The Future of Urban Planning in Los Angeles

Los Angeles stands at a pivotal moment in its urban development. As a member of the LA City Planning Commission, I see firsthand how decisions made today will shape our city for generations. The choices before us — on housing density, transit investment, climate resilience, and equitable growth — are not abstract policy questions. They are decisions about what kind of city Los Angeles wants to be, who gets to live here, and whether the region can sustain growth without deepening its existing inequities.

The Housing Imperative

No planning challenge looms larger in Los Angeles than housing. The Southern California region has chronically underbuilt for decades. The result is a housing shortage estimated at hundreds of thousands of units, a rental market that prices out working- and middle-class residents, and a homelessness crisis that has become one of the most visible and urgent policy failures in American municipal governance.

State legislation has accelerated the pace of change. AB 2097, which eliminates minimum parking requirements near frequent transit, is one of the most consequential zoning reforms in recent California history. By removing parking minimums, the law frees up land and reduces construction costs in exactly the corridors where density makes the most sense: along bus rapid transit routes, near Metro stations, and in walkable urban villages where car ownership rates are already declining. As a Planning Commissioner, I have seen how parking mandates have historically constrained what developers can build and pushed costs upward. Removing that constraint opens the door to more affordable, more compact, and more sustainable development patterns.

The density bonus program operates on a similar logic. By offering height and density allowances in exchange for affordable set-asides, the state creates a market incentive for developers to include income-restricted units in projects they are already building. It is not a perfect solution — the affordability levels and unit counts are always subject to negotiation — but it has produced tens of thousands of units across California that would not otherwise exist. The challenge for planners is ensuring that these tools are applied strategically, in places where infrastructure can support growth and where new residents can access jobs, schools, and services without a car.

Transit, Connectivity, and the 2028 Olympics

The 2028 Los Angeles Olympics presents the city with both an opportunity and a forcing function. Major international events have historically accelerated infrastructure investment that cities knew they needed but lacked the political will to prioritize. For Los Angeles, the 2028 Games are driving accelerated investment in Metro rail expansion, bus rapid transit improvements, and active transportation infrastructure — investments that will outlast the Games themselves by decades.

Transit-oriented development is the planning framework best suited to capitalize on this moment. When new Metro stations open, the surrounding neighborhoods become candidates for higher-density, mixed-use development that reduces car dependence and supports ridership. The Purple Line extension, the East San Fernando Valley transit corridor, and the planned rail connections to LAX are all creating new nodes around which denser, more walkable neighborhoods can form. The planning decisions made now — about zoning envelopes, community benefit requirements, and public space design — will determine whether those nodes become equitable, livable neighborhoods or simply higher-density versions of existing auto-oriented development.

Balancing Growth and Preservation

One of the greatest tensions in Los Angeles planning is between the imperative to build more housing and the legitimate desire to preserve neighborhood character, architectural heritage, and community identity. This is not a false dilemma, but it is often treated as one. The most successful planning processes I have been part of find ways to accommodate growth while genuinely engaging with community concerns about what is being changed and who benefits.

During my time as Chair of the Beverly Hills Planning Commission, I saw that dynamic play out directly. The historic preservation ordinance we helped craft — developed with active guidance from the Los Angeles Conservancy — demonstrated that development and preservation can be structured as complementary rather than competing goals. By identifying the specific architectural and streetscape elements that define a neighborhood’s character, planners can create frameworks that protect those elements while allowing infill development in forms that respect the existing urban fabric. That kind of specificity is harder than blanket opposition to change, but it produces better outcomes for everyone.

Climate Resilience and the Long-Term City

Climate change is not a future risk for Los Angeles — it is a present condition. Wildfires, extreme heat events, water scarcity, and coastal flooding are already reshaping the risk calculus for development decisions across the region. Planning in this environment requires integrating climate resilience into every major decision: where new development is sited, what building standards apply, how much green infrastructure is required, and how the city manages its urban heat island effect in neighborhoods that already lack tree canopy.

The 2035 General Plan update that Los Angeles is currently developing provides a once-in-a-generation opportunity to embed climate resilience into the city’s foundational planning framework. That means land use designations that reduce wildfire exposure, green infrastructure requirements that manage stormwater and reduce heat, and building codes that prepare the housing stock for a hotter, drier future. It also means thinking seriously about equitable resilience: the communities most exposed to climate risk in Los Angeles — low-income neighborhoods in the eastern San Fernando Valley, South LA, and the eastern flatlands — are often the least resourced to adapt on their own.

Looking Ahead: A City That Works for Everyone

The future of LA planning must address housing affordability, climate resilience, and equitable access to opportunity simultaneously. These challenges are deeply intertwined: a housing policy that ignores climate risk creates new vulnerabilities; a transit investment that does not include affordable housing nearby displaces the residents it was meant to serve; a preservation framework that applies only in wealthy neighborhoods reinforces spatial inequality.

I remain optimistic that Los Angeles can navigate these tradeoffs because I have seen what collaborative, community-centered planning actually produces. It produces ordinances that last because they reflect genuine consensus. It produces projects that get built because they have community support rather than just regulatory approval. And it produces cities that grow stronger as they grow larger — which is the only kind of growth worth pursuing. The decisions before the City Planning Commission in the next several years will define Los Angeles for a long time. I intend to make sure they reflect the full complexity of what this city is and the full range of people it serves.

Read more essays →