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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-11-19 Architectural Review Board Summary MinutesArchitectural Review Board Staff Report (ID # 11862) Report Type: Approval of Minutes Meeting Date: 12/17/2020 City of Palo Alto Planning & Development Services 250 Hamilton Avenue Palo Alto, CA 94301 (650) 329-2442 Summary Title: Minutes of November 19, 2020 Title: Draft Architectural Review Board Meeting Minutes for November 19, 2020 From: Jonathan Lait Recommendation Staff recommends the Architectural Review Board (ARB) adopt the attached meeting minutes. Background Draft minutes from the November 19, 2020 Architectural Review Board (ARB) are available in Attachment A. Draft and Approved Minutes are made available on the ARB webpage at bit.ly/paloaltoARB Attachments: x Attachment A: November 19, 2020 Draft Minutes (DOCX) 6 Packet Pg. 118 City of Palo Alto Page 1 Call to Order/Roll Call Present: Chair Peter Baltay, Vice Chair Osma Thompson, Board Members Alexander Lew, Grace Lee, and David Hirsch. Absent: None. [Roll Call] Oral Communications Chair Baltay: Oral Communications, are there any members of the public who wish to speak to any item not on our agenda today? Vinh, do we have any speakers? Veronica Dao, Administrative Associate: At this time there are no raised hands. Chair Baltay: Thank you very much. Next item is city official reports. The ARB schedule and attendance record Agenda Changes, Additions and Deletions City Official Reports 1. Transmittal of 1) the ARB Meeting Schedule and Attendance Record, and 2) Tentative Future Agenda items and 3) Recent Project Decisions Chair Baltay: Thank you very much. Next item is city official reports. The ARB schedule and attendance record, tentative future agenda items, and recent project decisions. Jodie, can we have a report, please? Jodie Gerhardt, Manager of Current Planning: Yes, I think Veronica is helping us this morning. Did I get that right? We have the yearly agenda here just showing that we are going to continue to be virtual at least until February for sure. We do have items for all of these hearings. The next page should show our future items. We do have 3585 El Camino, which will be the third hearing for that small mixed-use project. We also have 3241 Park Boulevard. This is going to be its first hearing and that is an office project along the creek in the north Ventura area. Lastly, we were thinking we might have elections on December 3rd, but after discussions with the Chair, we agree that we are not going to know who is reappointed at that time so we will delay that until at least the December 17th hearing. ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW BOARD DRAFT MINUTES: November 19, 2020 City Hall/City Council Chambers 250 Hamilton Avenue Virtual Meeting 8:30 AM 6.a Packet Pg. 119 City of Palo Alto Page 2 Chair Baltay: Before we leave this topic, I would like to request, at least for myself, to have paper copies of these two projects coming rather than the ones online. Are there any other members of the Board who would like to make the same request? Board Member Hirsch: Yes, I would, David Hirsch. Board Member Lee: I appreciate paper, as well, though I feel bad about the printing. Chair Baltay: It’s too bad about the printing but it made such a difference the other day when we had paper copies. At least three members, Jodie, are requesting paper copies of plans for those projects, okay? Ms. Gerhardt: Board Members Thompson and Lew, are you specifically not wanting paper? Board Member Lew: it doesn’t matter to me. If it is easier just to have all of the Board Members get paper I am fine with that. Vice Chair Thompson: I am in the same position as Board Member Lew. Ms. Gerhardt: Okay. I will talk to support staff and see what works best. Thank you. Action Items 2. PUBLIC HEARING / QUASI-JUDICIAL. 744-748 San Antonio Road [20PLN-00164]: Recommendation on a Master Sign Program to Allow Two Freestanding Signs, Eight Wall Signs and Ancillary Window Signs and a Sign Exception to Exceed the Number of Freestanding Signs and the Size of Freestanding Signs and Certain Wall Signs on a Building Face. Environmental Assessment: Exempt per CEQA Section 15311(Accessory Structures). Zoning District CS. For More Information Contact the Project Planner Sheldon S. Ah Sing at sahsing@m-group.us. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Jodie. Then we move on to our action items. The first item is action item number 2, a public hearing / quasi-judicial. 744-748 San Antonio Road: Recommendation on a master sign program to allow two freestanding signs, eight wall signs, and ancillary window signs and a sign exception to exceed the number of freestanding signs and the size of freestanding signs and certain wall signs on a building face. Before we get started, do we have any disclosures to make? David, disclosures? Board Member Hirsch: No disclosures. Chair Baltay: Osma, disclosures? Vice Chair Thompson: No disclosures. Chair Baltay: Grace, disclosures? Board Member Lee: No, disclosures. Chair Baltay: Alex, disclosures? Board Member Lew: Yes, I have a disclosure to make. I did take a call from Randy Popp on Tuesday who asked me if the drawings and the materials were clear. I told him that I thought the drawings were fine but that I had not reviewed the material sample. I did get to those samples yesterday. I also visited the site yesterday as well. 6.a Packet Pg. 120 City of Palo Alto Page 3 Chair Baltay: