Given the city still has no housing plan acceptable to the state it seems developers will be doing the planning for this area under the builder's remedy system.

I seem to remember a while back one of the gas stations wanting to sell coffee, nothing fancy just a drip coffee machine. It was refused, only cold drinks and prepackaged snacks allowed. This area of town has no amenities for residents and additionally no transportation.

Anyone living here will need a car and it will attract people who want easy access to 101.

"City urged to think bigger as it rezones San Antonio Road for housing
As planning commission debates ways to promote residential use at industrial sites, developers and housing advocates request broader changes"

Well of course they do. They won't be satisfied until they've destroyed all retail and added more unnecessary offices that make prices even more competitive.

Funny how they keep calling residents using Prop 13 "leeches" but never ever the landlords also using Prop 13 assessments while still raising rents every year because that's who's funding their advocacy.

A case in point is the $22,000 a MONTH rent paid by Mike's Diner to property owners paying $5,200 a YEAR in property taxes.

Ah, the hypocrisy of the DODO politicians and housing advocates knows no bounds and less logic. (DODO = Developer Owned Developer Operated)

@Online Name. What does the costs of a property have anything to do with the rent charged? Are you under the impression that landlords should only cover their actual costs?

/marc

Of course not but the double-standard used to blame residents but not commercial property owners is illogical, divisive and counter-productive since businesses "live longer" than humans and are clearly more responsible for the lack of affordable housing than the residents being pilloried.

The person who attacked Greg Schmid as a "leech" during public comments during the PTC meeting Weds. is just one example of this long-standing "campaign" tactic.

Gennady, please also post the MAP from the staff report that shows the area that will be rezoned to help people understand better what is being decided. The story is incomplete without that.

Thank you.

I'm not in love with this idea. Traffic around San Antonio and Charleston is already rather of a mess. There are few amenities in the area for residents. And it pushes out useful businesses in one of the few parts of Palo Alto they can still manage to squeeze into.

I understand that we have to get denser, but at least if we're going to do this let's do it in a planned manner, not one building at a time. That's just going to make things worse.

I recommend the Housing Element website ( Web Link ) for the most complete information. The Housing Element itself is available as a PDF ( Web Linkwp-content/uploads/2023/06/Palo-Alto-Housing-Element-2023-2031_6.7.2.pdf ) and the maps in section 3.7 show all the housing sites in the inventory. Appendix D lists all the sites in a table. As the consultant noted during the meeting, a little less than 30% of the sites are in the GM/ROLM zoning districts (which are the focus in the San Antonio area).

[There seems to be some problem with the link to the PDF. If it gives you trouble, you can still get to it from the main Housing Element website. Look for it under the "Clean Version" heading.]

There were a lot of really good comments from the public with personal stories (Palo Alto Formard PAF begs for us via email blast, to come out and support housing, using a personal story) of the struggle to keep up with the housing hole, rising rents, price gauging by landlords here. Why does Palo Alto Forward get all print, using fancy stats and acronyms (FAR? HIP?) Keep it simple and include more of those who are in the struggle, speak at meetings about the struggle and lifelong residents and have been this for years. Everyone is not a PAF board member or one of it's affiliated association members and spoke at the PTC meeting Planning and Transportation Commission .

Ah, aren’t developers lovely? How many of these folks live in Palo Alto and give a whiff about the quality of life here? They are given bonuses, exceptions, etc., and still they want more for the privilege of making money in Palo Alto real estate. The problem is not just the City. It is inflation in building costs and some weakening of demand in market-priced housing of the type that is being built, among other things. You see these buried in the list of factors the developer mentions. That is the central problem of relying on private developers to do social work. If you have been on San Antonio Road lately, you can see what density there already is there. The fees that developers cmplain about have to pay for water, sewers, utilities, schools and other infrastructure that is required for such a massive increase in population. So tired of these developers passing themselves off as down-trodden victims.

Are there going to be any new parks established in this area? (Not just slivers of “open space” but parks with play equipment for children, basketball courts, soccer fields, paths for walking and jogging?)

