Anyone who commutes to South San Francisco by bus or by car knows the lurch of stop and go traffic heading east off the highway in the morning and getting back on in the afternoon, and has gazed longingly at the deserted road on the other side of the median.
Well, that’s about to get worse now that Genentech’s plan to add up to 4.3 million square feet of office space to its headquarters was approved. Allowing developers to freely build office space where it’s needed is a good thing for commuters, especially after SF voters passed Prop E earlier this year to further cap new office space there.
But South City has a large and growing housing deficit (currently 2.6 jobs per housing unit), and perplexingly, Genentech breaks with other booming bay area employers and has opposed any housing developments east of 101 in South San Francisco, and I can’t fathom why. There’s no neighborhood character to be preserved, and the pleasant bayside, with walking trails, ferry boat and Caltrain access would be a fantastic place to live, and housing there would shorten commutes for everyone.
I originally submitted this as a letter to the editor at the SF Chronicle in response to this article, but it was not accepted ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Read more about Genentech’s relationship with housing here.