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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2017-10-05 Architectural Review Board Agenda Packet_______________________ 1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually. 2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers. 3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to two minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers. Architectural Review Board Regular Meeting Agenda: October 5, 2017 Council Chambers 250 Hamilton Avenue 8:30 AM Call to Order / Roll Call Oral Communications The public may speak to any item not on the agenda. Three (3) minutes per speaker.1,2 Agenda Changes, Additions, and Deletions The Chair or Board majority may modify the agenda order to improve meeting management. City Official Reports 1. Transmittal of the ARB Meeting Schedule and Attendance Record, and Administrative Staff-Level Architectural Review Approvals Action Items Public Comment is Permitted. Applicants/Appellant Teams: Ten (10) minutes, plus ten (10) minutes rebuttal. All others: Three (3) minutes per speaker.1,3 2. PUBLIC HEARING/QUASI-JUDICIAL. 3001 El Camino Real [16PLN-00097 and 16PLN- 00220]: Recommendation on Applicant's Request for Approval of a Site and Design Review to Allow for Construction of a Four-Story Mixed-Use Development With 19,800 Square Feet of Retail and 30 Residential Units in the CS Zone as Well as a Three-Story Multi-Family Residential Building With 20 Units in the RM-30 Zone. The Project Also Includes a Request for a Preliminary Parcel Map for a Lot Merger to Allow for the Proposed Development, a Design Enhancement Exception, and a Parking Adjustment for Shared Parking. Environmental Assessment: A Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was Circulated for Public Review from July 3, 2017 to August 2, 2017. Zoning District: CS (Service Commercial), RM-30 (Multi-family Residential), and R-1 (Single-family Residential). For More Information Contact the Project Planner Claire Hodgkins at claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org 3. PUBLIC HEARING / QUASI-JUDICIAL. 180 Hamilton Avenue (17PLN-00171): Consideration of a Minor Architectural Review to Allow for Exterior Improvements to an Existing Hotel. The Proposed Changes Include: Replacing the Ground Floor _______________________ 1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually. 2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers. 3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to two minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers. Storefronts Along the Hamilton Avenue and Emerson Street Entries, Replacing the Existing Awning at the Emerson Street Entry, New Façade Finishes on the First Floor and Part of the Second Floor. Environmental Assessment: Exempt from the provisions of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) per Guideline Section 15301 (Existing Facilities). Zoning District: CD-C(GF)(P) (Downtown Commercial) For More Information Contact the Project Planner Samuel Gutierrez at samuel.gutierrez@cityofpaloalto.org. Study Session Public Comment is Permitted. Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 Approval of Minutes Public Comment is Permitted. Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 4. Draft Architectural Review Board Meeting Minutes for September 7, 2017. Subcommittee Items Board Member Questions, Comments or Announcements Adjournment _______________________ 1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to fifteen (15) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually. 2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers. 3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to two minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers. Palo Alto Architectural Review Board Boardmember Biographies, Present and Archived Agendas and Reports are available online: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/boards/architectural/default.asp. The ARB Boardmembers are: Chair Alex Lew Vice Chair Kyu Kim Boardmember Peter Baltay Boardmember Wynne Furth Boardmember Robert Gooyer Get Informed and Be Engaged! View online: http://midpenmedia.org/category/government/city-of-palo-alto or on Channel 26. Show up and speak. Public comment is encouraged. Please complete a speaker request card located on the table at the entrance to the Council Chambers and deliver it to the Board Secretary prior to discussion of the item. Write to us. Email the ARB at: arb@cityofpaloalto.org. Letters can be delivered to the Planning & Community Environment Department, 5th floor, City Hall, 250 Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94301. Comments received by 2:00 PM the Thursday preceding the meeting date will be included in the agenda packet. Comments received afterward through 3:00 PM the day before the meeting will be presented to the Board at the dais. Material related to an item on this agenda submitted to the ARB after distribution of the agenda packet is available for public inspection at the address above. Americans with Disability Act (ADA) It is the policy of the City of Palo Alto to offer its public programs, services and meetings in a manner that is readily accessible to all. Persons with disabilities who require materials in an appropriate alternative format or who require auxiliary aids to access City meetings, programs, or services may contact the City’s ADA Coordinator at (650) 329-2550 (voice) or by emailing ada@cityofpaloalto.org. Requests for assistance or accommodations must be submitted at least 24 hours in advance of the meeting, program, or service. Architectural Review Board Staff Report (ID # 8526) Report Type: City Official Reports Meeting Date: 10/5/2017 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment 250 Hamilton Avenue Palo Alto, CA 94301 (650) 329-2442 Summary Title: City Official Report Title: Transmittal of the ARB Meeting Schedule and Attendance Record, and Administrative Staff-Level Architectural Review Approvals From: Hillary Gitelman Recommendation Staff recommends the Architectural Review Board (ARB) review and comment as appropriate. Background The attached documents are provided for informational purposes. The Board may review and comment as it deems appropriate. If individual Boardmembers anticipate being absent from a future meeting, it is requested that be brought to staff’s attention when considering this item. The first attachment provides a meeting and attendance schedule for the current calendar year. Also included are the subcommittee assignments, which rotate throughout the year. The second attachment transmits administrative staff-level Architectural Review approvals since the Board’s last meeting. Any party, including the applicant, may request a hearing by the ARB on the proposed director's decision by filing a written request with the planning division. There shall be no fee required for requesting such a hearing. The third attachment is a Tentative Future Agenda that provides a summary of upcoming projects or discussion items. The hearing dates for these items are subject to change. No action is required by the ARB for this item. Attachments:  Attachment A: ARB Meeting Schedule (DOCX)  Attachment B: Staff Approvals (DOCX)  Attachment C: Tentative Future Agenda (DOCX) 2017 Schedule Architectural Review Board Meeting Schedule & Assignments Meeting Dates Time Location Status Planned Absences 1/5/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Canceled 1/19/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 2/2/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 2/16/2017 /17 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Peter Baltay 3/2/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 3/16/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 4/6/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 4/20/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 5/4/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 5/18/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Baltay/Kim 6/1/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 6/15/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Robert Gooyer 7/6/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Peter Baltay 7/20/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 8/3/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Wynne Furth 8/17/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 9/7/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Robert Gooyer 9/21/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular Wynne Furth 10/5/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 10/19/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 11/2/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 11/16/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 12/7/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 12/21/2017 8:30 AM Council Chambers Regular 2017 Subcommittee Assignments January February March April May June (Gooyer/ Baltay) (Gooyer/ Baltay) (Gooyer/ Baltay) (Baltay/ Kim) (Baltay/ Kim) (Baltay/ Kim) July August September October November December (Kim/ Furth) (Kim/ Furth) (Kim/ Furth) (Furth/ Lew) (Furth/ Lew) (Furth/ Lew) Architectural Review Board Staff Approvals Project Description: ARB staff level review to allow for the installation of a new non- illuminated wall sign. Applicant: Theresa Heitkamp Address: 217 Alma Avenue, 17PLN-00316 Approval Date: September 28, 2017, 2017 Request for hearing deadline: October 12, 2017 Project Description: ARB staff level review to allow the removal of an existing monument sign and installation of a new one. Applicant: Harry Singh Address: 3549 Middlefield, 17PLN-00293 Approval Date: September 27, 2017 Request for hearing deadline: October 11, 2017 Project Description: ARB staff level review to allow the installation of one new illuminated wall sign. Applicant: Tony Park Address: 267 California Avenue, 17PLN-00317 Approval Date: September 26, 2017, 2017 Request for hearing deadline: October 10, 2017 Project Description: ARB staff level review to allow for modifications to an existing commercial building. Applicant: Ken Hayes Address: 585 Bryant Street, 17PLN-00246 Approval Date: September 19, 2017, 2017 Request for hearing deadline: October 3, 2017 Architectural Review Board 2017 Tentative Future Agenda The Following Items are Tentative and Subject to Change: Meeting Dates Topics October 19  Highway 101 Pedestrian/Bicycle Overpass  2775 Embarcadero Road: Baylands Boardwalk  3045 Park Blvd: New R&D Building  2747 Park Blvd: Master Sign Program  2120 Staunton: New Duplex November 2  Public Safety Building  2370 Watson Court: Master Sign Program November 16  Tier 3 WCF Vinculums/Verizon- Cluster 1 December 7  1310 Bryant Street, 1235 and 1263 Emerson - Castilleja School Preliminary  3945 El Camino Real: Exterior Remodel of a two story hotel  Tier 3 WCF Vinculums/Verizon- Cluster 2 September 29, 2017 - All Dates and Topics Subject to Change Architectural Review Board Staff Report (ID # 8460) Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 10/5/2017 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment 250 Hamilton Avenue Palo Alto, CA 94301 (650) 329-2442 Summary Title: 3001 El Camino Real: Mixed Use Development (3rd Formal) Title: PUBLIC HEARING/QUASI-JUDICIAL. 3001 El Camino Real [16PLN-00097 and 16PLN-00220]: Recommendation on Applicant's Request for Approval of a Site and Design Review to Allow for Construction of a Four-Story Mixed-Use Development With 19,800 Square Feet of Retail and 30 Residential Units in the CS Zone as Well as a Three-Story Multi- Family Residential Building With 20 Units in the RM-30 Zone. The Project Also Includes a Request for a Preliminary Parcel Map for a Lot Merger to Allow for the Proposed Development, a Design Enhancement Exception, and a Parking Adjustment for Shared Parking. Environmental Assessment: A Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was Circulated for Public Review from July 3, 2017 to August 2, 2017. Zoning District: CS (Service Commercial), RM-30 (Multi-family Residential), and R- 1 (Single-family Residential). For More Information Contact the Project Planner Claire Hodgkins at claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org From: Hillary Gitelman Recommendation Staff recommends the Architectural Review Board (ARB) take the following action(s): 1. Consider the Mitigated Negative Declaration and Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan; and 2. Recommend approval of the Site and Design Application, Design Enhancement Exception, and Director’s Parking Adjustment to the City Council based on findings and subject to conditions of approval included in the draft Record of Land Use Action in Attachment B. City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 2 Report Summary The proposed project would construct two buildings with a total of 50 dwelling units and 19,800 square feet of retail space on the east side of El Camino Real between Olive Avenue and Acacia Avenue. The project was previously reviewed by the ARB on two other occasions. A copy of the most recent staff report without prior attachments is available in Attachment I. Earlier staff reports include background information, project analysis, and evaluation to City codes and policies. Links to both the complete first and second ARB staff report are available here: November 3, 2016: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/54501 August 17, 2017: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/59084 On July 12, 2017, the PTC reviewed the project and recommended approval. A copy of the PTC staff report and minutes are available at http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/boards/ptc/. The purpose of this report is to restate the comments made by the board and detail the applicant’s response to those comments. Staff’s analysis concludes that the applicant’s resubmittal addresses prior comments made by the board and the analysis section below builds upon the information contained in earlier reports with modifications to reflect recent project changes. Background On August 17, 2017 the ARB reviewed the project. A transcript of the hearing is available in Attachment J. The Board’s comments and the applicant’s response are summarized in the following table. Specifically, the board made a motion asking for the following specific comments to be addressed: ARB Comments/Direction Applicant Response Building Elevation: The ARB noted that the plans were unclear with respect to the height of the first floor of the RM-30 building in comparison to existing grade. The board requested that the plans provide more clarity and asked that the residential building be redesigned, as needed, so that the first floor is no more than six feet above the adjacent sidewalk. The proposed RM-30 building has been redesigned to reduce the maximum separation between first floor elevation and the sidewalk to 5 feet 11 inches, just under the six foot maximum separation the ARB requested. Due to the slope of the site from a highpoint on the west side to a low point on the east side, the height of the first floor in comparison to the sidewalk ranges between this maximum height to a minimum separation of 5 feet 6 inches at the lowest unit. The lobby and electrical room on the southwest end of the building are set even lower, at three feet above the adjacent sidewalk. The building elevation drawings on Sheets A4.2 and A4.3 and the City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 3 ARB Comments/Direction Applicant Response site grading plan on sheet C2.0 in Attachment L reflect these changes. Roofline: The ARB requested that the design of the building facing El Camino Real be reconsidered to create a more definitive roof feature to further define the base, body and roof, in accordance with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines The applicant is proposing and six inch tall, recessed band at the roofline on El Camino, as shown on Sheet A4.0 of Attachment L. In addition, the applicant added balcony dividers with wood infill paneling and increased the size of the planters along El Camino Real. The recessed band provides additional definition to the roof, the balcony dividers with infill wood paneling provide additional definition to the middle section of the building. The improvements to the planters along the frontage further define the base of the building. All contribute to providing more visual distinction between the top, middle, and base of the structure in accordance with Guideline 4.1.5 of the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines. Bicycle Parking: The ARB requested that the long-term bicycle parking be placed at grade or otherwise made more easily accessible. The municipal code does not require long- term bicycle parking to be placed at grade; however, based on input from the ARB, long-term bicycle parking lockers have been added to provide accessible, on-grade bicycle parking for eight bicycles, as shown on site plan sheets A1.1 and L1.01. Materials: The ARB requested that a materials board that includes the actual proposed materials be provided. A materials board has been provided. Landscaping: The ARB requested that the applicant revise some of the selected plant species in order to provide more indigenous Planting species have been updated to provide more native species. Sheet L4.11 has been added to the set to clarify the City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 4 ARB Comments/Direction Applicant Response species to better comply with Architectural Review Board finding #5. The ARB also asked that the depth of the planters along El Camino Real be increased to provide more planting area. total amount of native planting versus non- native planting for the site area. In addition, the planter depth has been adjusted on El Camino as shown on site plan sheets A1.1 and L1.01. The applicant has increased the amount of planting adjacent to the curbs, as well as in the planters, in order to provide 31 percent more planting along the frontage. Details: The ARB asked for more design detail for the windows, awnings, and balconies along El Camino Real and asked for further refinement of the railings and awnings on Acacia. Per the ARB’s request, the applicant has further refined the details of awnings, windows, and balconies along El Camino and Acacia to provide additional clarity. Schematic detail sheets A4.0 and A4.1 have been added to the set. Analysis1 Changes to Address ARB Comments Building Elevation Although the applicant has met the maximum separation noted by the ARB, a smaller maximum separation between the sidewalk and first floor elevation would be preferred. However, the podium height has been lowered the maximum amount feasible without losing required parking spaces, removing residential units, and/or steepening the ramp beyond 22 percent, which would be un-safe with the current site layout. Further, the split level between the lobby and the elevator is two feet six inches, which is the minimum distance required for an elevator stop. Bringing the floor down lower would eliminate the elevator stop, requiring substantial redesign of the site grading, circulation, and access between the two buildings. Therefore, although further reducing the height of the first floor would be preferred, staff believes that the findings for approval of the project can be met for the project as proposed, as outlined in Attachment B. By lowering the height of the first floor and incorporating the proposed landscaping and pedestrian friendly features such as benches along the frontage, the project is more consistent with the multi-family context-based design criteria than the previous design and has addressed the maximum separation stipulated in the ARB’s previous comments. Roofline 1 The information provided in this section is based on analysis prepared by the report author prior to the public hearing. The Architectural Review Board in its review of the administrative record and based on public testimony may reach a different conclusion from that presented in this report and may choose to take an alternative action from the recommendation in this report. City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 5 Although staff notes that an even more defined roof may be more desirable, the proposed changes further define the base, body and roof of the structure in accordance with the ARB comments without changing the overall design intent. Staff previously concluded that the project, on balance, was consistent with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines. With, these changes, the project would be more consistent with Guideline 4.1.5; therefore, staff concludes that the project, on balance, is still consistent with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines. Bicycle Parking Although it would be preferable to have the majority, if not all, of the bicycle parking at grade, the six long-term bicycle parking spaces now provided at grade have been added in a manner that does not affect the overall site design/circulation. Providing more long-term bicycle parking at grade would either require substantial changes to the site design that may affect compliance with code requirements, or would otherwise need to be provided inside the building, requiring loss of retail space for the CS building and residential units for the RM-30 building. As redesigned, all retail bicycle parking, both short-term and long-term, is provided at grade and the below-grade bicycle room at the end of the garage ramp, which was located in a less accessible location, has been removed. Two long-term, residential bicycle parking spaces are provided at grade for each building (a total of four residential spaces). In balancing the need for substantial redesign to accommodate this, which would likely either affect code compliance in other areas or result in the loss of retail or residential unit space, staff recommends approval of the project as shown in the updated project plans. Landscaping Although Sheet L4.02, which provides the plant list summary, shows that several species selected are not native, Sheet L4.11 shows that the overall number of native plants proposed far exceeds the total number of non-native plants. A total of approximately seventy percent of the species planted will be native. The non-native plant species that were selected were chosen to provide evergreen foliage with color and texture accents in specific locations while maintaining a low water use. As discussed above, the applicant has increased the planter depths along El Camino Real as well as the amount of planting area in the planter strips to address the ARB’s comments. The Architectural Review findings have been updated to address these changes. Consistency with the Comprehensive Plan, Area Plans and Guidelines2 A consistency analysis with specific goals and policies outlined in the Comprehensive Plan is included in Attachment C. Based on the proposed uses within each land use designation, consistency with the housing element, and consistency with other policies and goals outlined in the Comprehensive Plan, staff finds that on balance, the project is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan. 2 The Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan is available online: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/topics/projects/landuse/compplan.asp City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 6 In addition, a summary of the project’s consistency with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines as well as the El Camino Real Design Guidelines is included in the ARB staff report in Attachment I. The proposed revisions to the roofline of the CS building, the addition of wood accents on the balconies, and the vegetation along El Camino Real result in a project that is more consistent with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines because they further define the base, body, and roofline, and improve the pedestrian experience along El Camino Real by providing more greenery along the frontage. The reduction to the height of the RM-30 building also provides for a slightly improved pedestrian experience in comparison to the previous design, consistent with goals outlined in the Comprehensive Plan. Zoning Compliance3 Staff has performed a detailed review of the project’s consistency with applicable zoning standards. As detailed in the zoning compliance summary tables in Attachments D and E and summarized in the previous ARB staff report included in Attachment I, the project complies with the requirements for each respective zoning district or is seeking, through the requested approvals, permission to deviate from certain code standards in a manner that is consistent with the zoning ordinance. Design Enhancement Exception The applicant is requesting a Design Enhancement Exception for the ramp to the below grade parking garage to be located five feet from a lot line where a 10-foot setback is required in accordance with PAMC Section 18.16.060. The location/design of the roundabout allows cars to enter from Olive Avenue but does not allow cars exiting below-grade parking to exit toward Olive Avenue. This parking lot design reduces traffic on Olive Avenue, adjacent to single-family residences and also allows for underground parking to reduce visual impacts of surface parking along El Camino Real. Further analysis of this exception is included in the previous staff report in Attachment I and the draft findings for approval of this DEE are included in the draft Record of Land Use Action in Attachment B. Director’s Parking Adjustment The project is seeking a Director’s Adjustment to allow for eight shared parking spaces and one on-street loading space in accordance with PAMC Section 18.52.050. The shared parking adjustment would allow shared use of four guest parking spaces with retail commercial uses and two at grade parking spaces to be restricted during trash pickup hours, which would occur in the morning, outside of peak periods. The Parking Management Plan included in Attachment F provides a parking analysis showing peak periods for the proposed uses throughout the day. In addition, the site design would make circulation of larger trucks on-site infeasible; therefore, the applicant is also requesting approval of a parking adjustment for one on-street loading space. Further analysis of the requested Director’s Parking Adjustment is included in the previous staff report in Attachment I. Because the applicant is requesting a parking reduction, in accordance with PAMC Section 18.52.030(i) a Transit Demand Management Plan will be 3 The Palo Alto Zoning Code is available online: http://www.amlegal.com/codes/client/palo-alto_ca City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 7 required as a condition of approval for the project in order to reduce and manage the number of single-occupancy vehicle trips generated by the project. Context-Based Design Criteria The proposed development requires that the City make the findings outlined in PAMC Section 18.16.090, Context-Based Design Criteria, for the CS building and the findings outlined in 18.12.060, Multi-family Context-Based Design Criteria, for the RM-30 building. A detailed review of the proposed project’s consistency with these context-based design criteria is included in Attachment G. Changes to further reduce the height of the first floor for the RM-30 building results in a project that is even more consistent with the multi-family context-based design criteria. Performance Criteria Because the proposed mixed-used development would be located within a CS zone, this portion of the development would be subject to the performance criteria outlined in Section 18.23 of the Palo Alto Municipal Code (PAMC). An analysis of the project’s consistency with the performance criteria is included in Attachment H. Multi-Modal Access & Parking As discussed in detail in Attachment I, the project is consistent with the City’s BPTP. With approval of the parking adjustment, as allowed in accordance with the Municipal Code, the project would be consistent with parking requirements. The parking management plan in Attachment F shows that based on parking demand throughout the day for each use, the total number of spaces provided will be effective in providing sufficient parking. As discussed above, the project has been revised to provide all long-term retail bicycle parking at grade and to provide a few long-term residential bicycle parking spaces at grade. Although staff would prefer to see more bicycle parking spaces provided at grade, the reasons why additional bicycle parking has not been provided at grade are described in detail above. Staff believes that the proposed project, as redesigned, still meets the code requirements and is consistent with the context-based design criteria and the architectural review findings; therefore, staff recommends approval with the incorporation of the proposed changes. Overall, parking area circulation eliminates existing entrances to the site from El Camino Real; creating entrances on Acacia Avenue and Olive Avenue; which is more consistent with the El Camino Real design guidelines. The proposed parking lot would allow for entrance from Olive and Acacia Avenue but the garage ramp location for the mixed use building would encourage exit onto Acacia Avenue, away from nearby single-family residences. The placement of the ramp requires approval of a DEE. Draft findings for approval of the DEE are included in Attachment B. Environmental Review City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 8 The subject project has been assessed in accordance with the authority and criteria contained in the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), the State CEQA Guidelines, and the City’s environmental regulations. Specifically, a Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was circulated on July 3, 2017 and was circulated for a 30 day period through August 2, 2017. A link to the Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration as well as the Draft Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan is included in Attachment K. The ARB must consider the draft Mitigated Negative Declaration in making a recommendation on the project and may comment on the draft. Following completion of the ARB’s review and recommendation on the project, a Final Draft MND and MMRP would be prepared for the City Council. Mitigation has been included, in particular, to address construction noise, to address construction in the plume, and to address pedestrian circulation. Construction, or payment toward construction, of a crosswalk across El Camino Real would be required. Public Notification, Outreach & Comments The Palo Alto Municipal Code requires notice of this public hearing be published in a local paper and mailed to owners and occupants of property within 600 feet of the subject property at least ten days in advance. Notice of a public hearing for this project was published in the Palo Alto Weekly on September 22, 2017, which is 13 days in advance of the meeting. Postcard mailing occurred on September 25, 2017, which is 10 days in advance of the meeting. Public Comments One public comment was received during the last ARB hearing on August 17th. The commenter noted that if there was a way to provide circulation from Acacia through Fry’s and then around it would be better, noting that any additional traffic near Page Mill/El Camino would be an issue. The commenter also noted that they would prefer to see less vertical and more horizontal accents in the design and that increasing planter boxes on the front of the building would be better. Comments received prior to the last ARB hearing are summarized in previous reports. No comments have been received since the last ARB hearing. Alternative Actions In addition to the recommended action, the Architectural Review Board may: 1. Approve the project with modified findings or conditions; 2. Continue the project to a date (un)certain; or 3. Recommend project denial based on revised findings. Report Author & Contact Information ARB4 Liaison & Contact Information Claire Hodgkins, Associate Planner Jodie Gerhardt, AICP, Planning Manager (650) 329-2116 (650) 329-2575 claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org jodie.gerhardt@cityofpaloalto.org 4 Emails may be sent directly to the ARB using the following address: arb@cityofpaloalto.org City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 9 Attachments:  Attachment A: Location Map (PDF)  Attachment B: Draft Record of Land Use Action (DOCX)  Attachment C: Comprehensive Plan Analysis (DOCX)  Attachment D: CS Zoning Consistency (DOCX)  Attachment E: RM-30 Zoning Consistency (DOCX)  Attachment F: Parking Management Plan (PDF)  Attachment G: Context Based Design Criteria (DOCX)  Attachment H: Performance Criteria (DOCX)  Attachment I: ARB Staff Report August 17, 2017 (PDF)  Attachment J: ARB Transcript August 17, 2017 (RTF)  Attachment K: Environmental Analysis (DOCX)  Attachment L: Project Plans (DOCX) 35 20 4 18 20 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440 450 460 471 461 451 4702805 2865 2875 412 420 430 440 450 451 441 431 421 411 2904 456 470 471 461 2999 2951 2905 461 2755 3000 3017 3001 412 410 2701 404 345 3128 755 406 3127 600 3111 473 435 3225 440 31802700 620 630 360 200 429 660 445 481 3215 3275 3327 3399 601 3333 3201 3051 3101 3160 2790 2705 3260 419 2825 3265 LAMBERT AVENUE EL CAMINO REAL HANSEN WAY EL CAMINO REAL SHERIDAN AVENUE SHERIDAN ASH STREET ACACIA AVENUE PORTAGE AVENUE OLIVE AVENUEPEPPER AVENUE ASH STREET PAGE MILL ROAD E MILL ROAD EL CAMINO REAL PAGE MILL ROAD EL CAMINO REA L EL CAMINO REAL EL CAMINO REAL This map is a product of the City of Palo Alto GIS This document is a graphic representation only of best available sources. Legend Zone District Boundaries 3001 El Camino Real (Project Site) abc Zone District Labels 0'250' 3001 El Camino Real Proposed Site Parcel with Zoning Districts Area Map CITY O F PALO A L TO I N C O R P O R ATE D C ALIFOR N IA P a l o A l t oT h e C i t y o f A P RIL 16 1894 The City of Palo Alto assumes no responsibility for any errors ©1989 to 2016 City of Palo Alto RRivera, 2016-10-05 14:08:323001 ECR CH (\\cc-maps\gis$\gis\admin\Personal\RRivera.mdb) Attachment A Attachment B APPROVAL NO. 2017-__ RECORD OF THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PALO ALTO LAND USE ACTION FOR 3001 EL CAMINO REAL: SITE AND DESIGN REVIEW, PRELIMINARY PARCEL MAP, DESIGN ENHANCEMENT EXCEPTION, PARKING ADJUSTMENT, MITIGATED NEGATIVE DECLARATION AND MITIGATION MONITORING AND REPORTING PLAN [FILE NOs. 16PLN-00097 and 16PLN-00220] On ________, 2017, the City Council adopted the Mitigated Negative Declaration and Approved the Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program; the Preliminary Parcel Map for the merger of three lots; the Site and Design Review to allow demolition of two existing structures total 9,100 sf and construction of two buildings totaling 49,494 square feet (sf) of multi-family residential housing and 19,800 sf of retail space with both below and at-grade parking located at 3001 El Camino Real; the Design Enhancement Exception; and a parking adjustment making the following findings, determination and declarations: SECTION 1. BACKGROUND. The City Council of the City of Palo Alto (“City Council”) finds, determines, and declares as follows: A. On June 21, 2016 The Sobrato Organization applied for a Preliminary Parcel Map [16PLN- 00220] for the development of a 1.97 acre parcel. B. The project site is comprised of three lots (APN Nos. 132-37-055; 13-37-056; and 132-38- 072) that are 0.32 acres, 0.33 acres, and 1.32 acres, respectively. The site contains two structures currently used for retail. Single family residential land uses are located to the northeast. Other surrounding uses include office, retail, and commercial recreation uses. C. On March 15, 2016 The Sobrato Organization applied for a Site and Design Review [16PLN- 00097] to allow demolition of two existing structures totaling 9,100 square feet and to construct one new three story, 20 unit multi-family residential building with partially below-grade parking and one new four-story mixed use building with 30 residential units totaling 19,800 square feet of floor area with below and at-grade parking and other site improvements. D. Staff has determined that the proposed project is in compliance with the applicable CS, RM- 30, and R-1 development standards, as applicable to each portion of the site. E. Following staff review, the Planning and Transportation Commission reviewed the project and considered the draft Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) and draft Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan (MMRP) and recommended adoption of the MND, approval of the MMRP, and approval of the Site and Design on July 12, 2017 subject to conditions of approval. F. Following staff and Planning and Transportation Commission review the Architectural Review Board (ARB) reviewed the project and considered the draft Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) and draft Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan (MMRP) and recommended adoption of the MND, approval of the MMRP, and approval of the Site and Design and Design Enhancement Exception on October 5, 2017 subject to conditions of approval. G. On ________, 2017, the City Council reviewed the project design and the MND and MMRP. After hearing public testimony, the Council voted to approve the Site and Design, Preliminary Parcel Map, Design Enhancement Exception, and Parking Adjustment subject to the conditions set forth in Section 7 of this Record of Land Use Action. SECTION 2. ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW. In conformance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), a Mitigated Negative Declaration was adopted and Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan approved by the City Council on ________, 2017. The Mitigated Negative Declaration concluded that the proposed project(s) would not have a significant effect on the environment with mitigation as proposed. The MND and MMRP are included in Attachment K of the staff report. All mitigation measures as stated in the approved Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program (MMRP) have been incorporated into the conditions of approval. SECTION 3. SITE AND DESIGN OBJECTIVE FINDINGS. The project is consistent with the Site and Design Objective Findings outlined in Chapter 18.30(G).060 of the PAMC. Objective (a): To ensure construction and operation of the use in a manner that will be orderly, harmonious, and compatible with existing or potential uses of adjoining or nearby sites. The proposed project is consistent with Objective A because the proposed use of the site is consistent with the goals and policies outlined in the Comprehensive Plan for this particular area of the City and the proposed uses are consistent with permitted uses within each of their respective zone districts on this split-zoned site. The proposed project eliminates light spillover to adjacent residences; screens mechanical equipment, trash, etc., placing it away from adjacent residences; and places most parking underground. It provides ample open space and screening between adjacent uses and the El Camino Real frontage encourages pedestrian and bicyclist activity. The frontage of both sites is articulated with setbacks, changes in height, and changes in material in order to reduce massing, incorporate and highlight natural elements from nearby sites, and to provide appropriate transitions both along the frontage and between the site and adjacent single family residential uses. Objective (b): To ensure the desirability of investment, or the conduct of business, research, or educational activities, or other authorized occupations, in the same or adjacent areas. The proposed project is consistent with Objective B because it includes retail uses on the ground floor close to adjacent office uses and also provides housing, placing residents in close proximity to office uses, commercial recreation uses, and retail both on and off-site. Objective (c): To ensure that sound principles of environmental design and ecological balance shall be observed. The proposed project is consistent with Objective C in that the project use encourages pedestrian and bicycle activity, and situates both housing and additional retail in a location close to extensive transit opportunities as well as adjacent retail and office uses, which helps to reduce vehicle trips. The building is also designed to comply with Calgreen plus Tier 2 requirements and all plants will be drought resistant. The project will comply with C3 and MWELO requirements. Although several trees on site are planned to be removed, these will be replaced in kind in a manner that creates functional open space area for retail users and residents. More than three times the existing number of trees will be added. None of the trees planned for removal are protected. Existing mature street trees along El Camino Real and Olive Avenue would be retained and protected during construction. Objective (d): To ensure that the use will be in accord with the Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan. The proposed project is consistent with Objective D because the project promotes medium density residential development within the El Camino Real corridor and areas in close proximity to transit. The design of the development is consistent and compatible with applicable elements of the City’s Comprehensive Plan in that the project will include high quality design compatible with surrounding development. More specifically, the Cal- Ventura area in which this development is located is specifically identified in the comprehensive plan as being an ideal location for mixed-use and multi-family residential development. The project has been designed to be compatible with adjacent single-family residential uses by concentrating the bulk and mass of the building toward El Camino Real, consistent with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines and build-to-line requirements, and set back substantially from the rear neighbors. Easy pedestrian and bicyclist access is provided to both residential and retail uses along El Camino Real to encourage alternate transit in a transit-oriented area. These areas include pedestrian amenities that create public spaces to sit and rest at each corner of the development and vehicle access to the site is oriented away from El Camino Real in accordance with City and Caltrans goals. As outlined in Attachment C of the staff report, the project is consistent with several policies and goals outlined in the Housing Element, Natural Element, Land Use and Design Element, and Transportation Element. With implementation of conditions of approval, which require design features to reduce exposure to air contaminants from the California-Olive-Emerson plume and air contaminants from vehicles and generators on El Camino Real, the the project would be consistent with Policy N-29, which requires that toxic air contaminants be mitigated. Therefore, the proposed use of the site, with the conditions of approval, is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan. SECTION 4. ARCHITECTURE REVIEW BOARD FINDINGS. The design and architecture of the proposed improvements, as conditioned, complies with the Findings for Architectural Review as required in Chapter 18.76 of the PAMC. Finding #1: The design is consistent with applicable provisions of the Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan, Zoning Code, coordinated area plans (including compatibility requirements), and any relevant design guides. The project is consistent with Finding #1 because: The proposed use of each building is consistent with the permitted uses for each respectively zoned area of the site. With the exception of the Design Enhancement Exception and Director’s shared parking adjustment requested in accordance with the municipal code allowances, the project is consistent with the applicable development standards for each zone district. There are no applicable coordinated area plans that have been adopted that would apply to the subject property. The project is consistent with applicable design guides, including the Context-Based Design Criteria as well as the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines and El Camino Real Design Guidelines. The map and proposed improvements are consistent with several Comprehensive Plan goals and policies outlined in the Housing Element, Land Use and Design Element, Transportation Element, and Natural Element as shown in Attachment C of the staff report. The project promotes medium density residential development within the El Camino Real corridor and areas in close proximity to transit (bus and Caltrain). The design of the development is consistent and compatible with applicable elements of the City’s Comprehensive Plan in that the project will include high quality design compatible with surrounding development. More specifically, the Cal-Ventura area in which this development is located is specifically identified in the Comprehensive Plan as being an ideal location for mixed-use and multi- family residential development. The project has been designed to be compatible with adjacent single-family residential uses by concentrating the bulk and mass of the building toward El Camino Real, consistent with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines and zoning code build-to-line requirements, and set back substantially from the rear neighbors. Easy pedestrian and bicyclist access is provided to both residential and retail uses along El Camino Real to encourage alternate transit in a transit-oriented area. These areas include pedestrian amenities that create public spaces to sit and rest at each corner of the development and vehicle access to the site is oriented away from El Camino Real in accordance with City goals. The project has been designed to highlight natural materials (i.e. wood) and the colors are subdued in accordance with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines. Therefore, the project is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan, Zoning code, and applicable design guides. Finding #2: The project has a unified and coherent design, that: a. creates an internal sense of order and desirable environment for occupants, visitors, and the general community, b. preserves, respects and integrates existing natural features that contribute positively to the site and the historic character including historic resources of the area when relevant, c. is consistent with the context-based design criteria of the applicable zone district, d. provides harmonious transitions in scale, mass and character to adjacent land uses and land use designations, e. enhances living conditions on the site (if it includes residential uses) and in adjacent residential areas. The project is consistent with Finding #2 because: The project proposes merging three parcels into a single parcel and redeveloping the resulting parcel with a mixed-use retail/residential building as well as a multi-family residence. The frontage along El Camino Real incorporates pedestrian amenities including benches built into planters and open gathering areas at entrances to the retail and residential use that are desirable for occupants and visitors. The project materials incorporate inspiration from the large redwood trees on neighboring properties by highlighting wood as a material throughout the buildings. It preserves all mature trees along the main El Camino Real frontage, which helps reduce massing of the proposed project. The proposed project is also consistent with the context-based design criteria, performance criteria, South El Camino Real Design Guidelines, and El Camino Real Design Guidelines, which are all applicable to the proposed project, as outlined in the body of the staff report and Attachments H and I of the staff report. The project has substantial setbacks between the main building and the single-family residential uses and the design takes into account the unique three-way split zoning of the site by providing appropriate uses and applying applicable development requirements within each respectively zoned area of the project site. The project enhances living conditions on the site by providing appropriate and usable open space areas for both developments and connects the two buildings to provide shared open space areas across the site. Finding #3: The design is of high aesthetic quality, using high quality, integrated materials and appropriate construction techniques, and incorporating textures, colors, and other details that are compatible with and enhance the surrounding area. The project is consistent with Finding #3 because: The design is of high aesthetic quality, providing pedestrian amenities and gathering areas across the site. It integrates natural materials inspired by adjacent natural features (i.e. mature redwood trees). The materials are of a high quality and the colors are subdued in accordance with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines. The design is set back substantially to provide space between the proposed buildings and nearby single-family residential uses and both buildings are designed appropriately based on their use and surrounding context, specifically nearby single-family residential uses and El Camino Real. Individual entries and detailed materials reinforce the pedestrian scale. The design is compatible with the immediate environment of the site. Finding #4: The design is functional, allowing for ease and safety of pedestrian and bicycle traffic and providing for elements that support the building’s necessary operations (e.g. convenient vehicle access to property and utilities, appropriate arrangement and amount of open space and integrated signage, if applicable, etc.). The project is consistent with Finding #4 because: The proposed project eliminates at grade parking and curb cuts along El Camino Real and provides parking below-grade or at grade but not visible from El Camino Real, which is consistent with City goals. Vehicular access to the property and circulation are respectful of these goals and also reduces traffic adjacent single-family residences. Pedestrian oriented features have been incorporated into the frontage of both buildings and access to both retail and residential uses has been provided from El Camino Real. Access for pedestrians and cyclists is convenient and safe. The project would not impact the existing bike path along El Camino Real but would provide, in accordance with Mitigation Measure (MM) T-1, improved pedestrian access from the new residential and retail uses to other retail, commercial recreation, and office uses across El Camino Real along this block. The project is designed to provide shared open space to residents across the site but provides sufficient open space to meet all code requirements for each respectively zoned area of the site. Specific signage is not proposed as part of the project; however, the proposed concept for signage shows that it would be pedestrian oriented. Finding #5: The landscape design complements and enhances the building design and its surroundings, is appropriate to the site’s functions, and utilizes to the extent practical, regional indigenous drought resistant plant material capable of providing desirable habitat that can be appropriately maintained. The project is consistent with Finding #5 because: Natural features are appropriately preserved and integrated with the project in that the existing street trees along El Camino Real and Olive Avenue consists of mature trees. This site asset will be preserved in the new design. Additional landscaping will be provided throughout the site and particularly along shared property lines with adjacent single-family residential uses to provide appropriate screening. The building materials, textures and colors are complimentary to the environmental setting and the landscape design utilizes drought tolerant and native plants that are appropriate to the site. Exterior pathways connect one building to another and provide outdoor areas throughout the site that are functional and serve as gathering places for residents and retail users. These outdoor areas are compatible with the buildings and natural features of the site. The plant species proposed are primarily indigenous (approximately seventy percent indigenous), as shown on Sheet L4.11. Those species that are not indigenous to the area, such as specific succulents or the vines over the arbor in the parking lot, were selected to provide more evergreen foliage with color and texture accents while still maintaining low water use. The native species selected as well as the few non-native species selected are suitable and adaptable to the site, capable of being properly maintained, and are of a variety that would tend to be drought-resistant and to reduce consumption of water in its installation and maintenance. The extensive number of proposed trees would provide desirable habitat for avian species. Finding #6: The project incorporates design principles that achieve sustainability in areas related to energy efficiency, water conservation, building materials, landscaping, and site planning. The project is consistent with Finding #6 because: In accordance with the City’s Green Building Regulations, the building will satisfy the requirements for CALGreen Mandatory + Tier 2. The project will use low water-use, drought resistant plants and will comply with C3 and MWELO requirements. SECTION 5. PRELIMINARY PARCEL MAP FINDINGS. A legislative body of a city shall deny approval of a Parcel Map, if it makes any of the following findings (California Government Code Section 66474): 1. That the proposed map is not consistent with applicable general and specific plans as specified in Section 65451: The site does not lie within a specific plan area and is consistent with the provisions of the Comprehensive Plan, as discussed further below. 