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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   29369 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 6, 2025

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If they execute on the plans, LA will be in the midst of America's biggest transit boom. I would wait a few years to find out if the up-zoning led to a loss in quality of life. Often, new infrastructure feels like a net negative until the whole plan gets executed. Many of China's once-ghost cities and trains-to-nowhere are a good example.

the shopping centers nearby are so crowded

Isn't that good for local business ?

Lights back up

That's just LA.

Also, the rent on these places wasn't any lower and rent has continued to rise precipitously in the area.

Wouldn't it have risen even faster if the apartments had not been built ?

Many of China's once-ghost cities and trains-to-nowhere are a good example.

This is, at best, a mixed example.

Lights back up

That's just LA.

That is decidedly not all LA was. As I mentioned in my reply to remzem's comment, the LA I grew up in was not overcrowded as a whole. It was population dense, but not overcrowded except for the most touristy/central spots (Hollywood, downtown).

The question of whether the up-zoning improved quality of life can be answered right now, because it's been going on for over a decade: It decidedly has not. The LA I visit occasionally is unrecognizable in the most in-your-face, uncomfortable way. The streets cannot support it, and barring a radical shift in the entire city council's (and let's be frank, populace's) attitudes toward law enforcement, no amount of transit overhaul will fix the problem.

I will probably get drunk and annoyed enough to write a top-level post about this because watching LA go from a quiet post-90s crime wave city with a ton of culture and places worth visiting to a homelessness, crime, and overpopulation-ridden nightmare has been a huge lesson inspiring my disenchantment with the idea that people on the whole will work to better things.

The streets cannot support it, and barring a radical shift in the entire city council's (and let's be frank, populace's) attitudes toward law enforcement, no amount of transit overhaul will fix the problem.

So it isnt YIMBYism that's the problem, it's pervasive soft on crime attitude that's the problem. How does that indict the YIMBY cause?

YIMBYs don't push for being tougher on crime.

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