For-profit, private commercial developers, especially the latest breed of private equity-funded commercial developers, are not going to bring us liveable neighborhoods and affordable housing. Their business model requires them to squeeze every possible cent of profit from the real estate they own and develop.

What this has led to so far in Palo Alto, literally without exception, are buildings of 300-500 square foot studios and junior one-bedrooms that are NOT suitable for families.

Our Planning Commission and City Council have completely dropped the ball each time they review these proposals. Never are there inquiries into quality of life for tenants. The private-equity-funded proposed additional "teacher housing" (not the county-backed teacher housing development but the private proposed one) would be comprised entirely of studios and junior one-bedrooms, even though 60% of teachers require 2-bedroom homes.

The truth is that private developers don't really have to care if their units are occupied or not. If they are, they earn income, but usually less income than the value they receive from the appreciation of their property. If they are not occupied, they receive tax deductions, and most pathetically, government bail-outs. Relying on commercial developers to achieve affordable, liveable neighborhoods is not a winning strategy. It never has been, and is unlikely to succeed in the future.

What should be done instead? Successful cities partner with non-profits and accept government subsidies and grants, of which there are many. Many cities are looking into new ways to provide ownership, such as land trusts and social housing developments. And to provide a much-needed social cushion for folks who fall into hard times, they provide ample shelter beds and well-maintained and attractive public housing opportunities.

There are numerous alternatives to 120 units/acre $5000/month 400 square foot studios, all of them better than what is proposed here.

Rebecca Eisenberg said "What this has led to so far in Palo Alto, literally without exception, are buildings of 300-500 square foot studios and junior one-bedrooms that are NOT suitable for families."

My understanding is this is largely due to the state counting a 5 bedroom mansion, as well as a studio apartment, as one housing unit each.

The state is mandating that we build 6086 housing units, and a 3 bedroom condo and a tiny studio each count as one unit. Thus, we can get to that goal much more efficiently by building studios, which developers also like because of more bang for their buck.

It would make more sense if the state counted bedrooms, instead of units. Then the city could encourage more 2/3 bedroom housing for families. But that's an issue that needs to be taken to the State level.

@Easy8 A bedroom counted could be the size of a closet. So bedroom count is not a good metric either. Area floor plan, square footage, efficiencies, amenities is the way to go. Families have demand a place to gather, pray, celebrate and eat a whole meal together around a table, in a space that accommodates and supports the value of human life under shelter. It's not just walls and a roof. It's human dignity, being a part of, the contribution to each other, the larger outside world. Housing is not just material bricks & mortar structure -- it's a social human value .

(South )Palo Alto needs public transport or the number of cars on the road especially on San Antonio will be even worse. Housing is needed as is good connectivity via public transport that will connect Oregon, San Antonio, Embarcadero, Middlefield, and Alma for the residents.

Realistically, obviously the landowners along San Antonio could right now be doing what the owners of the Fish Market land did and submit a proposal so as to lock in Builder's Remedy,. The issue I think is that this location is more of satellite of San Antonio Center in Mountain View than it is part of Palo Alto. There are ALREADY a ton of new apartments available along San Antonio but closer to the shopping and entertainment hub a San Antonio Center.

So, the question is, would interest really exist in renting an apartment up in the area being talked about here? Well, a big Builder's Remedy project was also already submitted to Mountain View for the same area very near to the subject Palo Alto territory.

It all goes to show that there is not so much of a demand for zoned capacity for development as there is talk about it being there.

I completely agree with Teacher that we REALLY need to focus on public transit in order to make these neighborhoods liveable. If the neighborhoods are liveable, there *will be demand*.

The problem is that all of the new and proposed housing has been tiny little apartments, and that inventory is not serving the demand. The demand is for 2 and more bedroom homes, whether apartments, condos, SFHs, duplexes, or otherwise. And those homes must be located on a transit corridor -- ideally a public transit corridor.

There was a decent proposal for townhouses near Greer Park, but I don't know if City Council killed that by allowing the Architectural Review Board to make expensive demands all dealing with the appearance of the units (the ARB really needs to back off with that kind of thing IMHO--they are killing housing). But even that development would not be well served by public transit.