2. That the design or improvement of the proposed subdivision is not consistent with applicable general and specific plans: The map and proposed improvements are consistent with the Comprehensive Plan and no specific plans are applicable to the project site. Merging the three parcels allows for use of the site for a development that increases the City’s housing inventory on a site that was identified as a Housing Inventory Site. The project promotes medium density residential development within the El Camino Real corridor and areas within the 0.5 miles of the Caltrain station. The design of the development is consistent and compatible with applicable elements of the City’s Comprehensive Plan in that the project will include high quality design compatible with surrounding development. More specifically, the Cal-Ventura area in which this development is located is specifically identified in the comprehensive plan as being an ideal location for mixed-use and multi-family residential development. The project has been designed to be compatible with adjacent single-family residential uses by concentrating the bulk and mass of the building toward El Camino Real, consistent with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines and build-to-line requirements, and set back substantially from the rear neighbors. Easy pedestrian and bicyclist access is provided to both residential and retail uses along El Camino Real to encourage alternate transit in a transit-oriented area. These areas include pedestrian amenities that create public spaces to sit and rest at each corner of the development and. Vehicle access to the site is oriented away from El Camino Real in accordance with City and Caltrans goals. The project has been designed to highlight natural materials (i.e. wood) and the colors are subdued in accordance with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines. Therefore, the project is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan. Specific policies and goals with which the project would be consistent are included in Attachment C of the staff report. 3. That the site is not physically suitable for the type of development: The siting of the new mixed use and multi-family residential buildings is consistent with uses encouraged in the Comprehensive Plan for this area and are permitted uses within their respectively zoned portion of the site. The subject property is located within the Cal-Ventura area. As stated in the Comprehensive Plan, the California Avenue/Ventura Area (Cal-Ventura) has an established pattern of mixed use, with service commercial, light industrial and housing. Continued mixing of land uses is encouraged. The Comprehensive Plan also states that the proximity of this area to transit and services makes it an excellent location for both housing and commercial uses. In addition, the project site is a housing inventory site as identified in the City’s adopted Housing Element. The lot merger would allow for the development to not only meet but exceed the housing inventory allocation for this site, contributing positively to a reduction in the jobs/housing imbalance in the City. 4. That the site is not physically suitable for the proposed density of development: The proposed density is consistent with densities outlined for multi-family uses in the Comprehensive Plan. Specifically, The Comprehensive Plan Land Use and Design Element notes that the permitted number of housing units for Multi-Family Residential land use will vary by area, depending on existing land use, proximity to major streets and public transit, distance to shopping and environmental problems. Net densities range from 8 to 40 units. Density should be on the lower end of the scale next to single family residential areas. The proposed project, at a density equivalent to 28 units per acre, is consistent with the density allowances for this land use designation. 5. That the design of the subdivision or the proposed improvements are likely to cause substantial environmental damage or substantially and avoidably injure fish or wildlife or their habitat: This merger will not cause environmental damage or injure fish, wildlife, or their habitat. The project site is located within a developed area. The nearest water feature is Matadero Creek, located over 750 feet west of the project site. There is no recognized sensitive wildlife or habitat on the project site or in the immediate project vicinity. 6. That the design of the subdivision or type of improvements is likely to cause serious public health problems: The merging of three parcels to create one combined parcel for a mixed-use and multi-family development will not cause serious public health problems, because the site is designated for such permitted uses. The site is located within the California-Olive-Emerson (COE) plume; however, implementation of the Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan as well as the conditions of approval outlined in Section 7 would ensure that, potential impacts associated with earth disturbing activities in the plume would not result in health impacts to existing or future residents within the area. 7. That the design of the subdivision or the type of improvements will conflict with easements, acquired by the public at large, for access through or use of, property within the proposed subdivision. In this connection, the governing body may approve a map if it finds that alternate easements, for access or for use, will be provided, and that these will be substantially equivalent to ones previously acquired by the public. This subsection shall apply only to easements of record or to easements established by judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction and no authority is hereby granted to a legislative body to determine that the public at large has acquired easements for access through or use of property within the proposed subdivision. There is a City of Palo public utility easement along the property line between the CS portion of the site and the adjacent single family residence. The ramp would be partially located within this easement. This easement currently provides power to the existing retail at the project site. However, as a condition of approval of the preliminary parcel map this easement would be vacated. A new easement from Acacia Avenue to a preferred central location would provide power to the resulting parcel. Therefore, the proposed preliminary parcel map would not conflict with any easements acquired by the public at large for access through or use of property within the subdivision. SECTION 6. DESIGN ENHANCEMENT EXCEPTION FINDINGS. In order for Council to approve a design enhancement exception, the project must comply with the following Findings for a Design Enhancement Exception as required in Chapter 18.76.050 of the PAMC. The proposed design enhancement is requested to allow for the location of the garage ramp leading to the below grade parking garage to be located five feet from the property line where a ten foot setback and landscaping strip is required. The proposed exception enhances the design of the site circulation by reducing vehicle trips leaving toward Olive Avenue in order to reduce traffic adjacent single-family residential uses. Finding #1: There are exceptional or extraordinary circumstances or conditions applicable to the property or site improvements involved that do not apply generally to property in the same zone district; The proposed project site is extraordinary in that it has three-way split zoning and three-way split land use designation on the site, which results in the need to develop the site consistent with the zoning and land use requirements of each respective portion of the site (e.g. meeting development standards such as setbacks as well as ensuring that the use of each portion is consistent with permitted uses within that specific zone district as well as consistent with the land use designation) despite the fact that the preliminary parcel map results in a single parcel. Although two-way split zoning does occur in some areas of the City it is not very common and three-way split zoning is extremely rare. This, combined with the project’s location on El Camino Real, which makes it subject to the South El Camino Real design guidelines, as well as its proximity to nearby residential uses and therefore associated development standards for areas within 150 feet of these uses, creates restraints with respect to where the buildings and parking can be located. The South El Camino Real Design Guidelines as well as development standards require that buildings along El Camino Real be built up to the build-to-line and encourage parking to be located in areas that are not visible from the street frontage. In addition, height restrictions and attention to privacy limit where the buildings can be located with respect to the adjacent residences. The location of the ramp is designed to meet all applicable requirements and guidelines and is also located as to reduce overall trips leaving the site toward Olive Avenue where they could be more impactful to single-family residents in the area. Finding #2: The granting of the application will enhance the appearance of the site or structure, or improve the neighborhood character of the project and preserve an existing or proposed architectural style, in a manner which would not otherwise be accomplished through strict application of the minimum requirements of this title (Zoning) and the architectural review findings set forth in Section 18.76.020(d); and The location of the ramp five feet into the required ten foot setback/landscaping strip is critical to the proposed site circulation, which is designed to reduce impacts on adjacent single-family residential uses by reducing traffic on Olive Street. In addition, the circulation design eliminates curb cuts and parking on/visible from El Camino Real by providing it at the rear of the property and underground, which is consistent with the goals of the Comprehensive Plan, South El Camino Real Design Guidelines, and Caltrans. It enhances views from El Camino Real by eliminating parking visible along the corridor and enhances views from single-family residences by providing most parking underground. The ramp only encroaches on a portion of the setback and still allows room for landscaping to be provided along the length of the property line. Finding #3: The exception is related to a minor architectural feature or site improvement that will not be detrimental or injurious to property or improvements in the vicinity and will not be detrimental to the public health, safety, general welfare or convenience. The exception relates to an encroachment of the garage ramp five feet closer to the property line than would typically be allowed in accordance with PAMC Sections 18.16.060(B) and 18.23.050(B)(vi). The proposed exception would reduce vehicle trips leaving toward Olive Avenue, reducing traffic adjacent single-family residential uses. A 5- foot landscaping strip would still be provided. A sound wall would be provided along the entire project site adjacent single-family residential uses to ensure that operational noise would not be impactful to existing single-family residents. Therefore, the proposed exception would not be detrimental or injurious to property or improvements. SECTION 7. Site and Design Conditions of Approval. PLANNING DIVISION 1. CONFORMANCE WITH PLANS. Construction and development shall conform to the approved plans entitled, "3001 El Camino Real Site Development Permit-Resubmittal 2,” stamped as received by the City on September 25, 2017 on file with the Planning Department, 250 Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, California except as modified by these conditions of approval. 2. BUILDING PERMIT. Apply for a building permit and meet any and all conditions of the Planning, Fire, Public Works, and Building Departments. 3. BUILDING PERMIT PLAN SET. The approval letter including all Department conditions of approval for the project shall be printed on the plans submitted for building permit. 4. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: All modifications to the approved project shall be submitted for review and approval prior to construction. If during the Building Permit review and construction phase, the project is modified by the applicant, it is the responsibility of the applicant to contact the Planning Division/project planner directly to obtain approval of the project modification. It is the applicant’s responsibility to highlight any proposed changes to the project and to bring it to the project planner’s attention. 5. The Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program associated with the project and attached here as Exhibit A is incorporated by reference and all mitigation measures shall be implemented as described in such document. 6. Toxic Air Contaminants Emissions Reductions. To comply with Comprehensive Plan Policy N-29 the applicant shall implement the following measures to reduce exposure of proposed residences to toxic air contaminants emissions from vehicles on El Camino Real: a. Submit to the City of Palo Alto a ventilation proposal prepared by a licensed design professional for all on-site buildings that describes the ventilation design and how that design ensures all dwelling units would be below the excess cancer risk level of 10 in one million established by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. b. If the proposed buildings would use operable windows or other sources of infiltration of ambient air, the development shall install a central HVAC system that includes high efficiency particulate filters (a MERV rating of 13 or higher). These types of filters are capable of removing approximately 90 percent of the DPM emissions from air introduced into the HVAC system. The system may also include a carbon filter to remove other chemical matter. Filtration systems must operate to maintain positive pressure within the building interior to prevent entrainment of outdoor air indoors. c. If the development limits infiltration through non-operable windows, a suitable ventilation system shall include a ventilation system with filtration specifications equivalent to or better than the following: (1) American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers MERV-13 supply air filters, (2) greater than or equal to one air exchanges per hour of fresh outside filtered air, (3) greater than or equal to four air exchanges per hour recirculation, and (4) less than or equal to 0.25 air exchanges per hour in unfiltered infiltration. These types of filtration methods are capable of removing approximately 90 percent of the DPM emissions from air introduced into the HVAC system. d. Windows and doors shall be fully weatherproofed with caulking and weather-stripping that is rated to last at least 20 years. Weatherproof should be maintained and replaced by the property owner, as necessary, to ensure functionality for the lifetime of the project e. Where appropriate, install passive (drop-in) electrostatic filtering systems, especially those with low air velocities (i.e., 1 mph) f. Ensure an ongoing maintenance plan for the HVAC and filtration systems. Manufacturers of these types of filters recommend that they be replaced after two to three months of use. g. The applicant shall inform occupants regarding the proper use of any installed air filtration system. 7. VAPOR MITIGATION SYSTEM: The below-grade parking garage will be designed to include a passive vapor mitigation system to protect future residents and retail users. 8. LOADING SPACE: The proposed on-street loading space shall be restricted to non-peak business hours for both the project site and adjacent commercial activities to ensure that economic and safety goals can still be achieved. Proposed loading hours shall be submitted and approved by the Transportation Division prior to occupancy. 9. TRANSIT DEMAND MANAGEMENT PLAN: In accordance with PAMC 18.52.03(i)(1), a Transportation Demand Management Plan to reduce and manage the number of single-occupant motor vehicle trips generated by the project shall be prepared and submitted the Planning Director and Transportation Division for review and approval prior to occupancy. 10. NOISE: In accordance with PAMC Section 9.10.040 no person shall produce, suffer or allow to be produced by any machine or device, or any combination of same, on commercial or industrial property, a noise level more than eight dB above the local ambient at any point outside of the property plane. 11. INDEMNITY: To the extent permitted by law, the Applicant shall indemnify and hold harmless the City, its City Council, its officers, employees and agents (the “indemnified parties”) from and against any claim, action, or proceeding brought by a third party against the indemnified parties and the applicant to attack, set aside or void, any permit or approval authorized hereby for the Project, including (without limitation) reimbursing the City for its actual attorneys’ fees and costs incurred in defense of the litigation. The City may, in its sole discretion, elect to defend any such action with attorneys of its own choice. 12. DEVELOPMENT IMPACT FEES. Development Impact Fees plus the applicable public art fee, per PAMC 16.61.040, shall be paid prior to the issuance of the related building permit. 13. FINAL INSPECTION: A Planning Division Final inspection will be required to determine substantial compliance with the approved plans prior to the scheduling of a Building Division final. Any revisions during the building process must be approved by Planning, including but not limited to; materials, landscaping and hard surface locations. Contact your Project Planner, Claire Hodgkins at claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org to schedule this inspection. PUBLIC WORKS ENGINEERING PRIOR TO AN EXCAVATION AND GRADING PERMIT SUBMITTAL 14. Subdivision Improvement Agreement is required to secure compliance with condition of approval and security of improvements onsite and offsite per PAMC Section 21.16.220. 15. OFF-SITE IMPROVEMENTS: Submit a copy of the off-site improvement plans that includes the replacement of curb, gutter, sidewalk, utilities, landscape, etc. Provide Caltrans standard details along the project frontage. Plans shall include the proposed public access easement, grades along the conforms. 16. Submit a construction cost estimate associated with the off-site improvements. 17. LOGISTICS PLAN: The contractor must submit a logistics plan to the Public Works Department prior to building permit demolition that addresses all impacts to the City’s right-of-way, including, but not limited to: pedestrian control, traffic control, truck routes, material deliveries, contractor’s parking, concrete pours, crane lifts, work hours, noise control, dust control, storm water pollution prevention, contractor’s contact, noticing of affected businesses, and schedule of work. Plan shall include the following, but not limited to, construction fence, construction entrance and exit, stockpile areas, equipment and material storage area, workers parking area, construction office trailer, temporary bathroom, measures for dewatering if needed, crane location, working hours, contractor’s contact information, truck traffic route, setbacks from environmentally sensitive areas, erosion and sediment control measures to be implemented during construction. 18. DEMOLITION PLAN: Place the following note adjacent to an affected tree on the Site Plan and Demolition Plan: “Excavation activities associated with the proposed scope of work shall occur no closer than 10-feet from the existing street tree, or as approved by the Urban Forestry Division contact 650-496-5953. Any changes shall be approved by the same”. Also plot and label the tree protection zone. 19. PUBLIC ACCESS EASEMENT: Owner shall create a public access easement for the additional area behind the property line needed to create a 12-foot wide sidewalk along El Camino Real. Plot and label the Public Access Easement along El Camino Real that provides the 12-foot wide sidewalk. 20. MAPPING: The proposed project appears to be located within 4 or 5 parcel. In addition it’s not clear from the plans how many parcels (at grade and air space parcels) the applicant intends to create as part of the new development. The parcels shall be merged and subdivided recorded prior to issuance of a building and/or grading and excavation permit. This project may trigger either a Minor or Major Subdivision Application. Five parcels would trigger a major subdivision. Please clarify the total number of proposed parcels associated with this project. If retail, commercial or residential units intend to be sold then new parcels would be required. Public Works’ Tentative Maps and Preliminary Parcel Maps checklist must accompany the completed application. All existing and proposed dedications and easements must be shown on the submitted map. The map would trigger further requirements from Public Works, see Palo Alto Municipal Code section 21.12 for Preliminary Parcel Map requirements and section 21.16 for Parcel Map requirements. If a Map is required, it shall be recorded prior to issuance of a building permit or excavation and grading permit. 21. STREET LIGHTING: The applicant is required to install decorative street lights along the El Camino Real sidewalk frontage. New pedestrian-scale luminaires, poles and bases shall be centered between the roadway lighting to provide a combined spacing of roughly 60-ft O.C. Decorative roadway and pedestrian scale lighting standards are available from Public Works staff. Plot and label the new lights on the proposed Site Plan and/or Utility Plan. 22. GRADING PERMIT: The grading and drainage plan must include an earthworks table with the estimated cut and fill volumes. If the total is more than 100 cubic yards, a grading permit will be required. An application and plans for a grading permit are submitted to Public Works separately from the building permit plan set. The application and guidelines are available at the Development Center and on our website. 23. Provide a Rough Grading Plan for the work proposed as part of the Grading and Excavation Permit application. The Rough Grading Plans shall including the following: pad elevation, basement elevation, elevator pit elevation, ground monitoring wells, shoring for the proposed basement, limits of over excavation, stockpile area of material, overall earthwork volumes (cut and fill), temporary shoring for any existing facilities, ramps for the basement access, crane locations (if any), etc. Plans submitted for the Grading and Excavation Permit, shall be stand-alone, and therefore the plans shall include any conditions from other divisions that pertain to items encountered during rough grading for example if contaminated groundwater is encountered and dewatering is expected, provide notes on the plans based Water Quality’s conditions of approval. Provide a note on the plans to direct the contractor to the approve City of Palo Alto Truck Route Map, which is available on the City’s website. 24. Provide the following note on the Rough Grading Plan and the Final Grading Plan: “In my professional judgement, the highest projected groundwater level to be encountered in the area of the proposed basement in the future will be ______ feet below existing grade.” 25. BASEMENT SHORING: Shoring for the basement excavation, including tiebacks, must not extend onto adjacent private property or into the City right-of-way without having first obtained written permission from the private property owners and/or an encroachment permit from Public Works or Caltrans. 26. BASEMENT DRAINAGE: Due to high groundwater throughout much of the City and Public Works prohibiting the pumping and discharging of groundwater, perforated pipe drainage systems at the exterior of the basement walls or under the slab are not allowed for this site. A drainage system is, however, required for all exterior basement-level spaces, such as lightwells, patios or stairwells. This system consists of a sump, a sump pump, a backflow preventer, and a closed pipe from the pump to a dissipation device onsite at least 10 feet from the property line, such as a bubbler box in a landscaped area, so that water can percolate into the soil and/or sheet flow across the site. The device must not allow stagnant water that could become mosquito habitat. Additionally, the plans must show that exterior basement-level spaces are at least 7-3/4” below any adjacent windowsills or doorsills to minimize the potential for flooding the basement. Public Works recommends a waterproofing consultant be retained to design and inspect the vapor barrier and waterproofing systems for the basement. 27. DEWATERING: Proposed underground garage excavation may require dewatering during construction. Public Works only allows groundwater drawdown well dewatering. Open pit groundwater dewatering is disallowed. Dewatering is only allowed from April 1 through October 31 due to inadequate capacity in our storm drain system. The geotechnical report for this site must list the highest anticipated groundwater level; if the proposed project will encounter groundwater, the applicant must provide all required dewatering submittals for Public Works review and approval prior to grading permit issuance. Public Works has dewatering submittal requirements and guidelines available at the Development Center and on our website: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/depts/pwd/forms_and_permits.asp 28. GRADING & DRAINAGE PLAN: Provide a separate Grading and Drainage Plan prepared by a qualified licensed engineer, surveyor or architect. Plan shall be wet-stamped and signed by the same. Plan shall include the following: existing and proposed spot elevations, earthwork volumes (cut and fill in CY), pad, finished floor, garage elevation, base flood elevation (if applicable) grades along the project conforms, property lines, or back of walk. See PAMC Section 16.28.110 for additional items. Projects that front directly into the public sidewalk, shall include grades at the doors or building entrances. Provide drainage flow arrows to demonstrate positive drainage away from building foundations at minimum of 2% or 5% for 10- feet per 2013 CBC Section 1804.3. Label the downspouts, splashblocks (2-feet long min) and any site drainage features such as swales, area drains, bubble-up locations. Include grate elevations, low points and grade breaks. Provide dimensions between the bubblers and property lines. In no case shall drainage across property lines exceed that which existed prior to grading per 2013 CBC Section J109.4. In particular, runoff from the new garage shall not drain into neighboring property. For additional grading and drainage detail design See Grading and Drainage Plan Guidelines for Residential Development. http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/2717 29. “NO DUMPING” LOGO: The applicant is required to paint the “No Dumping/Flows to Matadero Creek” logo in blue color on a white background, adjacent to all onsite storm drain inlets. Stencils of the logo are available from the Public Works Environmental Compliance Division, which may be contacted at (650) 329- 2598. A deposit may be required to secure the return of the stencil. Include the instruction to paint the logos on the construction grading and drainage plan. Similar medallions shall be installed near the catch basins that are proposed to be relocated. Provide notes on the plans to reference that medallions and stencils. 30. STAIRWELLS AND LIGHTWELLS: Due to high groundwater throughout much of the City and Public Works prohibiting the pumping and discharging of groundwater, perforated pipe drainage systems at the exterior of the basement walls or under the slab are not allowed for this site. A separate drainage system is, however, required for all exterior basement-level spaces, such as lightwells, patios or stairwells. This system consists of a sump, a sump pump, a backflow preventer, and a closed pipe from the pump to a dissipation device onsite at least 10 feet from the property line, such as a bubbler box in a landscaped area, so that water can percolate into the soil and/or sheet flow across the site. The device must not allow stagnant water that could become mosquito habitat. Additionally, the plans must show that exterior basement-level spaces are at least 7-3/4” below any adjacent windowsills or doorsills to minimize the potential for flooding the basement. Public Works recommends a waterproofing consultant be retained to design and inspect the vapor barrier and waterproofing systems for the basement. 31. STORM WATER TREATMENT: Provide a note on the plans to indicate that at the time of installation of the required storm water treatment measures and prior to the issuance of any occupancy permit, a third-party reviewer shall also submit to the City a certification for approval that the project’s permanent measures were constructed and installed in accordance to the approved permit drawings. 32. Applicant shall be aware that the project may trigger water line and meter upgrades or relocation, if upgrades or relocation are required, the building permit plan set shall plot and label utility changes. If a backflow preventer is required, it shall be located within private property and plotted on the plans. Similarly if a transformer upgrade or a grease interceptor is required it shall also be located within the private property. Plot and label these on the Utility plan. 33. WORK IN THE RIGHT-OF-WAY: The plans must clearly indicate any work that is proposed in the public right- of-way, such as sidewalk replacement, driveway approach, or utility laterals. The plans must include notes that the work must be done per City standards and/or Caltrans standards and that the contractor performing this work must first obtain a Street Work Permit from Public Works at the Development Center and from Caltrans. If a new driveway is in a different location than the existing driveway, then the sidewalk associated with the new driveway must be replaced with a thickened (6” thick instead of the standard 4” thick) section. Additionally, curb cuts and driveway approaches for abandoned driveways must be replaced with new curb, gutter and planter strip. 34. CALTRANS: Caltrans review and approval of this project is required. Caltrans right-of-way across El Camino Real extends from back-of-walk to back-of walk. The City has a maintenance agreement with Caltrans that requires the City to maintain the sidewalk and to issue Street Work Permits for work done on the sidewalks by private contractors. Caltrans has retained the right to review and permit new ingress/egress driveways off El Camino Real as well as the installation of Traffic Control devices as part of this project. Submit a permit from Caltrans to perform the proposed work. 35. The following note shall be shown on the plans adjacent to the area on the Site Plan: “Any construction within the city right-of-way must have an approved Permit for Construction in the Public Street prior to commencement of this work. THE PERFORMANCE OF THIS WORK IS NOT AUTHORIZED BY THE BUILDING PERMIT ISSUANCE BUT SHOWN ON THE BUILDING PERMIT FOR INFORMATION ONLY.” 36. Provide the following note on the Site Plan and Grading and Drainage Plan: “Contractor shall not stage, store, or stockpile any material or equipment within the public road right-of-way.” Construction phasing shall be coordinate to keep materials and equipment onsite or within private property. 37. SIDEWALK, CURB & GUTTER: As part of this project, the applicant must replace all existing sidewalk, curbs, gutters and driveway approaches in the public right-of-way along the frontage(s) of the property. The site plan submitted with the building permit plan set must show the extent of the replacement work (at a minimum all curb and gutter and sidewalk along the project frontage) The plan must note that any work in the right-of-way must be done per Public Works’ standards by a licensed contractor who must first obtain a Street Work Permit from Public Works at the Development Center. Include the 12-foot wide dimension on the plans and verify that the sidewalk is unobstructed. 38. PAVEMENT: Contractor shall be aware that Olive Avenue was resurfaced in 2015, any cutting into the pavement will trigger additional pavement requirements. Add the following note to the Site Plan: “Applicant and contractor may be responsible for resurfacing portions of the three project frontages based the roadway surface condition after project completion and limits of trench work. At a minimum pavement resurfacing of the full width of the street along the project frontage may be required.” Plot and label the area to be resurfaced as hatched on the site plan. 39. STREET TREES: The applicant may be required to replace existing and/or add new street trees in the public right-of-way along the property’s frontage(s). Call the Public Works’ arborist at 650-496-5953 to arrange a site visit so he can determine what street tree work, if any, will be required for this project. The site plan submitted with the building permit plan set must show the street tree work that the arborist has determined, including the tree species, size, location, staking and irrigation requirements, or include a note that Public Works’ arborist has determined no street tree work is required. The plan must note that in order to do street tree work, the applicant must first obtain a Permit for Street Tree Work in the Public Right-of-Way from Public Works’ arborist (650-496-5953). 40. OIL/WATER SEPARATOR: Parking garage floor drains within covered levels shall be connected to an oil/water separator prior to discharging to the sanitary sewer system. The oil/water separator shall be located within private property. Plot and label the proposed location of oil/water separator. 41. STORM WATER POLLUTION PREVENTION: The City's full-sized "Pollution Prevention - It's Part of the Plan" sheet must be included in the plan set. The sheet is available here: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/2732 42. IMPERVIOUS SURFACE AREA: The project will be creating or replacing 500 square feet or more of impervious surface. Accordingly, the applicant shall provide calculations of the existing and proposed impervious surface areas with the building permit application. The Impervious Area Worksheet for Land Developments form and instructions are available at the Development Center or on our website. 43. ADJACENT NEIGHBORS: For any improvements that extend beyond the property lines such as tie-backs for the basement, provide signed copies of the original agreements with the adjacent property owners. The agreements shall indicate that the adjacent property owners have reviewed and approved the proposed improvements (such as soldier beams, tiebacks) that extend into their respective properties 44. STORMWATER MAINTENANCE AGREEMENT: The applicant shall designate a party to maintain the control measures for the life of the improvements and must enter into a maintenance agreement with the City to guarantee the ongoing maintenance of the permanent C.3 storm water discharge compliance measures. The maintenance agreement shall be executed prior to issuance of the grading or building permits. The City will inspect the treatment measures yearly and charge an inspection fee. 45. SWPPP: The proposed development will disturb more than one acre of land. Accordingly, the applicant will be required to comply with the State of California’s General Permit for Storm Water Discharges Associated with Construction Activity. This entails filing a Notice of Intent to Comply (NOI), paying a filing fee, and preparing and implementing a site specific storm water pollution prevention plan (SWPPP) that addresses both construction-stage and post-construction BMP’s for storm water quality protection. The applicant is required to submit two copies of the NOI and the draft SWPPP to the Public Works Department for review and approval prior to issuance of the building permit. Also, include the City's standard "Pollution Prevention - It's Part of the Plan" sheet in the building permit plan set. Copies are available from Public Works at the Development Center. 46. Based on the City’s GIS there may be plume monitoring wells within the project site. Typically these wells are maintained by Santa Clara Valley Water District (SCVWD). The proposed work shall not destroy any of the monitoring well or affect the function and use of these. Contact SCVWD to verify the well location. Plot and label them on the plans and provide notes to protect wells as required by the district. 47. It’s unclear what the double dashed line surrounding the building represents on C2.0 as there is no Civil legend, but underground structures are not allowed to have perforated pipe drainage systems that pump groundwater. Please clarify what that represents and revise design accordingly. 48. Material of storm drain in ROW needs to be called out and propose materials per Engineering Design Guidelines. 49. Please include any applicable City standard details in the plan set and call them out on plans. PUBLIC WORKS URBAN FORESTRY DIVISION PRIOR TO DEMOLITION, BUILDING OR GRADING PERMIT ISSUANCE 50. BUILDING PERMIT SUBMITTAL- PROJECT ARBORIST CERTIFICATION LETTER. Prior to submittal for staff review, attach a Project Arborist Certification Letter that he/she has; (a) reviewed the entire building permit plan set submittal and, (b)* verified all his/her updated TPR mitigation measures and changes are incorporated in the plan set, (c) affirm that ongoing Contractor/Project Arborist site monitoring inspections and reporting have been arranged with the contractor or owner (see Sheet T-1) and, (d) understands that design revisions (site or plan changes) within a TPZ will be routed to Project Arborist/Contractor for review prior to approval from City. * (b above) other information. The Building Permit submittal set shall be accompanied by the project site arborist’s certification letter that the plans have incorporated said design changes and are consistent with City Tree Technical Manual Standards, Regulations and information: a. Provide a project arborist’s Updated Tree Protection Report (TPR) with building permit level mitigation measures, (e.g., resolve grading proximity issues with Public tree #2 and neighbor trees #3 and 5; exact TPZ scaled in feet). Provide plan revision directions to minimize root cutting conflicts that are obvious in the civil, basement, sidewalk improvement sheets. Specifically address new sidewalk replacement over El Camino Real trees. b. Palo Alto Tree Technical Manual Construction Standards, Section 2.00 and PAMC 8.10.080. 51. PLAN SET REQUIREMENTS. The final Plans submitted for building permit shall include the following information and notes on relevant plan sheets: a. SHEET T-1, BUILDING PERMIT. The building permit plan set will include the City’s full-sized, Sheet T-1 (Tree Protection-it's Part of the Plan!), available on the Development Center website at http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/31783. The Applicant shall complete and sign the Tree Disclosure Statement and recognize the Project Arborist Tree Activity Inspection Schedule. Monthly reporting to Urban Forestry/Contractor is mandatory. (Insp. #1: applies to all projects; with tree preservation report: Insp. #1-7 applies) b. The Tree Preservation Report (TPR). All sheets of the Applicant’s TPR approved by the City for full implementation by Contractor, (John McLenahan, dated June 2, 2016) shall be printed on numbered Sheet T-1 (T-2, T-3, etc) and added to the sheet index. c. Plans to show protective tree fencing. The Plan Set (esp. site, demolition, grading & drainage, foundation, irrigation, tree disposition, utility sheets, etc.) must delineate/show the correct configuration of Type I, Type II or Type III fencing around each Regulated Tree, using a bold dashed line enclosing the Tree Protection Zone (Standard Dwg. #605, Sheet T-1; City Tree Technical Manual, Section 6.35-Site Plans); or by using the Project Arborist’s unique diagram for each Tree Protection Zone enclosure. 52. SITE PLAN REQUIREMENTS: In addition to showing TPZ fencing, add the following Notes on the specified Plan Sheets. a. Note #1. Apply to the site plan stating, "All tree protection and inspection schedule measures, design recommendations, watering and construction scheduling shall be implemented in full by owner and contractor, as stated on Sheet T-1, in the Tree Protection Report and the approved plans”. b. Note #2. All civil plans, grading plans, irrigation plans, site plans and utility plans and relevant sheets shall add a note applying to the trees to be protected, including neighboring trees stating: "Regulated Tree--before working in this area contact the Project Site Arborist at 650-321-0202"; c. Note #3. Utility (sanitary sewer/gas/water/backflow/electric/storm drain) plan sheets shall include the following note: “Utility trenching shall not occur within the TPZ of the protected tree. Contractor shall be responsible for ensuring that no trenching occurs within the TPZ of the protected tree by contractors, City crews or final landscape workers. See sheet T-1 for instructions.” d. Note #4. “Pruning Restrictions. No pruning or clearance cutting of branches is permitted on City trees. Contractor shall obtain a Public Tree Permit from Urban Forestry (650-496-5953) for any work on Public Trees” 53. NEW TREES—SOIL VOLUME. Unless otherwise approved, new right-of-way trees each new tree shall be provided with 800 cubic feet of rootable soil area, utilizing Standard Dwg. #604/513. Rootable soil shall mean compaction less than 90% over the area, not including sidewalk base areas except when mitigated. Sidewalk or asphalt base underlayment [in lieu of compacted base rock] shall use an Alternative Base Material method such as structural grid (Silva Cell). Design and manufacturer details shall be added to relevant civil and landscape sheets. Each parking lot tree in small islands and all public trees shall be provided adequate rootable soil commensurate to mature tree size. Note: this expectation requires coordination with the engineer, arborist and landscape architect. a. Minimum soil volume for tree size growth performance (in cubic feet): Large: 1,200 cu.ft. Medium: 800 cu.ft. Small: 400 cu.ft. b. Landscape Plan. When qualifying for parking area shade ordinance compliance (PAMC 18.40.130) trees shall be labeled (as S, M or L). c. Engineered Soil Mix (ESM). When approved, Engineered Soil Mix base material shall be utilized in specified areas, such as a sidewalk base or channeling to a landscape area, to achieve expected shade tree rooting potential and maximum service life of the sidewalk, curb, parking surfaces and compacted areas. Plans and Civil Drawings shall use CPA Public Works Engineering ESM Specifications, Section 30 and Standard Dwg. #603a. Designated areas will be identified by cross-hatch or other symbol, and specify a minimum of 24" depth. The technology may be counted toward any credits awarded for LEED or Sustainable Sites certification ratings. DURING CONSTRUCTION 54. TREE PROTECTION VERIFICATION. Prior to any site work a written verification from the contractor that the required protective fencing is in place shall be submitted to the Urban Forestry Section (derek.sproat@cityofpaloalto.org). The fencing shall contain required warning sign and remain in place until final inspection of the project. 