Silicon Valley's Latest Desperate Housing Idea: On A Landfill (siliconvalley.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Silicon Valley real estate developers want to construct a $6.7 billion housing complex over a former landfill with 5.5 million tons of municipal waste from the last 25 years. "The regulators were pretty skeptical at the start, I have to say," one of the firm's partners told a local newspaper. Besides the 1,680 units of housing, there'd also be 700 hotel rooms, plus 5.7 million square feet of office space, and 1.1 million square feet for retail stores. The project "includes elaborate safety systems to block the escape of combustible methane gas and other dangerous vapors, and to prevent groundwater contamination," according to the Bay Area Newsgroup -- including one foot of solid concrete over 30 acres of landfill, with the housing built above the first-floor shops and parking structures "as a way of creating additional distance between residents and any escaped gases in the event of an emergency." In addition, there's alarms and sensors, "as well as another system to monitor, collect and dispose of gases underground."

Though the project has gained key approvals from the city of Santa Clara, it could still take two decades to complete. "Last year, the City of San Jose sued the City of Santa Clara, charging that the imbalance between the project's jobs and housing -- 23,000 jobs and 1,680 housing units -- will increase housing demand in San Jose and tax its overstretched services and infrastructure... but both sides said they hope for an out-of-court resolution."

Comments

What could go wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Canal

Re:What could go wrong

[__aaclcg7560]

The Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View was built on landfill and fires broke out when concert goers lit up their joints.

In its opening year, a fan attending a Steve Winwood concert flicked a cigarette lighter and ignited methane that had been leaking from a landfill underneath the theatre. Several small fires were reported that season. After those incidents, the city of Mountain View commissioned methane testing studies to define the location of methane vapors emanating from the soil within the amphitheater. These tests were used in developing a design for improved methane monitoring and more efficient methane extraction to assure the amphitheater became safe as an outdoor venue. Ultimately, the lawn was removed, a gas barrier and methane removal equipment were installed, and then the lawn was re-installed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoreline_Amphitheatre#Built_on_a_landfill

Re:What could go wrong

[Highdude702]

They would probably benefit from a joint or two..

Re: What could go wrong

[__aaclcg7560]

at least it not on burial grounds.

The city of San Francisco relocated all the graveyards to Colma after the 1906 earthquake, where the population of the dead outnumbers the living today.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/06/sports/football/the-town-of-colma-where-san-franciscos-dead-live.html

Good

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad the idiots that live in Silicon Valley and spew garbage will now be living on it too

Re:Good

[Anonymous Coward]

It's no different than San Francisco building on top of landfill from the 1906 earthquake.

Yes, yes it is MUCH different than what they built on in San Francisco. There are two different meanings of landfill here. In the case of post-1906 San Francisco, the buildings were built on land that was created from what was formerly waterlogged areas. Backfilled with soil and other debris. The biggest risk with this type of "landfill" is liquefaction during an earthquake.

Here they are talking about building on top of a mountain of modern municipal and industrial wastes. Many of these wastes are still in the process of decaying. So you've got methane needing vented, various toxic metals and chemicals that need to be ensured they are contained etc.

So yes, they are VERY, VERY different.

Re:Queue the NJ jokes

[BarbaraHudson]

Were they in earthquake zones? Landfill tends to liquefy even more than regular soil, and when it's mixed with garbage and methane .... well .... shake and bake, baby. One more reason not to live in Silly Valley.

Apartment?

[JBMcB]

As I scroll around Santa Clara I see lots and lots of single family detached housing and, probably, duplexes. A mobile home court. A BMX track.

How about zoning for some apartment buildings? The citizens will fight tooth and nail against it, but if you want affordable housing, that's what you build.

Re:Apartment?

[HockeyPuck]

There's tons of apartment buildings being built. All along Tasman by Cisco are massive apartment/condo complexes, and the old IBM facility off Cottle Rd had a 1000 units recently completed.

