Align Real Estate is proposing a 25-story housing development at the Safeway site in San Francisco’s Marina District. The grocer would open a location on the ground level.

QR code for Marina Safeway two takes

Align Real Estate recently proposed a 25-story, 790-unit housing complex in San Francisco's Marina District in place of the neighborhood’s Safeway store. Despite the site being zoned for development of up to four stories, Align used state density, streamlining and vesting laws to unlock the much larger project. Mayor Daniel Lurie and Marina Supervisor Stephen Sherrill oppose the development, arguing that it games the system by circumventing the mayor's Family Zoning plan before it takes effect.

We asked Opinion columnist Emily Hoeven and author Benjamin Schneider to go head-to-head on the merits of the plan.

San Francisco officials have spent the past two years developing and refining a plan to completely transform where new housing can be built in the city. They’ve held countless meetings and closely analyzed how the rezoning will affect transit, small businesses, rent control tenants and the visual look of neighborhoods. Members of the Board of Supervisors, Mayor Daniel Lurie  — and former Mayor London Breed before him — expended considerable political capital getting what is known as “family zoning” over the finish line. 

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Now, one proposal is undermining that hard work and trust-building. 

Align Real Estate’s proposal to redevelop the Safeway grocery store in the Marina District is, in theory, a good idea. There should absolutely be hundreds of homes above a new grocery store in this über-desirable area. 

But Align’s proposal short-circuits a delicate democratic process and lays the groundwork for an anti-housing backlash. 

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The project will use a state law’s density bonus to override local rules and make possible a 25-story, 790-unit project on a site currently zoned for four stories. It also significantly overshoots the development parameters set out in family zoning, which would have capped the project at roughly a quarter the size of the proposal. 

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It’s reasonable to criticize family zoning for not allowing more density on this prime, full-block site. But planning decisions should have real consequences, setting ground rules and expectations about the growth and development of the city.

Through their supervisor, Stephen Sherrill, who voted in favor of family zoning, Marina District residents endorsed a future with a great deal of new development. Mid-rise apartments will rise along........

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