55. EXCAVATION RESTRICTIONS APPLY (TTM, Sec. 2.20 C & D). Any approved grading, digging or trenching beneath a tree canopy shall be performed using ‘air-spade’ method as a preference, with manual hand shovel as a backup. For utility trenching, including sewer line, roots exposed with diameter of 1.5 inches and greater shall remain intact and not be damaged. If directional boring method is used to tunnel beneath roots, then Table 2-1, Trenching and Tunneling Distance, shall be printed on the final plans to be implemented by Contractor. 56. PLAN CHANGES. Revisions and/or changes to plans before or during construction shall be reviewed and responded to by the (a) project site arborist, (John McLenahan of McLenahan Consulting, LCC, 650-326- 8781), or (b) landscape architect with written letter of acceptance before submitting the revision to the Building Department for review by Planning, PW or Urban Forestry. 57. TREE PROTECTION COMPLIANCE. The owner and contractor shall implement all protection and inspection schedule measures, design recommendations and construction scheduling as stated in the TPR & Sheet T-1, and is subject to code compliance action pursuant to PAMC 8.10.080. The required protective fencing shall remain in place until final landscaping and inspection of the project. Project arborist approval must be obtained and documented in the monthly activity report sent to the City. The mandatory Contractor and Arborist Monthly Tree Activity Report shall be sent monthly to the City (pwps@cityofpaloalto.org) beginning with the initial verification approval, using the template in the Tree Technical Manual, Addendum 11. 58. TREE DAMAGE. Tree Damage, Injury Mitigation and Inspections apply to Contractor. Reporting, injury mitigation measures and arborist inspection schedule (1-5) apply pursuant to TTM, Section 2.20-2.30. Contractor shall be responsible for the repair or replacement of any publicly owned or protected trees that are damaged during the course of construction, pursuant to Title 8 of the Palo Alto Municipal Code, and city Tree Technical Manual, Section 2.25. 59. GENERAL. The following general tree preservation measures apply to all trees to be retained: No storage of material, topsoil, vehicles or equipment shall be permitted within the tree enclosure area. The ground under and around the tree canopy area shall not be altered. Trees to be retained shall be irrigated, aerated and maintained as necessary to ensure survival. PRIOR TO OCCUPANCY 60. LANDSCAPE CERTIFICATION LETTER. The Planning Department shall be in receipt of a verification letter that the Landscape Architect has inspected all trees, shrubs, planting and irrigation and that they are installed and functioning as specified in the approved plans. 61. PROJECT ARBORIST CERTIFICATION LETTER. Prior to written request for temporary or final occupancy, the contractor shall provide to the Planning Department and property owner a final inspection letter by the Project Arborist. The inspection shall evaluate the success or needs of Regulated tree protection, including new landscape trees, as indicated on the approved plans. The written acceptance of successful tree preservation shall include a photograph record and/or recommendations for the health, welfare, mitigation remedies for injuries (if any). The final report may be used to navigate any outstanding issues, concerns or security guarantee return process, when applicable. POST CONSTRUCTION 62. MAINTENANCE. All landscape and trees shall be maintained, watered, fertilized, and pruned according to Best Management Practices-Pruning (ANSI A300-2008 or current version) and the City Tree Technical Manual, Section 5.00. Any vegetation that dies shall be replaced or failed automatic irrigation repaired by the current property owner within 30 days of discovery. Building Division 63. Spiral stairs can be utilized to access residential areas no more than 250 square feet in size. 64. Separate reviews and permits are required for PV (solar) and EVSE (vehicle charging stations. Please show this on the plans in some way. 65. Common areas outdoors shall be made accessible for all elements. 66. The review and approval of this project does not include any other items of construction other than those written in the ARB project review application included with the project plans and documents under this review. If the plans include items or elements of construction that are not included in the written description, it or they may not have been known to have been a part of the intended review and have not, unless otherwise specifically called out in the approval, been reviewed. Watershed Protection Division The following conditions are required to be addressed prior to any future related permit application such as a Building Permit, Excavation and Grading Permit, Certificate of Compliance, Street Work Permit, Encroachment Permit, etc.: 67. DISCHARGE OF GROUNDWATER: The project is located in an area of suspected or known groundwater contamination with Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs). If groundwater is encountered then the plans must include the following procedure for construction dewatering (PAMC 16.09.170, 16.09.040): Prior to discharge of any water from construction dewatering, the water shall be tested for volatile organic compounds (VOCs) using EPA Method 601/602 or Method 624. The analytical results of the VOC testing shall be transmitted to the Regional Water Quality Control Plant (RWQCP) 650-329-2598. Contaminated ground water that exceeds state or federal requirements for discharge to navigable waters may not be discharged to the storm drain system or creeks. If the concentrations of pollutants exceed the applicable limits for discharge to the storm drain system then an Exceptional Discharge Permit must be obtained from the RWQCP prior to discharge to the sanitary sewer system. If the VOC concentrations exceed the toxic organics discharge limits contained in the Palo Alto Municipal Code (16.09.040(m)) a treatment system for removal of VOCs will also be required prior to discharge to the sanitary sewer. Additionally, any water discharged to the sanitary sewer system or storm drain system must be free of sediment. 68. UNPOLLUTED WATER: Unpolluted water shall not be discharged through direct or indirect connection to the sanitary sewer system (PAMC 16.09.055). And PAMC 16.09.175 (b) General prohibitions and practices Exterior (outdoor) drains may be connected to the sanitary sewer system only if the area in which the drain is located is covered or protected from rainwater run-on by berms and/or grading, and appropriate wastewater treatment approved by the Superintendent is provided. For additional information regarding loading docks, see section 16.09.175(k) 69. COVERED PARKING: Drain plumbing for parking garage floor drains must be connected to an oil/water separator with a minimum capacity of 100 gallons, and to the sanitary sewer system (PAMC 16.09.180[b][9]) 70. CARWASH: In accordance with PAMC 16.09.180(b)(11) New Multi-family residential units and residential development projects with 25 or more units shall provide a covered area for occupants to wash their vehicles. A drain shall be installed to capture all vehicle wash waters and shall be connected to an oil/water separator prior to discharge to the sanitary sewer system. The oil/water separator shall be cleaned at a frequency of at least once every six months or more frequently if recommended by the manufacturer or the Superintendent. Oil/water separators shall have a minimum capacity of 100 gallons. The area shall be graded or bermed in such a manner as to prevent the discharge of storm water to the sanitary sewer system. This requirement can be exempted if no washing is allowed on-site via rental/lease agreement and any hose bibs must be fitted with lock-outs or other connections controls and signage indicating that car washing is not allowed. 71. ARCHITECTURAL COPPER: Per PAMC 16.09.180(b)(14) on and after January 1, 2003, copper metal roofing, copper metal gutters, copper metal down spouts, and copper granule containing asphalt shingles shall not be permitted for use on any residential, commercial or industrial building for which a building permit is required. Copper flashing for use under tiles or slates and small copper ornaments are exempt from this prohibition. Replacement roofing, gutters and downspouts on historic structures are exempt, provided that the roofing material used shall be prepatinated at the factory. For the purposes of this exemption, the definition of "historic" shall be limited to structures designated as Category 1 or Category 2 buildings in the current edition of the Palo Alto Historical and Architectural Resources Report and Inventory. 72. LOADING DOCKS: Per PAMC 16.09.175(k) (2) (i) Loading dock drains to the storm drain system may be allowed if equipped with a fail-safe valve or equivalent device that is kept closed during the non-rainy season and during periods of loading dock operation. (ii) Where chemicals, hazardous materials, grease, oil, or waste products are handled or used within the loading dock area, a drain to the storm drain system shall not be allowed. A drain to the sanitary sewer system may be allowed if equipped with a fail-safe valve or equivalent device that is kept closed during the non-rainy season and during periods of loading dock operation. The area in which the drain is located shall be covered or protected from rainwater run-on by berms and/or grading. Appropriate wastewater treatment approved by the Superintendent shall be provided for all rainwater contacting the loading dock site. 73. CONDENSATE FROM HVAC: Per PAMC 16.09.180(b)(5) Condensate lines shall not be connected or allowed to drain to the storm drain system. 74. COOLING TOWERS: Per PAMC 16.09.205 No person shall discharge or add to the sanitary sewer system or storm drain system, or add to a cooling system, pool, spa, fountain, boiler or heat exchanger, any substance that contains any of the following: (1) Copper in excess of 2.0 mg/liter; (2) Any tri-butyl tin compound in excess of 0.10 mg/liter; (3) Chromium in excess of 2.0 mg/liter. (4) Zinc in excess of 2.0 mg/liter; or (5) Molybdenum in excess of 2.0 mg/liter. The above limits shall apply to any of the above-listed substances prior to dilution with the cooling system, pool, spa or fountain water. A flow meter shall be installed to measure the volume of blowdown water from the new cooling tower. Cooling systems discharging greater than 2,000 gallons per day are required to meet a copper discharge limit of 0.25 milligrams per liter. 75. COPPER PIPING: Per PAMC 16.09.180(b)(b) Copper, copper alloys, lead and lead alloys, including brass, shall not be used in sewer lines, connectors, or seals coming in contact with sewage except for domestic waste sink traps and short lengths of associated connecting pipes where alternate materials are not practical. The plans must specify that copper piping will not be used for wastewater plumbing. 76. MERCURY SWITCHES: Per 16.09.180(12) Mercury switches shall not be installed in sewer or storm drain sumps. 77. COOLING SYSTEMS, POOLS, SPAS, FOUNTAINS, BOILERS and HEAT EXCHANGERS: Per PAMC 16.09.205(a) It shall be unlawful to discharge water from cooling systems, pools, spas, fountains boilers and heat exchangers to the storm drain system. 78. Storm Drain Labeling: Per PAMC 16.09.165(h) Storm Drain Labeling Storm drain inlets shall be clearly marked with the words "No dumping - Flows to Bay," or equivalent UTILITILES - WATER, GAS, WASTEWATER PRIOR TO ISSUANCE OF DEMOLITION PERMIT 79. Prior to demolition, the applicant shall submit the existing water/wastewater fixture unit loads (and building as-built plans to verify the existing loads) to determine the capacity fee credit for the existing load. If the applicant does not submit loads and plans they may not receive credit for the existing water/wastewater fixtures. 80. The applicant shall submit a request to disconnect all utility services and/or meters including a signed affidavit of vacancy. Utilities will be disconnected or removed within 10 working days after receipt of request. The demolition permit will be issued by the building inspection division after all utility services and/or meters have been disconnected and removed. PRIOR TO BUILDING PERMIT 81. The applicant shall submit improvement plans for utility construction. The plans must show the size and location of all underground utilities within the development and the public right of way including meters, backflow preventers, fire service requirements, sewer mains, sewer cleanouts, sewer lift stations and any other required utilities. Plans for new wastewater laterals and mains need to include new wastewater pipe profiles showing existing potentially conflicting utilities especially storm drain pipes, electric and communication duct banks. Existing duct banks need to be daylighted by potholing to the bottom of the ductbank to verify cross section prior to plan approval and starting lateral installation. Plans for new storm drain mains and laterals need to include profiles showing existing potential conflicts with sewer, water and gas. 82. The applicant shall submit a completed water-gas-wastewater service connection application - load sheet per parcel/lot for City of Palo Alto Utilities. The applicant must provide all the information requested for utility service demands (water in fixture units/g.p.m., gas in b.t.u.p.h, and sewer in fixture units/g.p.d.). The applicant shall provide the existing (prior) loads, the new loads, and the combined/total loads (the new loads plus any existing loads to remain). 83. The applicant must show on the site plan the existence of any auxiliary water supply, (i.e. water well, gray water, recycled water, rain catchment, water storage tank, etc). 84. The utility plan (C3.0) show 1.5” irrigation, 4” domestic, and 8” fire water on Olive Ave. The water main on this street is only 6”PVC. The maximum water service connection to this water main is 6”. The propose sewer lateral is 8” (existing 4” lateral), sewer flow studies may require. The plan also show propose 8” sewer lateral on Acacia Ave. (existing 6” sewer main). See current WGW engineering standards in CPAU website. A meeting with WGW and Electrical engineering is recommending prior to building department permit application. 85. The applicant shall be responsible for installing and upgrading the existing utility mains and/or services as necessary to handle anticipated peak loads. This responsibility includes all costs associated with the design and construction for the installation/upgrade of the utility mains and/or services. 86. For contractor installed water and wastewater mains or services, the applicant shall submit to the WGW engineering section of the Utilities Department four copies of the installation of water and wastewater utilities off-site improvement plans in accordance with the utilities department design criteria. All utility work within the public right-of-way shall be clearly shown on the plans that are prepared, signed and stamped by a registered civil engineer. The contractor shall also submit a complete schedule of work, method of construction and the manufacture's literature on the materials to be used for approval by the utilities engineering section. The applicant's contractor will not be allowed to begin work until the improvement plan and other submittals have been approved by the water, gas and wastewater engineering section. After the work is complete but prior to sign off, the applicant shall provide record drawings (as-builts) of the contractor installed water and wastewater mains and services per City of Palo Alto Utilities record drawing procedures. For contractor installed services the contractor shall install 3M marker balls at each water or wastewater service tap to the main and at the City clean out for wastewater laterals. 87. An approved reduced pressure principle assembly (RPPA backflow preventer device) is required for all existing and new water connections from Palo Alto Utilities to comply with requirements of California administrative code, title 17, sections 7583 through 7605 inclusive. The RPPA shall be installed on the owner's property and directly behind the water meter within 5 feet of the property line. RPPA’s for domestic service shall be lead free. Show the location of the RPPA on the plans. 88. An approved reduced pressure detector assembly is required for the existing or new water connection for the fire system to comply with requirements of California administrative code, title 17, sections 7583 through 7605 inclusive (a double detector assembly may be allowed for existing fire sprinkler systems upon the CPAU’s approval). Reduced pressure detector assemblies shall be installed on the owner's property adjacent to the property line, within 5’ of the property line. Show the location of the reduced pressure detector assembly on the plans. 89. All backflow preventer devices shall be approved by the WGW engineering division. Inspection by the utilities or building inspector is required for the supply pipe between the meter and the assembly. 90. Existing wastewater laterals that are not plastic (ABS, PVC, or PE) shall be replaced at the applicant’s expense. 91. The applicant shall pay the capacity fees and connection fees associated with new utility service/s or added demand on existing services. The approved relocation of services, meters, hydrants, or other facilities will be performed at the cost of the person/entity requesting the relocation. 92. Each unit or place of business shall have its own water and gas meter shown on the plans. Each parcel shall have its own water service, gas service and sewer lateral connection shown on the plans. 93. A new water service line installation for domestic usage is required. For service connections of 4-inch through 8-inch sizes, the applicant's contractor must provide and install a concrete vault with meter reading lid covers for water meter and other required control equipment in accordance with the utilities standard detail. Show the location of the new water service and meter on the plans. 94. A new water service line installation for fire system usage may require. Show the location of the new water service on the plans. The applicant shall provide to the engineering department a copy of the plans for fire system including all fire department's requirements. 95. A new gas service line installation is required. Show the new gas meter location on the plans. The gas meter location must conform to utilities standard details. 96. A new sewer lateral installation per lot is required. Show the location of the new sewer lateral on the plans 97. The applicant shall secure a public utilities easement for facilities installed in private property. The applicant's engineer shall obtain, prepare, record with the county of Santa Clara, and provide the utilities engineering section with copies of the public utilities easement across the adjacent parcels as is necessary to serve the development. 98. Where public mains are installed in private streets/PUEs for condominium and town home projects the CC&Rs and final map shall include the statement: “Public Utility Easements: If the City’s reasonable use of the Public Utility Easements, which are shown as P.U.E on the Map, results in any damage to the Common Area, then it shall be the responsibility of the Association, and not of the City, to Restore the affected portion(s) of the Common Area. This Section may not be amended without the prior written consent of the City”. 99. All existing water and wastewater services that will not be reused shall be abandoned at the main per WGW utilities procedures. 100. Utility vaults, transformers, utility cabinets, concrete bases, or other structures cannot be placed over existing water, gas or wastewater mains/services. Maintain 1’ horizontal clear separation from the vault/cabinet/concrete base to existing utilities as found in the field. If there is a conflict with existing utilities, Cabinets/vaults/bases shall be relocated from the plan location as needed to meet field conditions. Trees may not be planted within 10 feet of existing water, gas or wastewater mains/services or meters. New water, gas or wastewater services/meters may not be installed within 10’ or existing trees. Maintain 10’ between new trees and new water, gas and wastewater services/mains/meters. 101. To install new gas service by directional boring, the applicant is required to have a sewer cleanout at the front of the building. This cleanout is required so the sewer lateral can be videoed for verification of no damage after the gas service is installed by directional boring. 102. All utility installations shall be in accordance with the City of Palo Alto current utility standards for water, gas & wastewater. 103. The applicant shall obtain an encroachment permit from Caltrans for all utility work in the El Camino Real right-of-way. The applicant must provide a copy of the permit to the WGW engineering section. 104. Due to high demands outside City’s control, a three to six month wait time for water and gas meters are expected. The applicant is strongly encouraged to provide the application load sheet demands as early in the design process as possible to the WGW utilities engineering department. Once payment is made, anticipate service installations completed within said time frame (3 – 6 months). GREEN BUILDING 105. CALGreen Checklist: If the project is a new construction residential building, then the project must meet the California Green Building Code Mandatory requirements outlined in Chapter 4, (with local amendments) plus Tier 2 minimum pre-requisites and electives outlined in Appendix A4* (with local amendments). The project must hire a Green Building Special Inspector for a pre-permit third-party design review and a third-party green building inspection process. The project must provide a preliminary GB-1 sheet for planning entitlement approval. Submittal requirements are outlined on the Development Services Green Building Compliance webpage. http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/depts/ds/green_building/compliance.asp PAMC 16.14.080 (Ord. 5393 § 1 (part), 2016) *Note: Projects subject to Tier 2 shall not be required to fulfill any requirements outlined in Appendix A4.2 Energy Efficiency. All energy efficiency measures are found in the 2016 California Energy Code and the Palo Alto Energy Reach Code PAMC 16.17 & 16.18. EVSE Transformer Location: 106. EVSE Transformer Location: If the project triggers the EVSE requirements in Part B of these comments, then applicant must identify transformer requirements associated with EVSE mentioned and show the appropriate transformer location and size on the Planning Application. The applicant must contact the Electric Engineering Department within Utilities to confirm the any transformer requirements associated with the proposed EVSE. For questions, contact the Electric Engineering mainline at 650-566-4500. Local Energy Reach Code for Residential Projects 107. Energy Efficiency Option 1: No Photovoltaic System. If the project includes new construction, then the project triggers the Local Energy Efficiency Reach Code. For all new single-family residential and multi-family residential, non-residential construction, the performance approach specified within the 2016 California Energy Code shall be used to demonstrate that the TDV Energy of the proposed new-single family residential or multi- family construction is at least: 10 percent less than the TDV Energy of the Standard Design if the proposed building does not include a photovoltaic system. (Ord. 5383 § 1 (part), 2016) Green Building Requirements for Residential Projects 108. CALGreen Checklist: If the project is a new construction residential building, then the project must meet the California Green Building Code Mandatory requirements outlined in Chapter 4, (with local amendments) plus Tier 2 minimum pre-requisites and electives outlined in Appendix A4* (with local amendments). The project must hire a Green Building Special Inspector for a pre-permit third-party design review and a third-party green building inspection process. The project must select from the City’s list of approved inspectors found on the Green Building Compliance Webpage. PAMC 16.14.080 (Ord. 5393 § 1 (part), 2016) *Note: Projects subject to Tier 1 or Tier 2 shall not be required to fulfill any requirements outlined in Appendix A4.2 Energy Efficiency. All energy efficiency measures are found in the 2016 California Energy Code and the Palo Alto Energy Reach Code PAMC 16.17 & 16.18. *Note: Projects subject to Tier 1 or Tier 2 shall not be required to fulfill any requirements outlined in Appendix A4.2 Energy Efficiency. All energy efficiency measures are found in the 2013 California Energy Code and the Palo Alto Energy Reach Code PAMC 16.17 & 16.18. 109. Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance: If the new residential development project has an aggregate (combined) landscape area equal to or greater than 500 square feet, the project is subject to the Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance (MWELO) and the project will require an separate permit for Outdoor Water Efficiency. See Outdoor Water Efficiency Submittal Guidelines and permit instructions at the following link. http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/depts/ds/green_building/outdoor_water_efficiency_.asp 110. Recycled Water Infrastructure for Landscape: If the project is either a new construction or a rehabilitated landscape and is greater than 1,000 square feet, then the project must install a dedicated irrigation meter related to the recycled water infrastructure. PAMC 16.14.230 (Ord. 5393 § 1 (part), 2016). The project applicant shall indicate the requirements on the Permit Plans. 111. Recycled Water Infrastructure for Landscape: If the project is outside the boundaries of the recycled water project area and is greater than 1,000 square feet, then the project must install recycled water infrastructure for irrigation systems. PAMC 16.14.230 (Ord. 5393 § 1 (part), 2016). The project applicant shall indicate the requirements on the Permit Plans. 112. Construction & Demolition: For residential construction projects subject to Tier 1 or Tier 2 requirements, the project must meet the enhanced construction waste reduction at 80% construction waste reduction. PAMC 16.14.260 (Ord. 5393 § 1 (part), 2016) The project shall use the Green Halo System to document the requirements. https://www.greenhalosystems.com 113. EVSE: If the project is a new multifamily residential project, then the project must comply with the City of Palo Alto Green Building Ordinance 5393. For resident parking, the project must supply one EVSE-Ready Outlet or EVSE Installed for each residential unit in the structure. For guest parking, the project shall provide Conduit Only, EVSE Ready Outlet, or EVSE Installed for at least 25% of the guest parking, among which at least 5% (and no fewer than one) shall be EVSE installed. See PAMC 16.14.420 for definitions on the types of EVSE parking. (Ord. 5393 § 2, 2016). 114. EVSE: If the project is a new multifamily residential project, with attached parking, then the project must comply with the City of Palo Alto Green Building Ordinance 5393. For resident parking, the project must supply one Conduit Only, EVSE-Ready Outlet or EVSE Installed for each newly constructed residence in a multi-family residential structure featuring (1) a parking space attached to the residence and (2) a shared electrical panel between the residence and parking space (e.g. a multi-family structure with tuck-under garages). See PAMC 16.14.420 for definitions on the types of EVSE parking. (Ord. 5393 § 2, 2016) 115. EVSE Transformer Location: If the project triggers the EVSE requirements in Part B of these comments, then applicant must identify transformer requirements associated with EVSE mentioned and show the appropriate transformer location and size on the Permit Plans. The applicant must contact the Electric Engineering Department within Utilities to confirm the any transformer requirements associated with the proposed EVSE. For questions, contact the Electric Engineering mainline at 650-566-4500. SECTION 8. Preliminary Parcel Map Conditions of Approval PRIOR TO PARCEL MAP SUBMITTAL 116. Proposed S.W.E. along El Camino Real should be changed and labeled as Public Access Easement. 117. Any proposed transformer is to be shown and kept on private property. 118. The Parcel Map shall include CITY ENGINEER STATEMENT, CITY SURVEYOR STATEMENT and DIRECTOR OF PLANNING AND COMMUNITY ENVIRONMENT STATEMENT. 119. The utility easement from Olive Avenue between the property line and the adjacent single family residence must be vacated prior to approval of the Parcel Map. 120. The new utility easement from Acacia must be shown on the Parcel Map. PRIOR TO PARCEL MAP RECORDATION. 121. The City of Palo Alto does not currently have a City Surveyor we have retained the services of Siegfried Engineering to review and provide approval on behalf of the City. Siegfried will be reviewing, signing and stamping the Parcel Map associated with your project. In effort to employ the services of Siegfried Engineering, and as part of the City’s cost recovery measures, the applicant is required to provide payment to cover the cost of Siegfried Engineering’s review. Our intent is to forward your Parcel Map to Siegfried for an initial preliminary review of the documents. Siegfried will then provide a review cost amount based on the complexity of the project and the information shown on the document. We will share this information with you once we receive it and ask that you return a copy acknowledging the amount. You may then provide a check for this amount as payment for the review cost. The City must receive payment prior to beginning the final review process. 122. Submit wet signed and stamped mylar copy of the Parcel Map to the Public Works for signature. Map shall be signed by Owner, Notary and Surveyor prior to formal submittal. SECTION 9. Term of Approval. Site and Design, Design Enhancement Exception, and Parking Adjustment Approval. The project approval shall be valid for a period of two years from the original date of approval. In the event a building permit(s), if applicable, is not secured for the project within the time limit specified above, the Site and Design approval shall expire and be of no further force or effect. Application for extension of this entitlement may be made prior to the one year expiration. SECTION 10. Preliminary Parcel Map Approval Granted. Preliminary Parcel Map approval is granted by the City Council under PAMC Sections 21.12 and 21.20 and the California Government Code Section 66474, subject to the conditions of approval in Section 8 of this Record. Approval of the Preliminary Parcel Map prepared by Kier and Wright, “Preliminary Parcel Map City of Palo Alto County of Santa Clara 3001 El Camino Real May, 2017”, consisting of three lots to be merged into one lot, dated May 17, 2017, is strictly limited to those features required to be included on a preliminary parcel map under PAMC Section 21.12.040. No development rights shall vest under PAMC Chapter 21.13 or the Subdivision Map Act as a result of this approval. SECTION 11. Parcel Map Conformance. The Parcel Map submitted for review and approval by the City Council shall be in substantial conformance with the Preliminary Parcel Map prepared by Kier and Wright, “Preliminary Parcel Map City of Palo Alto County of Santa Clara 3001 El Camino Real May, 2017”, consisting of three lots to be merged, dated May 17, 2017, except as modified to incorporate the conditions of approval in Section 8. A copy of this plan is on file in the Department of Planning and Community Environment, Current Planning Division. Within two years of the approval date of the Preliminary Parcel Map, the subdivider shall cause the subdivision or any part thereof to be surveyed, and a Parcel Map, as specified in Chapter 21.08, to be prepared in conformance with the Preliminary Parcel Map as conditionally approved, and in compliance with the provisions of the Subdivision Map Act and PAMC Section 21.16 and submitted to the City Engineer (PAMC Section 21.16.010[a]). PASSED: AYES: NOES: ABSENT: ABSTENTIONS: ATTEST: City Clerk Mayor APPROVED AS TO FORM: APPROVED: __________________________ ____________________________ Senior Assistant City Attorney Director of Planning and Community Environment ATTACHMENT C COMPREHENSIVE PLAN TABLE 3001 El Camino Real / File No. 16PLN-00097 Comp Plan Goals and Policies How project adheres or does not adhere to Comp Plan The Comprehensive Plan land use designation for the site is split between Service Commercial, Multi-family Residential, and Single-Family Residential The project adheres to the Comprehensive Plan by providing mixed use development and multi-family housing in a transit-oriented area and providing high quality design and public amenities that improve the aesthetic quality and vitality of the area, as discussed in further detail below. Housing Element Policy H2.1: Identify and implement strategies to increase housing density and diversity, including mixed-use development and a range of unit styles, near community services. Emphasize and encourage the development of affordable and mixed-income housing to support the City’s fair share of the regional housing needs and to ensure that the City’s population remains economically diverse. The proposed development includes both a mixed- use building along El Camino Real and an exclusively multi-family residential building at the rear of the lot. The development would include a total of 50 units with more than two-thirds of the proposed units being smaller (approximately 550 to 750 square feet) and therefore, presumably commanding a lower rent than the other larger units. Land Use and Community Design Element Policy L-5: Maintain the scale and character of the City. Avoid land uses that are overwhelming and unacceptable due their size and scale. The project maintains the appropriate scale and character based on the respective zoning for each building. It has appropriate density for each site and includes mixed use along the El Camino Real corridor and multi-family development along Acacia in close proximity to Caltrain. The Cal-Ventura area in which this development is located is specifically identified in the Comprehensive Plan as being an ideal location for mixed-use and multi-family residential development. The retail tenants are within walking distance to nearby residential neighborhoods and office locations. The proposed project has been designed to creatively make use of the existing site and existing Policy L-9: Enhance desirable characteristics in mixed use areas. Use the planning and zoning process to create opportunities for new mixed use development Policy L-12: Preserve the character residential neighborhoods by encouraging new or remodeled structures to be compatible with the neighborhood and adjacent structures Policy L-17: Treat residential streets as both public ways and neighborhood amenities. Provide continuous sidewalks, healthy street trees, benches, and other amenities that favor pedestrians Policy L-20: Encourage street frontages that contribute to retail vitality in all Centers. Reinforce street corners with buildings that come up to the sidewalk or that form corner plazas. buildings. The project has been designed to be compatible with adjacent single-family residential uses by concentrating the bulk and mass of the building toward El Camino Real, consistent with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines and zoning code build-to-line requirements, and set back substantially from the rear neighbors. Easy pedestrian and bicyclist access is provided to both residential and retail uses along El Camino Real to encourage alternate transit in a transit-oriented area. The project improves street trees and provides improved sidewalks and bulb outs. It would be required to provide a crosswalk across El Camino Real. Attractive and inviting small plazas that are open to the public are included at each corner of the development and vehicle access to the site is oriented away from El Camino Real in accordance with City goals. The project has been designed to highlight natural materials (i.e. wood) and the colors are subdued in accordance with the El Camino Real Design Guidelines. Therefore, the project is consistent with these Land Use Element Comprehensive Plan policies Goal L-6: Well-designed buildings that create coherent development patterns and enhance city streets and public spaces. Policy L-48: Promote high quality, creative design and site planning that is compatible with surrounding development and public spaces. Goal L-9: Attractive, inviting public spaces and streets that enhance the image and character of the City. Transportation Element Goal T-1: Less Reliance on Single-Occupant Vehicles. The project provides for all of its auto parking needs with the approval of shared parking, is located next to transit, supports walking due to having a mix of local and regional serving retail tenants near residential neighborhoods. Policy T-1: Make land use decisions that encourage walking, bicycling, and public transit use. Goal T-3: Facilities, services and programs that encourage and promote walking and bicycling. Local serving retail immediately adjacent to residential neighborhoods can increase walking and bicycling by its proximity and easy access. Bicycle parking is also required as part of the project. Provision of bicycle parking spaces supports increasing bicycle trip mode share. In addition, a Policy T-14: Improve pedestrian and bicycle access to and between local destinations, including public facilities, schools, parks, open space, employment districts, shopping centers, and multi-modal transit stations. Policy T-19: Improve and create additional, attractive, secure bicycle parking at both public and private facilities, including multi-modal transit stations, on transit vehicles, in City parks, at public facilities, in new private developments, and other community destinations. space for the future bike share location is provided. The proposed project would include improvements to sidewalks, street trees, and public spaces and would also provide pedestrian amenities. Site lighting would also be updated, which in turn would promote an improved pedestrian environment. Policy T-20: Improve maintenance of bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure. Policy T-23: Encourage pedestrian-friendly design features such as sidewalks, street trees, on-site parking, public spaces, gardens, outdoor furniture, art, and interesting architectural details. Natural Environment Element Goal N-4: Water Resources that are Prudently Managed to Sustain Plant and Animal Life, Support Urban Activities, and Protect Public Health and Safety. The project is required to comply with the NPDES Stormwater Permit and includes bio-retention areas for stormwater management. Policy N-21: Reduce non-point source pollution in urban runoff from residential, commercial, industrial, municipal, and transportation land uses and activities. ATTACHMENT D ZONING COMPARISON TABLE 3001 El Camino Real, 16PLN-00097 Table 1: COMPARISON WITH CHAPTER 18.16 (CS DISTRICT) Mixed-Use Development Standards Regulation Required Existing Proposed Minimum Site Area, width and depth None Currently 3 parcels 1.97 acres (49,927 sf in CS Zone) Minimum Front Yard 0-10 feet to create an 8-12 foot effective sidewalk width (1), (2), (8) 11 feet to create a 19’ sidewalk 4’ setback to provide 12’ wide effective sidewalk Rear Yard 10’ 70’ 5 feet for ramp; 75 feet for building (Design Enhancement Exception requested) Interior Side Yard 10’ N/A N/A Street Side Yard (Acacia Avenue) 5’ N/A (surface parking lot) 5’ Street Side Yard (Olive Avenue) 5’ 0’ 5’ Min. yard for lot lines abutting or opposite residential districts or residential PC districts 10 feet (2) 70’ 5’ for ramp; 75 feet for building (See above: DEE requested) Build-to-lines 50% of frontage built to setback on El Camino Real(7) (total frontage 239’7”) 33% of side street built to setback on Acacia Avenue (total side street 189’11”) 33% of side street built to setback on Olive Avenue (189’11”) 0% N/A (surface parking lot) 113’ (56.5%) 137’10” (57%) 63’10” (33%) 79’6” (42%) Special Setback 24 feet – see Chapter 20.08 & zoning maps N/A N/A Permitted Setback Encroachment Balconies, awnings, porches, stairways, and similar elements may extend up to 6' into the setback. N/A Balconies extend up to 4’ into the 12’ front setback. Max. Site Coverage 50% (24,963 sf) APN 132-37-056: 42% APN 132-37-055: 37% APN 132-38-072: N/A (surface parking lot) 47% (23,310 sf) Minimum Landscape Open Space 30% (8,989 sf) Not provided (all surface parking lot) 42% (21,212 sf) Max. Building Height 50 ft or 35 ft within 150 ft. of a residential district (other than an RM-40 or PC zone) abutting or located within 50 feet of the site Two buildings 14 feet and 18 feet in height 50 feet; steps down to 35’ Residential density (net) 30 None 30 Max. Floor Area Ratio (FAR) Residential 0.6:1 (29,956 sf) Retail 0.4:1(19,971 sf) Residential: None Retail: APN 132-37-056: 0.42 APN 132-37-055: 0.37 Residential 0.6:1 (29,952 sf) Retail 0.4:1 (19,798 sf) Daylight Plane for lot lines abutting one or more residential zone districts other than an RM-40 or PC Zone (6) Appears to comply with 16 feet at 60 degrees Complies with 16 feet at 60 degrees (1) No parking or loading space, whether required or optional, shall be located in the first 10 feet adjoining the street property line of any required yard. (2) Any minimum front, street side, or interior yard shall be planted and maintained as a landscaped screen excluding areas required for access to the site. A solid wall or fence between 5 and 8 feet in height shall be constructed along any common interior lot line.. (6) The initial height and slope shall be identical to those of the most restrictive residential zone abutting the site line in question. (7) 25 foot driveway access permitted regardless of frontage, build-to requirement does not apply to CC district. (8) A 12 foot sidewalk width is required along El Camino Real frontage 18.16.080 Performance Standards. As further described in a separate attachment, all development in the CS district shall comply with the performance criteria outlined in Chapter 18.23 of the Zoning Ordinance, including all mixed use development 18.16.090 Context-Based Design Criteria. As further described in a separate attachment, development in a commercial district shall be responsible to its context and compatible with adjacent development, and shall promote the establishment of pedestrian oriented design. Table 2: CONFORMANCE WITH CHAPTER 18.52 (Off-Street Parking and Loading) for Retail and Residential Type Required Existing Proposed Vehicle Parking Retail: 1 space/200 sf= 99 Studio Units (12): 1.25 spaces/unit= 15 One bedroom Units (6): 1.5 spaces/unit= 9 Two+ Bedroom Units (12): 2 spaces/unit= 24 Residential guest parking: 33% of units= 10 Total of 157 parking spaces required 11 spaces (additional surface parking lot roped off) 152 spaces (shared parking adjustment requested) Bicycle Parking Retail: 1/2,000 sf (20% long term and 80% short term) equals 2 LT and 8 short term spaces; Guest: 3 ST Residential: Studio: 12 LT One bedroom: 6 LT Two+ bedroom units: 12 LT None 43 spaces (32 long term, 11 short term) Loading Space 1 loading spaces 5,000 – 29,999 sq. ft. 1 on street and one part-time loading (required further resolution) ATTACHMENT E ZONING COMPARISON TABLE 3001 El Camino Real, 16PLN-00097 Table 1: COMPARISON WITH CHAPTER 18.13 (RM-30 DISTRICT) Regulation Required Existing Proposed Minimum/Maximum Site Area, Width and Depth 8,500 sf area, 70 foot width, 100 foot depth Complies (currently 3 lots) 30,738 sf (0.7 acres) Minimum Front Yard (2) 20 feet Parking lot 20 feet Rear Yard 10 feet Parking lot 28’3” above and below grade Interior Side Yard 6 feet Parking lot 20’6” and 70’ above and below grade Street Side Yard 16 feet Not applicable Not applicable Max. Building Height 35 feet Parking lot 33’ Side Yard Daylight Plane 10 feet at interior side lot line then 45 degree angle Not Applicable Complies Rear Yard Daylight Plane 10 feet at rear setback line then 45 degree angle Not Applicable Complies Max. Site Coverage 40% (12,295.2 sf) Parking lot 38% (11,710 sf) Max. Total Floor Area Ratio 60% (18,443 sf) Parking lot 0.63 (19,535 sf) Does not comply; requires revision prior to decision Minimum Site Open Space 30% (9,221.5 sf) Not Applicable 41.5% (12,738 sf without R-1 portion) Minimum Usable Open Space 150 sf per unit (3,000 sf for 20 units) Not Applicable 222 sf per unit (4,440 sf) Minimum Common Open Space 75 sf per unit (1,500 sf for 20 units) Not Applicable 222 sf per unit (4,440 sf) Minimum Private Open Space 50 sf per unit (sf) Not Applicable 90-230 sf per unit Table 2: CONFORMANCE WITH CHAPTER 18.52 (Off-Street Parking) for Multiple-Family Residential Type Required Proposed Vehicle Parking 2 spaces per unit, of which at least one space per unit must be covered. 29 spaces required Guest Parking: 33% of total number of units. 