Thank you, Alex. I’d like to disclose that I also visited the site yesterday and I also looked at the material sample board at City Hall earlier this week. With that, staff, can we have a staff report, please? Sheldon Ah Sing: Yes, hello. I am Sheldon Ah Sing. [Setting up presentation.] Mr. Ah Sing: 744 San Antonio Road. Thank you for the introduction and the applicant is here with their presentation as well. Just a little bit of context, here is the formal review of a master sign program located on 1.91 acres. It contains the construction site right now to two five-story hotels. It is zoned CS. That’s a little bit of context about the area. It is directly across the street from some multi-family residential. San Antonio Road is a truck route. It is a busy road. It does also include, right now, some lower-intensity types of commercial uses including a nursery, gas station, a little grocery mart, and just approved this last Monday was the new mixed-use project that’s a block away. The Council did also approve the expansion of the housing incentive programs. This will be an area that will potentially transition over the next several years. The request for this project is a master sign program as well as a sign exception. We are recommending approval of the project. The master sign program does include two hotels. There is the AC hotel on the Southern portion of the property. Then there is -- what you guys may remember was the Courtyard Grand Marriott -- now the Hotel Citrine. It is kind of a one-off type of grand within the tribute portfolio. I think the applicant would be able to explain that a little bit more. It is slightly different. Both are on the luxury end I would say. Each sign program includes a mirroring of each other. Each hotel site includes one free-standing sign in front of it along San Antonio Road, four wall signs that are in very similar areas, as well as four window signs. The first thing we will look at is AC Hotel. On the west elevation is the front elevation where we were able to get some construction photos to provide a better color context of the signs. This is sign A and it is halo-lit channel letters on the wall. The letters in frame are brushed aluminum material and it is about 41 square feet. This sign does comply with the sign code. You can see that the location of the sign there the material has been placed as the building backdrop of it. Along the north interior is the same sign but this is facing the other building. This is potentially the courtyard of the site. This is sign B. These are, again, halo-lit channel letters. The light gets emitted from behind with the lettering being a silhouette. This 41 square feet again and this sign also complies with the sign code. Along the same elevations here but on a different plane, you have two types of signs here. You have another wall sign. It’s illuminated brushed aluminum frame and copy and flat aluminum background. It’s just under four square feet. It is just where the entry of the building is. This sign also complies with the sign code. That’s the sign that you see on the left. Then on the right, the window decals that go on the doors. This is a 3M film. In total, all of these film decals are 15 square feet and the sign also complies with the sign code. On the north interior there is one more sign. This is on top of the canopy. It’s a sign K and it is actually mounted on top of the canopy. It has a face-lit illumination. It’s a little bit different. Light comes through the front of the sign. It has an acrylic face with vinyl applied to have that color. This is just over six square feet and this sign also complies with the sign code. Lastly for the C Hotel, you have the freestanding sign and this is sign E. It is mounted to a wall that is going to 42 inches tall. It is not constructed yet. It is a stacked copy. The first stacked copy the AC hotel will be halo-illuminated. The secondary letters below are dimension letters that are painted white that are non-illuminated. This is 175 square feet. It does sit bigger because where we count the sign area for freestanding signs the entire background. Since it is placed on a wall we do count that but the sign itself isn’t extraordinarily large at all. I think if you drew a box around it is about nine square feet. We do count the entire wall in this case. Moving on to the Hotel Citrine, this is at the San Antonio frontage. They had a lot of construction activity so it is a little difficult to get closer there. This is sign H and it is a freestanding sign on a pretty much identical wall 42 inches high. It is, again, stacked copied. This first copy is halo-illuminated. Then the dimensional letters are below and those are painted white. This is 280 square feet. This sign, along with the other sign that I mentioned, did not apply with the sign code and that is where the sign exceptions come to play. I will give a summary of compliance in a little bit. When you get to the front of the building -- this is again San Antonio -- this is sign F. It’s a stacked copy. Here we have a different type of sign. It’s a cabinet internally illuminated for the logo; it's 46 inches high by 27 inches high. Then we have the brushed 6.a Packet Pg. 121 City of Palo Alto Page 4 bronze letters. It is 136 square feet and this sign does not comply with the sign code. It does exceed the area. We do have a little bit of concerns with the cabinet illumination because it is basically like a light box. We want to seek some direction from the