Santa Monica and Miami Seaside are every cities of round 90,000 residents. The world thinks they’re paradise and flocks to their solar and sand.
However behind their glamorous facades, the success of those cities has bred new city woes and acrimonious debates amongst residents concerning the tempo of “growth.”
It doesn’t matter that they’re on reverse coasts: one a famously liberal city in a deep blue state, and the opposite a little bit of a purple island in a sea of deepening pink. In each cities, two very totally different visions for the longer term are in competitors.
To simplify, at one pole are the slow-growthers. They’re saying, “Whoa, maintain up! Life’s spinning uncontrolled. Site visitors’s loopy. Housing costs and rents are via the roof. Cash-grubbing builders don’t care about residents. Crime is rearing its head. This isn’t the bohemian seaside scene we bear in mind. Cease constructing a lot, respect our cool historical past, and protect what now we have.”
On the different finish are the modernizers. They’re saying, “Dudes, it’s time to step up our recreation! We’d like larger and higher constructions to accommodate our folks, take care of rising seas, encourage work/dwell density so folks shed their automobiles, and sophistication issues as much as encourage tourism, enterprise, spending, and jobs. And we’d like these growth taxes for brand spanking new infrastructure, public security, and inexperienced area.”
Take into account the current expertise of legendary architect Frank Gehry, who has managed to stroll into the crossfire in each cities.
An actual property reversal in Miami Seaside
In Miami Seaside on July 20, 2022, Gehry and famend developer Steve Ross, each of whom expressed love for the place due to lengthy household histories there, teamed as much as suggest two glitzy new towers. The towers would exchange a four-acre particles heap the place the famed however dilapidated Deauville Beach Resort from the Fifties sat till courts ordered it to be imploded.
Ross was keen to spend an astonishing $500 million to buy the lot from the personal proprietor. He requested no cash from the town, and as an alternative projected that his work would supply $6 million to $7 million a 12 months for the following three many years in new tax income to enhance this uncared for a part of city, in addition to the same quantity for the entire metropolis. As America’s largest reasonably priced housing proprietor, he additionally threw in a pledge to dedicate himself to that essential want within the space, and to offer $12 million in money for “public advantages” of the town’s selecting.
At age 93, Gehry personally got here to the public hearing. After an hour’s debate, the town fee supported Gehry and Ross, 5-1. Mayor Dan Gelber pronounced the provide a miracle that had landed at their doorstep. A required citywide referendum three months later appeared perfunctory.
However then got here a blizzard of flyers and emails circulated by the lone fee dissenter and historic preservationists, blasting “billionaires” and “land grabs.” They attacked the design as being out of sync with the neighborhood and certain to trigger auto Armageddon—regardless that a number of close by buildings are taller or larger, and the proposed 175 resort rooms and 125 condos for largely part-time residents would doubtless produce much less site visitors than the bygone 540-room resort.
Some mentioned the previous resort was “iconic” and expressed outrage it wasn’t rebuilt. Defenders of the brand new undertaking countered that the Deauville was designed by a middling architect of the Fifties, and its alternative could be by some of the revered architects of the final 100 years, who promised to pay “homage” to the previous resort in his design. They argued that it could be an enchancment for abnormal residents as a result of Gehry’s new vertical towers would enable a 200-foot inexperienced area between them, which might afford sightlines and entry from the road to the seaside that had by no means existed earlier than.
In brief, the case for the event appeared overwhelming.
However within the referendum on November 8, 2022, 53% of voters turned Ross and Gehry down.
Many thought the end result a fluke, the results of poor marketing campaign techniques, or shrill voices drowning out measured ones in Trump-era fashion. And 53% was hardly a landslide. However the message of opponents undeniably resonated.
Now the emboldened slow-growthers are calling for even stricter historic preservation within the metropolis (3,000 constructions have already got historic designation, which makes it tougher to switch or rehab them). And, within the title of stopping congestion, they oppose lowering the minimal measurement of flats that may be constructed. Modernizers counter that such restrictions will as an alternative forestall the constructing of desperately wanted reasonably priced housing, which in flip will worsen site visitors if native staff can’t dwell close by.