Decent public transit would return Palo Alto to a liveable community with a high quality of life. Studies universally agree that cars and traffic are the biggest destroyers of liveability for neighborhoods, and when residents and commuters can come and go with light rail or shuttles, everyone benefits. Streets are less clogged, parking problems are virtually eliminated, noise pollution lessens, and air quality improves. This is in addition to the material safety benefits to seniors, children, and others with mobility challenges when fewer cars are on the roads.

With a local light rail or shuttle system (not on-call but an actual shuttle route that folks can depend on and plan around), it would be a million times easier to put higher density housing in a larger number of neighborhoods. Each of these new neighborhoods should have sufficient retail and restaurants, but NONE of them need R&D or commercial office space!

This is the kind of planning that we Palo Altans deserve. It is the kind of planning that City-led resident work groups like the North Ventura working group considered in making their plans (recently tossed out by the city, instead giving neighborhood control to a billionaire commercial developer). Let's plan for neighborhoods and resident quality of life instead of merely trying to check off numbers on a to-do list.

IMHO!

And to Easy8 above: the state actually does NOT consider a 5-bedroom mansion the same as a studio apartment. The RHNA rules mandate that the housing be allocated in an equitable manner, especially with respect for socio-economy capacity AND familial status. You can read some of the background on the California State website here: Web Link

Developers, seeking to maximize revenue, are the source of the misstatements that the 6000+ homes requirement can be satisfied with efficiency apartments. It's a misstatement, and likely an intentional one, given their incentives.

Another thing to keep in mind is that Palo Alto has added virtually nothing to the inventory for entry-level homes over the past couple decades (or possibly longer). While new homes come for sale on the market, they mostly are rebuilds of homes that were bought for tear-down purposes, and they all are far outside of the cost range of the typical first-time home buyer, who deserve a chance to settle here too.

Many worry about overcrowding of our public schools, but that fear also is misplaced. Our public schools--especially elementary schools-- are facing significant problems with under-enrollment, which creates financial and other challenges for them. The fact that young families cannot afford to live here is directly harming our public school system -- and that impacts everyone, because even today, the quality of public schools is the factor most closely correlated with home values.

IMHO, many of these problems arise from the fact that our City is allowing commercial developers to create the narrative about housing-- and their narrative is a terrible one. We can't build a neighborhood with efficiency apartments. We have to build the infrastructure first.

That is why it is a good thing that the state law is better than what developers say: it mandates family homes, which we need.

We are still looking for that map from page 6 of the staff report, Gennady. It would help people understand more easily what is being proposed. The map is worth 1,000 words.

Thanks in advance for taking time to post it.

I think the map on p15 is easier to read.

I don't need a map, just look at that car turning on the right lower corner. That's where there was a fatality in the intersection not long ago. On the corner you can't see, is the cheapest gas station for miles. Many people go out of their way to buy gas there. It's like a turnstile, with cars queuing up from all directions, night and day. Getting out is always interesting. You can't get out unless you go around the building (but you don't know until you enter if there's a car blocking that access) and if you get stuck there is no way out besides waiting until there's a gap in the line of cars waiting for gas, and if the timing is just right you can turn right out of the parking lot directly into heavy traffic. It's a nightmare. But yeah, let's build 6000 units and let's spend some money after building it, to study how many ambulance calls there are every day. It's completely irresponsible to add more housing density for an already bottle-necked situation. The way Charleston opens to two lanes just to narrow to one lane and then to two again where the cheapest gas sits, is surely meant to cause Mr. Toad's Wild Ride flashbacks.

"The East Charleston Area has the potential to become a vibrant, mixed-use destination that provides a variety of community-centric offerings in the southern part of Palo Alto, including new market rate and affordable housing, neighborhood retail services, new industrial/R&D space adding to the daytime workforce population, open space, and new pedestrian and bicycle facilities," Code for DISASTER WAITING TO HAPPEN. "Open space" ... I'm still laughing about that. Oh and bicycles. HAHA.

