SF Chronicle – Could robotaxis be yet another reason for S.F.’s lack of new housing?
Editors note: and this article doesn’t even mention the problem of Waymo having used diesel generators at their urban charging locations.
And the best quote in the article certainly is:
“Pretty clearly in San Francisco we have a housing crisis and it’s outright bad public policy to build charging stations and store robot taxis on land that could be used to build housing for middle class working people struggling to live in our city,” said Peter Finn, president of Teamsters Joint Council 7.
See original article by J.K. Dineen at the San Francisco Chronicle
The proliferation of driverless vehicles buzzing up San Francisco’s hills and down its boulevards has prompted debate over traffic safety and the benefits and pitfalls of replacing human drivers with robots. But the question of where the city allows them to park and charge their batteries could be getting in the way of one of San Francisco’s most pressing needs: housing developments.
From Jackson Square to the Mission to SoMa, some San Francisco property owners are trading in risky, but potentially lucrative, housing developments for the relatively easy money offered by the autonomous vehicle industry’s growing need for fleet charging lots.
For instance, a fleet of Waymos can be found charging at 350 Pacific Ave., where a developer had previously proposed a 78-unit condo project. The owner of the old Caesar’s Restaurant at 2293 Powell St. — long a blighted property that had been under review for a 24 unit development — recently won permission to establish 19 superchargers for an AV fleet.
As the most prominent autonomous vehicle fleet in the city, the Alphabet-backed Waymo is proven to adapt quickly as it matures. It has its biggest fleet charging station at Toland Street in the Bayview, a former Uber lot. For a few weeks last summer Waymo was parking robotaxis at 350 Second St., a parking lot that is slated to become a hotel. But the Waymos were pulled out after nearby condo owners complained that a technical glitch was causing the robot cars to honk at one another.
And those who follow the autonomous vehicle fleets have tracked Waymo’s use of several other big SoMa development sites, including various parcels that are part of BPX’s Fourth and Harrison property, which is entitled for nearly 1 million square feet of office space as well as an 8-story low-income housing project with 144 units.
“I could definitely see why developers are inclined to put in AV charging stations given the cost and difficulty of building housing in San Francisco,” said Michael Montilla, a UC Berkeley Ph.D candidate who studies the autonomous vehicle industry. “It’s a balancing act, but in some cases AV might be the easier revenue-generating option.”
While San Francisco is a famously difficult and costly place to put up housing, it’s not as if building “Level 3” supercharging stations is free or easy, according to electrical contractors who build out lots. One super-charging station can cost as much as $400,000, with about half of that money going to PG&E, which has a backlog of nine months or more for new projects.
At 1201 Eighth St., which was previously slated for 15 housing units, the 23 superchargers could cost more than $8 million. For developers looking to make long-term income from AV fleet charging, that level of investment could be worthwhile. But it’s probably not attractive as a temporary use while a builder is waiting for interest rates and construction costs to come down to the level where housing works.
In addition, legislation sponsored by Supervisor Connie Chan and former Supervisor Aaron Peskin in 2023 imposed an extra layer of political process to groups looking to build fleet charging stations, a conditional use permit that automatically requires a Planning Commission hearing. A property owner at 330 8th St., for example, has been in the process of winning permission to build an AV fleet charging facility since late 2022, and is still awaiting approval.
The idea that development sites slated to provide housing, hotels or lab space might instead be used for autonomous vehicle charging has become a crusade for the Teamsters who are battling the growing likelihood that massive tech companies like Amazon and Alphabet are gunning to replace its members with self-driving delivery trucks.
The robotaxi industry is regulated by the California Public Utilities Commission, which has been supportive of the industry, which means that local groups hoping to exert pressure on companies like Waymo have to do so through land use restrictions.
“Pretty clearly in San Francisco we have a housing crisis and it’s outright bad public policy to build charging stations and store robot taxis on land that could be used to build housing for middle class working people struggling to live in our city,” said Peter Finn, president of Teamsters Joint Council 7.
Professional drivers make up the most common job category in California and 29 other states, said Finn.
“(Autonomous vehicles) cause congestion, they undermine public transportation, they eliminate driving jobs,” Finn said. “We want to be careful and thoughtful on how we make these decisions. These robot taxis are not just funny little weird things rolling around.”
Currently, the Teamsters are focused on fighting a proposed 138 vehicle fleet charging station proposed for 1111 Pennsylvania Ave. in Potrero Hill. The property owner had previously entitled the site for a five-story, 150,000 square foot laboratory building with retail on the corner of Pennsylvania and 25th St., currently a self-storage facility.
The planning commission had been scheduled to vote on the project in early January, but the item was postponed until February. The charging station is an allowable use under the current zoning, but requires a conditional use authorization, according to Planning Department Chief Of Staff Dan Sider.
Sider said the willingness of companies like Waymo to pay high rent for supercharger facilities in neighborhoods the company serves “makes the calculus more challenging” for some residential developers who have struggled since the pandemic to raise capital for housing.
“My hunch is that at the end of the day a parking lot, even one with that level of infrastructure, is not going to generate as much income as a 500,000 square-foot new building,” he said.
Planning Director Rich Hill said the department would rather have the AV fleets in industrial areas, instead of residential.
The planning application for 1111 Pennsylvania states that the end-user for the project has not been identified. A Waymo spokesperson said the company is not involved in the project, although the Teamsters are opposing it as a facility that will likely eventually be used by the Alphabet spin-off Waymo or the Amazon-owned Zoox.
The need for AV fleet charging is a small piece of the larger demand for electric vehicles charging infrastructure. San Francisco has 3,000 light-duty vehicles that need to plug in and Muni is planning for 1,000 electric buses. In 2023 EVs and plug-in hybrids make up 37% of new vehicle sales in San Francisco.
For several years South Park resident John Berry, a software engineer who works in the data and software platforms, has been tracking Waymo’s technical progress and poring over the company’s quarterly reports to state regulators.
He said, ultimately, where Waymo stores and charges their robot vehicles means a lot more to the property owner than the tech behemoth.
“When you are losing $3 billion a year, paying rent on a dozen or 20 parking lots is not that big a deal — these guys have massive data centers consuming hundreds of millions of dollars in electricity,” he said. “Steady cash flow from somebody with some of the deepest pockets in the world, that is a nice thing to have in your real estate portfolio. They can afford to pay as much as they want.”
See original article by J.K. Dineen at the San Francisco Chronicle
