2) Expecting your groundskeeper to drive a century on top of his (or her) actual job is pretty sick and cruel too

3) I'm pleased you mention Southern California as it's a useful case study of how to turn a pleasant area in to a dystopian hellscape. I've lived in Westwood (near UCLA), Santa Monica, and most recently San Diego (South Park - a fairly upscale neighborhood).

I routinely attended meetings of the planning group for South Park, where the attendees, all of whom were homeowners aside from me (and elderly), opposed ANY new housing of ANY sort ANYWHERE. They were blunt about their reasoning - it might hurt their home values. Of course, keeping homes expensive is a great way to ensure your groundskeeper can't live near work.

They also hated bike lanes, because they thought it would affect parking. It's rather sickening they cared more about places for cars to sleep than for people to sleep.

https://www.sandiego.gov/planning/community/profiles/greater... if you care to go yourself. The area's taxpayers will even give you free parking welfare.

Thankfully I escaped SoCal (and the US), but not everyone (including, perhaps, your gardener) is able to do that.