7 required 29 spaces 8 spaces Bicycle Parking 1 space per unit (100% long term) plus 1 short term space per 10 units 20 LT and 2 ST Memorandum Date: August 4, 2017 To: Mr. Robert Tersini, The Sobrato Organization From: Gary Black, Ricky Williams, and Jane Clayton Subject: Parking Management Plan for 3001 El Camino Real Hexagon Transportation Consultants, Inc. has completed a Parking Management Plan for the mixed-use development at 3001 El Camino Real in Palo Alto, California. The project consists of two buildings that are referred to as the CS and RM-30 buildings, in reference to the existing zoning regulations for the parcels that make up the site. The CS site includes the development of a three/four-story mixed-use building along the El Camino Real frontage with 19,798 square feet (s.f.) of first-floor retail space and 30 residential dwelling units. The RM-30 site includes the development of a partially below-grade, three-story residential building along the Acacia Avenue frontage with 20 residential units. This Parking Management Plan is based on the site plan provided by The Sobrato Organization and Steinberg Architects, dated May 22, 2017. The purpose of this plan is to identify the parking requirements of the proposed project and parking strategies to ensure that the parking supply is adequate. Parking Requirements The parking requirements for the project are based on the City of Palo Alto municipal code. Based on this code, the project would be required to provide adequate parking on each site for its respective use. Based on the City parking requirements, the project would need to provide parking on-site at the following rates: Residential: 1.25 spaces per studio unit; 1.5 spaces per 1-bedroom unit; 2 spaces per 2- bedroom or larger unit Residential Guest: 33% of the number of residential units Retail: 1 parking space per 200 s.f. of gross floor area Based on the above requirements, the project would be required to provide a total of 193 parking spaces, including 99 retail spaces, 77 residential spaces, and 17 residential guest spaces. The required 77 residential spaces are based on the following for the project as a whole: Studios: 24 units x 1.25 = 30 parking spaces 1-Bedroom units: 10 units x 1.5 = 15 parking spaces 2 or more bedroom units: 16 units x 2 = 32 parking spaces The requirement for 17 residential guest parking spaces is based on a total of 50 units (50 x .33 = 17) because the Palo Alto municipal code requires 33% guest parking if more than one space per unit is assigned or secured. The project will provide secured residential parking that is separate from the retail parking in the below-grade garage of the CS structure. Residential parking will be 3001 El Camino Real Parking Management Plan August 4, 2017 Page | 2 assigned in both structures. It should be noted that the 33% parking requirement for residential guests is higher than the residential guest parking requirements in surrounding municipalities. Table 1 summarizes the parking requirements and parking provided for each of the sites. Table 1 Parking Summary for 3001 El Camino Real Size or Parking Parking Parking Site and Use d.u.Requirement a Required Provided Location of Spaces CS Site Retail 19, 798 s.f. 1 per 200 s.f. 99 99 68 below grade, 31 surface Residential Studio 12 units 1.25 per unit 15 15 1-bedroom 6 units 1.5 per unit 9 9 2+ bedroom 12 units 2 per unit 24 24 Total Residential 30 units 48 48 48 below grade Residential Guest 33% of units 10 5 5 surface Total CS Site 157 152 116 below grade, 36 surface RM-30 Site Residential Studio 12 units 1.25 per unit 15 15 1-bedroom 4 units 1.5 per unit 6 6 2+ bedroom 4 units 2 per unit 8 8 Total Residential 20 units 29 29 29 below grade Residential Guest 33% of units 7 8 8 surface Total RM-30 Site 36 37 29 below grade, 8 surface Total Project 193 189 145 below grade, 44 surface Note: (a) Parking requirements are per Palo Alto Municipal Code, Section 18.52.040 Figure 1 Below-Grade Parking (6) 3001 El Camino Real TDM Plan Figure 2 Ground-Level Parking 3001 El Camino Real TDM Plan 3001 El Camino Real Parking Management Plan August 4, 2017 Page | 5 Parking Supply Parking for the project would be provided in four areas. Both the CS site and the RM-30 site would include below-grade parking areas and both would also include surface parking areas. Figures 1 and 2 show the below-grade and ground level parking areas, respectively. These parking areas would provide a total of 189 parking spaces, including 99 retail spaces, 77 secured residential spaces, and 13 residential guest spaces. Access to the CS site is provided through two driveways, one on Olive Avenue and one on Acacia Avenue, while access to the RM-30 site is provided through one driveway on Acacia Avenue. The project would provide four fewer parking spaces than would be required for the residential guest parking. Hexagon does not believe that this would cause any on-site parking demand issues based on the shared nature of the parking supply. A shared parking analysis was conducted in order to support this claim. The project has also provided for potential additional parking needs on the CS site by including a pit below some of the secured residential parking spaces in the below-grade garage. The pit would allow conversion of those parking spaces for use with mechanical parking lifts, providing space for two cars per stall in the future if necessary. In that case, the residential gate would be moved to keep the same number of residential spaces utilizing the lifts and increase the number of retail spaces. It is not currently anticipated that these additional spaces would be needed, but if one of the retail space occupants were a restaurant with greater parking needs, this foresight will provide the needed flexibility to adjust the parking supply in the future. Shared Parking Analysis Since the project would include complementary land uses on the CS site, on-site parking can be shared between the retail and residential guest uses. The shared parking analysis is based on the Urban Land Institute’s publication entitled Shared Parking, which provides parking occupancy rates for many land uses according to time of day. Based on the land uses provided on the CS site and the City’s municipal code, the project is required to provide 157 parking spaces, including 99 retail spaces, 48 residential spaces, and 10 residential guest spaces. The project site is proposing 152 parking spaces (99 retail, 48 residential, and 5 residential guest spaces) on the CS site, which is five fewer guest spaces than required. Because one more space than required is being provided on the RM-30 site, the project as a whole is providing four fewer spaces than required. As shown on the below-grade parking plan (see Figure 1), the 48 parking spaces for the residents of the CS site in the below-grade parking area would be fenced off from the portion of the garage open to retail employees and customers. Thus, the residential spaces are not included in the shared parking analysis, since only the retail and residential guest spaces would be shared. The combined requirement for the shared uses is 109 spaces (99 for retail and 10 for residential guests). According to the shared parking analysis (see Table 2), the project would only need to provide 104 shared spaces to meet the on-site parking demand for the two proposed uses. This is because the peak demand for the retail use and the peak demand for residential guest spaces do not occur at the same time of the day. Peak demand for retail occurs mid-day, and peak demand for residential guests occurs in the evening hours. The combined peak demand occurs at 7:00 PM on weekdays. Therefore, the 104 spaces provided would be adequate to meet this peak demand. 3001 El Camino Real Parking Management Plan August 4, 2017 Page | 6 Table 2 CS Site Shared Parking Analysis Based on the site plan, two parking spaces located in the surface parking area would be needed during certain hours for access to the trash enclosure. Two spaces near the Olive Avenue driveway would be located by the trash enclosure and parking would be prohibited during trash pick-up times. Therefore, when parking is restricted for these two parking spaces, the project would provide 102 total shared parking spaces. However, the parking restrictions would be in effect during the morning hours only. During the afternoon and evening when the site is expected to experience its peak parking demand, there would be no restriction on the use of these spaces, therefore leaving all 104 spaces available. Because combined demand reaches 101 spaces by 1:00 PM, the project should ensure that the two trash collection spaces are unrestricted by noon. As long as the parking restrictions for the spaces adjacent to the trash collection area are in effect only during the morning hours, the number of spaces provided on site would be adequate to meet the estimated parking demand for the CS site. The project would provide 37 total spaces on the RM-30 site. Per the City’s requirements, a total of 36 spaces would be required on this site, including 29 for the residential use, and 7 for residential guests. The RM-30 site would provide 29 residential spaces and 8 guest spaces, which is one space more than the requirement. The additional guest space would also be open to guests of the CS building residents. Wkdy Wknd Wkdy Wknd Wkdy Wknd 6 a.m. 3 3 0 0 3 3 7 a.m. 7 7 1 2 8 9 8 a.m. 20 16 2 2 22 18 9 a.m. 43 39 2 2 45 41 10 a.m. 68 56 2 2 70 58 11 a.m. 86 70 2 2 88 72 Noon 95 83 2 2 97 85 1 p.m.99 91 2 2 101 93 2 p.m. 95 99 22 97101 3 p.m. 91 99 22 93101 4 p.m. 91 95 2 2 93 97 5 p.m. 94 90 4 4 98 94 6 p.m. 94 80 6 6 100 86 7 p.m. 94 75 10 10 104 85 8 p.m. 81 66 10 10 91 76 9 p.m. 54 52 10 10 64 62 10 p.m. 32 37 10 10 42 47 11 p.m. 11 15 8 8 19 23 Midnight 0 0 5 5 5 5 Max. Demand 99 99 10 10 104 101 Source: Urban Land Institute (ULI) Shared Parking, 2nd Edition, 2005 . Total DemandHour of Day Residential GuestRetail Parking Demand by Hour 3001 El Camino Real Parking Management Plan August 4, 2017 Page | 7 Parking Management Measures To ensure that the parking supply is used efficiently and as intended the following measures should be implemented.  Residents should be prohibited from parking in the retail and guest spaces.  The retail and guest spaces should be marked and signed as “RETAIL/GUEST PARKING ONLY.”  The curb adjacent to each retail and guest parking space should be painted green. If no curb is present, the parking lane lines and/or parking stop should be painted green.  The retail and guest spaces should be clearly marked and signed.  All driveways and the entrances to the residential secured parking areas should include a “PARKING RESTRICTED 24 HRS A DAY” sign. Furthermore, it is recommended that the project establish a monitoring system for the on-site parking. The monitoring system would monitor residential violators, i.e., residents that park outside the residential secured parking areas in one of the retail and guest parking spaces, and issue warnings accordingly. The monitoring system would be established and maintained by the project’s property manager and/or the manager of the residential units. If violations persist, the project should consider a towing ordinance and the appropriate accompanying tow away signs. Conclusions Based on the shared parking analysis, the project would provide adequate parking to meet the anticipated parking demand on-site. The project should ensure that the two spaces adjacent to the trash collection area are unrestricted after noon. Also, the project should ensure that the retail and guest parking spaces, driveways, and entrances to the residential secured parking areas are marked and signed as described above. In addition, the project should establish a monitoring system for the on-site parking. Attachment G: Context-Based Design Criteria 3001 El Camino Real 16PLN-00097 Pursuant to PAMC 18.16.090(b), the following context-based design considerations and findings are applicable to the CS Zoned portion of this project. These context-based design criteria are intended to provide additional standards to be used in the design and evaluation of development in a commercial district. The purpose is to encourage development in a commercial district to be responsible to its context and compatibility with adjacent development as well as to promote the establishment of pedestrian oriented design. 1. Pedestrian and Bicycle Environment Project Consistency The design of new projects shall promote pedestrian walkability, a bicycle friendly environment, and connectivity through design elements. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the project provides bike racks near the building entrances for short term use as well bike lockers in the garage to support the bicycle environment. The street facades provide canopy coverage along the sidewalks and provide pedestrian shelter, which supports street activity. The site circulation with a central plaza and walkway provides an easy connection for pedestrians to travel within the site. 2. Street Building Facades Street facades shall be designed to provide a strong relationship with the sidewalk and the street (s), to create an environment that supports and encourages pedestrian activity through design elements. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that project provides substantial sidewalks to allow for pedestrian ease of use and includes canopies for shelter; the street facades are primarily storefront windows that supports an interior connection with the street and pedestrians; and the placement of an open plaza along the El Camino Real frontage provides a strong connection with the street and supports accessory outdoor activities on the site. 3. Massing and Setbacks Buildings shall be designed to minimize massing and conform to proper setbacks. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the proposed project complies with the CS zone setback requirements while also meeting the build-to line requirements in accordance with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines and the design incorporates appropriate articulation and materials as well balconies that help break-up the mass of the building. 4. Low Density Residential Transitions Where new projects are built abutting existing lower scale residential development, care shall be taken to respect the scale and privacy of neighboring properties. The proposed buildings are both set back substantially further than required from the property lines and the project is consistent with height requirements within the 150 foot radius of single-family residential uses. 5. Project Open Space Private and public open space shall be provided so that it is usable for the residents and visitors of the site. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the project provides open space with private balconies for the residents and an at-grade plaza and walkways for all to use. 6. Parking Design Parking shall be accommodated but shall not be allowed to overwhelm the character of the project or detract from the pedestrian environment. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the project’s parking is located and accessed from side streets and the project eliminates parking lots and curb cuts along El Camino Real. Also, the majority of parking spaces are located within a below-grade garage. 7. Large Multi-Acre Sites Large sites (over one acre) shall be designed so that street, block, and building patterns are consistent with those of the surrounding neighborhood. Although the proposed street façade along El Camino Real may seem tall in comparison to adjacent buildings, the façade built up to the build-to-line, is encouraged in accordance with design criteria for El Camino Real, which notes that buildings should be a minimum 25 feet in height to provide a presence in scale with El Camino Real. Gathering spaces clearly define entrance areas along the frontage. Project elements such as balconies are provided along the frontage to signal habitation and entrances to both retail and residential uses are provided along the frontage. The proposed building along El Camino Real includes ground floor retail with extensive windows that provide visibility into the retail stores as well as an outdoor seating area on the corner of Acacia and El Camino Real. These design features contribute positively to the pedestrian experience. 8. Sustainability and Green Building Design Project design and materials to achieve sustainability and green building design should be incorporated into the project. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the project is subject to the California Green Building Code (CalGreen, Tier 2) and includes a variety of sustainable elements. The project will utilize low-water use plants and will comply with C3 and MWELO requirments. Pursuant to PAMC 18.13.060, the following context-based design considerations and findings are applicable to the RM-30 Zoned portion of this project. These context-based design criteria are intended to provide additional standards to be used in the design and evaluation of development in multi-family residential districts. The purpose is to encourage development in a multi-family residential district to be responsible to its context and compatibility with adjacent development as well as to promote the establishment of pedestrian oriented design. 1. Massing and Building Facades Project Consistency Massing and building facades shall be designed to create a residential scale in keeping with Palo Alto neighborhoods, and to provide a relationship with street(s). The project provides most parking below-grade and includes windows, doors, and balconies along the frontage to provide a human scale and signal habitation. The entries are in keeping with the scale of the building and are oriented toward the street. Pedestrian amenities, new landscaping, and new street trees provide visual interest and human scale along the frontage. The materials are of a high quality and the project frontage uses balconies and a variety in the setbacks to provide articulation. The project is set back further than the required setback along the side lot lines and rear of the property. In addition, the majority of the building is 25 feet tall where 35 feet is allowed which provides a better transition between the adjacent single-family residential uses. All exposed sides of the building are designed with the same level of care and integrity. 2. Low-Density Residential Transitions Where new projects are built abutting existing lower- scale residential development, care shall be taken to respect the scale and privacy of neighboring properties. The project is set back further than the required setback along the side lot lines and rear of the property. In addition, the majority of the building is approximately 25 feet tall where 35 feet is allowed adjacent single-family residential uses. This proposed height provides a better transition between the adjacent single-family residential uses. All exposed sides of the building are designed with the same level of care and integrity. As discussed above, the project setbacks both on the side property lines as well as along the rear property line are greater than the setbacks required to comply with the municipal code. This area is also planned to be heavily landscaped. As shown on the landscaping plan sheets, the proposed trees along the rear property line are expected to be 15 feet tall at 5 years and would grow to a mature height of 40-50 feet to provide a substantial buffer between the project and adjacent single-family residences. The project is well below the rear daylight plane requirements ensuring that sun and shade impacts on the neighboring residential uses would not be an issue. 3. Project Open Space Private and public open space shall be provided so that it is usable for the residents and visitors of a site. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the open space is designed for both passive and active uses, incorporating seating into the landscaped areas as well as providing a BBQ. Both private and common open space is provided beyond the minimum requirements and common open space is sheltered from noise and wind to provide useable gathering spaces. Gathering spaces and pedestrian amenities are provided along the frontage to increase eyes on the street and activate the pedestrian areas. 4. Parking Design Parking needs shall be accommodated but shall not be allowed to overwhelm the character of the project or detract from the pedestrian environment. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the project’s parking is mostly provided below-grade with guest parking stalls provided at grade for convenience. The applicant has set the first floor at 4 feet above grade in order to provide privacy for the first floor residence but to maintain the pedestrian scale. 5. Larger (multi-acre sites) Large sites (over one acre) shall be designed so that street, block, and building patterns are consistent with those of the surrounding neighborhood. The proposed mixed-use development responds to its immediate environment by reducing the height of the majority of the building to approximately 25 feet where 35 feet is allowed adjacent single-family residences. Gathering spaces and pedestrian amenities improve the pedestrian experience in the immediate area and the project includes street level bicycle parking where none was previously provided. 6. Housing Variety and Units on Individual Lots Multifamily projects may include a variety of unit types such as small-lot detached units (Figure 6-1), attached rowhouses/townhouses (Figure 6-2), and cottage clusters in order to achieve variety and create transitions to adjacent existing development. The proposed project includes a single multi-family residential building in the RM-30 zone and therefore is not subject to these additional requirements for small-lot detached units, townhouses or cottage clusters. The project is consistent with all applicable code requirements for developments within the RM-30 Zone District. 7. Sustainability and Green Building Design Project design and materials to achieve sustainability and green building design should be incorporated into the project. This finding can be made in the affirmative in that the project is subject to the California Green Building Code (CalGreen, Tier 2) and includes a variety of sustainable elements. The project will utilize low-water use plants and will comply with C3 and MWELO requirments. The project is designs to provide a comfortable microclimates in common open space areas at the rear of the building and parking areas meet vegetation shading requirements to reduce the heat island effect. Short term bicycle parking is provided at most doors and exceeds requirements to provide convenience for bicyclists. The project is located in close proximity to several bus stops and the California Avenue Caltrain station. Attachment H Performance Criteria 18.23 3001 El Camino Real 16PLN-00097 These performance criteria are intended to provide additional standards to be used in the design and evaluation of developments in the multi-family, commercial, and industrial zones. The purpose is to balance the needs of the uses within these zones with the need to minimize impacts to surrounding neighborhoods and businesses. The criteria are intended to make new developments and major architectural review projects compatible with nearby residential and business areas, and to enhance the desirability of the proposed developments for the site residents and users, and for abutting neighbors and businesses. Assure that development provides adequate and accessible interior areas or exterior enclosures for the storage of trash and recyclable materials in appropriate containers, and that trash disposal and recycling areas are located as far from abutting residences as is reasonably possible. The project includes trash enclosure facilities at the rear of each building. The facilities are fully enclosed and not in clear sight of any public right-of-way or neighbors. To minimize the visual impacts of lighting on abutting or nearby residential sites and from adjacent roadways. The proposed exterior lighting is sufficient to provide safe circulation and is directed downward to reduce glare and impacts to the project’s residents as well as adjacent residents. The photometric studies show that there is no light spillover. The purpose is to restrict retail or service commercial businesses abutting (either directly or across the street) or within 50 feet of residentially zoned properties or properties with existing residential uses located within nonresidential zones, with operations or activities between the hours of 10:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. Operations subject to this code may include, but are not limited to, deliveries, parking lot and sidewalk cleaning, and/or clean up or set up operations, but does not include garbage pick-up. Current project proposal does not include late night uses or activities. Future commercial tenants that would like this will need to file for a Conditional Use Permit, as required per the Zoning Code. Privacy of abutting residential properties or properties with existing residential uses located within nonresidential zones (residential properties) should be protected by screening from public view all mechanical equipment and service areas. Landscaping should be used to integrate a project design into the surrounding neighborhood, and to provide privacy screening between properties where appropriate. The project is adjacent to residential uses and provides landscape screening across the parking lot and along the property boundaries between residential uses and the project. The buildings are set back substantially further than the required distance providing extra space and daylight plane to ensure light, air, and privacy. Mechanical equipment and service areas are screened. 18.23.020 Trash Disposal and Recycling Project Consistency 18.23.030 Lighting 18.23.040 Late Night Uses and Activities 18.23.050 Visual, Screening and Landscaping The requirements and guidelines regarding noise and vibration impacts are intended to protect residentially zoned properties or properties with existing residential uses located within nonresidential zones (residential properties) from excessive and unnecessary noises and/or vibrations from any sources in abutting industrial or commercially zoned properties. Design of new projects should reduce noise from parking, loading, and refuse storage areas and from heating, ventilation, air conditioning apparatus, and other machinery on nearby residential properties. New equipment, whether mounted on the exterior of the building or located interior to a building, which requires only a building permit, shall also be subject to these requirements. Loading, refuse storage, and all mechanical equipment is set back substantially from adjacent single-family residential uses. Although the proposed ramp to the parking garage is located in close proximity to an adjacent residence, landscaping and a sound wall are provided to limit noise. Also, by constructing the ramp in this location the circulation reduces car trips toward Olive Avenue, reducing noise from cars leaving the site as well as traffic on Olive Avenue adjacent these single family residential uses. The project would comply with PAMC 9.10. The visual impact of parking shall be minimized on adjacent residentially zoned properties or properties with existing residential uses located within nonresidential zones. The project’s parking is primarily located below grade and is designed to be focused away from the street frontages where they are more visible. The guidelines regarding site access impacts are intended to minimize conflicts between residential vehicular, pedestrian, and bicycle uses and more intensive traffic associated with commercial and industrial districts, and to facilitate pedestrian and bicycle connections through and adjacent to the project site. The site circulation facilitates easy access for all modes of transportation. The project includes short-term and long-term bike parking. The project eliminates a curb cut along El Camino Real and provides a pedestrian hybrid beacon crosswalk across El Camino Real, which would make a safer pedestrian experience. The proposed circulation design also significantly reduces trips leaving the site toward Olive Avenue, reducing impacts on adjacent single-family residences along Olive Avenue. The requirements for air quality are intended to buffer residential uses from potential sources of odor and/or toxic air contaminants. No uses on the site would produce odor or toxic air. Future uses are required to comply with these performance standards. Mitigation measures have been incorporated into the project to ensure that air quality would not result in impacts to future residents at the site. In accordance with Titles 15 and 17 of the Palo Alto Municipal Code, minimize the potential hazards of any use on a development site that will entail the storage, use or handling of hazardous materials (including hazardous wastes) on-site in excess of the exempt quantities prescribed in Health and Safety Code Division 20, Chapter 6.95, and Title 15 of this code. This is not applicable to the proposed uses associated with the project. 18.23.060 Noise and Vibration Project Consistency 18.23.070 Parking 18.23.080 Vehicular, Pedestrian and Bicycle Site Access 18.23.090 Air Quality 18.23.100 Hazardous Materials Architectural Review Board Staff Report (ID # 8013) Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 8/17/2017 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment 250 Hamilton Avenue Palo Alto, CA 94301 (650) 329-2442 Summary Title: 3001 El Camino Real: Mixed Use With 19,800 Square Feet of Retail and 50 Residential Units Title: PUBLIC HEARING/QUASI-JUDICIAL. 3001 El Camino Real [16PLN-00097 and 16PLN-00220]: Recommendation on Applicant's Request for Approval of a Site and Design Review to Allow for Construction of a Four-Story Mixed-Use Development with 19,800 Square Feet of Retail and 30 Residential Units in the CS Zone as well as a Three-Story Multi- Family Residential Building with 20 Units in the RM-30 Zone. The Project Also Includes a Request for a Preliminary Parcel Map for a Lot Merger to Allow for the Proposed Development, a Design Enhancement Exception, and a Parking Adjustment for Shared Parking. Environmental Assessment: A Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was Circulated for Public Review on July 3, 2017 and the circulation period ended on August 2, 2017. Zoning District: CS (Service Commercial), RM- 30 (Multi-family Residential), and R-1 (Single-family Residential). For More Information Contact the Project Planner Claire Hodgkins at claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org From: Hillary Gitelman Recommendation Staff recommends the Architectural Review Board (ARB) take the following action(s): 1. Consider the Mitigated Negative Declaration and Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan; and 2. Recommend approval of the Site and Design Application, Design Enhancement Exception, and Director’s Parking Adjustment to the City Council based on findings and subject to conditions of approval included in the draft Record of Land Use Action in Attachment B. 2 Packet Pg. 10 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 2 Report Summary The proposed project would construct two buildings with a total of 50 dwelling units and 19,800 square feet of retail space on the east side of El Camino Real between Olive Avenue and Acacia Avenue. The subject project was previously reviewed by the ARB. An earlier staff report includes extensive background information, project analysis and evaluation to city codes and policies; that report is available online: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/54501. A copy of the report without prior attachments is available in Attachment I. The project plans are included in Attachment L. On July 12, 2017, the project was reviewed by the PTC, which recommended approval of the project. A copy of the PTC staff report and minutes are available at http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/boards/ptc/. Staff believes that the applicant’s resubmittal addresses prior comments made by the Board and the analysis section below builds upon the information contained in the earlier report with modifications to reflect recent project changes. Staff is recommending that the ARB recommend approval of the Site and Design, Design Enhancement Exception, and the Director’s Adjustment to Council based on the findings and conditions of approval included in Attachment B. Background On November 3, 2016 the ARB reviewed the project. A video recording of the Board’s meeting is available online: http://midpenmedia.org/architectural-review-board-51/. The Board’s comments and the applicant’s response are summarized in the following table: ARB Comments/Direction Applicant Response Multi-family Residential Elevations: Several board members asked for further consideration of the RM-30 building elevation, noting that lowering the height of the first floor would create a more direct connection with the streetscape and make the building more apparently residential as well as more pedestrian friendly. Board members also asked for more greenery and more pedestrian friendly features to activate the frontage. At least one board member noted that creating stoops along the frontage should be considered. The Acacia elevations have been redesigned as shown on Sheets A3.3, A3.6 and A3.7 of the project plans. The first floor elevation was reduced from 13 feet to 4 feet above grade. Pedestrian amenities have been included along the frontage and landscaping has been integrated into the design to enhance the frontage and these provided amenities. Stoops leading out to Acacia from first floor units have not been provided. Staff’s analysis of these changes is included below. Mixed-Use Building Elevations: Board members identified concerns with the elevations along El Camino Real. Comments The El Camino Real frontage has been redesigned as shown on sheets A0.0, A3.1, and A3.5 of the project plans. The applicant 2 Packet Pg. 11 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 3 stated that the elevations were too repetitive, lacking variation in the design and materials which created a “walled canyon” effect. Board members suggested that changes in the materials, color, and articulation as well as the addition of more pedestrian friendly elements, gathering spaces, and plantings could help break up the massing along this frontage. Some board members also noted that a passage/paseo running from El Camino to the rear of building would be recommend to further break up the building. has made changes to the proposed colors, material and articulation of the building. In addition, the applicant has made revisions to the awning design, added pedestrian amenities and plantings, and has added more defined gathering spaces at the corners. A passage between the rear of the building and El Camino Real has not been provided. Staff’s analysis of these changes is included below. El Camino Real entrances: Several board members noted that the El Camino Real Design Guidelines encourage entrances for both residential and retail along the El Camino Real frontage in order to activate the pedestrian environment. Board members expressed concerns about the lack of connection between both the retail and residential units to the street frontage as well the grade differential between the sidewalk and the entrances. Access to residential units from El Camino Real has been included in the revised design as shown on Sheets A2.1 and A3.1 of the project plans. Additional access to the retail commercial area has also been provided along El Camino Real. Materials: Board members commented on the material/style proposed, recommending that the applicant consider “more timeless” materials than corrugated metal and less heavy architecture to better fit into the area. One board member recommended that the many adjacent redwood trees be used as a source of inspiration in the materials. The applicant has revised the proposed materials, removing the corrugated metal and stucco. The applicant has incorporated more wood into the design combined with a cement plaster instead of stucco and has revised the colors. Staff’s analysis of these changes is included below. Design of Open Space: Some board members had asked for further detail on the amenity space for the mixed-use building located along El Camino Real. Sheet L1.02 of the project plans shows the schematic landscape plan for the second level open space on the mixed-use building. Sheet L6.01 provides additional renderings of podium details. This open space is consistent with code requirements. Parking and Bicycle Design: One board member commented that the provided parking spots seem compact. In addition, at least one board member commented on the bicycle parking distribution. Sheet A2.0 of the project plans show dimensions for vehicle parking stalls as well as the revised bike parking plan. Staff’s analysis of the vehicle and bike parking is discussed below. 2 Packet Pg. 12 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 4 Staircase Design: One board member commented that the connection between the below-grade garage up to the ground floor as well as the residential units above. In particular, it was noted that improved natural light to the staircase would make it more useable for residents and retail users. It was recommended that the podium open space be better connected to the parking below. Sheets A3.2 and A3.3 of the project plans show the revised elevation plans along Olive Avenue, along the rear of the CS building, and for the RM-30 building along Acacia. Staff’s analysis of this change is discussed below. Analysis1 Multi-family Residential Elevations Several board members commented on the initial elevation plans for the building in the RM-30 Zone. Specifically, the previous design included the parking garage at grade and the first floor of residential units was set 13 feet above grade, creating a 13 foot wall along the Acacia frontage. Board members noted that the design had minimal articulation and no direct connection between the residential units and the streetscape. The proposed plans, as revised, lower the garage so that it is partially below grade, setting the first floor units at approximately 4 feet above grade. Although stoops have not been provided along the Acacia frontage, the applicant has provided open balconies closer to the ground floor to create the presence of residential use along Acacia. In addition, changes included improved landscaping and more pedestrian friendly features such as benches that encourage a more active pedestrian environment while still maintaining privacy and security for the residents. Mixed-Use Building Elevations, Entrances, and Materials The proposed plans include extensive revisions to the proposed El Camino Real frontage. To address board member comments regarding the repetitiveness and massing along the frontage the applicant has made design changes to create more variation through better articulation as well as provide more contrast in the colors and materials to break up the building. Corrugated metal, which was proposed for large parts of the frontage, has been removed and more wood components have been incorporated. Both staff and board members commented on the lack of pedestrian features and entrances along the El Camino Real frontage. The proposed project, as revised, includes entrances to retail and residential areas from the El Camino Real frontage. Although it would be more desirable for these entrances to be set at grade and along the build-to-line, the existing grade changes at the 1 The information provided in this section is based on analysis prepared by the report author prior to the public hearing. The Architectural Review Board in its review of the administrative record and based on public testimony may reach a different conclusion from that presented in this report and may choose to take an alternative action from the recommendation in this report. 2 Packet Pg. 13 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 5 site create a significant site constraint. Specifically, the grade at the approximate center line of the property along El Camino Real is notably higher than the grade at the Olive and Acacia corners. In addition, the grade of the site transitions from a high point along El Camino Real to a lower grade at the rear of the property (closer to the RM-30 zone). The applicant has explored multiple options for improving the pedestrian environment along El Camino Real to better comply with staff and board member comments as well as applicable design criteria that encourage pedestrian-oriented development. The proposed design ensures that the existing, mature landscaping along the El Camino Real frontage is preserved, that entrances to both residential and retails uses are provided along the frontage, incorporates usable amenities into landscape and hardscape features, provides small plazas/seating areas on each corner for gathering, maintains transparency along the entire frontage, and ensures that the below-grade parking garage does not daylight toward the rear of the CS Zone. The improvements to the ground floor along the frontage create a more defined base of the structure that provides an inviting pedestrian experience and is less repetitive than the previously proposed design. Although a different roof line might better define the roof, the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines encourage parapet roofing and the design is consistent with adjacent developments along the El Camino Real frontage. The step down from the 50 foot height limit to 35 feet on either side of the building frontage helps to define the line of the body of the structure. Parking and Bicycle Design Although no changes are proposed to the vehicle parking stalls, Sheet A2.0 has been revised to show the vehicle parking stall dimensions. Vehicle parking stall dimensions are consistent with standard code requirements, which require Uni-class stall A for 90 degree parking. Sheet A2.0 shows that bicycle parking has been revised to distribute the long-term bicycle parking appropriately between the CS zoned portion of the site and the RM-30 zoned portion of the site, consistent with board member comments. Long-term bicycle parking is provided in the parking garage. Although it may be more desirable to provide long-term bicycle parking at the ground level, the placement of long-term bicycle parking below-grade is allowed in accordance with the municipal code. Short-term bicycle parking is provided at ground level and is distributed between the various entrances, as required in the municipal code. Staircase Design The revised plans show a proposed open mesh material that will allow for natural light into all three staircases. All three staircases connect from the basement to all floors above so that residents or retail users can utilize the staircases as an alternative to the elevators, consistent with board member comments. In addition, the revised design for the mixed-use building in the CS zone connects the staircase to the second floor open space consistent with board member comments. PTC Requested Revisions and Clarification 2 Packet Pg. 14 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 6 On July 12, 2017, this project was reviewed by the PTC. Following the PTC’s motion to recommend approval of the proposed project to Council, the PTC passed a second motion asking the ARB to pay special attention to the following four items as they review the project: Revisions to the photometric study The PTC noted that the lighting studies only seemed to assess lighting from landscaping, parking, and at ground level entrances. The PTC asked for further consideration and revisions to the photometric study to ensure that lighting on upper floors is included. Sheet LT 1.1 has been revised to include the lighting from the upper floor balconies. Consideration of the Design Enhancement Exception The PTC motion included a request to the ARB to further evaluate this requested exception. As discussed further below, the DEE request would allow for the ramp to the below-grade parking garage to be located 5 feet into the required 10 foot setback/landscaping strip. The purpose of the request is to allow for a circulation design that would direct traffic away from Olive Avenue where it would likely be more impactful to single-family residences. Staff recommends approval of the DEE based on the findings included in the draft Record of Land Use Action in Attachment B. Protection from construction impacts The PTC motion asked the ARB to further consider impacts of construction on adjacent residents. Although there was no further elaboration on what types of impacts were of concern, staff believes that the Initial Study/Mitigated Negative Declaration adequately analyzes, and provides mitigation, where appropriate, for construction related impacts. In particular, Mitigation Measures (MM) HAZ-1 and HAZ-2, and MMs N-1 through N-7 address construction related impacts associated with any hazardous materials that could be exposed as a result of ground disturbance at the site as well as construction related noise. With incorporation of these mitigation measures, impacts would be less than significant. Landscaping The PTC requested that the proposed landscaping along the rear property line between the RM-30 building and the adjacent single-family residences be similar in height and canopy to the existing trees along that property line. The applicant has added Sheet L2.01 to the plan set to show the anticipated height of the landscaping along this property line at 5 years growth and at maturity. Consistency with the Comprehensive Plan, Area Plans and Guidelines2 The subject site has a split land use designation of Service Commercial; Multiple Family Residential; Single Family Residential. As detailed in the initial ARB staff report, the proposed project components are consistent with the land use descriptions outlined in the Comprehensive Plan Land use and Design Element for each respectively designated area of the 2 The Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan is available online: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/topics/projects/landuse/compplan.asp 2 Packet Pg. 15 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 7 site. The proposed project is located on a Housing Inventory Site (HIS) which is currently allocated to provide a maximum yield of 9 units and realistic yield of seven units to the City’s housing inventory. However, because of the proposed consolidation of three parcels (only one of which was listed as a HIS), the project proposes 50 units, more than five times the maximum yield outlined in the Housing Element. Proposed housing supports the Comprehensive Plan Goal of providing housing to support the City’s fair share of regional housing needs and the location of this housing within the proximity of job opportunities within the City (including the 10-story Palo Alto Square office complex and Stanford Research Park) is consistent with the City’s goal of improving the existing job/housing imbalance in Palo Alto. A consistency analysis with specific goals and policies outlined in the Comprehensive Plan is included in Attachment C. Based on the proposed uses within each land use designation, consistency with the housing element, and consistency with other policies and goals outlined in the Comprehensive Plan, staff finds that on balance, the project is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan. In response to a previous comment from the ARB, staff also discussed the light rail/jitney corridor right-of-way that previously ran through this area with both transportation and long- range planning. Previously identified right-of-way has, in most cases, been sold off to adjacent property owners (as is the case for this project site) and improvements have been added within that former right-of-way. The proposed new Comprehensive Plan does not include any reference to this corridor and the current adopted Comprehensive Plan generally speaks to a future jitney/rail line but does not specifically identify this former right-of-way as part of an existing or future corridor. South El Camino Real and El Camino Real Design Guidelines The project site is located within the California-Ventura corridor area and is identified as a Cal- Ventura strategic site in the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines. The guidelines note that development of mixed uses in this area along the eastern El Camino Real frontage should accommodate pedestrian activity with attractive sidewalks and landscaping. New buildings should front El Camino Real with prominent facades and be clearly visible and easily accessible to pedestrians. The proposed project includes entrances to retail and residential areas from both the El Camino Real frontage as well as parking areas, consistent with the guidelines. As discussed above in staff’s analysis of the revised El Camino Real frontage, it may be more desirable and consistent with the guidelines for these to be set at grade. However, the proposed design ensures that the existing, mature landscaping along the El Camino Real frontage is preserved, that entrances to both residential and retails uses are provided along the frontage, incorporates usable amenities into landscape and hardscape features, provides small plazas/seating areas on each corner for gathering, maintains transparency along the entire frontage, and ensures that the below-grade parking garage does not daylight toward the rear of the CS Zone. Therefore, staff finds that the project, on balance, is consistent with the South El Camino Real Design Guidelines. 