So punch out Rez ones in heavily trafficked areas. When what is present in town is so ill conceived full of danger.

On the other end of the ECR at Cal Ave and ECR a youngster’s life — one of our own PA community was lost.

Eve of Lock Down, early nite in March 2020, cold & dark. The intersection then was bad and presently, made worse with multiple site line obstruction Orange cones, weeds, water barriers to navigate — on foot, wheeled, auto vehicle, transit bus, residential commercial units plopped down while massive cement trucks, unmarked white box trucks whiz thru w U turns okay, no right turns, rights turns okay, no left turns, on and on.
And near zero done to calm the mass. Literally, East (Google satellite Maps is wrong) S. Cal Ave is a direct route to Cal Train and it’s a mess ! Who or what blocks off a ECR artery to a transit center ? I mean the traffic on ECR back up to Stanford on the North and Oregon on the South. For what? Miniature golf!

No comment from PTC — all enjoy the interior once over the dangerous, deadly crossing. Yet is the most of us on the outside of interior street dining who are stressing.

How can a city plan right for homes for all on the Sea Level rise exterior, when right now, a simple pedestrian commerce to housing stress test fails in the interior zones?

@RE

Re: "While new homes come for sale on the market, they mostly are rebuilds of homes that were bought for tear-down purposes, and they all are far outside of the cost range of the typical first-time home buyer, who deserve a chance to settle here too."

This makes a lot of sense, except for the aspirational goal at the end. Public subsidies or philanthropy are the only ways I know of to make new homes in Palo Alto fit "the cost range of the typical first-time home buyer..."

In addition, Palo Alto has afaik never had good public transit and imho never will due to the lack of major trip source and destination point concentrations. The best we could hope for would be a massive expansion of the community shuttle program.

Both of the goals above would cost an enormous amount of money - could you provide some ideas on possible sources of that money?

The intersection of San Antonio Road and Charleston Road is currently overwhelmed. Good luck trying to cross as a pedestrian or cyclist.

All the San Antonio “transit oriented” development to the west of Alma access 101 through Palo Alto. This traffic is generated by the thousands of new residential units constructed around the San Antonio-California Avenue-El Camino apartment developments (with more planned and approved).

San Antonio Road at Charlston is WAY beyond its natural capacity and becomes gridlocked twice a day. We are seeing Charleston backed up from 101 (near Costco) to the San Antonio Road traffic light daily. The same goes for Middlefield Road at San Antonio Road.

The BOTTOM Line is the existing road infrastructure is incapable of accepting ANY MORE vehicles. The concept that these developments are “transit oriented” and residents will use public transportation (busses/CalTrain) to get to work is a carefully constructed lie.

For those of us who live in South Palo Alto and need the San Antonio Road corridor, this proposal to loosen the zoning regulations is a non-starter.

The South Palo Alto community are totally against the idea of more dense housing along the San Antonio Road corridor. Expect us to deliver this message in large numbers at CPA Planning, Architectural Review Board, and at City Council meetings.

Oh yeah.

Whoever came up with the idea of "Builders Remedy" needs to be voted out of office.

Nuf Said!

Builder's remedy has been on the books since the 90s, and anyone who voted for it would have been termed out a long time ago.

Biggest recent change is executive. State regulators ended the longstanding practice of rubber-stamping pretty much any facially bogus claim a city will make. The bar also went up on what it takes to achieve compliance, but without that shift in regulatory philosophy none of it would have mattered.

Essentially what's going on is a decades-long riot of mendacity is finally being broken up, and the looters are big mad the law is actually being applied to them. Rather than simply stopping the looting, they're trying to power through.

Still no zoning map with the article. You are really falling down on the reporting job, PA Online. This map is worth 1,000 words. It is on page 6 of the staff report. Please post for everyone to see and understand.

Rebecca mentioned light rail. Why? All we have is the VTA light rail boondoggle - and it doesn’t include Palo Alto.

