Housing Plan Prompts Fear of Crowding : Development: Homeowners and city officials express concerns about locating affordable residences near light-rail right of way.
A housing strategy aimed at solving Los Angeles’ crisis in affordable housing has alarmed local community leaders who think it could open their neighborhoods to excessive high-density apartment development.
The Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy, unanimously approved by the Los Angeles City Council earlier this month, outlines dozens of methods for developing affordable housing to help accommodate the 26,000 new families arriving in Los Angeles each year.
The report recommends that all communities have a fair share of low-income housing, but it emphasizes that the best place for the new developments would be along light-rail lines and other public transportation routes.
Some Highland Park leaders fear that concept will spell disaster for their community, through which transportation planners hope to run a light-rail line linking downtown Los Angeles to Pasadena. Some residents are also concerned that the emphasis on affordable housing will conflict with the special districts they are now forming for historic preservation.
An aide for Councilman Richard Alatorre, who represents the district, said that the councilman shared the community’s concerns but didn’t think the housing strategy would lead to the results they fear.
The aide, Alatorre’s planning deputy Diego Cardoso, noted that the document, which was prepared as a part of the city’s application for federal housing funds, represents overall goals for the city and that any specific changes in zoning would have to be approved by the City Council.
“Anything that will increase the density will have to be reviewed with community participation,” Cardoso said.
The housing strategy calls for zone changes in the areas surrounding transportation routes so that developers can build “compact, transit-reliant communities.” The report states that building more housing near a railway line would reduce the congestion usually associated with apartments because the residents would rely on the public transportation.
Despite the report’s theory that residents of such buildings would rely on public transit, community members said they believe that most residents would use their own cars to move around the neighborhood, putting strain on the community’s narrow streets.
“The road network can’t take it,” said Charles Fisher, of the Highland Park Neighborhood Assn. “The roads that are there were designed in the 1880s and they haven’t changed much since.”
The housing strategy also makes little mention of where the new residents would work and play.
“Issues such as infrastructure and recreational facilities seem to be regarded as problems that will take care of themselves,” said Bob Ebinger, president of Highland Park Heritage Trust, a historic preservation organization.
Cardoso said Alatorre agreed that the area could sustain only a limited increase in population density.
“We don’t have the infrastructure,” Cardoso said. “We already have overcrowded schools--that is a serious problem for us, and we must come up with answers. It’s not just a question of the number of units; it’s also an issue of the quality of life.”
Ebinger and other community leaders also fear that the emphasis on affordable housing along railway corridors could lead to the destruction of many historic buildings in Highland Park.
Highland Park Heritage Trust members have been working for several years to have the area designated as a Historic Preservation Overlay Zone, which would prohibit developers from demolishing buildings without permission from a committee charged with protecting the neighborhood’s historic character.
Any new developments in a historic preservation zone also would have to comply with architectural guidelines set up for the area.
City planners are now finishing a survey of historic buildings, as a precursor to establishing a historic zone. Proponents of the historic zone are concerned that the city’s goal of building more affordable housing might be incompatible with their cause of historical preservation.
Fisher, one of the prime movers behind the establishment of the zone, said: “Our real concern would be if push came to shove and somebody came in and said ‘I am going to build low-income housing and to do it I am going to demolish three Craftsman houses.’ Which will take precedence?”
However, Cardoso said that Alatorre had sought assurances from the Housing Preservation Department that the community’s historic character would not be sacrificed to build more apartments.
