A Boom, and a Turning Point, for Downtown San Jose
http://www.spur.org/news/2016-04-06/boom-and-turning-point-downtown-san-jose
Thirty years ago, few people could have imagined that downtown San Jose would be taking off like it is today. In the last year, 659 new units of housing came on the market and more than 1,900 are under construction. Over 5,000 more are approved or proposed. With almost two million square feet of commercial office space in the pipeline, even downtown’s commercial market is waking up. The two maps below show the dramatic uptick in development activity in just the last two years.
Generally, San Jose’s housing market has been much stronger than the commercial market. However, today developers are proposing almost two million square feet of new office space in downtown. It’s the first time in many years that downtown has attracted substantial commercial investment....
While it has long had the South Bay’s largest concentration of social, cultural and entertainment activities, downtown San Jose finally seems to be benefitting from the growing trend toward working and living in urban centers. This is what a generation of city leaders has been working toward, and the excitement is both palpable and well deserved. But it’s also fragile....
At the same time, it is important to make sure that each development adds up to a great urban place. Codified urban design rules give the market confidence that such a place will emerge. While recent buildings have demonstrated better urban design, there is no certainty that every building will support the active, walkable downtown that San Jose hopes to achieve. Where design policies exist, they are guidelines, not codes, which means they are aspirational and largely unenforceable. Clear, binding codes can produce a level of certainty about the length of the entitlement process and help build investor confidence that others will follow suit to create great places.
= new reply since forum marked as read