2 Packet Pg. 16 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 8 The project is also subject to the 1979 El Camino Real Design Guidelines (ECR Guidelines) guidelines with respect to trees, signage, architecture and building colors. Because the occupant(s) for the proposed retail space is/are yet to be determined, specific signage is not currently proposed. Therefore, staff finds that the project is consistent with the 1979 El Camino Real Design Guidelines. Zoning Compliance3 Staff has performed a detailed review of the project’s consistency with applicable zoning standards. As detailed in the zoning compliance summary tables in Attachments D and E the proposed project complies with the requirements for each respective zoning district or is seeking, through the requested approvals, permission to deviate from certain code standards in a manner that is consistent with the zoning ordinance.. Although a portion of the proposed site is zoned R-1, no buildings are proposed within this site area; therefore, no summary table is provided for this zoning. Landscaping and landscape features are allowed within required setbacks and are consistent with zoning code requirements. As rental housing, the project is not subject to the City’s inclusionary requirements for affordable housing; thus the project is not required to include deed-restricted affordable units. Nonetheless, the project consists of smaller rental units, and will contribute to the City’s affordable housing funds through payment of impact fees. Design Enhancement Exception The proposed building in the CS zone is set back substantially (between 75 to 90 feet) from the rear lot line and areas of the site within a different zone district. However, the below grade parking garage and associated ramp is located five feet from a lot line where a 10-foot setback is required in accordance with PAMC Section 18.16.060. In addition, PAMC Section 18.23.050(B)(vi) requires that a minimum 10-foot planting and screening strip be provided abutting a low density residential district. Placement of the parking garage ramp within the required setback allows for only a 5-foot setback and planting strip along a portion of the site between the CS and R-1 zone districts. The location/design of the roundabout allows cars to enter from Olive Avenue but does not allow cars exiting below-grade parking to exit toward Olive Avenue. Only a car parked in one of the 28 surface parking spaces adjacent Olive Avenue would be allowed to exit onto that street. This parking lot circulation design reduces traffic on Olive Avenue, adjacent to single-family residences and also allows for underground parking to reduce visual impacts of surface parking along El Camino Real. Approval of this encroachment requires that the findings for a DEE be made. The draft findings for approval of this DEE are included in the draft Record of Land Use Action in Attachment B. Director’s Adjustment for Parking and Loading The project is seeking a Director’s adjustment to allow for six shared parking spaces in accordance with PAMC Section 18.52.050. The shared parking adjustment would allow shared use of four guest parking spaces with retail commercial uses and two at grade parking spaces to 3 The Palo Alto Zoning Code is available online: http://www.amlegal.com/codes/client/palo-alto_ca 2 Packet Pg. 17 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 9 be restricted during trash pickup hours, which would occur in the morning, outside of peak periods. The Parking Management Plan included in Attachment F provides a parking analysis showing peak periods for the proposed uses throughout the day. Because residential stalls would be secured, the analysis only includes the 99 retail parking spaces on the CS portion of the site and the ten guest parking spaces required for the CS portion of the site. The analysis shows that shared use of four parking spaces would be acceptable during maximum peak periods. Shared use of two parking spaces for trash pickup would be acceptable before noon (i.e. outside of peak hours). The applicant is also requesting a Director’s adjustment to allow for one on-street loading space. The site design, which is designed to place parking where it would be less visible from El Camino Real and would reduce vehicle trips out to Olive Avenue, would make circulation of larger trucks on-site infeasible. Parking spaces would need to be further restricted during morning loading/unloading hours and trucks would have to back up into the site, which could result in back-up beepers going off during morning hours. Policy L-77 encourages alternatives to surface parking lots to minimize the amount of land that must be devoted to parking, provided that economic and traffic safety goals can still be achieved. The location of one shared loading space off-site on Acacia would be consistent with this goal because it would devote less land to parking. Loading would be restricted to non-peak business hours for both the project site and adjacent commercial activities to ensure that economic and safety goals can still be achieved. Because the applicant is requesting a parking reduction, in accordance with PAMC Section 18.52.030(i) a Transit Demand Management Plan will be required as a condition of approval for the project in order to reduce and manage the number of single-occupancy vehicle trips generated by the project. Context-Based Design Criteria The proposed development requires that the City make the findings outlined in PAMC Section 18.16.090, Context-Based Design Criteria, for the CS building and the findings outlined in 18.12.060, Multi-family Context-Based Design Criteria, for the RM-30 building. A detailed review of the proposed project’s consistency with these context-based design criteria is included in Attachment G. Performance Criteria Because the proposed mixed-used development would be located within a CS zone, this portion of the development would be subject to the performance criteria outlined in Section 18.23 of the Palo Alto Municipal Code (PAMC). An analysis of the project’s consistency with the performance criteria is included in Attachment H. As discussed above, the applicant is seeking a DEE to allow for the ramp to be located 5 feet from the property line where the performance criteria require a 10 foot landscape strip. With the granting of the Design Enhancement Exception to allow for this reduced setback, staff finds that the project, on balance, is consistent with the performance criteria. Multi-Modal Access & Parking 2 Packet Pg. 18 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 10 The location, use, and required off-site improvements associated with the proposed project are consistent with the goals of the City’s 2012 Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan (BPTP). The City’s BPTP goals include converting discretionary vehicle trips to walking and biking trips as a mechanism to reduce greenhouse emissions by 15% and doubling rates of bicycling and walking. Mixed-use development located near transit (0.5 miles from Caltrain and 600-2,000 feet from several bus stops including VTA Route 22, 101, 102, 103 and the Dumbarton Express line DB-1) and housing allows persons to access a greater share of destinations while reducing the need for single-occupancy vehicle trips. Direct pedestrian connectivity from the public sidewalk is provided to both commercial and residential uses, promoting increased bicycle and pedestrian both from residents and those accessing the site from surrounding areas. Parking With approval of the Director’s parking adjustment, the proposed project is consistent with the municipal code requirements for vehicle parking. The Parking Management Plan in Attachment F shows that based on parking demand throughout the day for each use, the total number of spaces provided will be effective in providing sufficient parking. At least one board member noted that it would be more desirable for bicycle parking to be provided at the ground floor level. All short-term bicycle parking is provided at the ground floor level; however, the applicant has not made changes to place long-term bicycle parking at the ground floor level. Although staff agrees that ground level long-term parking would be more convenient, the municipal code does not prohibit providing long-term parking below grade. One member of the public commented that the existing surface parking is currently utilized and therefore should be replaced. The existing surface parking along El Camino Real is roped off and is not currently used. Although the lot adjacent the Fry’s site is often used by adjacent commercial and retail uses, is not required parking for any adjacent development and is therefore not required to be replaced. Circulation Overall, parking area circulation eliminates existing entrances to the site from El Camino Real; creating entrances on Acacia Avenue and Olive Avenue; which is more consistent with the El Camino Real design guidelines. The proposed parking lot would allow for entrance from Olive and Acacia Avenue but the garage ramp location for the mixed use building would encourage exit onto Acacia Avenue, away from nearby single-family residences. However, the placement of the ramp within the required setback requires that the City make the findings for a DEE. The draft DEE findings for approval of the DEE are included in Attachment B. Environmental Review The subject project has been assessed in accordance with the authority and criteria contained in the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), the State CEQA Guidelines, and the City’s environmental regulations. Specifically, a Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was circulated on July 3, 2017 and was circulated for a 30 day period through August 2, 2017. A link to the 2 Packet Pg. 19 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 11 Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration as well as the Draft Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Plan is included in Attachment K. The ARB must consider the draft Mitigated Negative Declaration in making a recommendation on the project and may comment on the draft. Following completion of the ARB’s review and recommendation on the project, a Final Draft MND and MMRP would be prepared for the City Council. Mitigation has been included, in particular, to address construction noise, to address construction in the plume, and to address pedestrian circulation. Construction, or payment toward construction, of a crosswalk across El Camino Real would be required. Public Notification, Outreach & Comments The Palo Alto Municipal Code requires notice of this public hearing be published in a local paper and mailed to owners and occupants of property within 600 feet of the subject property at least ten days in advance. Notice of a public hearing for this project was published in the Palo Alto Weekly on August 4, 2017, which is 12 days in advance of the meeting. Postcard mailing occurred on August 4, 2017, which is 12 days in advance of the meeting. Public Comments During the first formal hearing with the ARB, one member of the public commented on the proposed project. This comment primarily focused on concerns regarding the displacement of parking from the existing at grade parking lot and concerns regarding massing along the El Camino Real façade. The commenter asked that more attention be made to the façade to make it more attractive and break up the vertical facade. A transcript of the ARB hearing is included in Attachment J and includes these comments. During the formal PTC hearing on July 12, 2017 one member of the public, whom identified herself as a nearby resident on Olive Avenue, expressed concerns about the size of the project, noting that she felt that the project was too large based on the size of the lot. She also expressed more general concerns about the City’s follow up on development projects in the area to ensure that requirements (e.g. landscaping) are being maintained and the fact that parcels along Olive Avenue should be allowed to rezone to multi-family residential. A transcript of the PTC hearing is not yet available; however, a video recording of the hearing can be viewed online at http://midpenmedia.org/planning- transportation-commission-52/. Alternative Actions In addition to the recommended action, the Architectural Review Board may: 1. Approve the project with modified findings or conditions; 2. Continue the project to a date (un)certain; or 3. Recommend project denial based on revised findings. Report Author & Contact Information ARB4 Liaison & Contact Information Claire Hodgkins, Associate Planner Jodie Gerhardt, AICP, Planning Manager 4 Emails may be sent directly to the ARB using the following address: arb@cityofpaloalto.org 2 Packet Pg. 20 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 12 (650) 329-2116 (650) 329-2575 claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org jodie.gerhardt@cityofpaloalto.org Attachments:  Attachment A: Location Map (PDF)  Attachment B: Draft Record of Land Use Action (DOCX)  Attachment C: Comprehensive Plan Consistency Analysis (DOCX)  Attachment D: CS Zoning Consistency (DOCX)  Attachment E: RM-30 Zoning Consistency (DOCX)  Attachment F: Parking Management Plan (PDF)  Attachment G: Context-based Design Criteria (DOCX)  Attachment H: Performance Criteria (DOCX)  Attachment I: First Formal ARB Staff Report (PDF)  Attachment J: First Formal ARB Transcript (PDF)  Attachment K: Environmental Analysis (DOCX)  Attachment L: Project Plans (DOCX) 2 Packet Pg. 21 123 4 5 678 9 Architectural Review Board Meeting 10 Excerpt Minutes of August 17, 2017 11 12 13 14 Board Members: Staff: 15 Alexander Lew- Chair Hillary Gitelman, Planning Director 16 Kyu Kim– V-Chair Albert Yang, Deputy City Attorney 17 Wynne Furth Jonathan Lait, Assistant Planning Director 18 Peter Baltay Jodie Gerhardt, Manager of Current Planning 19 Robert Gooyer Claire Hodgkins, Associate Planner 20 Yolanda Cervantes, Administrative Assistant 21 Molly Stump, City Attorney 222324 25 The Architectural Review Board of the City of Palo Alto met on this date 26 in the Council Chambers at 8:30 A.M. 27 28 Present: Lew, Kim, Furth, Baltay 29 30 Absent: Gooyer 31 Action Items 32 33 2. PUBLIC HEARING/QUASI-JUDICIAL. 3001 El Camino Real [16PLN-00097 34 and 16PLN 00220]: Recommendation on Applicant's Request for Approval of a 35 Site and Design Review to Allow for Construction of a Four-Story Mixed-Use 36 Development with 19,800 Square Feet of Retail and 30 Residential Units in the 37 CS Zone as well as a Three-Story Multi-Family Residential Building with 20 38 Units in the RM-30 Zone. The Project Also Includes a Request for a Preliminary 39 Parcel Map for a Lot Merger to Allow for the Proposed Development, a Design 40 Enhancement Exception, and a Parking Adjustment for Shared Parking. 41 Environmental Assessment: A Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was 42 Circulated for Public Review on July 3, 2017 and the circulation period ended 43 on August 2, 2017. Zoning District: CS (Service Commercial), RM-30 (Multi- 44 family Residential, and R-1 (Single-family Residential). For More information 45 Contact the Project Planner Claire Hodgkins at 46 claire.hodgkins@cityofpaloalto.org 1 Chair Lew: Then we can move onto the first item which is number two, 3001 2 El Camino Real. Recommendation on applicant's request for approval of a Site 3 and Design Review to allow for construction of a four-story mixed-use 4 development with 19,800-square feet of retail space, 30 residential units in 5 the CS zone; as well as a three-story multi-family residential building with 20 6 Units in the RM-30 zone. The project also includes a request for a preliminary 7 parcel map for a lot merger to allow for the proposed development, a Design 8 Enhancement Exception, and a parking adjustment for shared parking. The 9 environmental assessment is a Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was 10 circulated for public review on July 3, 2017, and the circulation period ended 11 on August 2. The zone district is service commercial, and RM-30 (multi-family 12 residential), and R-1 (single-family residential). Our project planner is Claire, 13 welcome. 14 15 Ms. Claire Hodgkins, Project Planner: Good morning, Claire Hodgkins, Project 16 Planner. The proposed project is located at 3001 El Camino Real. This is, as 17 you mentioned, a 19,800-square foot commercial retail area and 50 residential 18 units proposed. It includes two separate building, so the first building is 19 located along El Camino Real. It’s a mixed-use building, four-stories and then 20 the building fronting Acacia is a multifamily residential development located 21 within the RM-30 zone. The project site is currently three parcels that would 22 be merged into one as part of a preliminary parcel map application. The site 23 has split zoning so it’s a CS, RM-30 and then a small portion of the site is 24 zoned R-1. The site also includes a split land use designation; service 25 commercial, multi-family residential and single-family residential. It’s currently 26 developed with two buildings along El Camino that total 9,100-square feet of 27 retail commercial surrounded by surface parking. This just shows a map that 28 shows the complete project site with applicable zoning and how it’s split. 29 Based on ARB comments, the applicant made changes, in particular, to add to 30 the El Camino Real frontage to add better pedestrian amenities, to better 31 define the corners and their transition to the entrances, the proposed 32 materials, better definition to the base of the structure and to add a residential 33 entrance. Along Acacia, based on ARB comments the applicant made changes 34 to bring down the first floor to 4-feet; previously it was 13-feet above grade. 35 Decrease the overall – that in turn decreased the overall height of the 36 structure so there is a portion of it that goes up to 35-feet but the majority of 37 it goes up to about 25-26-feet. The added pedestrian amenities, added 38 vegetation, and provided the balconies to better signal habitation and made 39 changes to the proposed materials. Key consideration for today, the project 40 provides multi-family residential rental housing on a housing inventory site, 41 which fulfills a need for the City. It also is close to office and transit and this 42 use is consistent with the Comprehensive Plan vision for this area. Parking, the 43 proposed project is providing four fewer parking spaces than required by the 44 code for the site which requires a Director’s adjustment. Also, the loading 45 space, they are asking for an exception to put that on the street instead of on 1 the site. Design Enhancement Exception is required to allow the garage ramp 2 to encroach into the setback. The Draft Mitigated Negative Declaration was 3 circulated on July 3rd and the circulation ended on August 2nd but you can, of 4 course, comment on that document and we’ll be preparing a final that will go 5 to Council. The project received preliminary feedback from the ARB at the end 6 of last year and changes to the design since that hearing are summarized in 7 the Staff report, so following your review we would go to Council. The PTC has 8 already reviewed this and recommended approval and Staff are 9 recommending that the ARB take the following actions. Consider the Mitigated 10 Negative Declaration and mitigation monitoring and reporting plan and 11 recommend approval of the Site and Design application, parking adjustment, 12 and Design Enhancement Exception to the City Council based on findings and 13 subject to conditions of approval in the record of Land Use Action. That’s all. 14 Chair Lew: Great, thank you very much. We will do the applicant presentation 15 now, you have 10-minutes. 16 17 Mr. Tim Steele: While she is doing that, good morning. My name is Tim Steele 18 and I’m with the Sobrato Organization the applicant. First, I want to thank the 19 Architectural Review Board for the opportunity to present our updated 20 application for the mixed-use project at 3001 El Camino. That is in response to 21 our first visit with the ARB in November of last year. Second, I would like to 22 also thank Staff for their hard work and I agree with her analysis and their 23 findings and recommendations in the Staff report. I’m pleased to present to 24 you that we started this project with a design process with a directive with 25 being compliant with the existing zoning designations. In this case, there are 26 three different zoning designations on the subject property. Also, important to 27 the design approach is to consider the context and be sensitive to all the 28 street neighbors and minimize traffic patterns there while predominantly 29 focusing this to the Acacia side of the project. As our architect presents to you 30 this morning, I think you will appreciate that we’ve developed a careful, 31 responsive and thoughtful design project that has accomplished these goals 32 and more. This mixed-use project provides 50 new, well amenitized rental 33 units and in responses to Council’s expressed desires, they are smaller rental 34 apartments with an average size of 750-square feet. Additionally, the Council 35 has shown interest in preserving retail. In this case, we are required to replace 36 9,100-square feet of retail but we can build as much as 20,000-feet of 37 commercial. We are dedicating all 20,000-square feet to retail only. On a 38 parking note, we are proposing the two complementary uses share a small 39 portion of its guest parking via the four, for a total of two percent of the total 40 project parking. This is supported by a parking analysis in your packet. 41 Additionally, the CS parking is currently designed to provide traditional retail 42 parking in keeping with the City of Palo Alto parking requirements. However, 43 we’ve also designed a CS garage to accommodate future parking lifts and this 44 would be accommodated by adding the lifts in the current residential area but 45 shifting the security fence between the unsecured commercial and the 1 residential, to keep the allocation of residential parking exactly what it is 2 today. While allowing to enhance and add additional parking for the 3 commercial side so that we can use a higher intensity use in the space, such 4 as a restaurant and not have the project not have enough parking in 5 anticipation that potential use in the future. With that, I would like to 6 introduce our design team that’s here today which we are available to answer 7 any individual questions you might have. I’ll start with my architect Rob 8 Steinberg, he will be making a further presentation in a second. We have Nick 9 Samuelson with the Guzzardo Partnership, our landscape architect. I have 10 Nick [phonetics] [Tarious] Mathew from Kier and Wright (inaudible). I have 11 Gary Black from Hexagon, our traffic engineer and my associate with Sobrato 12 Robert Tersini all in the audience. With that, I would like to introduce you to 13 Rob Steinberg and he’ll be walking you through our changes on the project, 14 thank you. 15 16 Mr. Rob Steinberg: Good morning, I’m Rob Steinberg. I just – I don’t want to 17 be difficult in the beginning but I noticed that the screen is kind of cutting off 18 part the image. Is there any way to adjust that? None, ok. Alright, well we’ll 19 work with what we’ve got. 20 21 Vice Chair Kim: If it makes you feel any better, on our screen it’s much less 22 cut off if any at all so we’re looking at the whole picture. 23 24 Mr. Steinberg: Ok, great. The last time we met, you asked us to go back and 25 really focus on three areas that you would like us to -- be further develop, the 26 repetitive character along El Camino Real, the sense of access and clarity of 27 entry into the El Camino building and then how to make the RM-30 building on 28 Acacia a little bit more pedestrian in nature. Let’s just start with a quick 29 refresh, three separate parcels merged into one. You know as a designer you 30 think, that’s going to give me great flexibility so that’s very positive but keep 31 in mind that each of the three still has their specific zoning requirements. Then 32 the (inaudible) merge site needs to respond to the El Camino Real Design 33 Guidelines, the South El Camino Real Plan, as well as the Cal/Ventura Area 34 Plan so there is a lot of direction as to how this should work. There are two 35 important characteristics to the site that I’d like you to kind of keep in mind. 36 First of all – let me just get use this pointer. People are going to be coming to 37 the site from the corners. You can’t get across El Camino directly across our 38 site so everybody is going to be coming from either the Olive side or the 39 Acacia side. Then the second thing is you can see in the drawing is that our 40 site is a little unusual because it’s got this bulge where there’s a 2-foot level 41 change in the site, which is not really common or desirable the fact that it’s 42 low, then it goes high and it ends again low. So, there’s kind of two options for 43 dealing with our garage there. One is we put it at the top of the crown, in 44 which case a good proportion of it – of the garage is going to be exposed 45 along the sidewalk and the street; which is obviously counter to making it 1 pedestrian friendly. So, what we’ve done is we’ve lowered the garage 2 completely and what happens is when people come from the corners, we now 3 have the flattest area of the site and that allows us to utilize that for public 4 activity for gathering and for socialization. I’ll just orient everybody, Olive is of 5 course at the top, El Camino and Acacia at the bottom. So, let’s start looking 6 at pedestrian access. The first thing that I would like you to note is that we’ve 7 moved the buildings as far to address the street – as close to the street as 8 possible so that maximizes the distance away from the homes. If we look first 9 on the El Camino building, our mixed-use building, we’ve tried to make that 10 building both pores from the front and in the back to have the opportunity to 11 spill out to the corners. For example – it’s a little hard to see but you can 12 enter the retail here from the Olive side from the corner or get into the middle 13 from the Olive entrance. From the other corner on Acacia, you get into the 14 retail from the corner, from the middle and then there’s a second shared 15 entrance that is both residential and commercial in the middle of the site. Both 16 the corners have plazas and ideally that would-be restaurant or activities that 17 could spill out and activate both the El Camino corners. On our residential 18 street, because we only have residences on the Acacia building, we tried to 19 develop a sense of arrival both motor court and pedestrian for the residential. 20 You can see that we’ve got two lobbies that sort of flank that and activate it 21 and then we’ve got the potential for a restaurant that could also spill out and 22 activate that space. Then we have another entrance farthest away moving 23 east. In respect to the parking, just very simple on the left is the residential 24 and the residential only accesses the site from Acacia; one hundred percent. 25 On the right is the retail and retail can come in and accesses about 15-20 cars 26 here but everyone else needs to exit and come from Acacia so we’ve really 27 limited the impact of vehicles along Olive. We talked about the planning, let’s 28 focus a little bit now on the elevation. This was the original elevation that we 29 looked at last time on El Camino and I think there was positive feedback on 30 the transparency for the retail at the lower level but there was concern about 31 that there wasn’t a strong sense of clarity and hierarchy of entrance to the 32 building. There really was one major entrance on the corner and the second 33 thing was there was a little bit of concern about the repetitive nature of the 34 middle of the building. When we went back and looked at it, I realized that not 35 only are all three of the bays the same but the spacing between the bays is 36 also almost the same and so it really makes a very static, repetitive pattern. 37 Our goal here is to activate the street and to make it pedestrian friendly. To 38 do that we’ve prioritized the two corners and we’ve made oversized entrances. 39 Glass that comes in the corner and then goes vertically and to the left of that 40 you can see we’re flanking it with a yellow and with a warm wood material to 41 give some accent; some residential character to that. Then we’re doing that 42 again, that same strategy, on Olive but a little bit smaller scale. It steps down 43 but the same idea of the vertical glass and the warm wood material flanking 44 that to talk about entrance. The transparency we’re retaining and then the 45 question was what do we do in the middle? What we’ve tried to do is anchor 1 the corners with two lobbies, one that allows you get into the building here, 2 here and a shared entrance that allows you to get into the residential, as well 3 as retail. We’ve taken that same idea along Olive where the retail comes up 4 and the glass comes up and it’s flanked by the wood so that’s a comparison of 5 the two. This is a view from Acacia, you can see we’ve recessed the first floor 6 so that the (inaudible) is still out. We’re stepping the building down as you 7 move away from El Camino and you can see we’re introducing these wood 8 type materials, warmer materials that really begin to talk about sense of entry 9 and also pay homage to the redwood trees across the street. We did a similar 10 strategy on Olive, room for gather on the corner and you can see the warm 11 wood material really flanking and calling attention to the sense of entry and 12 we’re emphasizing the corners with variety, both in plant and elevation. Then 13 lastly, real quick we’ll look at the Acacia building. This was the original building 14 and the basic concern was the garage was too far out of the ground – it’s 15 exposed. So, up at the top is a section that we just looked at. You can see the 16 garage was out of the ground about 11 ½-feet. What we’ve been able to do 17 now is to lower the entire building 7 ½-feet so our height comes down, the 18 garage comes down, the building comes down. By lowering the height, we 19 were able to create a little finer grain scale to the bays. We were able to 20 connect them to the ground and then we punctuated it with two lobbies, one 21 at the head and one in the middle. So, that’s a comparison of the two and I 22 think that was very good advice from the ARB and from Staff and I think this 23 is a really good improvement. On Acacia, there’s the shared pedestrian motor 24 court plaza and it’s activated hopefully by a restaurant, the two lobbies, 25 people going back and forth with the amenities. As we move further away 26 from El Camino, the building steps down to the two-story, we’re anchoring and 27 grounding the building, we’re creating a sense of entry, a place to sit. If you 28 were being picked up by Uber or Lift and maybe you don’t want to be in the 29 main plaza if you are leaving with your suit case, we’ve got another entrance. 30 It’s not just a back door but it’s a dignified way of coming and going from the 31 building. We’re excited about the collaboration with you and Staff of what 32 we’ve shown you and we look forward to hearing your thoughts now. Thank 33 you. 34 35 Chair Lew: Great, thank you, Mr. Steinberg. Now is the time for public 36 comment on this particular item. Staff, there was – I think there were some 37 late cards. I don’t know if it was for this item. Great, so we do have one 38 speaker which is Mr. Moss and you will have 5-minutes. 39 40 [Mr. ?? Moss]: Thank you, Chairmen Lew and Commissioners. Well, the 41 development meets the zoning requirements so there are no issues about 42 compatibility but anything that’s developed on this site is going to create a 43 problem because it’s a block or two from the most congested intersection in 44 Palo Alto; El Camino and Page Mill. No matter what you put there, it’s going to 45 be a problem. I’m going down El Camino at 10 o’clock in the morning and 1 traffic is backed up past Acacia so there is going to have been some attention 2 paid to how people get in and out of that site. Putting the parking entrances 3 on Acacia or Helen is probably the only way to do it. You can’t get in and out 4 along El Camino, they’ll just be a block forever. If there was a way to go from 5 Acacia around past Fry’s and go down Park and (inaudible) town to Page Mill 6 and El Camino, that might actually work more effectively. So, you might want 7 to take a look at that and whether it’s possible or not. As far as the design, 8 I’m not sure what I saw was the last one but some of the accents where 9 vertical and it made the building look bulkier and taller and I think if you are 10 going to put accents, then the accents should be either square or horizontal so 11 the building doesn’t look as bulky and it has more of an extension rather than 12 the height emphasis. Take a look again at the way that the building is laid out 13 and the way the accents are put on. Maybe I missed it but it looked to me like 14 it was mostly vertical rather than horizontal and I think we should take 15 another look at that. Finally, we should have as much landscaping as possible 16 along El Camino and that’s not just trees along the street but also you can 17 have planter boxes in front of the building so that you have some greenery 18 and you make the building look like it’s more environmental, rather than just a 19 structure. I think that would be an improvement also. Thank you. 20 Chair Lew: Great, thank you, Mr. Moss. Are there any questions from the 21 Board? Peter. 22 23 Board Member Baltay: Yes, for the architect, please. I’d like to understand the 24 raised floor of the back residential building. You said it’s 4-feet above the 25 grade but I’m not sure which end of the building. It seems like the grade at 26 Acacia Avenue is sloped towards the bay. In the rendering, the people are 27 maybe not the best way to judge it but at the main residential entrance, sort 28 of closest to El Camino, how high is the main floor plate of the residences 29 above the ground? Then how far – how about back at the other end? 30 31 Mr. Steinberg: That’s a good question and I’m sorry I wasn’t clear on that. If 32 you look at the bottom section, the lobby closest to El Camino is right here 33 and that’s at grade; flush. Then you can see this dotted line is the slope of the 34 grade dropping down and at the highest point, it’s 4-feet. 35 36 Board Member Baltay: I’m sorry, I’m missing this. Then the lobby – is the 37 lobby at the same level as the residents? 38 Mr. Steinberg: The lobby – there are two lobbies, one on the left, do you see it 39 there? 40 41 Board Member Baltay: Yes, that lobby. 42 Mr. Steinberg: Is at grade; flush with grade. 43 1 Board Member Baltay: I guess I am then referring to the floor level of the 2 residences themselves, not the lobby. How high is the residence above the 3 grade? 4 5 Mr. Steinberg: At the highest point, it’s 4-feet and at the lowest point, it’s 6 probably a 1 ½-foot. 7 8 Board Member Baltay: Thank you. 9 Chair Lew: Wynne. 10 11 Board Member Furth: Thank you. Could you take me through how a person 12 either using a wheelchair or are not able to climb steps accesses both the 13 retail and the residential? 14 15 Mr. Steinberg: Sure. I lost control of the – did I do something? Let’s start with 16 the retail, so retail is the whole lower floor here so you can get in at grade 17 from here from Olive. You can get in at grade where we’re stepping the 18 building back from the corner and you can get into the middle of the building 19 about here, about three-fifths of the way -- two-fifths of the way to the top of 20 the building. So there… 21 22 Board Member Furth: And that’s from the rear? 23 24 Mr. Steinberg: … are three entrances from the front for the top half of the 25 building and similarly on the bottom, you can access the building from Acacia 26 from the corner. We’ve stepped it back so that you can get into a second 27 division and we’ve actually added an entrance here so that you can get into 28 the top of the lower portion… 29 30 Board Member Furth: So… 31 32 Mr. Steinberg: Yes? 33 34 Board Member Furth: So, essentially, I’d be able to access any retail space 35 from the sidewalk? 36 37 Mr. Steinberg: Yes… 38 39 Board Member Furth: Thank you. 40 41 Mr. Steinberg: … you would and you would also – I’ll just point out that you 42 could also access them from the back side as well where there’s convenient 43 short-term parking. 44 45 Board Member Furth: That part I got. Then on the residential? 1 Mr. Steinberg: On the residential -- you know I neglected to say one very 2 important thing. Not only did we try to generate the lobbies here to have a 3 sense of that entry but this building has shared amenity space for both 4 buildings. For example, it’s got a barbeque and outdoor dining and this 5 outdoor space has a spa. It’s available of course to both buildings so we 6 wanted the main lobbies to be close so that if I lived in this building and I 7 wanted to go down in my swim suit to go to the spa, I could kind of go 8 through the back and I don’t have to go out. So, to get into the residential, 9 you would either come in this lobby or you would come in this lobby. 10 Board Member Furth: Thank you. 11 12 Chair Lew: Peter. 13 14 Board Member Baltay: I’m sorry to keep beating to death but again, back to 15 the grades and the elevation of the building. 16 17 Mr. Steinberg: Sure. 18 19 Board Member Baltay: What’s confusing me is when I look at the – what’s 20 called you Olive elevation of the residential lower building in the back and I’m 21 trying to make sense of FAR again, the residence is? The floor of the 22 residences is above the ground and in this case, above that outdoor back area 23 – the open space? You said it’s a foot and half at the high end and four at the 24 lower end and I’m looking at your drawing and the lower end is clearly above 25 the height of a person. Then on the upper end by the lobby, it looks like it 26 would be 4-feet. Is there a grade change across the site transversely as well 27 or am I missing something or hopefully these drawings a bit inaccurate? 28 29 Mr. Steinberg: You know I’ve been so focused on the public side of it that I’m 30 not – I’m less aware of all of the details. I believe that the site does fall to the 31 back but I’m going to get some support here from our engineer. 32 33 Board Member Baltay: Great, yeah, if you could just – it would be nice to get 34 that resolved. We’re looking at elevation two on sheet A-3.3 for anybody who 35 is following this. 36 37 Mr. Steinberg: Oh, I see, the back. 38 39 [Mr. Nick Tarious:] Talking about Olive? 40 41 Mr. Steinberg: He’s asking about the front and this is no more than 4-feet. 42 He’s asking – this looks taller, why? 43 44 Mr. Tarious: On Olive? 1 Mr. Steinberg: On the back side. He’s asking about the section going 2 perpendicular. 3 4 Mr. Tarious: Oh, ok. Hello, I’m Nick Tarious with Keir and Wright. So, yes, the 5 back side of the site does drop down from El Camino and that’s why you have 6 a taller section. 7 8 Board Member Baltay: By how much, can you say? 9 10 Mr. Tarious: Off the top my head? Do you know (inaudible)? 11 12 Mr. Steele: Also, I would add that in our landscaping plan along Acacia, that 13 from the side walk up to the building, that we’re sloping the soil up to reduce 14 the sense of how the 4-feet is out of the ground. So, from the front, it doesn’t 15 read like – so there’s a sense of that being added to the delta when you’re 16 looking at the images. We wanted the back to be at grade so that we could do 17 the amenities on grade but we have a slope on the front side to reduce the 18 sense of the building being a little higher than the street level. We also pulled 19 the building closer to the street than prior images that you had seen 20 (inaudible). 21 22 Board Member Baltay: We’ll get to all that but I would just like to get a 23 number. At the back of the building, on the low end and the high end, how 24 high is the floor level of the residences above the grade? 25 26 Mr. Tarious: Along Acacia (crosstalk) 8 ½-feet. 27 28 Board Member Baltay: The ground level is 8 ½-feet below the floor of the 29 apartments? 30 31 Mr. Tarious: The finish floor of the building is 8 ½-feet. The ground level is 8- 32 feet below the floor. 33 34 Board Member Baltay: And it’s 4-feet at the street so it’s a 4… 35 36 Mr. Tarious: No, it varies so when you start – the worst condition… 37 38 Board Member Baltay: That’s pretty far, that’s why I’m asking these 39 questions. Well, help me out, get an answer, Alex, for me. 40 41 Mr. Steinberg: Well that’s the curb. 42 43 Mr. Tarious: The curb, yes. (Inaudible) 44 1 Chair Lew: Can you – why don’t we move – I was going to say, should we – 2 we’ll move on and then maybe go back – can I ask you to do – can I ask you 3 do a little bit more homework because I would just say that the existing 4 grading plan, it’s relatively flat. So, if you have to do – if you’re doing 5 something else for the building to get it to work, I understand but there isn’t 6 that much a change front to back. There seems like there’s an existing 7 landscape strip back in the back that’s higher but let’s… 8 9 Mr. Tarious: The grade generally is flat, that is correct, yes and the building is 10 raised to compensate for that. That’s why you have the stoops and the 11 podiums coming out the front. 12 13 Chair Lew: So, let’s – we’ll get back – why don’t we get back to the grade but 14 I think we can move onto other questions (inaudible). Let’s not get stuck on 15 one item. Wynne, did you have another question? 16 17 Board Member Furth: No, thank you. 18 19 Chair Lew: Ok, your light – ok. I have a whole bunch of questions. 20 21 Mr. Steinberg: Ok, sure. 22 23 Chair Lew: Is there a public art requirement for the project and then what is – 24 how is that being handled? 25 26 Ms. Hodgkins: Yes, there is a public art requirement and it’s going to be paid 27 in lieu. They are not proposing any public art on site. 28 29 Chair Lew: Ok and then I was looking for it in the conditions of approval, I 30 didn’t see it but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t there. I just… 31 32 Ms. Hodgkins: It was just noted as the in-lieu fee would need to be paid as a 33 condition before the building permit is issued. 34 35 Chair Lew: Thank you. There is – for Mr. Steinberg, there’s a – I guess there is 36 a car wash requirement in the conditions of approval which is number 68 and I 37 think there’s a car wash space on the landscape plans but it looks like it’s just 38 space. So, are you building a whole pavilion structure for the car wash? 39 40 Mr. Steinberg: The condition allows us to -- that sense it’s a rental property, 41 not to provide one and have a lock off on the water source and prohibited in 42 the lease agreements. That will be the choice because of the various spaces 43 that the residents would have to park and we’d have to do the oil separate so 44 we’re going to elect not to have a wash station. 1 Chair Lew: Thank you. Are there air conditioner condensers for each unit and 2 if so, where are they? Are they on the roof or are they on the balconies? 3 4 Mr. Steinberg: They are on the roof. 5 6 Chair Lew: Great, good answer. Are there Z-Ducts on the El Camino frontage 7 for ventilation? I mean like you don’t have to have it if you have air 8 conditioning? 9 10 Mr. Steinberg: I don’t – we haven’t quite got to that level of development. 11 Chair Lew: Yeah, that’s fine. 12 13 Mr. Steele: Yeah, we don’t have the MEP but we would be looking at meeting 14 code for fresh air make up, which has changed recently and either it would be 15 incorporated into the window systems themselves or designed in a way that 16 they would complement the architectural exterior. 17 18 Chair Lew: Let’s see, I think for Mr. Steinberg, you’re showing a lot of soffits 19 like exterior corridors, the corners on El Camino, what are all the – what’s all 20 the soffit material? Is it just stucco or is it – or do you have different material 21 or will it vary depending on… 22 23 Mr. Steinberg: It’s going to vary so like on Olive, you can see the inside is the 24 – the soffit is going to be wood. On – generally, it looks like it's wood but it’s 25 going to be contiguous with the material that it’s adjacent to. 26 Chair Lew: You’re trying to make it look 3-dimensional – you’re not trying to 27 (crosstalk) (inaudible). 28 29 Mr. Steinberg: (Inaudible) look like wall paper, we’re trying to make it look 3- 30 dimensional, yes. 31 32 Chair Lew: That’s – thank you. Then on the railings, I think in some of the 33 renderings it’s looking like glass but in some of your drawings it’s called out as 34 metal, it’s sometimes a mesh. 35 36 Mr. Steinberg: Yes. 37 38 Chair Lew: Are there – yeah, so what… 39 40 Mr. Steinberg: It’s a decorative metal mesh so what we’re trying to do is to 41 strike a balance between not making it so clear that you see everything that 42 somebody has up there but not so opaque that you can’t enjoy the view when 43 you are sitting down inside. 1 Chair Lew: Ok, that makes sense. On the building along Acacia, the RM-30 2 zone building, you’re showing balconies on the – I guess it’s the first 3 residential floor. 4 5 Mr. Steinberg: And some on the second ones. (Inaudible) (crosstalk) 6 Chair Lew: Yeah, so I guess I was mostly concerned with the ones on the – I 7 guess the ones that I noticed was on the – let’s see. I guess this is – I guess 8 my question is that you are showing some privacy screens between units but 9 not every unit and like on the back of the building you are showing three stair 10 cases down to the open space. I was wondering how that is going to work? 11 Like because of you – I mean that’s somebody’s private deck, right? Each – 12 they are private decks but some of them are shared between units so you 13 don’t necessarily have privacy between every unit. 14 15 Mr. Steinberg: So, you are correct. That we missing some perpendicular 16 separations on those balconies. Some – one or two are shown and there are a 17 few that are missing but for the stairs, for example, the two units on the left 18 would share a stair, the two units in the middle would share a stair and the 19 bigger unit on the right would get its own stair so I apologize about that. 20 21 Chair Lew: Ok, I think we can discuss that later and then – ok, I think that’s 22 all the questions I have or I have one last question. I’ve been reading a lot of 23 complaints about one of our new mixed-use buildings on El Camino and the 24 complaint is from – retail customers cannot figure out how to get into the 25 building garage and then get from the garage to the stores. So, I was 26 wondering if you could explain, like if I am coming to one of the stores in this 27 future building, how – as a customer and not as a resident of the building. 28 How do I know to get to the front door of the store and I think part of it is 29 signage, which isn’t in your – part of your – part of the project today but I 30 think that’s something that we’re – I’m curious about. 31 32 Mr. Steinberg: Let me see if I have a better drawing to explain this. I was 33 looking for the floor plan but it’s pretty straight forward really. You – if you are 34 coming to the retail and you want to park in the garage, you could come on El 35 Camino, turn on Acacia, come in our main entrance and go down the ramp. 36 This part, the northern part, two-thirds of it or half is the commercial parking 37 and in there is an elevator lobby right in the middle of that building. So, 38 centered in the middle of the commercial dedicated parking is an elevator that 39 takes you right up. 40 41 Chair Lew: Can you differentiate it from the residential elevator lobby? 42 43 Mr. Steinberg: Yes, it’s separate. 44 1 Chair Lew: I know it’s separate but make it – actually make it – that’s not 2 really part of the ARB’s purview but design wise, make it look more public. So, 3 like we have some of the garages here in downtown where the elevator 4 enclosure – like elevator lobby is all glass so it’s pretty clear that it’s a public 5 lobby but then the residential… 6 7 Mr. Steinberg: I see what you’re saying. 