Board on this type of sign, and whether this is appropriate and how to address that. We suggest in the staff report of having some kind of film to reduce light emissions. The applicant is also going to propose something in their presentation as well. On the south interior this is facing the courtyard facing the AC building. This is a very similar sign. It’s an identical sign. You can see a little bit of the back material there being applied in this photo. That gives you a little bit of context of what that would look like. Again, the cabinet logo is 46 inches by 27 inches. The second copy is halo-illuminated with brushed bronze letters. This is, again, 136 square feet and does not comply. Then also here we have sign I. This is very similar to the plaque that was on the AC Hotel. It’s non-illuminated. It has a mirror-polished stainless steel border and letters, and a flat aluminum background. This is just under four square feet. This does comply with the sign code. Moving on here, we have the window vinyl, again very similar to the AC Hotel. It is 15 square feet total when all of those are applied to the doors. This itself does apply with the city code. Then the last sign is the sign that is on top of the canopy. This one is applied a little bit differently. It’s not on top of the canopy necessarily. It is stacked in line with that canopy. It is halo-lit, brushed bronze, trimless base letters. It's different than the other sign that was face lit, halo lit, and the brushed bronze returns. It also is just over 10 square feet. With materials, they are kind of similar and they do share some of those brushed aluminum features and there is also the bronze that is used. The applicant can explain a little bit more about those and how they are applied. Here we get to the sign code compliance. It is under Municipal Code 16.20. For freestanding signs, only one is allowed per site frontage. In this case for free standing signs under five feet and the maximum size for signs under five feet in this situation is 27 square feet. There are two signs that are proposed because they are advertised to different brands and two different buildings. The combined square footage is 455 square feet. That exceeds the amount and that is where we have to get into the sign exception. Wall signs here are not to exceed are indicated in Table 3 of the ordinance for each building face. Sign D exceeds the area allowed. Signs G, I, and L combined exceed the area allowed along that building face plane for Hotel Citrine. Windows signs are not to exceed 20 percent of the window and that does not exceed the threshold. We are good there. Then we have a combination of signs of the code where there is a freestanding sign, any one of the following: a flat wall sign, a projecting wall sign, or an awning sign. In this case, the applicant is proposing a master sign program that will allow different sets of combination of signs. That’s where that request comes from. The master sign program does allow for occupants of the building or project to include a number of buildings and combine their lawful sign area coverage into one or more lawful signs to an integrated design concept. Here that is what the project is going to do. We can make those findings that are on attachment B, packet page 21. There are five different findings for those. The sign exception is an application made in conjunction with the architectural review which requests a deviation from what is allowed in the sign code. Here we are looking at exceptional or extraordinary circumstances or conditions applicable to the property and we are saying here that the sign exemption findings can be made because the site includes hotel uses that cater to visitors that are unfamiliar with the area but they may be familiar with the brand. That’s why it is important o have signs situated where they are and also of size that is consistent with the size of the buildings. The buildings are also larger. In conclusion, for CEQA, California Environmental Quality Act, these are exempt pursuant to accessory structures, the project meets the findings for a master sign program and sign exemption, the staff seeks direction on the cabinet signs proposed, and we request that the ARB conduct a public hearing. Staff does recommend that the ARB recommend approval of the proposed project to the Director of Planning based on the findings and subject to approval. That concludes my presentation. I would be happy to answer any questions for you. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Sheldon. Any questions from the Board for staff? Sheldon, I have a question. Could you please pull up your slide number six? I’d like to understand how you measure the area of this wall sign, please. Oh, I am sorry; not that one. Go down father on your presentation. It is the Citrine wall sign similar to that. A few more slides down. This one right here, yes. How do you measure the area of that sign, please? 6.a Packet Pg. 122 City of Palo Alto Page 5 Mr. Ah Sing: Yeah, we would take a rectangle around the area of the sign and what is behind it. I think we took the area of the cabinet and then we also took the area of the Hotel Citrine. Chair Baltay: Combined together they come up to 136 square feet you say? Mr. Ah Sing: Yes. Chair Baltay: Okay. I don’t measure it to be that. Maybe we can ask the applicant in more detail, or you. Sheldon Ah Sing Yeah, I can do… certainly the applicant does his presentation and I’ll go through and double-check these. Chair Baltay: Why don’t you double-check that for me if you could? Any other questions for staff? Board Member Lew: Peter, I have a question. Chair Baltay: Go ahead. Board Member Lew: Thank you, Sheldon, I think, if I recall correctly, Palo Alto limits the signs to only allow the trademark logo. I have a question about the freestanding sign. One, like the AC Hotel, includes Palo Alto and the Citrine includes a Tribute Collection below the logo and I was wondering if those are allowed. Mr. Ah Sing: Let me check that, Jodie. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah, I had looked into that a little bit. I will find the wording for you. It is supposed to be the business name. I believe I looked into that and it was part of the full name but we can ask the applicant to go over that as well and I will find that definition. Board Member Lew: Okay, thank you. Chair Baltay: Thanks, Alex. Any other questions? Then do we have the applicant with us this morning? Is that Randy Popp? Good morning, Randy. Let’s give Randy a chance to tell us about his project. [Adjusting Audio.] Chair Baltay: Randy, you'll have ten minutes to make your statement, please. Randy Popp, Applicant: Before I start, I would like to ask that you also allow Rashik Patel, who I believe is part of the audience, to come into the presentation group. He is going to speak briefly on behalf of the hotel. Chair Baltay: Who is he, first, please? Randy Popp: Rashik Patel, is the Vice President of Development for T2 Hospitality and they are the ownership group for the hotel. Chair Baltay: Okay. Vinh, if you could unmute him, please. Combined you will have ten minutes whenever you are ready to start. Mr. Popp: Let’s just make sure we got the right person. [Setting up presentation.] 6.a Packet Pg. 123 City of Palo Alto Page 6 Rashik Patel: My name is Rashik Patel, [spells name]. I am the Vice President of Development for T2 Hospitality. Chair Baltay: Welcome to our meeting. Whenever you are ready, gentleman. Mr. Popp: I am ready to get started. I will just briefly thank Sheldon for an excellent presentation. I am not sure you really need to see my slides. He has done a great job of explaining what I was going to run through. I will be more rapid in what I am doing and won’t waste your time this morning. If we can go to the next slide. I’ll just mention that today we are seeking a recommendation of approval from the ARB. We are close to finishing this project and we are hoping to be open sometime in December if that is possible. This hearing is really only required because the project has two buildings similar to other campuses in town, like VMware and other places, when you got that our sign requirements are not consistent with that type of development. They are more appropriate for a small shop on University Avenue or something like that. Whenever you have a multi-building site you have to contemplate this other version which is the master sign program. I believe as Sheldon has stated pretty clearly the signage is consistent with the requirements for that. While we are very sensitive to your review and want to participant in this process I need to state clearly that virtually all of what we are proposing is reflective of very specific brand standards, things like that the word Palo Alto is included in the name, that the Citrine logo includes Tribute Portfolio [distortion]. With that, let me just let Rashik take a moment on how signage works for a brand like this and what their methodology has been to get these approved so far. Mr. Patel: Good morning, Boardman. Thank you for hearing us on the signage package here. The number thing that Marriot drives its business with is consistency in all of its brands. That is no different for the AC Hotel and The Tribute. There are almost 200 AC Hotels worldwide and almost 90 in North America. The signage is how Marriott ensures that their guests will receive a level of service that is the same no matter where you go anywhere in the world. Therefore, their process for the signage is simple; they all have to look the same with only two potential options: either a box sign or individual letters. If you want to deviate from that, then don’t build a Marriott; choose another hotel franchise. This is how they ensure no matter what that if you go to one of their hotels -- whether it be a Marriott or a Tribute -- that the level of service is guaranteed and that it is the same. You get the same level of service, you get the same type of furniture and the amenities are all alike. This way Marriott can guarantee that you get the service that you have bought in on with their name behind it. Marriott prides itself on the fact that its consistency is their number guarantee for its guests. Thank you. Randy. Mr. Popp: Thank you, Rashik. Sheldon, if you want to go to full screen that might make it a little bit easier to see the detail. Just make it a little bit larger then we can go to the next slide. I will just relay that placeholders have been shown throughout the entitlement process for the signage what was -- as we all heard previously -- the Courtyard by Marriott has now been rebranded as the Hotel Citrine, which is part of The Tribute Portfolio. This is actually a pretty exclusive brand. It is frankly lucky that we’re able to get one in Palo Alto. It allows for a certain level of flexibility for the interior design and it is based on an image or concept that represents the character of the hotel itself. The citrine stone and the colors of