Palo Alto is a *suburb* that was happy for DECADES that the state is now determined to transform into high density w/o logic, nor sufficient road capacity to get across town all owing to San Fransiscan CA State Senator Scott Weiner’s dislike of us. Meanwhile, much wealthier CA communities skate.

San Antonio Road took extra traffic when Charleston/Arastradero were slowed by the narrowing, awkward single lanes in each direction. Meadow is too slow because of two schools, so the obvious alternative route is San Antonio.

Los Altos residents always use San Antonio as their best route to get to 101, other routes are not as direct and/or have awkward intersections.

San Antonio is used by so much through traffic that adding more local traffic is going to slow down traffic to a crawl at busy times.

This housing needs MORE tall shade trees. Also, a garden courtyard is crucial for cooling during hot summer days. There is too much concrete. Have gravel paths instead of heat-collecting concrete. We need to build for a warming future. Paint the roof with heat-reflecting paint and add more rooftop trees and plants.

There are ELEVEN public and private schools served by Charleston-Arastradero, not to mention after-school destinations that kids use: multiple parks, Mitchell Park Library, Cubberley Community Center, JCC and playing fields, Little League field (to mention just a few).

There has been a LOT of development in the this area in both Mountain View and Palo Alto over the last 17 years. To say that San Antonio Road congestion is "caused by" the C-A project is fallacious. The road has the same auto capacity today as it did before the project. This is well studied. However, speeds and turning movements are more controlled for safety--which is completely appropriate on a heavily used school and Stanford Research Park bicycle/pedestrian commute route.

San Antonio Road has received less attention because it previously had no homes there. That is about to change. A thoughtful area plan with improved transportation facilities for all modes, including transit (Hello VTA and Caltrain, are you listening?), and community services facilities and room for school expansion is needed. Fix rotting Cubberley.

@Considered
Sections of Charleston/Arastradero that used to be 2 lanes are now 1 lane, so capacity *has* been decreased (albeit perhaps for good reasons).

Mondoman: Government money is flowing into housing and public transit. Biden just created a climate corps that will train 20,000 people for jobs in sustainable infrastructure, including climate resilient public transit and affordable housing. Meanwhile, existing federal housing programs, including old fashioned section 8 subsidies and newer incentives from the Inflation Reduction Act are starting to flow.

In California, there is the Homekey Program, that already gave away $1.5 billion to local governments to fund affordable housing and transitional housing developments (this is the program that our City Manager literally denied existed for YEARS until it was almost too late to obtain any homekey funds -- but fortunately (thanks to the great work of our transitional housing partner Dignity Moves), we managed to receive a grant in the nick of time (but now we must spend it!)

Additionally, the more than $1 TRILLION dollars in carbon credit funds are finally starting to flow to sustainable projects. I invested in a company (terraformation.com) that is using carbon credits + solar-powered desalination to regenerate forests throughout the world. I also heard that carbon credits are going towards a variety of sustainable infrastructure projects. As a reminder, public transit and affordable housing are both sustainable infrastructure projects.

Finally. I used light rail as an example of local public transit. I'm not advocating for repeating the mistakes of the VTA system. Local shuttles are another way to bring residents to workplaces and shopping and back. I imagine that there are other ways to provide reliable, dependable public transit as well. Europe seems to have cracked this nut decades ago, so I imagine we could take a look at what the most livable European cities do. My sister moved to Portugal the year after Trump was elected, and she loves the transit options i Lisbon. Just thinking out loud.

Most things worth doing are hard. But we do them anyway.

There is definitely a need to rethink the school bus situation. The old shuttles did help to get some middle and high school students to school and now it is replaced with the Link which does not work for a shuttle load of kids who have to get to school before the school bell.

Likewise, getting people to Caltrain, shuttles could help. We were told that when the JCC was built there would be a bus or shuttle to take them to Caltrain or San Antonio Center. Of course that never materialized.

Parking and traffic are concerns for any new housing because there is no alternative and it is not likely they will ride bikes for most of their trips

The CC made two very bad decisions this last two weeks: 1) Rezoning all residential RM30 climate protected (Fry’s) in exchange for more commercial and then about facing, rezoning all Com/ROLM/Idust toxic bay water (climate unfriendly) shore for all residential. Neither — area, parcels, property, acreage — does the city own.

