Greater Bay Area (Los Angeles, San Jose, San Francisco: transplants, live in, store)

[frsno1]

Hi everyone. I was curious about how the Bay Area almost had a comparable plan of organization like the Greater New York borough system. However a year after New York voters voted in their borough system, San Francisco Bay Area voters rejected the plan.

This in effect shaped the somewhat unique urban geography of what is the Bay Area today. I was wonder what if the plan would have been approved instead. What would the Bay Area be like today? Would the city of San Francisco have been significantly larger than it is today, say in the top 5 in terms of population?

[hsw]

Population is a fairly meaningless stat to analyze any city or metro region or state or country

Need to know where economy of a region is based, esp valuable companies' HQs and >>$100K/yr jobs

Most of SF's economy is sprawled across a bunch of suburbs 20-60 mis S of SF with very little of economic value based in City of SF....Oracle, HP, Google, Apple, Intel, Cisco, etc are in SiliconValley; Chevron is in EastBay suburbs

NYC's economy (esp financial industry) is more heavily MidtownManhattan-based, but many major companies (and hedge funds) are HQ'd in various suburbs in NY/CT/NJ 25-50mis from Manhattan; the various "outer" boroughs of NYC (and most of the close-in, older suburbs) are fairly irrelevant economically, though teeming with millions of economic underachievers

In any major city in US, most major companies (and even high-powered financial firms) are HQ'd in distant, newer suburbs in low-lying, mundane, anonymous office campuses, not in some old city in a trophy skyscraper...just examine where world's most valuable companies and hedge funds, VCs, etc choose to locate their HQ offices

[frsno1]

Population is usually the first thing we look at when analyzing orcomparing cities/metros. They Bay Area is the way it is today in part because of the decisions that were made in the past. If there were different decisions made regarding the region say 50 years or 100 years ago, I'm pretty certain that the dynamics of the region would be different.

If San Francisco had for example 2 million people under a borough type system, it would make sense that it would have more clout in a metro of 7.5 million (assuming the Bay Area's population was the same) than it's current population.

Anyway, what if the Bay Area had approved a borough system. What other things do you think would have been different?

[ImRandy]

The first thing that comes to mind is that the water system would be much different. We're just now finishing interconnecting the various water systems and even so we have all different water rationing goals, rates, regulations, and availability.

[BayAreaHillbilly]

Originally Posted by frsno1

Hi everyone. I was curious about how the Bay Area almost had a comparable plan of organization like the Greater New York borough system. However a year after New York voters voted in their borough system, San Francisco Bay Area voters rejected the plan.

As a result, the Bay Area (people here cannot tolerate the term "San Francisco Metro Area") is the USA's most balkanized, fragmented mega city.

Absolute disaster.

[frsno1]

The level of "balkanization" is ridiculous in the Bay Area. When you factor in politics and NIMBYS, and even environmentalists, you wonder how anything gets accomplished.

Case in point, you have CA HSR that was approved by the voters, yet it seems now that Atherton and Menlo Park are crying foul about the route and design. It was common knowledge that HSR would either go through Pacheco or Altamont.

Things can be tied up forever there it seems.

[batransplant]

the bay area is spread out and made up of what I consider "little towns w/ few amenities". It takes 45 min to get anywhere beyond a grocery store from no matter where you live unless you live in the exact same "little town" as your job. If you change jobs in the bay area, which is probable, you will end up driving to some other "little town" 30 min to 1 hour away.

[BayAreaHillbilly]

Originally Posted by batransplant

the bay area is spread out and made up of what I consider "little towns w/ few amenities". It takes 45 min to get anywhere beyond a grocery store from no matter where you live unless you live in the exact same "little town" as your job. If you change jobs in the bay area, which is probable, you will end up driving to some other "little town" 30 min to 1 hour away.

In other words, "Los Angeles Del Norte."

Now here come all the brick bats from offended, smug, "locals" (most of whom cannot remember the streets being torn up to build BART).

[jman650]

Originally Posted by batransplant

the bay area is spread out and made up of what I consider "little towns w/ few amenities". It takes 45 min to get anywhere beyond a grocery store from no matter where you live unless you live in the exact same "little town" as your job. If you change jobs in the bay area, which is probable, you will end up driving to some other "little town" 30 min to 1 hour away.

What does the Bay Area consist of in your very strange mind? Sonoma County, Livermore and Gilroy only?? If you wound up with the situation you've described then that's your own personal fault and doesn't reflect the norm out here. Please go back to wherever you came from. We don't need to keep importing negative people here.

Whatever happened to all the cool transplants who once helped to make this place special and actually had a realistic concept of what things are like out here? 90% of the transplants we've received in the past decade we should get a refund for.

[goonzy]

Nah, I dont think a bourough system would work like New York City. While we share many similarities, geographically with New York City, we differ as well in many ways. For example, Oakliand is not like Brookyln, Oakland is the central business district of the East Bay region, Oakland has its own identity, its own sport franchises, its own airports and its own water supply independent of any other sub region of the Bay Area. Brookyln and Manhattan are and have always been heavly tied together and the passage of the bourough sytems of New York City deminstarte this point while Oakland and San Francisco have never been abler(for the most part) to work togther. Faliure of past consolidation efforts between the East bay and San Francisco prove this point.
I think what makes the San Francisco Bay Area and so unique and progressive is our heavley independent balkinized regions are always trying to do their own thing.
Let the East Bay be the East Bay and not part of San Francisco. This also works vice versa.
I do think though that we should have 4 independent regions in the Bay Area each anchored in by their own independent central businnes district as the capitol of the sub regions of the Bay Area. San Francisco gets the West Bay. Oakland gets the East Bay. San Jose gets the South Bay and Santa Rosa gets the North Bay. It is competion why the Bay Area is so impressive, with SF and Oakland and San Jose saying forget this B.S., we are going to build our own dowtown and our own airports and have our own teams and hospitals. Every region is constintly trying to out do each other but while still maintaing a bay area identity. This is what makes the Bay Area so cool. We our the only metroplitan region anchored in by 3 cities. The San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose Bay Area. No other Metro area has three large american cities in its metropolitan region.
So lets roll with this balkinization that our for fathers left for us but lets try to reel it in a tiny bit. So instead of 9 counties in the bay area, now there will only be 4. West Bay county, SOuth Bay County, East Bay County and North Bay County. But no matter what side of the Bay we are from, let us never forget that we are all representin the BAY.