8 9 Chair Lew: …elevator could be more solid walls. It would look like it’s 10 something private and I understand (crosstalk) that you have a fence or a 11 gate and everything too. 12 13 Mr. Steinberg: No, no, I follow your point. That elevator lobby that is 14 dedicated just to the retail is on the same plane as the glass retail and so it’s 15 going to be of that same vocabulary. It’s going to be quite clear that that is an 16 elevator dedicated to this use. It will speak the same language and I take your 17 point that it should be obvious and clear that that’s an asset to the project. 18 Thank you. 19 20 Chair Lew: Then also to maybe consider possibly have consideration for 21 signage to the ramp – the garage ramp. So, if I came – if I was a customer 22 and I came down Olive and I turned into the parking lot and the parking lots 23 full. I might not know to make a little U-turn through the roundabout and go 24 down to the – go down the ramp. 25 26 Mr. Steinberg: So, there should be some signage at the end that explains – 27 yeah. 28 29 Chair Lew: Because to be honest with you, Acacia doesn’t have very good – as 30 good of visibility as Olive. That’s just my take on it, I don’t… 31 32 Mr. Steinberg: No, you’re right. Here’s one of the things that we found, 33 particularly on El Camino and with retail, that if you can get a clue of where 34 the parking is before you see the retail as compared to seeing the retail and 35 then seeing oh yeah, you can park here. It gives you a few minutes to process 36 but your points well taken. 37 38 Chair Lew: I agree. Ok, any other questions? Wynne. 39 Board Member Furth: I’m sorry, this is a complicated site and I like your 40 proposal and all that but take me through a resident, when I come home at 41 night, late, I’m going to feel secure about where I’m parking and how I get to 42 my home? 43 44 Mr. Steinberg: Ok, so we have two different conditions. For the El Camino 45 building, you would drive into Acacia, you’d come through a nice entry plaza 1 that would be glass and the lobbies would be lite up and we have columns and 2 lighting in the sense of an arrival. Then you would go past the turnaround and 3 you would go directly down to the garage, straight ahead, no turns. You would 4 go into the garage and you would go past the commercial and there would be 5 a secondary security gate. So, at this end of the site is all residential and in 6 the middle of that residential parking would be an elevator that would take 7 you directly up to your unit. On our Acacia building, you would make the turn 8 on Acacia, you would go past the building, you would turn into the site and 9 make a left and go right into a double loaded parking garage. If you were at 10 this end of the site, you could go on that elevator and if you were here, you 11 could go up a secondary lobby directly to your unit. 12 13 Board Member Furth: And that’s a secured garage in the evening? 14 Mr. Steinberg: Yes, oh, yes. 15 16 Board Member Furth: Thanks, nice answer. 17 18 Mr. Steinberg: Ok, thank you. 19 20 Chair Lew: Ok, Kyu? 21 22 Vice Chair Kim: Alright, thank you, Mr. Steinberg, for your presentation. I 23 think overall the project has made a lot of improvements since the last time 24 we’ve seen it. I especially appreciate the fact that you are trying to 25 accommodate our wishes for that Acacia building to be lower and closer to the 26 ground than it was before. I do agree with Board Member Baltay that there’s a 27 little bit of open-ended to exactly how far above grade that building is. I was 28 looking at the building sections on A-4.0 and it seems to actually fairly clearly 29 call out that on the garage entry portion of the building, that the finished floor 30 of the residences is 8 ½-feet above ground but I guess that’s closer to the 31 garage ramp so perhaps it’s a little bit higher than it is actually at the side 32 walk of Acacia. I do think it’s definitely an improvement over the 13-feet 33 above ground that it was. 34 35 Mr. Steinberg: Excuse me, I apologize for the confusion here. On sheet A-4.0… 36 37 Vice Chair Kim: Yes. 38 39 Mr. Steinberg: If you look at the section closest to the bottom right corner, 40 you can see that there – the grade – the existing grade level – I see what’s 41 causing – the section is taken not a that the street. It’s setback from the 42 street but if you look at the notes that the curb is at 00. That’s where the 43 street is and level two is 4-feet higher than that. 44 45 Vice Chair Kim: So, the (crosstalk)… 1 Mr. Steinberg: (Inaudible) 2 3 Vice Chair Kim: … sidewalk of Acacia… 4 5 Mr. Steinberg: The section that we’re looking at is showing the grades 6 ramping down to the garage. 7 8 Vice Chair Kim: So, Acacia is essentially parallel to the building? There’s no 9 additional slope along Acacia? 10 11 Mr. Steinberg: No, there is. If you… 12 13 Ms. Hodgkins: It seems like it slopes… 14 15 Mr. Steinberg: The street is sloping but we are building up the grade with a 16 series of planters and landscaping (inaudible) (crosstalk). 17 Vice Chair Kim: So, it still to me and maybe I am miss reading the drawing 18 but you seem to call out that dotted line saying sidewalk grade change and it 19 comes down basically to the garage entry. Which would indicate that it’s still 8 20 ½-feet below the residential finished floor? I mean it’s ok, it’s just something 21 to maybe take a look at and confirm with us. 22 23 Mr. Steinberg: Sure, so I just want to point out one thing to you. This is the 24 construction but if you look at the rendering on the screen, you can see that 25 the lower part, we’re actually naturally berming the land up and we’re doing 26 another layering with a retaining with a secondary planting so that we’re really 27 trying to make the building feel grounded. 28 29 Vice Chair Kim: Right and I think you’ve done a much better job of this than it 30 was previously so thank you. I guess my comments are a little unorganized 31 but I’ll just make them as I go so I want to reiterate a point that was made 32 previously. That I feel strongly that the long-term bicycle parking should be 33 accessible at grade. I think given the location of the site, it’s actually a great 34 location because it’s on a busy street; El Camino. Where I feel we can use the 35 greater density and it’s also convenient access to the Caltrain station on 36 California and just being to get around from this location is a great asset for 37 the project. I think for those who are taking their bicycles everywhere, to have 38 to ride your bike down the ramp or to have to shove it into the elevator to go 39 down to park your bike seems like a bit of an inconvenience but I understand 40 that that’s not a requirement but I did want to reiterate the point. 41 Mr. Steinberg: You know, we’ll take that heart. Of course, we’re fighting for all 42 these different things but I… (crosstalk) 43 44 Vice Chair Kim: (Inaudible) 1 Mr. Steinberg: …recognize what you’re saying and we’ll try to accomplish – 2 we’ll try to address that. 3 4 Vice Chair Kim: Yeah, thank you. I can’t help but really applaud your take on 5 the project because it is such a difficult project with the three different zones 6 and just the awkward shapes that you are trying to merge to make this 7 project happen. One comment that I have when looking through the drawings 8 set was that I think the perspectives at eye level of the different views of the 9 residential entries and the corners of the building are excellent. They give us a 10 nice feel of what the building is going to look like and how people are going to 11 interact with it. Maybe a comment that I don’t make too often is maybe we 12 could – I was looking for maybe a view of – a bird’s eye view that would show 13 both of the building and how they relate to one another. As opposed to simply 14 having to look at the elevations and make my own compare and contrast 15 observations but that’s a relatively minor comment. The reason why I wanted 16 to look at that was that I think the material pallet that you are using between 17 the two building is quite similar and there’s a lot of repetition of materials. I 18 don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I think you can use that to 19 your benefit in this project. Especially because you’ve got those shared 20 amenities that you were explaining in your presentation. The elevation along 21 El Camino, I think is much better and the fact that you are kind of staggering 22 these elements and you’ve moved the ins and outs of the building in such a 23 way that I think begins to feel much more interesting and less repetitive. I like 24 the fact that you’re reoriented the residential lobbies to face one another and 25 to really make that feel like a residential entry for pedestrians, bicycles and 26 automobiles alike from Acacia. I think looking at the elevation drawings, one 27 thing that’s a little misleading is traditionally we use a lot of line weights to 28 indicate what elements of the building are closer and what elements are 29 further away. I know that you are attempting to do that using some kind of an 30 opacity layer in some aspects of the building. I think it can read a little bit 31 more flat than you are actually proposing and so that’s where I think the 3-D 32 views really help me to understand exactly how far back certain elements of 33 the building are pushed back and pushed forward and where the soffits are 34 coming out to extend and create over hangs. Overall, I think I can make the 35 findings to recommend approval of the project. I think there are a couple 36 things such as a real materials board and material samples that we can look 37 at. Especially for the cement plaster and the colors and the materials such as 38 the metal mesh railing that you mentioned, as well as the wood, of course. I – 39 you know I think the fact that this is a very large project at a site that 40 deserves a large project and the fact that it’s mostly residential is excellent 41 and it’s something that the City really needs. I understand that with the Site 42 and Design Review Process, that this project will go to Council nevertheless as 43 well so I don’t have very many hesitations in recommending approval. I thank 44 you for trying to address our comments and additionally listening to the other 1 comments that I’ve made today and taking them to heart. Thank you very 2 much and I hope to see the building built. 3 4 Mr. Steinberg: Ok, thank you. 5 6 Chair Lew: Peter. 7 8 Board Member Baltay: Ok, thank you. I am very impressed and pleased with 9 the overall site planning of this project. The way you’ve accommodated the 10 parking and the pedestrian activation of the corners. In fact, I would like to 11 say to Staff and hopefully this gets to the Council level even but this is a good 12 example of how to create pedestrian friendly spaces on corners along El 13 Camino. The way they’ve stepped back these plazas and they have a few trees 14 and plants to shelter it a little bit. They’re not expecting it to be the main 15 public space of a residence but for a café, a Starbucks, it really works. It’s also 16 attractive looking on both ends of the street. It’s something that we see 17 repeatedly, especially in this neighborhood, as being developed intensely now 18 and we’ve repeatedly said that. That pedestrian activation is important and 19 this is, in my opinion, a good example of how you can accomplish that at the 20 ground level. I also think that the parking is well done in that they have some 21 spaces up at the grade level. When those people are looking for the store, 22 there are 15 or so spots right there. So, most of the time you can just run in 23 and out. You also can sort of see where the store is before you go down the 24 ramp so you have a little bit of the visual sense of orientation. You have a mix 25 of parking that for the residences it’s all the way in the back where they need 26 it to be and understand it. We’ll see in other projects even today -- I think this 27 is a good example again, of how to mix it up a little bit with the parking and 28 meet the needs of all the tenants in the building. I find that that planning 29 really works quite well. Again, that circle in the middle again, really helps to 30 find the space, it gives you the sense of slowing down, how to drive around. I 31 applaud you on your site planning for building and I’m very impressed with 32 the design at the grade level along El Camino, especially. I’m also fine with 33 the Design Enhancement Exception for the ramp. We’ve repeatedly approved 34 that kind of thing and it’s necessary to make this work. It’s actually a good 35 use of the land close to the residents and shields them so again I think that’s 36 a good idea. Ok, I have two sets of concerns I guess. One is on the El Camino 37 frontage, as handsome as I find the building to be, we have design guidelines 38 that call for buildings to have base, a middle and a top. I find that this building 39 has a wonderful base and a clear middle but there’s no top and if I pull your 40 attention to some of the renderings. Maybe elevation one on 3.5 for example, 41 if you look at that corner. That’s a very dramatic sculptural bit of building 42 there and it certainly marks the corner and it creates a wonderful pedestrian 43 space but I’m afraid that I can’t find that it meets the El Camino Real 44 Guidelines of having a top. We’re trying to create a grand boulevard and that 45 requires the buildings to have some sense of relating to each other over the 1 time. Generally, that means some capping element, some kind or another. 2 When I just sort of poke around on your elevations, say elevation one on 3 sheet A-3.1, the – what I call the middle. The large residential portion of the 4 building again, has these white pieces which are nicely mixed up in massing 5 and as you pointed out in your initial presentation, they do create a less 6 monolithic feeling to the street than your plans. I put it to my fellow 7 colleagues on the Board though how far do we push to get some kind of a 8 cap? Some kind of a roof element on the top here and I guess I feel that we 9 have to force these guidelines. That’s what they are for and I don’t see it on 10 this façade here. It would also be nice to see the actual materials that you are 11 proposing. I don’t know why that’s not here now but it is pretty important 12 what color that plaster is and what that wood finish would be. Then my second 13 issue really had been with the building in the back when it was – the 14 residences were 13-feet above ground and it was just unacceptable. I find the 15 drawings unclear but if the residential floor level is 4-feet above the grade at 16 the street, I think that’s great; 4-feet at one end and 2-feet or so at the other. 17 That seems to me just the perfect amount of grade separation. I think from 18 walking on the site and from looking at your grading and drainage plan and 19 stuff, the back area should be similarly situated. I don’t see how you can get it 20 down 8-feet and I suspect that there’s some inconsistencies on the drawings 21 that -- I can’t believe that ramp coming off of Acacia drops down 4-feet before 22 you go into the garage. That doesn’t seem realistic and you're showing it 23 connecting to the existing parking lot. I walked over there just yesterday and 24 there’s no notice of a grade change and I think it’s fine. I think I’d like to say 25 though that we should ask that the building remain at about 4-feet above 26 grade, which is what you’ve stated and I think that’s a really nice amount of 27 grade separation. I think it does have the effect that we wanted to bring that 28 building down to a more residential scale. I think the planting and the 29 landscaping you’ve done along Acacia are quite handsome and they do a nice 30 job. That the plantings do a – give it a residential feeling. I know I had 31 mentioned earlier that having balconies or stoops but I think what you’ve 32 proposed seems good. My concern was related to the open space on the back. 33 It’s the kind of place where a mother may want her children to be able to play 34 and the difference between being 8-feet above ground and an average of 35 three is a big difference. That’s where it’s important that I think that space to 36 be activated and closer to grade you can get the residences is better. So 37 again, if it’s 4-feet at the back and 2-feet at the front, I believe that works. 38 Then when I look at the design of the buildings on the back, I’d like to pull up 39 your rendering two on sheet A-3.6 and just comment to my fellow Board 40 Members that I find that the design of those balconies, it seems to be some 41 sort of a steel frame with an X-brace. It’s just not quite residential enough, I 42 don’t think. It could use a little bit of revision just to down play it a little bit 43 more. So again, I’m eager to hear what my colleague’s think but that 44 rendering shows it to me that it’s just not quite right. So, with that I’ll finish 45 my comments and see what everybody else has to say. Thank you. 1 Mr. Steinberg: Excuse me, Mr. Chairmen? 2 3 Chair Lew: Yes, Mr. Steinberg? 4 5 Mr. Steinberg: Would it be possible for me to respond… 6 7 Chair Lew: Yes. 8 9 Mr. Steinberg: … those (inaudible) while it’s fresh in everybody’s mind? The – 10 let’s go backward, X-bracing, we can certainly look at that. We can certainly 11 look at the detail, how the mesh is attached and the framing so we’re more 12 than happy to continue to refine that. On the Acacia and the height of that 13 building, I think I wasn’t perfectly clear and I just want to make sure that 14 we’re meeting in the mind and where I think the confusing is, is if we look at 15 A-4.0, there is about an 8-foot difference from the existing grade at the 16 sidewalk to the first floor. In the setback, as I showed you on the rendering, 17 we are landscaping that to elevate it so that we minimize so that it’s about 4- 18 feet from the grade against the building. Do you follow? 19 20 Board Member Baltay: I follow. I find that you guys are being deceptive, 21 frankly. These drawings are not showing it at 8-feet and they are not showing 22 it at 4-feet. The Staff report and what’s been stated in the public is that it’s 4- 23 feet above the ground; now you’re saying it’s 8-feet. 24 25 Mr. Steinberg: No, I’m saying it’s 4-feet above what will be the finished grade. 26 27 Board Member Baltay: Ground I mean is a sidewalk. It’s a flat site right now 28 because you’re building up the grade next to the building, it’s deceptive to 29 claim that that’s the grade. We’re all talking about the ground right now at the 30 sidewalk. So, the question that I will ask you once again, at the low end of 31 Acacia, if I am standing on the sidewalk, how high above me is the floor level 32 of the first floor of the residence? 33 34 Mr. Steinberg: Eight feet. 35 36 Board Member Baltay: Thank you. Ok and then I put to my Board Members in 37 that that’s too high. It really needs to be 4-feet. That’s what’s we asked for 38 the first time around and playing (inaudible) tricks with the finished grade is 39 not really doing it. Your elevations and renderings are showing something 40 different. Look at the rendering on the screen, that many standing there, his 41 head is above the finished floor of that balcony; that’s not 8-feet. It’s 42 important to present it honestly and this is beautifully done and you’ve got 43 very good design stuff going on… 44 45 Mr. Steinberg: Well, so that’s the… 1 Board Member Baltay: … but these are back and forth. I’m sorry, I don’t want 2 to argue back and forth but speaking to my colleagues here that we need 3 something that works and I feel like this should be… 4 5 Chair Lew: If you look on section A-4.1, which is the cross section through the 6 building along Acacia. So, the one – so, drawing number one, that’s actually at 7 the exit stair, right? So, they are showing the 4-feet plus an additional 20 8 inches. 9 10 Board Member Baltay: Which drawing are you looking at, Alex? 11 Chair Lew: The section on the bottom number one. 12 13 Board Member Baltay: The bottom section number one. 14 15 Chair Lew: Right and see the exit stair? 16 17 Board Member Baltay: Yes, that’s… 18 19 Chair Lew: Ok, so we’ve got – so that – what we’ve been mentioning is that 20 there’s a 4-foot difference between the first resident floor and the elevator 21 lobby, right? Then there are an extra 20-inches down to the street. So, that 22 would be under 6-feet so it doesn’t – maybe it’s 8-feet at the far end near the 23 garage but it’s not 8-feet – there isn’t an 8-foot change all the way through, 24 right, so it’s confusing. 25 26 Board Member Baltay: Is the street sloping that significantly? There’s 2-feet of 27 slope (crosstalk) (inaudible). 28 29 Chair Lew: I don’t know. There are – there is a grading plan – there is a 30 topographic survey on C-1.0. Everything slopes, slightly right? I mean this 31 31.5 versus 31.2. If we think this need to come back, I’m fine with that but… 32 33 Board Member Baltay: I would… 34 Chair Lew: I think we’ve got – we understand that there’s a problem. Ok, 35 Wynne? 36 37 Board Member Furth: Thank you. I’m feeling a little better about being 38 confused about some elements of the plan. First of all, it’s a wonderful project 39 to have come before us and to have this kind of development. It’s been in 40 general a very good presentation and it’s exciting to think of this number of 41 residential units being built here. I think you’ve successfully, as I say, 42 engaged the street and it’s easy to imagine this as being a very successful 43 place to live, to walk through, to walk by, to go to for retail uses. I think the 44 parking is thoughtfully and effectively designed. I agree that having some 45 surface parking for retail uses is basically essential in this still – this City that 1 still thinks it’s a suburb and I very much appreciate the thoughtfulness that’s 2 gone into thinking about how people navigate through this site at various 3 times of the day. For varies purposes, I very strongly second my colleague 4 Kyu Kim’s comments about bicycle parking. I’m a person who rides a bike to 5 get places like the dentist and the grocery store and I do not want to go 6 wandering off into the garage with my bicycle. I was a little puzzled by what 7 seemed to be continuous first floor balconies along Acacia, is that a drawing 8 error? 9 10 Mr. Steinberg: Yes, we’re missing the (inaudible) (crosstalk). 11 12 Board Member Furth: It’s not actually an external… 13 14 Mr. Steinberg: No. 15 16 Board Member Furth: …walk way? 17 18 Mr. Steinberg: No, they are individual. 19 Board Member Furth: Because I would not support that. I also agree with my 20 colleague Peter Baltay’s comments about the design of the second-floor 21 balconies looking a little bit over designed. They look like the Alcoa building 22 and this is not appropriate (inaudible) I think. I’m completely bewildered by 23 what the grades are at Acacia but I will tell you that from my point of view, 24 grade means when I’m standing on the sidewalk because that’s what’s going 25 to affect my perceptions of how high the first floor is. I thought it was 4-feet 26 and I thought that was terrific; I hope it turns out to be somewhere like that. 27 You know the drawings of this project get ever more beautiful and I suspect 28 that I’m not the more critical viewer of such drawings. I like your proposal for 29 dealing with the plazas. I think that you addressed Mr. Moss’s concern about 30 having the significant feel of landscape and greenery as you go along this 31 project and as you move within it. When I look at the plant list -- I forget 32 which exhibit that is, I took some notes but I know you can find it and look at 33 the plant selection; I guess it's L-40. No, it must be L-46, any way you know 34 where it is. If you look at the list and all the boxes checked no on whether 35 these are native plants, then I don’t have enough information about your 36 landscaping plans to make the required findings about your landscaping being 37 suitable habitat and using native plants where possible. This is a big site so 38 you should have significant non-human wildlife here. Preferably of the desired 39 type but at present, I can’t understand the plant choices. One last look at my 40 notes. I think that addresses everything I looked at. My notes from the first 41 round say great proposed use, like the corner treatments, still a little muddled 42 on how it all fits together in terms of access but you’ve addressed that. I’d say 43 the way you handled the parking is not only good, it verges on visionary. I 44 mean this seems to be finally an appropriate use of puzzle parking or 45 whatever we call it these days and this is really thoughtful. So many of the 1 issues that we raise on other projects, you’ve thought about ahead of time. 2 Thank you. 3 Mr. Steinberg: Could… 4 5 Chair Lew: Yes, Mr. Steinberg? 6 7 Mr. Steinberg: Well, I just wanted to say that we are certainly agreeable to re- 8 looking at the cross bracing. We’ll certainly – will work with you on making 9 sure we get a good balance with the drought tolerant plants and we’ll give a 10 good try to see what we can do for the long-term bike. Those I just want to – 11 we’ll work with you on that no problem. If the issues come down to a material 12 board, whether to put some detail on the caps along El Camino and clarifying 13 and refining the corner of the Acacia building. If those are the things that are 14 troubling, I might ask that we be able to do that with a Committee and 15 expedite that. We’re trying to stay on a schedule to get to the Council if 16 possible. Thank you. 17 18 Chair Lew: Ok, so I have – I’m generally in agreement with my other Board 19 Members. I do want to thank you for doing a great packet of drawings. It’s 20 very clear generally and easy to read and thank you, Claire, you did a great 21 job on the Staff report. My concern – here are my concerns, one is I think it 22 gets to Mr. Moss’s point, which is that I don’t think there is enough 23 landscaping on the El Camino frontage. You’re showing some planters at the 24 corner and then you’re showing some really, really skinner planters in the 25 middle portion of the building. I was scaling them and they might be 12-inches 26 deep and the ones that I’ve seen where we’ve done it really skinny, like at 27 Bloomingdale’s, they just don’t – they just barely work. I would argue that in 28 the 12-foot effective sidewalk – right, so we have the sidewalk but it looks like 29 a public sidewalk but it’s on your private property. I would argue that you 30 have room there to do something else. We have like the furnishing zone of the 31 sidewalk, you can make those – you can make them deeper, thicker and get 32 more plants in there and I would like to see a detail for that. I don’t – I didn’t 33 find any detail for that. I do want to see a detail for railings and may be soffits 34 as well and I think to your point – also awnings. You know I’ve been torn in 35 my mind about this, I was thinking that the details could come back to the 36 subcommittee and then I am also reminded that some of the Board Members 37 weren’t happy with your – one of your other projects. Just the way the – well 38 not the design of the project, it’s just the way it was handled. So, like the 39 Epiphany Hotel, where things came back to the subcommittee but the 40 subcommittee wasn’t aware of all the changes that were happening. I think we 41 will have to (inaudible) it here on the Board. On the awnings along El Camino, 42 I do want to caution you that I’ve done that on the big mixed-use building and 43 when you have the grade sloping, sometimes at the high point of the grade 44 the awnings look to low. You don’t see it in elevation, it’s only once the 45 awnings go – once they’re installed, then you realize that they are too low and 1 you don’t see it in elevation. Also on the store front windows along El Camino, 2 I think I would like a detail at the sill. I didn’t – I was looking at your drawings 3 and I couldn’t figure out exactly what you were doing but I think generally we 4 like to have some sort of nice detail at the base there and not just have a 5 standard store front going down to the concrete curb. So, I don’t know if that’s 6 tile or some sort of detail or an extra channel or something; I think that would 7 be appreciated. On the – I think I also would want to see more information on 8 the – so, in addition – like the Board Members have mentioned the materials 9 board and in addition, I would include on the landscape, like the decking. I 10 think you’re showing wood decking on Acacia and I just want to caution you, 11 you know wood decks look great when they are new but a year later they 12 often look terrible if they’re – if the stain is wearing out. Then in the most high 13 traffic areas, they get worn down pretty heavily. So, I want to know if this is 14 stained wood, is it pressure treated wood, is it Trex, what exactly is it? I agree 15 with Board Member Further on the landscaping. I would not be able to – I 16 don’t think I could make the findings for that and it’s not just drought tolerant 17 anymore. Our findings changed earlier this year so it’s California or local 18 native plants that can provide habitat to wildlife to the maximum extent 19 possible; factoring in maintenance. In your planting plan, I mean there are a 20 lot of very good garden plants like – so like fortnight lily, I mean that could be 21 – I would say just out of the top of my head maybe that could be a native iris 22 possible. It’s showing lavender, it seems to me that maybe could be 23 Eriogonum or Zauschneria or possible a Salvia. Showing like Rhaphiolepis and 24 Rosmarinus, those could also be native plants, so it seems to me that there’s 25 a whole bunch of them that could increase your ratio of non-native to native 26 plants. Some of the – also, I have some trouble keying the plant pallet to the 27 drawings. I’m not sure – they may not be final yet and so I think that could be 28 revised to get them – to get the plan and the plant legend perfectly 29 correspondent. So, that’s all – oh, then I think my last item would be that I 30 would argue you for more – maybe one more – one or two more colors on the 31 stucco between the two buildings like an accent color; maybe at entrances or 32 something. I think the dark gray or the gray that you are showing, I think is 33 compatible with the Equinix building. My hunch is that the white is going to 34 provide a lot of glare in the late afternoon and I think that’s undesirable. I 35 think that – yeah, I think the other caution that I would have on the white if 36 you don’t want to have a cornice is that all the dirt comes down on the cornice 37 and it looks terrible. We have that here on our – I think we have a Studio 38 (inaudible) project on Alma where the dirt is just oozing down the sides of the 39 building and it looks awful. Ok, we’ll bring it back to the Board now, what do 40 you guys – do you want to see this again as the Board or do you think this can 41 come back to a subcommittee or it could even come back to Staff? And or – 42 yeah? 43 44 Board Member Furth: I would be in favor of bringing it back to the Board. 45 1 Vice Chair Kim: I’m in favor of subcommittee. 2 3 Chair Lew: Peter? 4 5 Board Member Baltay: No, I don’t understand how the subcommittee could 6 handle all these things so I think it has to come back to the Board. 7 8 Chair Lew: Do we (inaudible) of every or do we have any internal 9 disagreements about the things that we’ve been discussing? 10 11 Vice Chair Kim: Well, Board Member Baltay asked us to comment on the 12 notion of a base, middle and top. 13 14 Chair Lew: Yes. 15 16 Vice Chair Kim: To me, I can see a top. I don’t think the top necessarily has to 17 be a crown or an eyebrow or anything like that. I clearly see elements of the 18 building that extend higher and I think it’s more of a contemporary treatment 19 of a top so that doesn’t bother me too much. I understand that other people 20 can view that in different ways but that would be my response to that. The 21 architect also said that he would take a look at the long-term bicycle parking. 22 I just wanted to be clear that that really should be incorporated into the 23 building. I just don’t want it to end up at the – on top of the garage ramp or 24 anything because it’s a matter of safety and being able to bring your bike into 25 a secured area very close to your home so I just want to throw that out there 26 as well. 27 28 Chair Lew: The language – I read – we read the language of the code 29 yesterday for that. I mean it does ask that it be at grade or it could be in a 30 garage but it’s in the garage and it needs to be next to the stair and the 31 elevator. I would argue that... 32 33 Vice Chair Kim: (Inaudible) 34 35 Chair Lew: … it’s not – well, there’s residential and there’s also commercial but 36 I would actually argue that they are not in the best place. 37 38 Board Member Baltay: I fully support the notion of getting much better 39 accessibility for the long term and short-term bike parking as Kyu has been 40 pointing out. I want to caution and ask my colleagues, I think if the architect 41 just puts a trim band at the top of these white units on El Camino, the building 42 will be much worse off. What I am really doing is trying to point out to us that 43 we’ve been tasked to enforce these guidelines which require a top. I would 44 really like to see the architect give a very creative effort to how do you make 45 a contemporary building meet this guideline? It would really require you to go 1 back and try to understand what the intent of the guideline is. The intent is to 2 create a boulevard of buildings which create a sort of a height line like the 3 [phonetics] [Champ La Seine] in Paris. That’s what the planners, that’s what 4 everybody is dreaming for and we’re just tasked to try and enforce it but I 5 would be really sad if this comes back to the subcommittee with a 12-foot – 6 12-inch trim band a different color at the top. That we stuck our foot in the 7 wrong place and it made it a lot worse. So, I think if we are to require that, it 8 has to be something that’s done very carefully. I think we, as a Board, should 9 think hard about that this is a fairly well-designed building as it is but it just 10 doesn’t quite meet this guideline. Do we really want to jump into that? 11 12 Chair Lew: Ok, I was trying to pull up the – pull it up on the – the actual 13 wording on the – in the guidelines. That was under building design, right? So, 14 section four… 15 16 Board Member Baltay: As well as I (inaudible)… 17 18 Chair Lew: Well, it doesn’t really say that you have to have cornice. It’s saying 19 that you have to have a parapet edge so it’s pretty vague. It has to have 20 something, right? Ok. 21 22 Board Member Baltay: My understanding is that the idea is to give the building 23 a cap. A roof that’s connecting to the other building up and down the street. 24 25 Chair Lew: I’m not sure it says that. 26 Board Member Baltay: So, yeah, it is vague. What I am trying to do is avoid 27 us just having the architect for the sake of expediency give a trim band… 28 29 Chair Lew: Right. 30 Board Member Baltay: …which makes it a lot worse. 31 32 Chair Lew: Ok. 33 34 Board Member Baltay: It is a well-designed building and I don’t want to make 35 it worse. I’m just pointing out that we have this other requirement. So, I think 36 we’re speaking with one voice on that? 37 38 Chair Lew: Yes, I – well I agree with you, more is better on big buildings. 39 40 Board Member Baltay: The other issue Alex, I think we talked about a lot is 41 the height of the residential building above the ground and how we establish 42 that. I think we’re better off giving them a clear direction than leaving it 43 vague. I had thrown out there that the floor plate of the – the floor should be 44 no more than 4-feet above the ground level at the sidewalk adjacent to the 1 building. Maybe that’s too much but I think we should give him some 2 direction. It’s really a matter of how the parking access works in the garage. 3 Chair Lew: Right. Well I get – that was my point is that they have to get the 4 ramp to work down to the garage so why don’t we say that we want – well, 5 that’s what we want and then we will see what we get. 6 7 Board Member Baltay: We started this when they came to us when it was 13- 8 feet above the ground. We asked them to bring it to four. We were told that it 9 was four when we’re looking at it, it’s 8-feet and I don’t know how to put it to 10 you more bluntly but we asked for four. I think that’s a perfect amount as far 11 as design relative to the street. Maybe I would say 6-feet would be acceptable 12 to me given that you have other constraints but leaving it like it is, is not good 13 enough in my opinion. I think we should, as a Board, speak how we feel about 14 that so we don’t go around in circles on this issue. 15 16 Chair Lew: I’m in agreement with you. Question for Staff, so they’re in a hurry 17 to get to the Council, as everybody is, right? What is the calendar looking like 18 and is there an anticipated Council date that you – that Staff is thinking 19 about? 20 Mr. Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director of Planning: I’ll take that question so it 21 really needs to – it’s a Site and Design Application. It’s gone to the Planning 22 Commission, it goes the Architectural Review Board and you have up to three 23 reviews. I believe this is your second formal hearing and our schedule is based 24 on when it gets passed this process. So, we do have some tentative dates 25 scheduled but it’s contingent on what happens here. 26 27 Chair Lew: Thank you for that. Ok, Peter, I’m going to leave it to you. I think 28 you’ve got a motion, you just have to make it. 29 30 MOTION 31 Board Member Baltay: Well, I move that we continue this project to a date 32 uncertain subject to the comments we’ve made. I’d like to stipulate in 33 particular that the residential building be no more than 6-feet above the 34 ground adjacent to the building at the sidewalk. 35 36 Chair Lew: I would just – I go ahead with the – all the cornice piece. 37 Board Member Baltay: Do you want me to list all those things? 38 Chair Lew: Yeah, cornice, materials and all that. 39 40 Board Member Baltay: Ok, that the design of the building facing El Camino be 41 reconsidered to have some sort of a cap or element at the top on some 42 portions of the façade. That the long-term bicycle parking be placed at grade 43 or otherwise easily and directly accessible. That the landscaping be revised to 44 incorporate native and drought-tolerant plants. That we have a color and 45 materials board presented. Railings -- that the balconies and associated 1 railings and awnings for the residential building on Acacia be reconsidered. As 2 well as – do we have an issue with the railings on El Camino? 3 Chair Lew: Well, they haven’t really – there’s no design detail presented so 4 why don’t we just (inaudible). 5 6 Board Member Baltay: So, we’d like to see some of that design detail. I think 7 we also asked for some of the detail on the store front glazing. 8 9 Chair Lew: I would say window details. 10 11 Board Member Baltay: Window details in general? Ok, so window details be 12 provided. That the planters along EL Camino be reconsidered to be slightly 13 wider, is that right? Deeper. I think that covers everything so that’s my 14 motion. 15 16 Chair Lew: Any seconds? 17 18 Board Member Furth: Second. 19 20 Chair Lew: Ok, all in favor? Opposed? None, so that’s 4-0 with Board Member 21 Gooyer absent. Thank you, Mr. Steinberg, great and Mr. Steele. We’re going 22 to take a 2-minute break and then hear the next item which is 4190 El Camino 23 Real. Attachment K Environmental Documents Directions to review Environmental Documents online: 1. Go to: https://paloalto.buildingeye.com/planning 2. Search for “3001 El Camino Real” and open record by clicking on the green dot 3. Review the record details and open the “more details” option 4. Use the “Records Info” drop down menu and select “Attachments” 5. Open the attachment named “Draft Initial Study/Mitigated Negative Declaration 3001 El Camino Real” 6. Open the attachment named “Draft Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program” Attachment L Project Plans Hardcopies of project plans are provided to Commissioners. These plans are available to the public online and by visiting the Planning and Community Environmental Department on the 5th floor of City Hall at 250 Hamilton Avenue. Directions to review Project plans online: 1. Go to: https://paloalto.buildingeye.com/planning 2. Search for “3001 El Camino Real” and open record by clicking on the green dot 3. Review the record details and open the “more details” option 4. Use the “Records Info” drop down menu and select “Attachments” 5. Open the attachment named “2017-0925 Project Plans” Architectural Review Board Staff Report (ID # 8468) Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 10/5/2017 City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment 250 Hamilton Avenue Palo Alto, CA 94301 (650) 329-2442 Summary Title: 180 Hamliton Ave: Hotel Facade Change (1st Formal) Title: PUBLIC HEARING / QUASI-JUDICIAL. 180 Hamilton Avenue (17PLN-00171): Consideration of a Minor Architectural Review to Allow for Exterior Improvements to an Existing Hotel. The Proposed Changes Include: Replacing the Ground Floor Storefronts Along the Hamilton Avenue and Emerson Street Entries, Replacing the Existing Awning at the Emerson Street Entry, New Façade Finishes on the First Floor and Part of the Second Floor. Environmental Assessment: Exempt from the provisions of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) per Guideline Section 15301 (Existing Facilities). Zoning District: CD-C(GF)(P) (Downtown Commercial) For More Information Contact the Project Planner Samuel Gutierrez at samuel.gutierrez@cityofpaloalto.org. From: Hillary Gitelman Recommendation Staff recommends the Architectural Review Board (ARB) take the following action(s): 1. Review and provide formal comments 2. Continue to a date uncertain Report Summary The proposed project seeks to change the exterior façade of the existing Epiphany hotel. The changes are focused along the ground level façade, where the most significant change would be to replace the existing illuminated perforated metal tree façade with a new solid textured stone façade. The existing façade was previously reviewed and approved by the Architectural Review Board. Background City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 2 Project Information Owner: PA Hotel Holdings, LLC Architect: Montalba Architects, Inc. Representative: Lori Marmolejo Legal Counsel: n/a Property Information Address: 180 Hamilton Avenue Neighborhood: Downtown Palo Alto Lot Dimensions & Area: 85’ by 100’ Housing Inventory Site: Not Applicable Located w/in a Plume: Not Applicable Protected/Heritage Trees: Four Street Trees Historic Resource(s): Not Applicable Existing Improvement(s): 51,021sf; 8 stories; 76’ high; Built 1976 Existing Land Use(s): Hotel Adjacent Land Uses & Zoning: North: Zoning (retail) West: Zoning (retail) East: Zoning (retail) South: Zoning (retail) Aerial View of Property: City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 3 Source: Google Maps Land Use Designation & Applicable Plans Zoning Designation: Downtown Commercial District CD-C(GF)(P) Comp. Plan Designation: CC Context-Based Design Criteria: Yes Downtown Urban Design Guide: Yes South of Forest Avenue Coordinated Area Plan: Not Applicable Baylands Master Plan: Not Applicable El Camino Real Design Guidelines (1976 / 2002): Not Applicable Proximity to Residential Uses or Districts (150'): Not Applicable Located w/in the Airport Influence Area: Not Applicable Prior City Reviews & Action City Council: None PTC: None HRB: None City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 4 ARB: Preliminary Review 2/16/2012 & 5/3/2012; Formal Review 6/7/2012 Project Description The proposed project involves exterior improvements to the existing Epiphany hotel to accommodate a new restaurant, NOBU, on the ground level. The proposed changes include: replacing the ground floor storefronts along the existing Hamilton Avenue and Emerson Street entries, replacing the existing awning at the Emerson Street entry, new façade finishes on the first floor and part of the second floor, and new floor finishes at the existing Hamilton entry ramp along with new planters. a. Photos of the existing façade. Source: Google Maps b. Rendering of Proposed Changes Day Time View of Site Night Time View of Site City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 5 The proposed changes to the building include high quality materials and finishes, such as honed Jerusalem limestone, teak bands, bronze storefront windows, and raked stone. The new wood panels would be installed along the first floor eave, removing the light to dark wood color variation of the existing eave. A new awning is proposed over the Emerson entry that would be reduced in thickness. As shown in the photo above, a new ground floor textured stone façade is proposed along the Emersion elevation and would wrap around to the Hamilton Avenue entrance. The same materials and finishes are proposed for a new single story building directly adjacent to the site at 620 Emerson, where the applicant has submitted an application (17PLN-00331) to extend the existing NOBU restaurant. Requested Entitlements, Findings and Purview: The following discretionary applications are being requested:  Architectural Review – Minor (AR): The process for evaluating this type of application is set forth in PAMC 18.77.070. AR applications are reviewed by the ARB and recommendations are forwarded to the Planning & Community Environment Director for action within five business days of the Board’s recommendation. Action by the Director is appealable to the City Council if filed within 14 days of the decision. AR projects are evaluated against specific findings. All findings must be made in the affirmative to approve the project. Failure to make any one finding requires project redesign or denial. The findings to approve an AR application are provided in Attachment B. 180 Hamilton 620 Emerson City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 6 Analysis1 The project introduces a new design aesthetic on the ground floor which results in the loss a unique design element that previously received considerable Board attention. While analysis of the project will focus on the new design, staff encourages the Board to reflect on prior discussions to help inform the applicant on possible revisions to enhance the pedestrian experience and strengthen other building design connections. Neighborhood Setting and Character The project site is located in Downtown Palo Alto on the corner of Hamilton Avenue and Emerson Street within the Downtown Parking Assessment District. The site is 8,500 square feet and was developed in the mid 1970’s with an eight- story structure (76 feet tall) that was utilized as an intermediate care facility before being converted to a hotel in 2012. The building is one of the more prominent in downtown due to its size and ground floor internally lit metal tree, which ties into the six-story tile mosaic of El Palo Alto on the North side of the building. One to three story buildings surround the site which consists of commercial retail and office spaces. The northern corner has a historic two-story commercial building, the western corner is a one-story restaurant, and the eastern corner is a contemporary three story mixed use building with ground floor retail and office spaces above. The existing building is built out to the property lines on three sides with the Hamilton Avenue façade at the ground level setback nine feet six inches. Along both Hamilton and Emerson frontages there are existing city street trees (two on Emerson and three on Hamilton). The existing building is considered a legal 180 Hamilton 201 Hamilton 200 Hamilton 566 Emerson 180 Hamilton City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 7 non-complying facility due to its height and FAR, which exceed the current development standards. Consistency with the Comprehensive Plan, Area Plans and Guidelines2 The proposed changes to the existing building incorporate high quality materials and finishes. However, the manner in which this design would be incorporated may present some consistency issues with the Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan. Comprehensive Plan Policies and Goals that relate to this project include the following:  POLICY L-20: Encourage street frontages that contribute to retail vitality in all Centers. Reinforce street corners with buildings that come up to the sidewalk or that form corner plazas.  