And these decisions were contrary to the will of the public participating loudly, against both. Sorry very sad day.

There is not one pro environment, climate friendly member sitting on the PA council Dais. Not one. These decisions favored themselves to win big w greasy developers.

@Bystander The JCC seriously pitched locating their site on old Mayfield at ECR Page Mill/Cal Ave (search 2005 Mayfield Agreement). They pulled out. Why?

Now JCC suffering the consequences — SanAntonio is a public transit / ped unfriendly desert.

The 17 acre Mayfield Agreement ie Stanford / PA deal, threw open a windfall for multi billion dollar developer greed. Swaths of land for them in exchange for paltry, pennies on the dollar, civic / social return. Fools (city) pyrite v. developer greed in gold,

The entrance to the becoming creepy mysterious unknown corridor.
The answer to someone above. All of this is contrary to the Public.
I remember when you could pass the (stationary) Ford motor Car plant, with the hundreds of NEW Cars. Continue to travel down towards wonderful Mayfield Mall. JC Pennys. Down towards The Old Mill, then Sears Shopping Ctr. (w/the Bird-Cage) This is What a dozen decades make when the Old Guard dies off and you have outside influences coming into town, destroying Landscape for progress. What happens to cultivating what we already have?
They are sending mini-golf courses, movie theaters, and entertainment locations down the drain. OR is this their figment, of their imagination of progress? Or is it Profit over People? I am resigned, to NOT to seeing a stationary "Motor Plant" any longer. But Thousands of post MOBILE motor vehicles interloping what has replaced the Car plant that was stationary. The NEW Bodies that have come upon the scene don't care because they didn't/don't have a Dog in the fight. They vocally say this "Me, me, me". This is NOT for you any longer. Go away and grow up. Money talks. B.S. walks. Even while walking the trail, they commandeer the Bike trails zooming through at high speeds, putting in danger the walkers and their dogs.
NO speed limits posted or how to be courteous.
Another thing, is it me or am I seeing constant Auto accidents in the curve on the 101 Hwy? Dont any of them know how to drive? There are at least one to 3 major accidents in that location a week.
The curve is near where that man was driving with no hands in his Tesla and crashed. Ok end of my rant. Carry-on powers that be.
Whoever decided that California was in need of more housing, overthought. What is exactly wrong with telling Folks to not move here? But move into locations, that are sparse and commute in? Like Fresno, Bakersfield or Death Valley. Why come to my home and overload your burdens?
That section of the Highway needs to be rethought.

Consider Your Options:

Please list the 11 schools on the Charleston Arastradero corridor you are referencing.

From my own observation, there seems to be worse traffic around schools than there was pre-pandemic. More parents than ever seem to be driving their kids to school. If more housing is built near San Antonio/Charleston, where will the kids go to school and how will they get there? The JCC plans indicated there would be new transportation options for residents. That didn't materialize. What will school commutes be like?

Pat Markeviitch,

Not Consider Your Opinion, but I could come up with these. It depends a bit on how wide you define corridor.

Gunn
Fletcher
Hoover
Unitarian Elementary
Palo Alo Adult
Challenger
AbilityPath
JLS
Fairmeadow
Greendell
Palo Alto Chinese School
Melody Academy of Music
Sofia University
JCC Pre-school

Juana Briones and Bowman School as well.

I said eleven public and private schools served by Charleston Arastradero". They are:

1. Fairmeadow
2. Greendell
3. Hoover
4. JLS
5. Fletcher
6. Juana Briones
7. Gunn
8. Kehillah High School
9. Gideon Hausner
10.Challenger School
11.Bowman International School

Note this list does not include multiple small private schools at Cubberley, nor any of the preschools and many after-school destinations, including playing fields, parks, libraries, community center, Little League Field, etc.

Looks like I may get an 80 unit complex right by my back fence. Thanks PACC. ????