Silicon Valley's Urban Planning Dilemma

California’s Silicon Valley is notoriously jobs-rich and housing-poor. There has been a particularly severe shortage of affordable housing, forcing workers employed in communities such as Mountain View, Los Altos, Sunnyvale and Santa Clara to live far from their workplaces, driving long distances through severe traffic congestion just to do their jobs. A detailed 2007 report developed by The Institute for Metropolitan Studies at San Jose State University found that Silicon Valley would need 90,000 new units of affordable housing over the next 20 years to meet growing demand.

This has been a drain on the region’s economy, and also a source of significant environmental damage. Because an insufficient number of homes have been built within existing Valley communities, the region’s housing supply has taken the form of low-density suburban sprawl in far outlying areas, eating up the California landscape while mandating lengthy car trips that increase emissions of carbon dioxide and other air pollutants.