So, what did Sen. Darrell Steinberg's last-minute switcheroo mean for CEQA reform? More than you might think.

In the pantheon of developer complaints about the California Environmental Quality Act, perhaps the most common one is that it's too easy to use it to file crazy lawsuits purely for the purposes of gumming up the works.

Which is maybe why the building industry and property rights advocates have spent so much time lately filing CEQA lawsuits apparently designed to gum up the works.

Will CEQA ever give infill development a break?

SB 731 – now pending in the Assembly – is intended to do just that. But in the latest twist in an increasingly long-running tale, the bill has now been amended in a way that could push CEQA significantly in the direction of assessing the socioeconomic impact of infill development.

As the California legislative session winds down, both CEQA reform and the revival of redevelopment appear headed to Gov. Jerry Brown's desk.

Both bills are being carried by Senate leader Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento. They both passed the Assembly Appropriations Committee last Friday. The redevelopment bill – SB 1, virtually unchanged since last spring -- passed 12-5, presumably on a party-line vote. The CEQA bill – SB 731, the subject of endless wrangling in August – passed 17-0.

Recently, economist and entrepreneurship expert Carl Schramm announced a discovery in the pages of Forbes.com: "the practice of city planning has escaped reality." Planners don't see the big picture. They don't understand economic growth. They've unleashed upon us scourges like live-work lofts, fire stations, and bloated pensions.

The First District Court of Appeal has batted down an attempt by the California Building Industry Association to turn CEQA on its head, saying that the passage of significance thresholds is not a project under the environmental law. In so doing, the court concluded that an environmental analysis is not required to examine the environmental impact of the standards used to conduct environmental analysis and assess environmental impact. 

In other words, the appellate court ruled that CEQA does not apply to CEQA – at least not in this case.

Two weeks after it was left for dead, SB 731 – the bill to reform the California Environmental Quality Act – unanimously passed the Assembly Local Government Committee Wednesday. The bill was amended last week to ease parking requirements on infill development but it was unclear whether that would be enough to satisfy the Assembly. 

At a glance, last week's California Supreme Court ruling in the Expo Line CEQA case laid down a pretty clear rule: Lead agencies can use a "future baseline" for environmental analysis, but they have to be very careful in documenting the reasons why. L.A. Metro erred in using a "future baseline," but fortunately for the agency the court concluded that it didn't make any difference to the analysis.

Reports of CEQA reform appear to be greatly exaggerated. After sailing through the Senate late last spring, SB 731 – Senate leader Darrell Steinberg's supposedly consensus-based reform of the California Environmental Quality Act – is still in the Assembly.  Business-oriented CEQA reformers have reversed their earlier position and come out against it, while labor and environmental groups may also have problems with the bill. 

San Francisco's Transbay Transit Center is slowing taking shape in a hole south of Market Street.  

At first glance, the premise of journalist Daniel Brook's History of Future Cities threatens to overwhelm its substance. "What do these four cities...have in common?" asks Brook, as if co-hosting a parlor game with Edward Glaeser, Saskia Sassen, and Jaime Lerner. >>read book

The City of San Jose has won an important round in a potentially landmark chase challenging the legality of inclusionary housing ordinances in California.