California’s legislature may have whiffed this year on SB 827, a comprehensive measure to boost housing near major transit stops this year. But state leaders ended up passing a significant and pioneering bill (now law, with Governor Brown’s signature on Sunday) that forces development on land owned by BART around its rail stations. It could be a precursor to future state efforts to limit local restrictions on development near transit.

AB 2923 (Chiu) requires the BART board to adopt new development standards for height, density, parking, and floor area ratios on land the agency owns within one-half mile of each of its stations. Local governments then have two years to conform their zoning with these standards — or else the standards become de facto land use policy.

The agency standards are limited to some extent, as height can only go as high as a certain percentage of surrounding buildings, and any net loss of parking for commuters has to be addressed through improved access. Furthermore, the parcels have to be owned by BART as of July 1, 2018, so BART can’t go on a buying spree to develop more land down the road.

So why was this law successful where the statewide SB 827 approach failed? Three reasons:

1. AB 2923 covers a relatively tiny geographical area, just within the San Francisco Bay Area, thus minimizing potential opposition with a smaller scope (although suburban BART communities certainly freaked out to no avail); see map above;
2. It includes mandatory affordable housing requirements for any new housing built under these standards, plus union workforce requirements, bringing two crucial constituencies on board to support it; and
3. It only affects BART-owned land of primarily non-residential parking lots, which means there is no risk of displacing existing residents and raising the ire of groups dedicated to protecting low-income renters.

So what’s next? First, opponents are likely to sue to overturn the law, although I don’t think they’ll have a strong legal case given that other state-charted agencies have similar land use authority.

But more importantly, this legislation could encourage other California transit agencies in cities like Sacramento, Los Angeles and San Diego to request similar land use authority, broadening the scope of its application significantly. Furthermore, it could encourage the state to get more involved in limiting local regulation of land use near transit in general.

So while the legislature did not manage a comprehensive housing fix this term, it may have laid the conceptual foundation with AB 2923 for a new statewide approach to boosting housing near transit.