There was another Hacker News thread last month about a 32-floor prefab apartment skyscraper in Brooklyn[1]. Many commenters said the promise was hyped and that construction was slow. It was disappointing because this seems like a good solution for places like the Bay Area where armies of single professionals would happily live in small, private units with common space amenities instead of sharing a $4-5k/mo two-bedroom with a roommate.
Does anyone know whether these apartments would be legal in California? I did a cursory search and it looks like all apartments need one 120sqft room and at least 70sqft for any other living rooms (not storage?). Oakland has some additional requirements about partitions separating kitchens, but it's unspecific about how an "efficiency apartment" designation modifies that. Not sure about SF regulations, assuming they're even more onerous.
I don't know the regulations of California but where I live the city has prohibited the construction of smaller units (1 bedroom, less than 700 square feet) thru zoning regulation and the existing stock of smaller units has been converted to bigger units.
I think if you look for a general reason why we don't have cheaper housing thru smaller units more suitable for people living alone, you will find that it is the explicit policy of the bigger cities.
The amount of idiocy surrounding one project to build new studios and one bedrooms with very little parking one block away from a train stop in Chicago was maddening. The market wants these units but developers literally cannot build them.
Does anyone know whether these apartments would be legal in California? I did a cursory search and it looks like all apartments need one 120sqft room and at least 70sqft for any other living rooms (not storage?). Oakland has some additional requirements about partitions separating kitchens, but it's unspecific about how an "efficiency apartment" designation modifies that. Not sure about SF regulations, assuming they're even more onerous.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8873906