POLICY L-21: Provide all Centers with centrally located gathering spaces that create a sense of identity and encourage economic revitalization. Encourage public amenities such as benches, street trees, kiosks, restrooms and public art.  POLICY L-23: Maintain and enhance the University Avenue/Downtown area as the central business district of the City, with a mix of commercial, civic, cultural, recreational and residential uses. Promote quality design that recognizes the regional and historical importance of the area and reinforces its pedestrian character.  POLICY L-24: Ensure that University Avenue/Downtown is pedestrian-friendly and supports bicycle use. Use public art and other amenities to create an environment that is inviting to pedestrians.  GOAL L-6: Well-designed Buildings that Create Coherent Development Patterns and Enhance City Streets and Public Spaces.  POLICY L-48: Promote high quality, creative design and site planning that is compatible with surrounding development and public spaces.  POLICY L-49: Design buildings to revitalize streets and public spaces and to enhance a sense of community and personal safety. Provide an ordered variety of entries, porches, windows, bays and balconies along public ways where it is consistent with neighborhood character; avoid blank or solid walls at street level; and include human-scale details and massing. Consistency with Application Findings The existing Emerson Avenue ground floor façade consists primarily of an illuminated perforated metal tree that the applicant is proposing to remove and replace with a textured stone façade. The Board previously reviewed the proposal for the existing façade where they expressed enthusiasm for the metal tree as it connects the upper floor mosaic of El Palo Alto to the ground floor. 2 The Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan is available online: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/topics/projects/landuse/compplan.asp City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 8 The project involves substantial changes to the Emerson Avenue ground floor façade with the incorporation of high quality materials, textures, and colors. The proposed changes also include a new canopy, maintaining a pedestrian refuge from weather which complies with the required design features of the Pedestrian (P) Combining District. The Hamilton Avenue façade would remain open to the interior of the restaurant, supporting a connection with the street and pedestrians. While staff acknowledges that building façades need to change over time, we lament the loss of the perforated metal tree. The concern is that the proposed project would create a blank wall, diminish the visual impact of the façade, and remove a feature that promotes a sense of place especially during the evening hours when the building’s mosaic is less visible. Additionally, the project would create a solid wall where adjacent buildings have façades with large quantities of windows to enliven their storefronts. Staff would appreciate ARB recommendations on how the project may be enhanced to meet the required ARB findings. Environmental Review The subject project has been assessed in accordance with the authority and criteria contained in the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), the State CEQA Guidelines, and the environmental regulations of the City. The proposed changes to the exterior of the existing hotel would be categorically exempt from the provision of CEQA under Guideline Section 15301 (existing facilities). Public Notification, Outreach & Comments The Palo Alto Municipal Code requires notice of this public hearing be published in a local paper and mailed to owners and occupants of property within 600 feet of the subject property at least ten days in advance. Notice of a public hearing for this project was published in the Palo Alto Weekly on September 25, 2017, which is 12 days in advance of the meeting. Postcard mailing occurred on September 27, 2017, which is 12 in advance of the meeting. Public Comments As of the writing of this report, no project-related public comments have been received. Alternative Actions In addition to the recommended action, the Architectural Review Board may: 1. Approve the project with findings or conditions; 2. Continue the project to a certain date; or 3. Recommend project denial based on revised findings. Report Author & Contact Information ARB3 Liaison & Contact Information Samuel Gutierrez, Associate Planner Jodie Gerhardt, AICP, Planning Manager 3 Emails may be sent directly to the ARB using the following address: arb@cityofpaloalto.org City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department Page 9 (650) 329-2225 (650) 329-2575 samuel.gutierrez@cityofpaloalto.org jodie.gerhardt@cityofpaloalto.org Attachments:  Attachment A: Location Map (PDF)  Attachment B: Draft ARB Findings (DOCX)  Attachment C: Applicant Project Description (PDF)  Attachment D: Project Plans (DOCX) ATTACHMENT B ARB FINDINGS FOR APPROVAL 180 Hamilton Avenue 17PLN-00171 The design and architecture of the proposed improvements, as conditioned, complies with the Findings for Architectural Review as required in Chapter 18.76 of the PAMC. Finding #1: The design is consistent with applicable provisions of the Palo Alto Comprehensive Plan, Zoning Code, coordinated area plans (including compatibility requirements), and any relevant design guides. The project would need to be found in conformance with the following Comprehensive Plan Goals and Policies. Comp Plan Goals and Policies How project adheres or does not adhere to Comp Plan The Comprehensive Plan land use designation for the site is Regional Commercial. Land Use and Community Design Element POLICY B-20: Support and enhance the University Avenue/Downtown area as a vital mixed use area containing retail, personal service, office, restaurant, and entertainment uses. Recognize the importance of an appropriate retail mix, including small local businesses, to the continued vitality of Downtown. Staff will complete its review prior to requesting a formal recommendation from the ARB Policy L-5: Maintain the scale and character of the City. Avoid land uses that are overwhelming and unacceptable due their size and scale. Policy L-20: Encourage street frontages that contribute to retail vitality in all Centers. Reinforce street corners with buildings that come up to the sidewalk or that form corner plazas. POLICY L-21: Provide all Centers with centrally located gathering spaces that create a sense of identity and encourage economic revitalization. Encourage public amenities such as benches, street trees, kiosks, restrooms and public art. POLICY L-23: Maintain and enhance the University Avenue/Downtown area as the central business district of the City, with a mix of commercial, civic, cultural, recreational and residential uses. Promote quality design that recognizes the regional and historical importance of the area and reinforces its pedestrian character. POLICY L-24: Ensure that University Avenue/Downtown is pedestrian-friendly and supports bicycle use. Use public art and other amenities to create an environment that is inviting to pedestrians. GOAL L-6: Well-designed Buildings that Create Coherent Development Patterns and Enhance City Streets and Public Spaces. Policy L-48: Promote high quality, creative design and site planning that is compatible with surrounding development and public spaces. POLICY L-49: Design buildings to revitalize streets and public spaces and to enhance a sense of community and personal safety. Provide an ordered variety of entries, porches, windows, bays and balconies along public ways where it is consistent with neighborhood character; avoid blank or solid walls at street level; and include human-scale details and massing. The project would remain consistent with the zoning requirements for hotel uses and will not increase the level of nonconformity in regards to height, floor area ratio, setbacks, daylight planes and lot coverage as the project involves only exterior cosmetic changes to the existing building. Finding #2: The project has a unified and coherent design, that: a. creates an internal sense of order and desirable environment for occupants, visitors, and the general community, b. preserves, respects and integrates existing natural features that contribute positively to the site and the historic character including historic resources of the area when relevant, c. is consistent with the context-based design criteria of the applicable zone district, d. provides harmonious transitions in scale, mass and character to adjacent land uses and land use designations, e. enhances living conditions on the site (if it includes residential uses) and in adjacent residential areas. Pursuant to PAMC 18.16.090(b), the following context-based design considerations and findings are applicable to this project. These context-based design criteria are intended to provide additional standards to be used in the design and evaluation of development in a commercial district. The purpose is to encourage development in a commercial district to be responsible to its context and compatibility with adjacent development as well as to promote the establishment of pedestrian oriented design. 1. Pedestrian and Bicycle Environment Project Consistency The design of new projects shall promote pedestrian walkability, a bicycle friendly environment, and connectivity through design elements 2. Street Building Facades Street facades shall be designed to provide a strong relationship with the sidewalk and the street (s), to create an environment that supports and encourages pedestrian activity through design elements 3. Massing and Setbacks Buildings shall be designed to minimize massing and conform to proper setbacks The proposed project will not change the existing buildings massing and/or setbacks. 4. Low Density Residential Transitions Where new projects are built abutting existing lower scale residential development, care shall be taken to respect the scale and privacy of neighboring properties This finding does not apply. 5. Project Open Space Private and public open space shall be provided so that it is usable for the residents and visitors of the site This finding does not apply. 6. Parking Design Parking shall be accommodated but shall not be allowed to overwhelm the character of the project or detract from the pedestrian environment The proposed project will not change the existing parking which is provided off-site. 7. Large Multi-Acre Sites Large sites (over one acre) shall be designed so that street, block, and building patterns are consistent with those of the surrounding neighborhood This finding does not apply 8. Sustainability and Green Building Design Project design and materials to achieve sustainability and green building design should be incorporated into the project Finding #3: The design is of high aesthetic quality, using high quality, integrated materials and appropriate construction techniques, and incorporating textures, colors, and other details that are compatible with and enhance the surrounding area. Finding #4: The design is functional, allowing for ease and safety of pedestrian and bicycle traffic and providing for elements that support the building’s necessary operations (e.g. convenient vehicle access to property and utilities, appropriate arrangement and amount of open space and integrated signage, if applicable, etc.). Finding #5: The landscape design complements and enhances the building design and its surroundings, is appropriate to the site’s functions, and utilizes to the extent practical, regional indigenous drought resistant plant material capable of providing desirable habitat that can be appropriately maintained. Finding #6: The project incorporates design principles that achieve sustainability in areas related to energy efficiency, water conservation, building materials, landscaping, and site planning. Attachment E Project Plans Hardcopies of project plans are provided to ARB Members. These plans are available to the public online and by visiting the Planning and Community Environmental Department on the 5th floor of City Hall at 250 Hamilton Avenue. Directions to review Project plans online: 1. Go to: https://paloalto.buildingeye.com/planning 2. Search for “180 Hamilton” and open record by clicking on the green dot 3. Review the record details and open the “more details” option 4. Use the “Records Info” drop down menu and select “Attachments” 5. Open the attachment named “Initial Plans ” and dated 05/25/2017 City of Palo Alto Page 1 Call to Order/Roll Call Present: Chair Alexander Lew, Vice Chair Kyu Kim, Board Member Wynne Furth, Peter Baltay Absent: Board Member Robert Gooyer Oral Communications Chair Lew: Just for the record, Board Member Gooyer is absent today and now is the time for oral communications. The public may speak to an item that’s not on the agenda and I don’t have any. I do have a speaker card for the first item. Agenda Changes, Additions and Deletions Chair Lew: Are there any agenda changes? No. City Official Reports 1. Transmittal of the ARB Meeting Schedule and Attendance Record, and Administrative Staff-Level Architectural Review Approvals Study Session 2. PRELIMINARY REVIEW, 375 Hamilton, Downtown Parking Garage [17PLN-00224]: Preliminary Architectural Review of a New Five-Story Parking Garage with One Basement Parking Level with 1,709 sf of Ground Floor Retail, Bike Storage, and 331 Parking Spaces Located on a 29,164 s.f. Surface Parking Lot. Zone District: PF (Public Facilities). Environmental Assessment: An Initial Study has been Prepared in Accordance With the California Environmental Quality Act, for Which a Scoping Session was Held on May 31, 2017, With the Planning and Transportation Commission. For More Information Contact Amy French, Chief Planning Official, at amy.french@cityofpaloalto.org Chair Lew: Then let’s go into the first item which is number two, which is a study session; preliminary review for 375 Hamilton downtown parking garage. Preliminary Architectural Review of a new five-story parking garage with one basement parking level with 1,709-square footage of ground floor retail, bike storage and 331 parking spaces located on a 29,164-square foot surface parking lot and the zone district in public facilities. The environmental assessment is an initial study has been prepared in accordance with the CEQA and a draft EIR will be prepared with the formal application. We have Amy French, our City Planning Official, welcome. ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW BOARD DRAFT MINUTES: September 7, 2017 City Hall/City Council Chambers 250 Hamilton Avenue 8:30 AM City of Palo Alto Page 2 Amy French, Chief Planning Official: Good morning, thank you. Amy French. Today you are looking at three options in a study session format for a preliminary design for the downtown parking garage at 375 Hamilton. The slide on the screen has one and two options mislabeled so the one to the left is option two, the one to the right is option one and the one at the bottom is option three, as noted. Just a quick review, this is going to be going through a CEQA for environmental review. This did go to a scoping session with the Planning Commission and a meeting with the Council to confirm the direction of the project, which includes one basement level and they added a top level – an additional floor to maximize the parking on the site. The HRB reviewed this last week and now it’s your turn. The Planning and Transportation Commission will be looking at a code amendment in October, October 11th, to modify the PF development standards that set forth the special setbacks and setbacks and floor area ratios and that kind of thing. So, there’s going to be some amendments going forward to the Planning Commission and Council. We expect to see the application to come in, in about October and then the follow up will be the environmental review. This will all be going to the City Council, so your recommendation is to Council but not today; we’re looking at direction. Just a quick recap, the HRB saw this last week, the packet page 13 does discuss what the HRB was asked to do; specifically, compatibility with nearby historic resources - there are three nearby historic resources - and to take a look at architectural review finding 2b to assist staff and the ARB. One member was concerned about the special setback encroachment and suggested that the City consider two basement levels and lopping off the top floor. Several members prefer the option one, which was the screen but with some openings in that mesh to give it more interest. They did note the benefits of the second story horizontal line on that option one with the colonnade that reflects the Post Office and they appreciated a step back at the upper floors and the desire for street trees on Hamilton was expressed. A couple folks talked about the Spanish/Mediterranean Revival style and thought that the tower might be an opportunity to express some of that Birge Clark iron work in some way. Just showing you the three nearby historic resources: we have a Victorian on the left with a turret there, we have the sport shop there which is coming forward at some point soon for rehab to more historic and potentially adding some residential on the top floor there. Then we have, of course, the Post Office across the street with its colonnade. These are the considerations at this time; we have finding 2b that looks at the compatibility and nearby historic resources. We also have the Downtown Urban Design Guidelines and there are two goals for the Hamilton Avenue District, and there are guidelines as well. I have those on the screen and they are in your staff report as well. One thing to note is that there is a look at the Hamilton frontage and we do have a bus stop there and we have the opportunity to widen the sidewalk. It’s pretty narrow at this time so they are looking at putting a wider sidewalk there to match what’s in front of that AT&T building next door. I am going to load the applicant’s presentation and Holly Boyd with Public Works is the Project Manager. Ms. Holly Boyd, Public Works: Hi, Holly Boyd, Public Works Engineering and I did have one correction. Originally our Council proposal was for five-stories above ground and when we went to Council in April, they actually added the below grade basement to the project so it’s five above and one below, thanks. Ms. French: Now we have Ken Hayes, who is going to give a presentation. Mr. Ken Hayes: Good morning, Chair Lew and Members of the Board. My name is Ken Hayes with Hayes Group Architects and I’ll be making a presentation on behalf of the team. There we go. I am joined by Watry Design this morning, Michelle Wendler and Gordon Knowles if there are questions about the specifics of the garage itself. The site, as we know, is a 29,000-square foot parcel on the corner of Waverley and Hamilton. It’s an ‘L’ shaped parcel currently occupied by a City parking lot. In terms of the content, right across – this is Hamilton here and right across the street, we have the Palo Alto Post Office; a Category One historic structure, as well as a National Registry building located here. Then on Waverley Street, we have the Palo Alto Sports structure which is a Category Three. The Victorian house next to that is a Category Two and on the corner here at University Avenue and Waverley is the [Decaoats] building and that’s a Category Three historic resource. The property is currently zoned PF and surrounding properties on this side at least are primarily CDC, P, ground floor restricted uses. Across Hamilton, the ground floor restricted uses are not in (inaudible). At the rear along the property here is access from Waverley that is a one-way alley called Lane Twenty-One and it provides access to the back of CDS and the stores actually along Waverley here – the backs of those. There’s also a parking space in City of Palo Alto Page 3 the back of Lot 84 I believe. These are views of the existing buildings in the neighborhood, we have the AT&T building that’s about 74-75-feet tall. It has an interesting brick base to it and a big block on top. We have the All Saints Episcopal Church, which is primarily a building in the landscape. We have the Post Office which is the Category One historic building. We have 400 Hamilton, which is kind of a brick post and beam office building with some ground floor public space out front. A little bit closer in, the Post Office has the beautiful tile roofs, the arcade, it has some nice metal work that we can draw from, deep shades and recesses. Then along Waverley, we have the Palo Alto Sport Shop here, it’s a little bit more modest and then the completely different Victorian building next to that. This ground floor area is all primarily retail or retail like, ending in this building here at 510 so our property is just to the left of that. The program is a four-story but five-level because we’re parking on the roof, structure with the above ground with one level of basement parking; 330 stalls. The City dictated plus one stall to replace the stall that we would loosing at the back of Lot 84, which is located in here so that will have a stall in the parking structure for a total of 331. Council would like to see about 1,700-square feet of retail fronting on Waverley Street and they share a trash enclosure for the buildings kind of in this area. As well as a bike storage facility incorporated into the structure itself. The design constraints, we have setback issues here and then on this side here we’ve got to provide a solid wall with zero setback because opening penetrations would be an issue and so that’s a solid wall. We have a 16-foot setback on the back of the building that fronts onto Bryant – Waverley Street and the reason for that is to provide some pedestrian access for utilities. We can bring our potential trash and that sort of thing out into this area but also it provides for protection of openings. So, create the open space there so the garage can be open and we’re not impacting the windows that are in the backs of the existing buildings so it’s kind of a dictated setback in that location. The same thing is true along this edge of the property and here’s the property line but we’re going to set 10-feet back so that we can have an open parking structure with unprotected openings and as you’ve probably noticed, the 510-existing building has windows on the property line. So, it allows for those to continue for light – daylight penetration into that existing building. Then we have a special setback along Hamilton of 7-feet located there with the AT&T building that is on that special setback. We have a requirement for 65 ¼-feet essentially to get the parking dimension to work and the dimension that we have is 66-feet so we have ¾-foot extra basically in that leg of the ‘L’. In this leg of the ‘L’, we’re required to have 87 ½-feet because of the two aisles of parking, as well as the driveway or the ramp and we have 90-feet and so we have about 2 ½-feet of extra space there that we’ll be using essentially for articulating the façade. The garage is an open ventilated parking garage, other than the ground – the basement level, which will be mechanically ventilated but the floors above grade will all be designed as an open parking structure. So, we’re required to have lots of openings in the walls, essentially around the perimeter and because of this wall being solid, as well as some others, being solid, that is a bit of challenge for this project. We have a 2-foot zone basically running around this edge where we can start to create some articulation and relief that’s outside of the main structure of the garage so that’s clear of the columns that support the garage. Auto access, this is the alley that’s one- way in that direction coming off of Waverley heading over to Bryant and we’re going to keep the entrances to the garage almost in the same place that it is today for the entrance for the parking so, we’re eliminating all the access from Waverley Street. In terms of pedestrian access, we’re trying to create an alley here and the alley will then turn and kind of create this zone in back of the Waverley buildings. The corner, sort of open court yard space is also a pedestrian focus and those both terminate on stair and elevator (inaudible) so both these locations will have stairs and elevators. Then the retail rhythm of the street will be maintained along that street edge and lacing the retail space here and that’s about 1,700-square feet. So, in all the concepts before you, one through three today, the locations of vertical circulation of the entrance to the garage, those elements have stayed the same in all of the concepts. So, what we’re looking at is different ways of the look and feel and expressing the form. We understand that we’re going to have opportunities for pedestrian amenities and seating and that sort of thing long the ground floor. We can talk about that as we look at the alternatives. These are some, I guess local – this garage here, some presidents are over at Stanford. This is in San Jose and I think it’s a (inaudible) garage and this is garage is Claremont, California. What I like about all these garages is that they are richly detailed and there’s a lot of relief, a lot of shade and shadow with the deep recesses and so on and they kind of change character at night because of the use of metal screen in this particular garage here. This garage also has some metal screen here that becomes transparent at night. I like the outdoor spaces that are created here, as well as – this has a pedestrian zone retail space, basically on the City of Palo Alto Page 4 whole ground floor here and then a stair comes down into that space that leads you up into the first level of the parking. Way-finding is pretty obvious and very important in a public parking facility from being able to find where you are, know where you’ve parked your car and for safety reasons. So, the idea of the stairs being very well defined in all of these garages I think makes sense and so we’re trying to incorporate that also into the building. Just some close up of ways of screening, this is a metal mesh and the reason for the metal mesh is it’s very open. We achieve some sense of screening to create this feeling of a block or a mask but allow that transparency to take place for ventilation purposes. This is a metal mesh at the Epiphany, this is actually a brick screen wall and that could be very interesting perhaps on the ground floor because there’s a lot of – if you will go back to the pictures of the context, 400 Hamilton is a brick masonry building; it’s veneer. The AT&T building, a lot of brick and – I can’t believe I’m almost out of time already. Chair Lew: Ken, it’s a study session so we can – you’re – we only have one item on the agenda so… Mr. Hayes: So, I don’t want to rush, normally I start to rush at this point. Chair Lew: We’ll give you two more minutes. Mr. Hayes: So, this is some ideas for mesh, whether it’s a metal or brick. Obviously, the brick would probably be lower level and then this is some kind of a louver treatment. Concept one, the idea is to create the block of the garage and get that mass on the corner to sort of hold the corner relative to the AT&T building next door but incorporate a rhythm of arcade, let’s say on the ground floor that is reminiscent of the Post Office, create a vertical stair element that is easily recognizable. So, this is the Hamilton façade and then the Waverley façade, we would continue the rhythm of the store fronts and try to create some form that relates to 510 Waverley next door and then it slowly transitions into the entrance of the parking structure. So, this is a view from Waverley looking towards the Post Office on the left. Opposite the entrance of the Post Office is essentially an entrance into the garage for pedestrians; the stair defines that. The height of the first two floors is defined here and it approximately lines up with the roof of the Post Office and then we would repeat that – the rhythm as we march down Hamilton. The garage entrance is approximately in the same location as it is today. We separated the garage from the AT&T building by about a 20-foot reveal so that there’s a gap in the rhythm but it’s also a screened gap. This shows opportunities for pedestrian seating and landscaping on the ground floor and then on the Bryant – I’m sorry, I keep saying, Bryant. On the Hamilton Street façade, that would actually wrap and this is the entrance to the pedestrian alley that takes you down – sorry? Mr. Hayes: Waverley, what did I say the second time, Hamilton? Waverley. We’re on Waverley Street and then the garages are shielded above. This stair comes down into a small court yard opportunity for seating; obviously, this could spill out here for retail purposes. The other concept picks up on the AT&T building where we try to express the mass a little bit more formally. We still have the gap here between the AT&T building and the parking garage. We tried to express some kind of artistic treatment of the ground floor that might be reminiscent of the metal work or the brick work or something that you might find on the Post Office. So, an opportunity actually, for an artisan to perhaps get involved at that ground floor and along Hamilton. Then along Waverley Street, it would be retail space on just that first level and expressed in that way. Same views looking towards the Post Office on the left, the stairs in the same place but a little bit different expression. You start to look at this post and beam kind of idea that you see on the diagonal corner at 400 Hamilton, the brick building. So, it starts to draw from a number of the neighboring buildings. You can see where we would -- could have this ground floor artistic metal work; bars or twisted rod iron or something that then could climb up the buildings. The HRB thought that could actually be incorporated into the stair in some way. We’ve picked up on the openings of the AT&T building, these just big extrusions that kind of protruding from the façade and thinking that this could be some kind of a metal mesh. Then, as we come down Waverley, this is the entrance again to the pedestrian area. A little bit more generous plaza and the stair comes down as a broader stair into that space but the actual area allocated is (inaudible) all of these concepts. Then the third concept is a little bit different so instead of using a metal mesh, we could use some kind of a louver approach to define the mass of the building above. Again, to hold the corner relative to the AT&T building and the downtown City of Palo Alto Page 5 plan. We would – this is kind of a hybrid, we would still pick up on this arcade of the Post Office on the first two floors here, the elevator and stairs all in the same location, the ground floor could be some kind of the brick mesh – the brick screening rather perforated wall or more of the metal work on the ground floor. On Waverley Street, we would again go back to a two-story expression to relate to the building next door and the ground floor retail that occurs there. Same view, the stair has turned into this option but it comes down to the same plaza here. However, the ground floor retail is expressed – this is this idea that these fins pick up on the terra cotta color of the brick across the street, the tile roofs both on Waverley and the Post Office. A view from the other direction with the entrance and then as it goes down the pedestrian alley. Then this plaza is setback even more because the stair has been turned so it’s more open let’s say, for that retail to spill out and create some seating opportunities. We see seating opportunities in these recesses as well. It’s a great place to sit and look at a Category One historic resource across the street. Of course, there will be landscaping and so on and we’re not yet at that point; this is more about the massing and that concludes my presentation. I look forward to your questions. Chair Lew: Great, thank you, Ken. We’re going to do the speakers, we have two public speakers and then get Board Member questions and comments. I do have one little announcement, is that the Castilleja School expansion was originally scheduled to be on the agenda today and they pulled it off of the agenda because of they… Ms. French: The applicant requested a postponement and so we sent out notices and I think we did a pretty good job advertising the cancellation. Chair Lew: Yeah, I just want to make sure that every – if anyone was tuning in and they were looking forward to that, that’s what happened today. Ok, so we have two speakers, Elizabeth Wong and Roxy [Rap] and you each have 5-minutes. Ms. Elizabeth Wong: Buenos Dias, (followed by statements in Spanish) The reason that I am saying this is because I grew up in Buenos Aires and Spanish is my natural language. So, every time I come and make a speech, I have this language impediment but I’ll try to – not to tax your ears. So, this is the third time that I bring similar issues concerning this parking garage. We own – oh, what happens? Oh, we’re the owners of the Lot number 85, which is adjacent to the parking garage and there are some things that are very important and I express three times, as I said before, and I was to bring it to the public’s attention. They fall into two categories, one is at it relates to our – the next – the adjacent buildings and the second category is as it relates to the garage itself. Concerning the first category, I have a problem with the access for future residences at my buildings, as well as the adjacent building but I will speak only to my building. By making a walkway between the garage and the rear of Lot 85, you pretty choke the traffic – the car movement on that – in that stripe or in that parking space. One of the – we met with Amy French and Holly Boyd and one of the suggestions that came up -- and Brad [Eggleston] – one of the suggestions that came up was the idea of tunneling a path from the underground parking to the underground of Lots 85 and 84 so that it can provide onsite parking for future residences. I believe this is a concept that has been used in the City before and it was said that it was – at the meeting that it was used at the City before and I would like to very strongly for you to consider that opportunity. Otherwise, we are landlocked and there will never be any development – any residential development at those sites. The second issue also concerns that so-called walkway and if they called it a driveway, then I would imagine that they would allow us car access to the back of the building and why do we need the access to the back of the buildings? Ok, those spaces are or has been restaurants ever since I can remember. We have owned them for 15-years or 20-years and even before we bought them, they were an Italian restaurant and with restaurants, you have constant cleaning of grease traps, which is extremely messy. You have (inaudible) that come and de-grease the hoods and the air conditioning system and all those trucks need access to the rear of the building. Right now, at that walkway, you have the dumpsters in the new design and you – the waste – (inaudible) waste will have to have access to those dumpsters. What we’re requesting is that our trucks that we need for the functioning of the business, be allowed to come in and do the services that they have been providing for years. Then there is the issue of deliveries so right now you have almost no loading zone around this area and the reason is because the existing City of Palo Alto Page 6 parking lot is being used as a delivery zone. When you take that – when you build a new structure, all these delivery people – oh, how long do I have? Chair Lew: You used up your 5-minutes but – we – I think the Board read all of your emails too but if you could just wrap up – try to wrap up quickly but we have read your emails. Ms. Wong: So, the loading zones don’t work because you have – not only do the loading zones and the garage service the Waverley buildings, they also service Apple and CVS. Well, I want to briefly tell you about my objections to the new design of the garage. I think it’s super massive, I suggested that they put two levels of underground parking, and four above ground but instead they are having five levels of parking. I think that the screens are atrocious, there’s no reason at all to have screens in a – for parking. You are protecting the cars where you should be protecting the stair well where people walk from the inclement weather and glass in the stair well would be a really great addition; leave it open. Make it an organic garage, alright, thank you. Chair Lew: Great, thank you, Ms. Wong and Roxy Rapp Mr. Roxy Rapp: Thank you. Roxy Rapp, 265 Lytton and I also happen to own the building on the corner of Waverley and University. I have two – well, first I want to say I support the garage one hundred percent. I think it’s great the City wants to do and develop it and it’s the center of town and I think it will be really used a lot. The biggest problem I have is it’s not big enough and as you know, we took employee parking out of the neighborhoods and we’re having a tremendous problem downtown. Especially with the restaurant workers that are not being able to find parking and it’s starting to have an impact on our vacancies at restaurants and turning over now. I think this would be a great opportunity for the City to do something about employee parking. I think definitely you should go deeper, you should go two floors and there’s no problem. Lot GNL has three-floors and I think you should go higher and make the top and maybe the bottom extra floor employee parking. You could do it with a gate and it would be terrific to be able to have employees to be able – close to their job and park and not have to circulate or be put way out on the – further out and have to come in. I think you should definitely try to encourage that. The second thing is I would encourage you to have Ken talk to the owners of – especially the new owner of the Toy World building and see what his plans are in the futures. I’m pretty sure he plans to go up and do something really nice there. That’s the [Thorwt] family and it’s run by Jon Shank and then the Brad [Hicken] family, who are another very good developers in town, I think you should try to find out what’s going to go on there just to be able to have a whole picture of what’s going to happen there in those two major properties that are supporting the development. I can’t encourage you enough to try to get City Council and the Commission to accept higher than 50-feet and to go lower. I think it’s a great opportunity for the City and I would hate to lose it, thank you. Chair Lew: Great, thank you, Mr. Rapp. Let’s move onto Board Member questions, I’m sure we have lots of questions. Peter. Board Member Baltay: Yes, good morning. A question for architect Ken Hayes regarding the 10-foot setback between the garage and the Thai Pan buildings is it possible to reduce… Mr. Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director of Planning: Excuse me, I’m sorry one second. Board Member Baltay: My understanding is that you need that setback to allow the wall of the garage to be open for ventilation purposes but is it possible to reduce that setback? If it weren’t a pedestrian alleyway, could it be closer to 5-feet? As I read the code it seems to have some flexibility there. Mr. Hayes: I think for the amount of openings that we need, we need 10-feet because we can’t make it work with twenty-five percent, right? This is Michelle Wendler. Ms. Michelle Wendler: Yes, Michelle Wendler from Watry Design, so when we have the 10-feet, we’re allowed to have all of those be unprotected openings on that side. If we make it 5-feet, we can only have City of Palo Alto Page 7 twenty-five percent of the area and we need all of that area to make up the difference because we’re so solid along the AT&T side and because of working with the openings around the rest of the façade. Board Member Baltay: So, it’s a matter of how many – what percentage of openings you can have. Ms. Wendler: Correct. Board Member Baltay: Ok, thank you. Chair Lew: Any other questions? Wynne. Board Member Furth: Some question for Staff, these are – I doubt you will have the answers today but this is a very interesting corner of course and it’s architecturally fascinating; context I should say. So, I’d like to know more about the history of All Saints. Do I mean All Saints or All Souls? All Souls – All Saints, whatever. The Episcopal Church across the corner and I’d like to know more about the AT&T building, particularly as it moves up towards Bryant. It has that elaborate brick façade, it’s got arches, it’s got the diagonal roof fading into the building’s rectangular block and I’d like to know what happened there? Why is it like that? Who designed it? What’s it for? Then I would like to understand more about the legal rights that the property owners facing on Waverley adjacent to this site might have. I understand that we have our own principles that say we’re supposed to be – any structure going up is supposed to be respectful of what’s around it but I’m curious as to what kind of actual entitlements for access anybody might have – any of those property owners might have. I am also curious about the extensive use of Lane, whatever it is, Twenty-One, for trash bins. My understanding is that that’s not what those lanes are supposed to be used for. That means that the buildings have to be designed to have them somewhere else and in thinking about what I would think that this design should be accommodating or making space for, I would – it would matter to me whether those present uses are essential but probably in violation of local rule or something the City wants to continue or something we think over time might change. This is not a question but one of my concerns here is that we would be trying to accommodate buildings that aren’t long for this world in their present form and so that’s going to be something that I’m going to be thinking about a lot. Thank you. Chair Lew: Wynne, can you clarify what you’re looking for on the All Saints Church? Board Member Furth: Some discussion in the Environmental Review of what that buildings history is and what it's designed is and whether it is of (inaudible). Chair Lew: Oh, ok, interesting. It’s been – there’s been a Church there as long as Palo Alto and they tore down the original church which is originally something more like St. Thomas Aquinas and that size of wood – a little wood building. Then they built the concrete building to accommodate their congregation. On the – just so you – also, on the AT&T building, that use to be a – the taller piece use to be a mid – just classic mid-century building and then in the 80’s, I remember when they sort of annexed the building next door and they added all of the brick – yeah, towards Bryant. They added all of that brick work at that same time and the angle, that was all done at the same time, that’s my recollection. Then also on this particular site of the garage, there was a Church, it was the first Congregational Church and it was a big shingle style Church right on the corner with a big oak tree. Yeah, the current – the existing parking lot. Board Member Furth: Oh, and I have one other question for Staff. There’s an oak tree on site, is that too small to be protected? Ms. French: I think it is a protected tree so – but that’s what the environmental review is going to cover. Mr. Hayes: Yeah, it’s a protected tree. Board Member Furth: Thank you. City of Palo Alto Page 8 Mr. Hayes: It’s the one out… Vice Chair Kim: Could you come and speak into the mic for the record, please. Mr. Hayes: This is Gordon Knowles with Watry Design. Mr. Gordon Knowles: Hi, good morning and I am Gordon Knowles with Watry Design. The Arborist report has looked through the trees in the Bay Area and I think the tree that you’re talking about is a protected tree. The Arborist report is that it’s been previously damaged and isn’t in good condition. Though we could try and protect it and we’ve looked at options of possibly even moving the tree. He doesn’t feel that – actually, with the damage the is to the tree, it would be viable to save as part of the process. Board Member Furth: Thank you. Chair Lew: I have some questions for Staff. I guess on the 10-foot passageway that’s being proposed, has there been any thought about the passage way design? I was looking at the Cowper – the Webster and Cowper Street garage and it has about a 10-foot passage with an arbor and lighting and vines and signage. I was wondering if anything like that was considered for this site? Ms. French: The last sheet of the set would be the sheet to refer to as to the thinking thus far and perhaps Mr. Hayes would have any… Mr. Hayes: I really don’t think we’ve given it a whole lot of thought yet. They should a paving pattern right now or I’m sorry, we show a paving pattern right now but that whole space needs to be studied on how it relates to the garage, how it pulls people down to the elevator and the stair and that sort of thing. There will be eyes on that space and I mean there are windows into the adjacent building and then the parking garage would be primarily open at that level. Chair Lew: I would say the living wall is a really interesting idea. I’ve looked at some of the ones in San Francisco and they are really beautiful; like the one at [SF Moma] is really gorgeous and there’s also the one at the private school near California. I would just be – I guess my concern on that is just the scale of having a very tall wall of the garage and I mean that’s – I would be interested in seeing something that breaks down the scale. So, if you’re thinking of a living wall, is it only two-stories or would you think it would be even taller? That would be my question, is real – you know you’ve got something – basically, you’ve got something 10-feet wide and 50-feet high and that’s like a mid-evil street so I would be curious to see how you mitigate the scale on that. I have some questions on the – I was wondering if Staff could maybe talk a little bit about how the City is going to manage the parking because I attended the Council hearings and I do understand that there’s some discussion about changing how garages are used. Is there any thought and it’s not necessarily the Board’s purview but I just want to say that there have been larger discussions out there about permits or attendance or what not and – or active monitoring systems. Ms. Boyd: Yeah, so we are – this garage is going to have a parking way finding to help guide people to open spaces to they will be able to tell on each floor which spaces are available. I – at this point, we don’t – I don’t know what the Transportation Division and Planning is going to decide regarding how many permit spaces various public spaces; that hasn’t been discussed. I know for transportation they have been discussing for future garages – we show in the plan that there are provisional gates at the entrances that may be added later for future pay for parking but again, that hasn’t been decided on. Chair Lew: Then I have a question on the – the plans are showing a bike station and is that intended to be similar to the outdoor bike racks or is this something else like a supplement to the existing – to the bike share system? City of Palo Alto Page 9 Ms. Boyd: This – the desire for the bike station was requested by the Transportation Division and they want it to be similar to what’s at the University Caltrain Station lot, where it’s a key access and a secure station but no attendant though. Chair Lew: Also, a question for Staff, on Lane – what is it? Lane Twenty-One, so the alley there, does – has Staff received any complaints on how that functions from the various businesses in its current configuration? Do we know anything about how it works? I mean there’s a lot of dumpsters and I walked through yesterday and there are lots of dumpsters which is pretty