But planners and residents working to rebuild Los Angeles aren’t starting with a blank slate. Existing roads, infrastructure, and land parcels will all shape how cities are rebuilt. Some residents may want to rebuild immediately on the same land, while others may be willing to sell their land to create a buffer zone.
On January 13, Mayor Bass issued an executive order expediting “equivalent” rebuilding permits and exempting them from reviews that would slow the rebuilding process. Governor Newsom also relaxed permitting requirements under the California Environmental Quality Act to speed up rebuilding.
How L.A. then chooses to rebuild is really a “question of social values,” Moritz said. “It’s no longer a question of science. Shouldn’t we, as a society, be able to consider where and how people are building and rebuilding so that they are safer and more secure in the future? I think we can reduce the impact from a public funding perspective because many of these events will happen again.”
California wildfires have grown in size and damage in recent years. Approximately 7.08 million acres burned in California from 2009 to 2018, more than double the area burned from 1979 to 1988. The number of fires entering urban areas is also increasing. In the 10 years from 1979 to 1988, approximately 22,000 acres were burned within the so-called wildland-urban interface, areas where homes are close to wildfire-prone areas. From 2009 to 2018, its area increased to 32,000 acres.
One result of all this is that California officials have better maps of high-risk areas. Many of the areas affected by the Palisades and Eaton fires were classified as very high fire risk areas, so new development in these areas should be done with wild protection, such as planting fire-resistant plants. means you need to take steps to minimize the risk of fire spreading from plants to your home. Cut down other trees and shrubs and move them away from your home.
But the demand for housing in cities like Los Angeles is so high that developers often end up building in these high-fire-risk areas anyway. Nicholas Irwin, a real estate economics researcher at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said that after a wildfire, developers tend to slow down construction in high-risk areas for a while, but after a few years they return to previous development rates. It is said that it will return to . .
Cities and local governments need to think about ways to discourage development in high-risk areas, Irwin said. One way is to raise development taxes in fire-prone areas, but another is to incentivize developers to fill land and build more homes and apartments in underused urban areas.
“We need denser development, especially in places like Los Angeles. The real estate market there is out of control and will only get worse,” he says. “We need to think about how we can rebuild so we can build more units for affordability, but we also need to think about ways to be more resilient to future wildfire risks.”
Burying power lines may also go a long way in protecting your home from wildfire hazards. The fire that destroyed Paradise, like at least seven other California’s most destructive wildfires, was caused by a faulty power line. Burying power lines isn’t cheap, and the cost is passed on to utility customers, many of whom don’t live in areas at risk of wildfires.
“In the long run, these little things make a difference,” Irwin says. Bury power lines, encourage denser development, and build more defensible communities. But these long-term investments will require changing the way people think about living in wildfire danger zones and accepting that more resilient communities come at a cost. “I don’t know if we’ll learn anything,” Irwin says.
(Tag translation) Science
