The problem with the SF and the Bay Area is that home owners actually have fairly strong ownership rights to the land surrounding their home. At least in the sense of being able to stop anything being constructed there.

You can think of it as an interesting experiment in collective land ownership.

I'm using "own" meaning "control" here.

That is true, and nobody claimed otherwise.

But I can have the desire for the conditions to stay the same.

We have a way for you to express that desire. You can buy the surrounding properties and keep them exactly the same.

See Zuckerberg's purchases in Palo Alto for example.

Or you can vote municipalities that best aligns with what you desire.

That'd be a great example if it weren't for the fact that Zuck didn't keep things the same at all: he wants to raze the surrounding houses.