normal for our alleys downtown but it’s only 15-feet wide. So, it's narrower than some of our other ones so what do we know about that? Ms. French: Well, we’ve – over the years there have been code enforcement cases like people putting pallets out and this kind of thing. This is true of many of the alleys downtown, we – people – there are dumpsters and as buildings re-develop, we ask that people provide trash enclosure rooms and then it becomes please use those for the trash instead of for something else. In this project, they are proposing the trash enclosure to handle the trash from those three – two or three businesses there on Waverley… Ms. Boyd: As well as the trash from the retail on our parking garage site. Ms. French: Then we still have the CVS pharmacy and the other uses there and Starbucks etc. on University that has a need for placing detritus in the alley. Chair Lew: Then my last question is regarding the special – the 7-foot special setback on Hamilton and I know we have that on many of the streets downtown and it was originally used to widen the streets. It’s come up before on other projects on Hamilton – on several projects on Hamilton and I was wondering what – you’re proposing to change the zoning for this zone or were you thinking that it would be a variance and there would be findings for a variance for this? Ms. French: This is part of a larger discussion that will be with the Planning and Transportation Commission and Council, and that is for City public or for City parking garages that go below grade in a setback and above grade in a setback. This would be a change to the Public Facilities Zone Development Standards for this particular use. In this case, the Public Facility Zone Standards require a 20-foot setback on any street, which is actually wider than the 7-foot special setback. Yes, the original intent of the special setbacks was to widen the streets and that plan has not, since the 1950’s, come forward to widen Hamilton, but in this case with the geometries of the lot, it’s really tough to meet that 7-foot setback and so they are requesting the 5-foot encroachment and we’ll do that through a zoning, legislative decision by Council. Chair Lew: Yes, Wynne. Board Member Furth: What would the setback be if this was a commercial development on this site? Ms. French: If it was a commercial zone? Oh, 7-feet. Board Member Furth: If we (inaudible) looking at the adjacent uses that we have there. The retail and whatever… Ms. French: Yeah, it would be a 7-foot special setback on Hamilton. Board Member Furth: From the property line? Ms. French: Right, not a 20-foot. Board Member Furth: But absent that special setback, if we already had as wide as the street (inaudible) because (inaudible) it’s zero setbacks? City of Palo Alto Page 10 Ms. French: Correct. Board Member Furth: Thanks. Board Member Baltay: In the same… Chair Lew: Peter. Board Member Baltay: …(inaudible), what would the setbacks be regarding the 16 and 10-foot walkways to the adjacent commercial buildings if this were a standard commercial development in a CDC zone, would those setbacks be required? Ms. French: There would be no setbacks required in the CDC zone, which this is not going to be changed to a CDC zone but yeah, to compare. We can have – if you’d like for formal review so you can understand - a comparison between the CDC – if it were a commercial building in the CDC, if you’d like that. Board Member Baltay: It’s ok, I’m just trying to understand what – where these parameters have come from because they are restrictive on the design. Chair Lew: Ok, Kyu? Vice Chair Kim: Could you explain how the trash will be picked up from the trash enclosure? Ms. Boyd: So, I’ve been in talks with our refuge group and the trash collector will come down Lane Twenty-One… Vice Chair Kim: So, a truck can navigate down Lane Twenty-One? Ms. Boyd: Yeah, they do because they have to pick up all the trash from Starbucks and everything. Vice Chair Kim: I didn’t know if they came down Lane Twenty-One or if they actually access the parking lot. Ms. Boyd: I think they probably do both to come down the parking lot for the three buildings here for frontage but there’s quite a lot of trash bins along the University front – businesses as well. Vice Chair Kim: To me, it seems like perhaps the enclosure doors should then be facing Lane Twenty-One and not the pedestrian access but perhaps – I don’t know. Was there a reason the doors are facing the pedestrian alley as opposed to the Lane? Ms. Wendler: (Inaudible), we have a couple different things happening on the frontage to Lane Twenty- One. One is we have a mechanical exhaust duct coming up from the basement that needs to discharge out that direction, that’s what’s on the left corner. Then we have the access – the vehicular access – right next to that is a sheer wall and we have very limited places to put our seismic shear wall elements in this building. We’ve squeezed that into that particular location and so we imagine that the dumpsters would be pulled out and around that sheer wall. Vice Chair Kim: Ok, thank you. Chair Lew: No other questions? We’re going to go to Board Member comments. Peter? Board Member Baltay: Thank you. I have three general rounds of ideas/directions/ thoughts for this. The first one has to do with the overall site planning and so overall, I agree that it makes sense what you have here. I’m wondering if it wouldn’t – I’m questioning the 10-foot pedestrian alley between Waverley Street and (inaudible). I think it’s going to feel very tight and I think that if you were to reduce that to City of Palo Alto Page 11 more like 5-feet, you could actually get a greater setback along Hamilton, which I think would be really a good thing. I think that the – when I look at the guidelines for the Hamilton Avenue again, it’s asking for a pedestrian connection from Hamilton through to University somehow. My office is very close to this site and I walk past it several times a day and the pedestrian traffic cutting from the corner of the AT&T building through – behind Prolific Oven and out to University is pretty intense. I mean I would say every 30-seconds somebody is walking through there and I don’t think that’s going to change. What you’re going to have – the way this is designed is people walking through the parking lanes to make that same connection. Secondarily, I’m very empathetic to the businesses in like the Thai Pan, Prolific Oven, whatever happens to the Toy Sport building and that they just need some means to service their business functions. It’s true that they are perhaps not legally entitled to that use of that land but if we take that away, they are just going to be trying to access things off of the diagonal parking on Waverley Street; which is really a hit to the community and that’s just not an attractive thing. So, I think we have to (inaudible) somehow, which means that pedestrian access has to be somehow functional. Mr. Hayes: At the back of those buildings? Board Member Baltay: At the back of those buildings and I think that we just – unfortunately, we just have to accomplish that and I don’t know if it’s 16-feet or 20-feet. You’re very sympathetic again, to the – you got to make the parking spaces work and that’s not – there’s no squeezing on that and it has to work. The thought process is that could that pedestrian access goes clear out to Hamilton and then remove the pedestrian connection – 10-foot connection over to Waverley Street. That’s a – not one of your options here but looking at that, I think that that’s the pedestrian connection you need and… Mr. Hayes: To force people through the garage you’re saying? Board Member Baltay: Essentially come up with a very creative garage design where you also have a pedestrian connection through. I say that because I think that’s what’s going to happen. If you go through a number of garages downtown today like the one over on the corner of Lytton and I think it’s Waverley again. There’s a lot of pedestrian traffic just cutting these corners, working their way through; it’s a tight urban area. I think it’s going to happen regardless and maybe there’s a creative way to get that connection and keep your parking functionality and better serve these businesses that are going to be impacted. It also better meets the guidelines of pedestrian connection from Hamilton and I think the 10-foot alleyway out to Waverley is really just going to be a dark, almost dangerous tight alley. That’s also duplicated by Lane Twenty-One cutting through adjacent to it. In that same vein, I’m really struck that there’s the little corner back there where the alley jogs and there are two other buildings that are very likely or three to be redeveloped… Mr. Hayes: Right here? Board Member Baltay: Yeah, and it feels to me that on one hand, we’re dealing with an incomplete set of information here because the City really could look into more of what is going to happen with the buildings in that area? Then is there an opportunity to create some sort of a micro plaza back there, some sort of -- what you would find in a European City. A little pedestrian area way or something where again, you mix the pedestrian with the functional needs but right now it’s not being thought about and we’re developing it in reaction to what local businesses do. When we’re developing a garage like this, it’s the opportunity for the City to try to take that into control. You do have one little green space indicated back there but if you go back on these alleys during the day and the evening, it’s remarkable how many people –a guy taking a cigarette break, a couple having an argument, a person who is pulling off the sidewalk to do something. These alleys are used but they are not designed and it's incumbent upon us as architects, as City planners to take that into account and maybe we can do something more back there. Again, my thoughts about the planning of this are that the 10-foot alley at Waverley, I don’t think works and I think you’re missing an opportunity to make an important connection to Hamilton. My second set of thoughts really had to do with – I guess I confessed to my fellow Board Members that I’ve just been struggling on trying to understand the importance of the historic aspect of all the buildings around this. Clearly, the Post Office is an important building and the Historic Resources Board seems to – when I City of Palo Alto Page 12 listened through to their discussion, they seem to say that they like the idea of some sort of element on the garage that mimics the height of the eave; that second story line. I think Wynne pointed out very (inaudible) that the Church across the street is a very interesting and striking building that doesn’t seem to have been considered. I guess I’m just really feeling like the ARB is in a bit of a vacuum here on understanding how much should we be considering? Should we be treating this Birge Clark building across the street as some sacrosanct thing that we have to respond to or can we ignore it? What I am sort of hearing everybody eludes to is we need to pick up some of the details; maybe some metal detail or maybe an eave line. The best idea I heard was what architect Hayes mentioned in the past meeting that by having a bit more of a setback from the parking garage, you have a place where you can see and look at this wonderful building. I have to say that I walk by that Post Office several times a day and I always look at it and it always brings a smile to my face. Maybe that’s the best way to respect this because I’m not sure by putting some clever iron detailing that’s of our time, modern, but still eluding back to that and that it’s going to work or that it’s really a historically appropriate. I don’t think we want to put a bunch of masonry arches or a tile roof on this building. What I am finding though is that there doesn’t seem to be quite enough discussion about how we’re fitting into the history or what we want it to be doing. I really wish on the historic resources level that somebody really understood the history of this was coming forward saying this how we ought to be approaching it because I think again, we’re reacting in small levels to it. With that said I did, in walking around, come to one idea that I think the Post Office and the Wells Fargo building and the Church have in common a sense of an enclosed outdoor spaces; the arcade along the Post Office, the covered two-story portico on the Wells Fargo building. The Church has wonderful outdoor spaces around it and it leads me to think that the stair tower on the corner is an opportunity for what I would call an enclosed vertical space and I understand that there’s some concern about wanting it to be safe by being visible. At the same time, I think that that’s the one place Ken, where I think you’re failing on the design; it just looks industrial and scary to me. If I were coming down with my kids, I’d really hold their hands tight. Mr. Lait: Excuse me, Board Member Baltay. Chair, if you don’t mind, I’d like to take a break and just discuss a procedural matter with the Chair. Thank you. Chair Lew: Ok, so we’re going to take a 5-minutes break and sorry about that. Board Member Baltay: No, problem. Board Member Baltay: So, I apologize to everybody but it appears that I might have a conflict of interest in this project so I’d like to recuse myself from any further participation at the moment while I check with the City Attorney. So, at this point, take what I said with a grain of salt and I might be back later but at the moment I am going to recuse myself from participating, thank you. Mr. Hayes: Thank you. Chair Lew: We do have to wait till he actually leaves the room and then I think we’ll go to Board Member Kim. Vice Chair Kim: Alright, so this is a study session so I’ll just kind of go out of order. I also agree that – I feel strongly that the City should look at two underground levels and really try to max out the parking lot as much as possible with a certain sense of responsibility to the mass and scale with the neighbors. When I look at some of these elevations, especially the Waverley elevations and seeing those building outlined in the background, I don’t see why adding another story to the top and also the underground levels would be that detrimental. I was also thinking if – and looking at seeing if there are ways to maybe reverse the ramp such that perhaps the portion – perhaps there’s on a half sixth level that is up against the AT&T building. That way it would still remain five levels at the Waverley Street elevation and I realize there are complications with possibly reversing the ramp and so on and so forth but just kind of ideas that I was thinking through. Another thing that I think is missing currently that will – that could eventually play into the design of this is the solar canopy. I know it’s been mentioned in some of the City of Palo Alto Page 13 sections and I’m just wondering isn’t there a possibility for that solar canopy to kind of tie itself into the design of the elevation of this garage as well, rather than it being kind of an afterthought and stuck on. Mr. Hayes: Actually, can I have Michelle just address that real quick (inaudible)(crosstalk)… Vice Chair Kim: Yeah, it’s a study session so I think that’s fine. Mr. Hayes: I know this is comments but... Ms. Wendler: Just currently in our program and in the budget, solar panels are not in the project. Although we are designing it for the future possibility to add the solar panels into the project. So, looking at the architectural (inaudible), that’s possible but it’s currently not in the project that was given by Council. Vice Chair Kim: Well, I’ll just say for the record that I feel that that’s a huge shame… Ms. Wendler: (Inaudible) Vice Chair Kim: …and that’s a disservice to the public and to this building project actually. Moving on, some other comments that I have with regards to the circulation of the garage. I think there are some things that bother me enough, such as these dead-end aisles on every floor. If I am coming up the ramp and I need to – there are basically these dead ends that die into the Lane Twenty-One area of each floor of the ramp except for the first floor. I was also thinking that perhaps the entry and exit from Lane Twenty-One maybe that can only be an exit only. I don’t know if we want to encourage the public to access Lane Twenty-one form Waverly just to enter the garage. That would also free up those extra two stalls that could be deleted or may have to be deleted if that – the (inaudible) for entry from Lane Twenty-One as well. I was also – you know looking over the different options, at first, I really appreciated the options one and three where you have this taller arcade element that kind of relates to the Thai Pan building but listening to the discussion and reading emails of possibilities of redevelopment along that Waverley set of buildings there. I’m wondering if that’s a strong enough element that the parking garage should try to tie itself into, especially if that building is going to get redeveloped or changed. For now, I mean I guess if we’re assuming that building is going to be staying the way it is, I do like the way that it ties into that. So, the element that ties into that is the retail and I’m a little bit concerned about the proportions of the retail space as far as the depth and the height. It doesn’t appear that the first floor of the parking garage is any taller and I know that retail has preferred heights. I did read in the Staff report that perhaps it’s a florist or some other kind of specific retail that may not require the height but I just want to put it out there as a comment. Also, looking at the bike station, I notice that there’s an intake right in front of the bike station entry. In my opinion, I don’t know what the intake is going to look like but sometimes it can make for a situation where it really turns people off from wanting to enter and exit that bike station. I think the City’s desire to have a bike station there is great and wonderful but we should try to make that entry and exit experience a little bit more favorable to the people that are using it. I also wanted to make a note on the different stairs that you are showing at the corner of Waverley and Hamilton. While I’ve personally preferred the overall design scheme of option three, I felt that the stair kind of dying into the wall as you come down on the street level probably wasn’t favorable. I do prefer something like option one or two where they kind of exit out onto either street as opposed to the wall of the parking garage/retail area. Then in the future, as this comes back as a preliminary review or a formal application, I’d liked to see some 3-D views of the alley ways and I realize that they are still under developed but I think those are important for us to see. I think those are – that’s it as far as my initial comments. Mr. Hayes: Great, thanks, Vice Chair Kim. Chair Lew: Wynne. City of Palo Alto Page 14 Board Member Furth: Thank you and thank you for the presentation. I did watch the Council’s deliberations on this and so it did seem much of the Staff report in the study presented to them and it was a very impressive amount of thinking and research that has gone into this. I know this area very well because I’ve lived near it but not within 500-feet of it, for 18-years. I patronized the Post Office and CVS and Prolific Oven and all those areas; the farmers market so that’s of great interest to me. First, I started thinking about the context and you know that one of my concerns is that we don’t seem to be thinking about the church across the street; heavily used outdoor space. Those – that’s not just a – a kind of not to well-kept front lawn, that’s an assembly space and their court yard goes in and out, it’s going to be sort of across the street from this and that should continue to be something desirable. Another thing that I wanted to say about context is what I think of as the Wells Fargo building. It is kind of classic Wells Fargo in the sense that it’s red brick but the building is fascinating because it is set way back with those big elaborate porches, terraces, galleries, and large elements that come over planters. It’s also really impressive if you ever use the ATM there because the flowers are at shoulder height so instead of having flowers at knee level with cigarette butts in them, you have really impressive landscaping that is a pleasure to be around. With respect to the Birge Clark Post Office which I understand we owe to Lou Henry Hoover, just like the Girl Scout House, because she had her husband call the then President of the United States and say no, we’re not having federalist here. We have a very good local architect and so we got this building. However, if you look at the entry, it’s true that it’s shades of, I guess stucco. It’s very square and it has what looks like a national recovery act eagle on it. I think that’s the most – so it’s very a steer and rectangular. I realize that it’s round but it looks very squared off and formal. We seem to have a lot of volunteer trees in front of the Post Office and it’s all great to look at. I think Council Member Filseth pointed out that one of the pleasures of walking down Waverley and along this parking lot and generally, it’s a hot, glary, unpleasant corner with a restroom, is that you get to see that entry. So, I think preserving to the extent possible the ability to see that portion of the building would be valuable. Not that the rest of the building isn’t lovely but it’s lovelier as experienced. I’m also concerned that when we spend these many, many millions of dollars, we don’t spend too much time and money and design compromising important project goals for buildings that may not stay long or that logically under our existing zoning will change. Then I thought a lot about the current functions of this surface parking lot and one of the things that I think I see is that this is a place that I can always find a parking place. It would be nice to pretend I never drive over there but I do; often on my way home from somewhere else and I can always find a parking place. There’s always one or two spaces available and if there aren’t, there will be within 90-seconds. So, an important part of this in supporting retail, is quick in and out parking, which is not served by having a whole bunch of electric charging stations on the ground floor, in my view. I won’t say anything about the urge to key Tesla’s while trying to find a parking place but I don’t – I think we should think about what – by definition, you don’t use charging stations for a 5 to 15- minute stop. They should be somewhere else, put them in the basement, (inaudible). The other things that I’ve been thinking a lot about – I mean actually complaining to Staff a lot about for years is there is no bicycle parking. You guys want to me to ride my bike but I end up climbing through the Algerian Ivy or lifting my bike up onto the bumpers – the curb next to the cyclone fence next to the AT&T building because there is nowhere to put a bike unless you want to trip people on their way into CVS. So, I think quick in and out (inaudible) parking is also important. I don’t need a bike station for running into CVS for 15-minutes so I think bike stations – more secure parking might be important but I also think that accessible, in fact, I’m sure it is for some people, places to park are an important part of this. You know you’re just across the street from the farmers market and that’s the other big function that happens around here. The front of the AT&T building is a major place for workers to take breaks because there are benches – seating areas integrated into it and as members of the public pointed out, you can look – it’s got a good view, you look across at an attractive place. There’s great landscaping on the parking lot across – what is the name… Mr. Hayes: (Inaudible)(crosstalk). Board Member Furth: Hamilton, that’s more fabulous landscaping so it really makes it an inviting place. So, I’m expecting to see great landscaping with flowers, which brings out the point that if you’re going to have a living wall, I want to see the endowment that goes with it. I love the [SF Moma] living wall, which among other things features Agapanthus growing out horizontally but that must cost a great deal of time City of Palo Alto Page 15 and energy and expertise to maintain. The last thing that I guess I want to say about context is all those corners go in and out – let your eye go into the building, let’s you walk along and still see the street but be in a protected way. I’m sure that All Saints doesn’t have the kind of maintenance budget it would like and that’s not a great wild life habitat on the corner yet and I know it’s heavily used for their purposes but these are inviting spaces for the eye. They let you go in and out and I think that would be important to have here. I also want you to show me designs that are going to let me see the corner towards the bay of the Post Office as soon as possible as I walk up Waverley. I think if you are going to have 50-story buildings, you need at least some 40-story – 40, sorry, 40-foot architect – landscape elements. Whether they grow up from the bottom or not and I am not in favor of maintaining trees that we think are not going to make it in the longer run. Pedestrian access is interesting, it is a heavily used area, however, I don’t think the alley from Waverley may be heavily used by people who work there, by people who are making deliveries, by people who are doing service work or servicing these buildings. As far as I can tell, pedestrian walk through CVS, you know you just walk – you come straight out of the sidewalk on University, you walk through CVS, you walk through the parking lot and you’re over here. I am not in favor of a walkway from Waverley that’s shared with motor vehicles, I don’t think that’s a walkway. I’m also not really in favor of a 10-foot wide walkway with 50-foot walls next to it. So, I tend to think that it – that space would be much better used on the Hamilton front of the building. I’m perplexed by the staircase and generally, I like the idea of visible staircases but I may be having trouble understanding how these staircases work and look but I think we have some less than successful parking lot stair cases in town. I’m not particularly fond of the one across the street from – gosh, which park? Mr. Hayes: The one on Bryant? Board Member Furth: Yes, there’s seems to be consensus on this point. It doesn’t work, I mean it seems askew, I don’t see people using it, it’s hot when it’s sunny, it’s wet when it rains. I’m very familiar with the Claremont parking garage. Mr. Hayes: So am I. Board Member Furth: I spent more time, Ken. You were just visiting your daughter but I was one of the people who put together the redevelopment agency. What works is the broader shallow steps of the lower level and they are kind of gracious, they invite you in but it’s because they are wide and relatively shallow and they only go part way and then it gets a little more whatever. That is an incredibly busy parking lot and you are never up there by yourself. It is always occupied because that’s a retail zone with a hotel across the street and a train track on the back. I don’t particularly like the stair cases – the look of the stair case coming out towards the street but I don’t know what should be done but I don’t like the way these things appear to the point of where I wondered if they should be tucked up against the AT&T building instead. So that you could have more setback for greenery and view, I don’t know but I do think if you can move the building back another 5-feet that will help. Retail, I didn’t read the City Council to say that they wanted 1,700-square feet of retail. I heard them say they wanted retail that was functional, that was going to be highly (inaudible) and desirable for some kind of use and I do understand the paradox that as you make it bigger, it generates some parking demands. I think we have seen sort of token commercial when we have districts that require commercial. That’s not really what’s driving the redevelopment and then we get commercial that we’re quite skeptical about so it would be important to know that this is designed for real world, successful retail or whatever other permitted use we have in that area. I’m also concerned about the lack of public restrooms facilities there. I think they are hard to design into parking garages but it’s a long way to the nearest restroom. The (inaudible) I mean there is actually one somewhere if you finding it in the Wells Fargo building but it’s a long way so I would be interested in that. I don’t know if it’s possible to essentially say we think the pedestrians can’t be bothered to walk around the corner which is now going to be lovely and attractive with benches and plantings. That that’s -- that the cut through basically should be satisfied by cut (inaudible) – I mean from the policy that encourages inter-block pedestrian connection. If we just need to be sure that that’s designed so that when in fact people cut through that, which they are going to do all the time, it’s reasonably safe for them to do so. I don’t know how you do that but it’s important. Let’s see, I have a whole bunch of notes. The other thing is that this is a really interesting project because the City is City of Palo Alto Page 16 struggling to maximize and budget desirability. Desirable things including the number of parking spaces and we’ve had to make serious compromises and have – the Council has in the past. If you look at Heritage Park, Staff didn’t recommend Heritage Park. Staff said Heritage Park is too expensive, the neighborhood went bezerk and we have Heritage Park and I don’t think anybody regrets it and we were able to attract private funding to develop it. More on point, the Opportunity Center was a site both graced and constrained by great big trees and we were looking at building not only low-income housing but no income housing on that site. Every unit is precious and I think we sacrificed two to three to preserve the trees and I think it’s been totally worth it. So, I would bear that in mind when thinking about how this works. I do hope that this redevelopment lets us make the existing alley work better for whatever it needs to work for. I’m not sure that casual pedestrian cut through is going to be much of it but I don’t know. In terms of the designs, I found the rectangular window attachments unconvincing. The AT&T building is very formal, everything is balanced, symmetric and I don’t know if they used the golden mean but it’s very formal and I don’t know think quoting it works at all. I also don’t think quoting other elements necessarily works but I do notice the great – the preponderance of creamy stucco and brick and tile and those might be things to learn from. I went to Stanford in the 60’s and we had the original Richardson Romanesque and then we had to use the technical term really stupid buildings that had a lot of yellowish stucco with little tile veneer roofs on top. Most of which have now been torn down because they started to just build well design buildings that because of their setbacks, their landscaping, their parapet heights, and their materials complimented those existing buildings and respected them; that’s more of what I am looking for. I do sort of like the idea of a different element – a different thing going on lower down. This is a very tall structure new to a very tall structure and I kind of have liked, at least in the drawings that we’ve seen, the idea of something lighter at the top. I mean I’m certainly not looking for five-stories of stucco. Mr. Hayes: Right. Board Member Furth: On the 50-foot height limit, that’s a Council directive, that’s a voter directive, right? That’s a ballot measure. Ms. French: The 50-foot height limit in the City is Comprehensive Plan, as well as… Board Member Furth: (Inaudible) the Comprehensive Plan right, it’s a voter enacted initiative? Ms. French: It came out of that era. Board Member Furth: It’s a – we’ve never repealed it, right? It’s a voter directive and we don’t get to change it. Am I confused, has it changed? That’s why we had to have an override vote to do the new Stanford Medical Center buildings. Ms. French: Well, it became – had a rezoning to a different zone but its… Board Member Furth: Well, you had to have voter approval to go over 50-feet. Could we… Ms. French: I know it’s a Comp. Plan policy. Board Member Furth: I believe it’s a voter initiative so it was not a Council idea so we need to check and see. I don’t know if they stuck it in the Charter or just did it as a – they could have done it as an intuitive ordinance rather than a Charter amendment but double check because PAMF was built and in many ways, it made sense for that building to be taller. Almost any health care facility it’s easier to move by elevator than long corridors but I think we are constrained by that so if you could check. Maybe we repealed it but that’s not what I understood. Mr. Hayes: So, I’m sorry, are you in favor of – if it’s not, are you in favor of a taller structure? City of Palo Alto Page 17 Board Member Furth: I have no idea. I think the damage is done by the time you get up that high so I don’t know that I could tell the difference between 60 or 50-feet but I think we’ve been (inaudible) structures above the 50-feet if it is a voter mandate. On the – I hope that it’s – I realize that there are lots of problems but I share the view that’s been expressed by others that it’s a pity not to go down two floors. We’ve been looking at a lot of projects and we keep struggling to approve them, particularly downtown or in the areas around downtown if they don’t have two below parking because you can’t get what you want above ground if you don’t have two floors below ground. More recently we’ve been looking at a hotel that’s proposed at Su Hong on El Camino and it’s next to a Palo Alto Redwoods and Palo Alto Redwoods is – what’s the density? It’s high like 50 or somebody look that up for me; 50 or 60 dwelling units per acres. It’s fully parked, it’s got great loading zones, it’s massively landscaped and it works because they have two floors of underground parking and a big deep site but I’m concerned that this doesn’t – we’re going to really regret it if we don’t go under. We also have parking lots that encroach into the street underground; it’s our street. I don’t know what kind of utilities, it’s mostly our utilities so have we seriously studied encroaching into the street and what we could get there? I would think we would want to do that because I think if you are going to build a garage, boy do you want it to (inaudible). I also and I’m sure other people think about this too but if you are going to spend these many millions of dollars for cars, I hope – I would like us to think about its next use; whether it’s housing or whatever. I understand the load factor for parking garages is so huge that actually the load factor is not a problem for convertible uses but it’s about are the plates flat and a few other things. So, I would like to know how we’ve considered that. There’s seems to be an exhaust vent over by the, at this point, 10-foot pedestrian alley from Waverley kind of near its entry. It shows on sheet PK-2.1 and I don’t know what’s that about but that tends to be uninviting to go into – well, I don’t think that’s an inviting space anyway but if you were going to keep that as a 10-foot alley, that tends to discourage people from walking in. I don’t – sorry. Mr. Hayes: It would be up high. It discharges (inaudible) (crosstalk). Board Member Furth: Ok, that’s what I wondered so it’s up high, it wouldn’t be bothering us. It’s just something going by but I do think that – this does not strike me as an alley that I would like to go down. I think of our funny little alley adjacent to the historic building, is it on Florence too – no, no, that one works, it’s short, it’s straight, it’s well lite, it’s wide enough and the buildings are short. No, this is next to… Mr. Hayes: 420 Florence? Board Member Furth: The – yes, I think it’s the one – it’s the garage that fronts on Bryant and then I guess backs up on Florence and there’s this funny little zigzaggy thing and it’s not a pedestrian access way. It’s a… Chair Lew: You’re saying from Lytton? Board Member Furth: Yeah, from Lytton, the one that wonders by the historic buildings. It’s because it needed to be done to accommodate a complex setting but this -- I don’t think this is going to be where people walk. So, I don’t think we should dedicate a lot of space to it if we can pull the building back and do better on Hamilton; that’s my thought at the moment. Chair Lew: Thank you, Wynne. Great, thank you to the Staff and also to Ken, I think the packet and how you presented the project were perfect for preliminary. I guess the first thing that I want to say is that I have not read the HRB minutes yet because we just got them today but I have been talking to other Board Members on – about other historic projects and I’ve been – I think there’s some unhappiness about the way we’ve been reviewing new buildings when they are adjacent to historic buildings. So, I’ve been doing some research on my own about this and in Philadelphia, there’s an organization and they try to sort of frame the discussion about the design of new buildings. So, you could have literal replication of the historic building on the new site or you use that style but come up with a new – something new within that style or you could just make an abstract reference, which would be Ken Hayes preferred way City of Palo Alto Page 18 or you could just do a completely different strategy where you do something completely different and you just respect the old as old. Maybe you can’t replicate an old colonial building but you just make it completely different and there – so there are these four strategies and we don’t really talk about them. We sort of talk about the projects on the – you know like cornices and metal work respecting – similar to the Post Office but we don’t really actually talk about the four strategies and which strategy would be the best for a particular site. I think that probably should have happened on some of our other recent projects like Avenidas and what not and also, we have the Junior Museum project. I think that there’s some sentiment on the Board to try to elevate the level of discussion about that and debate about these different strategies so there’s that. On the site plan, I have several concerns that have been mentioned before which one is the 10-foot passage way. It just seems like it could be a very dark, undesirable place if it’s not designed correctly. I have also been concerned about as exiting this garage onto Land Twenty- One, which is only 15-feet wide and it’s one-way. I’m also concerned about the – as cars enter the garage from Hamilton. I’m concerned about queuing and stacking because once you – the car enters the garage, they have to decide are they going straight, are they going right or are they going up the ramp and so that seems to me to be a tricky point where you – we could actually end up with a lot of delays there with people not trying to figure out where they are going. On the retail depth, I think it’s been mentioned before that there are concerns about the dimensions of it and so if you have a 25-foot deep retail space, my unscientific survey of downtown is that’s going to be one of the small – shallowest spaces downtown. We have some barbers in the President and also the Cardinal Hotel and they are around 28-feet. There’s some – I think there’s a little ice cream place on University that may be around 28 or 30-feet but I mean most of the time they are like 40 or 50 or more in depth. So, you’re just going to limit the types of tenants that are going to be able to go into it. Then you – (inaudible) – also, within that 25-foot depth, you’re going to have to take out like handicap accessible bathrooms so you’re taking out 7 or 8-feet from that depth. So, I just have to give caution to Staff that there is a – that it’s very desirable to put the retail space in there but we may be limited in the number of tenants – types of tenants that could utilize that space. On the options, I think I would – I think I’m in agreement with – I guess it was the HRB’s sentiment which was something in between options one and two and I think I’m sort of there. Mr. Hayes: I thought it was one and… Chair Lew: Oh, one and three. Yeah, one and three with some sort of – some openings on the upper levels; I think that sounds fine. Two seems top heavy to me, having four floors of the garage over a low base and then I think the other concern that I would have on option two is that the – it really requires a hand of a very skilled designer, as yourself, but it’s really tricky. If you look at the federal building in San Francisco, the architects maybe a lot of mistakes with perforated metal. It’s very hard to get the right proportions of openings on the perforated metal and the public just doesn’t like them at all. Then with the – all the different meshes, sometimes they look good like there is a mesh on one of the UC Mission Bay buildings, it looks great from one direction and then you look at it from the other direction and it doesn’t look so great. It’s a trick material to use and it has its place, for sure. Anyway, it seems to me that something in between one and three is safer. Mr. Hayes: I mean one also has a mesh or metal of some kind but there are ways to mitigate that kind of impact. I mean it could be a bronze kind of color so it’s a real earthy – it’s not a shiny metallic metal (inaudible) (crosstalk)… Chair Lew: Yeah, no, there’s definitely a place for mesh in the right – there are beautiful meshes out there but some of them are very expensive. So, there’s definitely room in there to work with. I do want the – your Hamilton Avenue façade, I think you’re showing some – you’re trying to make some recess in there and I do want to see how that works with the arcade of the Post Office and how they look together in perspective. I’m curious to see if the Board wants to see a sun study on this and how it would impact the Waverley Street properties, especially if they are proposing residential uses there. It seems to me having a very tall garage on the southern side of those properties is going to impact the sun light on those; although we don’t really have any requirements. I don’t think we have and requirements on the – in the downtown zone for that. One just nitpicky item that I’ve seen on other garages that have had to City of Palo Alto Page 19 have fire sprinklers so if you have to have fire sprinklers – you’re not normally required to have them but you might have to if you have a retail use. Mr. Hayes: Retail, yeah, we’ll have fire sprinklers. Chair Lew: So, I’ve seen – there’s one near my house where they just didn’t figure out where to put all the stand pipes. They do this zig zag thing in the (inaudible) stair case on the corner and it looks terrible so I trust you to figure out where that goes. Mr. Hayes: Can you comment a little bit, Chair Lew, about the corner entrance and stair. Chair Lew: Yeah, you know I hadn’t – I am undecided on the staircases. When I use the stair cases in San Francisco, I prefer the stair cases to be completely open for – the feel safer, even if they are exposed. It just seems to me to be a nicer experience but then when I look at it and I think about all of the Birge Clark buildings and what not, I’m not sure I want to see this big open stair case with the big wing wall that goes all the way up. Then the other thing that I think about too is that on the outdoor stair cases are usually, like in a hand of unskilled lighting designer, they’ll just put these really ugly wall pack lighting and exposed conduit on there so it doesn’t look that great at night. I do trust that you sort of design the lighting to be attractive there. My take is a little modern and I could go – I’m open. My take on it was something more enclosed but I’m flexible on that. Mr. Hayes: Thank you. Chair Lew: So, I think that’s all that I have. Any other closing comments? Yes, Wynne. Board Member Furth: Elizabeth Wong mentioned underground connectivity to the adjacent parcels, which we did in the 800 block or the City and the 800 block of High Street to accommodate affordable housing on an adjacent site. So, I think under the right circumstances, that can work and that did involve funding from both parcels. On the stair case, I was suddenly thinking of the ornamental staircases with tile risers around – across the street on Ramona which is probably not appropriate here but I think there’s enormous variation in the attractiveness of stair cases. I think lighting makes a huge difference and I look forward to seeing that. Then I just wanted to tell Staff that on the 50-foot ceiling limit, I’m perfectly willing to believe that I’m dead wrong. I was just terrorized by the City Attorney who hired me in believing that it was sacred but I would like to know the history of that because I thought that we had to do a ballot measure for the more recent Stanford health project because it was going to exceed 50-feet. So, I look forward to understanding where I came across the misapprehension if it is one. Chair Lew: Great, any closing comments Ken? Mr. Hayes: No (inaudible). Thank you very much for your comments and we look forward to coming back. Chair Lew: Thank you. 3. PRELIMINARY REVIEW, 1310 Bryant Street, 1235 and 1263 Emerson Street [16PLN- 00238]: Preliminary Architectural Review of a Concept Plan for Phased Redevelopment of the Castilleja School Campus for a Proposed Expansion. The Project Anticipates a Lot Merger, Demolition of Two Existing Single-Family Residential Structures, Construction of a Below Grade Parking Garage, Replacement of Several Structures and Other Site Improvements. Zone District: R-1(10,000). Environmental Review: A Draft Environmental Impact Report is Being Prepared, for Which a Scoping Session was Held March 8, 2017 With the Planning and Transportation Commission. For More Information Contact Amy French, Chief Planning Official, at amy.french@cityofpaloalto.org. At the applicant’s request, this item will not be heard. Approval of Minutes: City of Palo Alto Page 20 4.Draft Architectural Review Minutes of August 3, 2017, and August 17, 2017. Chair Lew: So, we have the approval of minutes and we have two sets. We have two – well, they – you mean the minutes were sent by email. Board Member Furth: I’m thinking I missed one of those meetings. Chair Lew: Yes. So, should we do – do you want to do the August 17th? MOTION Board Member Furth: So, moved. Chair Lew: I don’t have any comments on them. Board Member Furth: Move approval. Vice Chair Kim: I’ll second that. Chair Lew: Ok, all in favor? Opposed? None. MOTION PASSES 3-0 WITH BOARD MEMBER BALTAY RECUSED AND BOARD MEMBER GOOYER ABSENT Chair Lew: Then for the minutes for August 3rd, we will push those back to a future agenda. Subcommittee Item Avenidas Expansion Project Chair Lew: We have one last item which is subcommittee. Ms. French: So, before adjournment of a full Board, I would like to note on Jodie’s behalf that packet page six there are some corrections needed. Let’s see, today – sorry, on the 21st, which it says the 22nd but that’s the 21st, Board Member Furth will not be attending. Then the dates there after are a day off so we’ll fix that on the next packet, thanks. Board Member Furth: I have a conflict of interest with respect to Avenidas because I live within 500-feet of the corner of the park so I will not be participating in the subcommittee. Ms. French: Thank you, Alex, for agreeing to step in for that. Chair Lew: So, we’re adjourned. Board Member Questions, Comments, Announcements Adjournment On September 21, 2017 the ARB subcommittee reviewed project details per approval condition 2c from the ARB approval of the project in October 2016, and verified consistency of same with AR approval findings. Project details included were light fixtures including courtyard trellis light fixtures, photometric plan, trash enclosure roof/trellis detail, and final palette showing the paint color for the exterior of the existing Category 2 building.