicles like Airbnb crowd-sources homes. This model requires no upfront capital, and can grow exponentially. Car owners can use an App like Turo to list their car like Airbnb lists your home for rent. Then a car-renter can reserve the car on the App. It’s like renting a car – only from an owner who lives nearby. With keyless driving, it’s even easier: book the car, walk up, open the car with the App, drive with the App, return it, walk away. The car owner makes money when their car is idle (cars sit idle on average 95% of the time); car-renters have 24/7 access to a car without the cost and hassle of owning one. It’s a win-win for car-owners and car-renters – for the car-owner who works from home or is retired or rarely uses their car but doesn't want to let go of it – they make some extra cash. For the car-renter, they can ditch owning a car with confidence that they won’t be stranded and will always have access to a car. Financially, it’s a very attractive option: owning a Camry costs about $30/day (all in for payments, gas, insurance, fees - not including maintenance, parking, etc). Turo-ring a Camry costs about $30-50/day. For people who don’t have a daily car commute, it might make sense to ditch their car and use car share/Turo and Uber for the trips they need – it is both cheaper, and far less hassle.

    An interesting benefit is that in a neighborhood with an abundance of P2P options, car-renters have access to every model of car – a Camry, a Tesla, a pick-up truck, a minivan, even a sports car – without owning anything. For skeptics, it’s important to remember that the sharing economy is a world-wide movement.

  • The recent book Paved Paradise by Slate reporter Henry Grabar meticulously lays out all the ways that parking hurts housing in many small ways that add up: the affordability, the feasibility/profitability, and the aesthetics. It has been virtually impossible to build affordable housing at the scale we need if it includes parking. Experts believe that parking has become a case of “death by a thousand cuts” – and it's deceptive because no one thing does it, but when all the issues are combined, then most projects don’t “pencil out” to be even minimally profitable - even in a severe housing shortage in a city with an overheated rental market. But experts also believe it is possible to build housing at any scale without. Here are a few of the worst ways that parking affects housing:

    1. Expense: Building underground parking, podium parking or surface parking is extremely expensive $50,000–$75,000/spot – even $150,000/spot.

    2. Lot assembly: Because cars need 42 feet to turn around, developers need to assemble multiple lots in order to accommodate parking (for instance, many commercial lots in the LA region are 25 or 30 feet wide – not wide enough for parking). This takes time, and adjacent property owners “hold out” for more money – adding 40% to the cost of land.

    3. Increased rent for parking: Bundling parking increases the rent.

    4. Increased rent due to unit size: Where parking is required, the requirements are often one parking space for a studio or 1BR apartment, and two parking spaces for a 2BR or 3BR, which means that for small units, like a micro unit or a small studio, the developer could end up building more square footage for parking than for the actual apartment. This creates an incentive for builders to build bigger units. For many projects, a large, luxury 3BR pencils the best – because it only requires two parking spots so the developer can amortize the cost of the parking over more rent. But this makes the rents/home price far more expensive.

    5. Pushback: To make projects pencil out with parking, developers often build bulky, tall buildings – which can create eyesores, and are often met with fierce opposition from neighbors who fight the height and size – adding costly delays and hoops to jump through such as community meetings and city council office approval. This adds 20% for soft costs of lawyers, consultants and expediters; and another 20% for carrying costs – interest and taxes for the 4-7 years it takes on average.

    6. Pushback: While surface parking is cheapest, it takes up land, and the next cheapest is “podium parking,” where parking is built at ground level and above – taking up the first few floors of a building. But this deadens the street and is an eyesore for the community – often creating backlash from neighbors and a costly, lengthy approval process.

    7. Fees: The anger towards tall buildings and more traffic has created a culture of hostility toward developers. Anti-housing activists have conducted a 30 year campaign labeling “big developers” as “greedy” and “evil.” For example, when a politician tries to streamline building, mailers are sent to every mailbox in their district saying they are “in bed with greedy developers.” To appease neighbors, council offices’ extract concessions and “extractions” from developers in the form of rec rooms, community rooms, trees, and payments to fund things like schools and trees – all wonderful things. Cities ended up funding basic services through extraction fees – and have come to rely on them.

    8. Monopoly: Underground parking requires sophisticated engineering – and only certain developers have the know-how, locking out small builders and creating an artificial monopoly of a few builders, driving up prices and slowing construction.

    For parking skeptics, we highly recommend reading the book Paved Paradise or the coverage of the book:

  • Parking is already a nightmare in most of LA. But there is a fix: Permit parking on surrounding streets, and requiring residents to sign a contract they won’t store a car on the surrounding side streets.

  • Los Angeles has overbuilt parking across the city. The good news is, there are existing systems to solve parking. Parking Apps are revolutionizing parking around the world – and eliminating the stress of not being able to find parking. How it works: Parking Apps list every open parking spot near your destination – street parking, municipal lots, private garages, and excess parking in commercial buildings (there can also be options for non-phone users). These Apps mean drivers do not have to circle the block looking for parking (or get to a destination and not be able to park).

    Using a model championed by UCLA professor Donald Shoup, author of The High Price of Free Parking, parking prices can be adjusted so there are always spots available, especially near business districts. Another benefit: If people always know they will find a spot, they are more likely to go to a destination, helping local businesses. A third benefit is: if there happens to be no parking, people can delay the trip until there is, saving them the frustration of circling the block. This is especially important because an estimated 30% of traffic is from people circling to find a parking spot. Pricing parking can be implemented progressively and free to people with disabilities, low income residents, seniors, doctors appointments, and/or frontline and essential workers, etc. Here is a guide to parking ideas from the Parking Reform Network.