A Santa Monica love fest
In distinction to his Miami Seaside expertise, Gehry took half in a love fest in Santa Monica, 2,700 miles away. On July 14, 2022, he appeared earlier than the town council to be crowned with approval for a excessive profile mixed-use project on Ocean Avenue. The measure engendered nary a detrimental phrase either at the hearing or from the broader public. As a substitute, members of the council crowded round Gehry for footage, predicting thrilling rejuvenation for a drained stretch of downtown and an iconic new landmark for the town.
So what was Santa Monica’s secret sauce that produced kumbaya?
To some extent, it was simply exhaustion. Gehry and the developer, Jeff Worthe, had made their proposal 10 years earlier than. Within the ensuing time, slow-growthers and modernizers jousted over approval, not in contrast to the standoff in Miami Seaside. The unique request for a 250-foot, 22-story tower was sliced right down to 130 toes and 12 flooring. But in the long run Gehry and Worthe nonetheless bought 120 resort rooms, and a second tower of 100 residential models.
To realize this, proponents discovered to speak early and infrequently with native stakeholders and provide beneficiant and particular “group advantages,” together with many extra reasonably priced housing models, a metropolis cultural museum incorporating two historic Santa Monica bungalows, public pathways, photo voltaic power, and the like, in addition to new tax {dollars}. And so they acknowledged that goals of the opposite facet ought to be handled not simply as an afterthought however as a core a part of the proposal.
Former Santa Monica mayor Sue Himmelrich says, “Present me a undertaking that’s turned down, and I’ll present you a package deal of group advantages that’s too small.” Metropolis councilman and slow-growth chief Phil Brock, 69, in rotation to be mayor subsequent 12 months, says, “Not like a few of my previous pals who solely hearken to music from our faculty days, I hearken to all the brand new stuff too. Sluggish development doesn’t imply no development. I’m keen to compromise.”
It could be straightforward to hope Santa Monica has discovered the magic formulation. However the course of is usually gradual and grudging. And now the town is dealing with tug-of-wars over different initiatives like converting parking lots into residential buildings, and the way forward for 227 acres when the local airport closes. Some see answered prayers for sorely wanted housing, others see congestion and vanishing facilities. Most see protracted clashes.
Future battles loom
In Miami Seaside, annoyed modernizers are amping up. Businessman and former mayor Phil Levine says sturdy management and real-world pragmatism are wanted to battle “phony populism,” as a result of “we are able to’t turn out to be a metropolis of no. Capital is fluid and can transfer elsewhere.” He warns that Gov. DeSantis might search a state legislation guaranteeing industrial house owners the proper to switch their personal property as they see match within the face of sea stage rise and a housing disaster. Levine says NIMBYs ought to understand they’ll in all probability discover different effective however cussed preservation boards “on the backside of the ocean with the continent of Atlantis.”
Paradoxically, the battle in each cities comes at a time after they have an historic alternative to re-establish their glittering manufacturers with new generations, for the renewal communities want.
Downtown Los Angeles is beset by a homelessness disaster and post-COVID distaste for office towers, and corporations need to relocate. What youthful cohort wouldn’t be drawn to new dwelling and dealing areas in a cool beachside city?
And South Florida, with its balmy winter climate, finds itself a rediscovered promised land for not solely chilly Northeasterners however entrepreneurial young people and corporations from throughout. Miami Seaside, solely considered one of many doable locations within the area, could possibly be extra engaging if it handled these hordes not as exterior invaders, however as energizing recent blood, spirit, and, sure, cash.
The excellent news is, proponents of each gradual development and modernization are activated by love of their communities. But when they’re to keep away from changing into a microcosm of the deadlock seen on our nationwide political stage, they should acknowledge one another’s good intentions and get to compromise way more cheerfully and rapidly.
If not, residents could by no means take pleasure in their cities the way in which the vacationers do.
Mark Bisnow, a former writer, lives in each Miami Seaside and Santa Monica.
The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary items are solely the views of their authors and don’t essentially mirror the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.