Nobody is building new stand alone single family homes. High density, multi-story apt or condo complexes, complete with pools, rec rooms, gyms and shopping on the first floor are the norm. If there's a single family home being built, it's being ruled with an iron fist by HOAs that charge $300/mo for nothing.

One foot of concrete is relative...

[__aaclcg7560]

Many houses in the valley are built on 6" slabs. The replacement building for the McDonald's near my home has a one-foot concrete foundation with reinforced steel, conduits and drains. When they built the fire lanes for San Jose State University in the 1990's, the foundations were three-feet deep to handle the weight of multiple fire trucks.

Re:Better suggestion

[Applehu Akbar]

It used to be that landfills were turned into golf courses.

In Phoenix, I lived next to one of these. It had its own methane collection system that included a periodic nocturnal flare-off, so it didn't depend on Californians sparking up their joints.

Think of it as. . . .

[msk]

Will the roofs have diving boards?

Landfill not the major problem...

[XSportSeeker]

I've read about this yesterday, and what came to mind is that building housing on a landfill is not the major issue there... it's the desperation part.

Of course people behind the project will try to dissuade skeptics with fancy tech buzzwords and whatnot saying they will take proper care and do it right, but the thing is that landfills are pretty much unpredictable. They are only accounting for stuff they can imagine will happen, and even so, I highly doubt they'll invest much into it.

And then, of course, when housing is desperatedly needed and these construction firms are expected to get huge profits from it, they will cut corners the first opportunity they get. This isn't charity with limitless funding, it's business.
It's cheaper for them to deal with liability later on than really spend all the money possible to make sure nothing bad will happen, because it's a game of probabilities.

Then again, people have been moving to big urban centers to live a crap live inside shoebox sized apartments all the time, closing all windows to avoid the smog, noise pollution and whatnot. Living on top of a landfill doesn't seem too far out. And I'm willing to bet that when these get available, they'll still sell for too much.

Re:Landfill not the major problem...

[Solandri]

Landfill tends to not be compacted as well as regular soil. Consequently it tends to liquefy more easily during earthquakes, leading to uneven settling and destruction of homes built on top. Nearly all the homes which collapsed during the 1989 Loma Prieta quake were in the Marina district which was built on landfill (albeit mostly from dredging the harbor). (They were also 3-4 stories, which happens to have a resonance frequency matching that of most earthquakes.)

Smell is not an issue. The landfill is typically covered with several layers of barrier several feet thick, including watertight plastic sheeting.. Drainage holes are left along the sides to capture and treat excess water which manages to seep in when it rains, while methane recapture piping extracts gases which build up due to biological decomposition for resale. A friend's house is built on landfill and he never would've known it if I hadn't remembered the location as being a landfill from back when I was in high school.

You can build on it, but the buildings have to be built much more sturdily than if built on regular soil, and you're still screwed if the ground settles unevenly causing the home's foundation to break. Usually the land is used for non-structural purposes, like a park.

Chemicals

[rsilvergun]

The reason you don't do this is because there's often dangerous chemicals all over landfills and the cleanup is too expensive. Odds are is this is allowed we'll be hearing about the cancer rates there in 20 years. But by then the investors will be long gone.

You mean a money toilet?

[s.petry]

There are very few apartments outside of NYC which are investments. If you want vertical growth you need to give people other than the land owner reason to put up money. As is, pay 5K a month in SF for a couple years and what do you have to show for 120K? Nothing!

People don't want apartments for this reason. Apartments are seen as a necessary evil until you can afford something which is actually yours.

Re:Poltergeist Remake?

[avandesande]

just think if chickens have souls.... poultrygeist!

Tried it 50 years, FAILED

[AnalogDiehard]

50 years ago in Endicott NY, they built a shopping plaza on top of a small landfill. The site was so unstable that the buildings and parking lot were constantly settling. It became an extremely rough ride driving through the parking even at a crawl.

The plaza was finally closed about ten years ago, and was demolished. No new development is permitted on that site.