that are used throughout the interior and the Lemon Verbena, which is the branch that you see on the logo, represents an eco-centric aesthetic and approach to the operations. Next slide, please. You can see how the building is shaping up here a little bit. Next slide. Same is true for the AC Hotel. Similarly, we have shown the placement of signage and you can see the front-facing AC sign. It's hidden a little bit by the foliage and we anticipated that. The side facing sign that was on the Courtyard, now the Citrine. Next slide, please. And the buildings are coming along nicely. I am glad you were all able to get out there and walk around. We would be happy to invite you out to come see the interior soon, as well. Next slide, please. As Sheldon mentioned, we do have six types of signs, which are really mirrored for each of the buildings. I will be frank in saying that the specifics for the AC standard have driven a bit of the design for the Citrine as well because they are mirrored next to each other we want to have compatibility between those two. Next slide, please. As Rashik was mentioning, the brand standard is quite specific. If you look on the web briefly, you will see all over the world this is what the signs look like. They are typically an internally lit cabinet-type sign for the AC that has a fairly high rating for the 6.a Packet Pg. 124 City of Palo Alto Page 7 color, typically about a 5,000 Kelvin and they are quite bright. We recognized in Palo Alto early on that that was going to be challenging to do everywhere so we have requested from Marriott some exception to that. Next slide, please. Sheldon did a great job explaining what the character of those will be. Sheldon, if you could flip to the next slide for me that would be great. [Setting up presentation.] Mr. Popp: The next slide is just our building again. You have seen these pictures In Sheldon's so we can just go forward. I will explain very briefly I put in a couple of images of one other AC that we were able to find that did halo-lit letters similar to what we are proposing so that you can see how that would be constructed and what that will look like. This type of halo-lit signage is consistent for both the AC and the Citrine; so as we go through this and you see halo-lit signage this is what we’re talking about. Next slide, please. Sheldon mentioned very quickly also the type C and D signage. The C signage is really so that people don’t walk through glass. It’s just a band on some of our larger glass windows so that there is a level of safety and people don’t run into those. It protects from bird strikes and other things we’ve found in the past that can be an issue. Then the plaque that is on the building which is sign type C, is really a critical element of the brand appearance. Next slide, please. I will take a moment to just very quickly explain that, again, the Citrine is this different style of hotel for Marriott. Each one has a unique character to it. I have given a couple of examples for others that are in other areas. For us, we have chosen this Lemon Verbena as the motif. That leaf blossom that comes off of that is important for a number of reasons in terms of the design, and when you see the interior you'll see how that’s reflected throughout. The detail in that and the delicacy of that is important for us. Next slide, please. I am going to pass by some of the other things that we talked about here in terms of the halo-lit signage. I think you all understand that clearly now and just focus on this cabinet sign for a moment, which is something that exists in many locations in Palo Alto. A number of sign programs that have been approved at staff level have cabinet-lit signage like this. The Homewood Suites is a good example. It is just right up around the corner on El Camino. For us, I want to make sure that everyone understands that the balance between contrast and legibility of this is pretty critical. We have dimmable LED’s inside this cabinet and our intention is to turn this down so low that the logo really glows and is present and is not washed out in any way by the brightness of the sign. If there is some concern about this we would welcome a condition where some of the board members or staff would come with us at the site as we got this turned on and we can dial that up or down to make sure that it is not too bright. I will say that film is not a good option for us on this because it would damage the intricacy of the design. Go ahead to the next for me as well, Sheldon. Mirroring, again, as we said what is going on on the AC. We’ve got these internal signs. The type G and then going to the next is more detail that you’ve already seen. I am just skipping through this because Sheldon explained it so clearly. Then, again, for the Citrine the similar plaque and the glass mounted vinyl to create some privacy protection help on that. Let’s look on the next and talk briefly about these signs that are mounted on the canopy. As I showed early on, this type of sign is a very specific brand standard. It appears on every single AC Hotel and this is a location because it is on the interior of the property and really not visible from the exterior in any way we did stay with essentially an internally lit sign that will glow in the way that the AC has asked us to make it happen. These letters will be mounted to the top of the canopy and we will have a brightness to them that is very consistent with the brand standard. If you go the next for me, Sheldon (crosstalk). I’m sorry? Mr. Nguyen: Quick time check. It has been ten minutes. Mr. Popp: Okay. I am sorry. I will go very quickly. I have two more slides. The Citrine is different than the ACV in this way. We‘re going to just use the same halo-lit signage. Next slide. The last thing that I will mention very briefly is the way this sign was calculated I respect what Sheldon has done here. I do have a pocket slide if anyone wants to see it. This panel is actually made up of a series of individual pieces of metal and so the sign itself is quite a bit smaller than that large wall and the large wall is made up of a bunch of smaller pieces. If that helps to change how any of you might review that I would be happy to discuss that. Thank you very much. That concludes my presentation. Happy to answer any questions you have. 6.a Packet Pg. 125 City of Palo Alto Page 8 Chair Baltay: Thank you very much Randy and Rashik. At this point, I would like to open the meeting to public comment. Vinh, do we have any speaker cards? Ms. Dao: There are no raised hands. Chair Baltay: Okay. To any members of the public, now is the chance to speak. Okay, we will close the meeting to public comment. Do we have any questions of the applicant, please, from the Board? Vice Chair Thompson: I have a quick question. Chair Baltay: Go ahead, Osma. Vice Chair Thompson: Mr. Popp, you said that that wall sign is made up of smaller elements. What did you mean when you said that? Mr. Popp: Sheldon, if you could open my presentation back up and flip to the first pocket slide. I think it’ll help explain what I'm talking about. Ms. Gerhardt: Staff also has a few definitions ready to go when you need them. Mr. Popp: Yeah. I am not trying to bend the intent of this in any way but I do want you to understand. [Setting up presentation.] Mr. Popp: This is a Corten wall and, of course, we are not Richard Serra here. We’re not going to bend a giant piece of steel the way he might. What we are doing is we will be faceting the sign and there will be very slight one-inch gaps between the individual panels so you can see highlighted in red. [Setting up presentation.] Mr. Popp: You can see the dashed lines there around some of the pieces is where the actual signage exists. I will share that we have heard from the fire department that they may prefer the 744/748 building numerals to actually be on the building itself. We are not certain about where those will exist ultimately. We are going to do whatever the fire department tells us we have to do. We prefer them to be out on the front as we have shown them and as staff has asked us to place them. Osma, just to very quickly answer your question -- I am sorry for being too long about this -- it’s segmented and we are only applying the sign to a portion to this segmented wall. Vice Chair Thompson: Thank you. Chair Baltay: Thank you. Any other questions? Sheldon, do you have any response for me regarding the measurement of the Citrine wall sign? Ms. Gerhardt: I think Sheldon might still be working on that measurement. If I can share my screen here. Chair Baltay: Randy, you might also want to chime in. I just don’t measure it to be nearly as large as the report says it is and I want to understand what I am missing. Mr. Popp: I think I will ask Jodie to relay what staff interpretation of this is. My guess is -- and I used to struggle with this when I was in the position you are all in today -- very often the sign requirements state that you have to include the entire wall surface or some large portion of the mall surface in the measurement of the sign rather than just drawing a boundary bubble around the sign itself. I think that may be what’s according here. I will leave it to Jodie as to what her interpretation is. 6.a Packet Pg. 126 City of Palo Alto Page 9 Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah, that is especially true for the monument sign that is the entire sign structure is considered the sign area. That is why that monument sign is looking so large. As far as the wall sign, I think those could be calculated as two individual pieces and I don’t know if it was done as one rectangle or two. I think that is what Sheldon is working on to verify those numbers. The other question that I think the Board had… sorry. The sign area comes out of the definitions of the sign code and then as far as the business name that comes out of prohibited signs. It does say that the sign shall be the place of business enterprise solely for naming the business. It is not to advertise products or anything like that. It does give some leeway for what we consider the name. It is incidental to the naming. If there is some add on such as the Palo Alto that goes along with the hotel name. Chair Baltay: Jodie, you're saying that in staff’s opinion the addition of the word Palo Alto is appropriate. Ms. Gerhardt: Correct. Chair Baltay: Thank you. Okay, any other questions? Then let’s just bring this back to the Board. Who wants to get started here? Maybe Alex? Board Member Lew: Sure. Thank you, Randy. I am generally in favor of the proposed project. I think I would add in the sign exception finding number one… I think my recommendation would be to add that the two hotel entrances are internally facing because when you actually factor that in it really explains why there are more signs. I think the other factor I am thinking is that the signs that are being proposed some of them are oriented to automobile drivers but a lot of the other ones -- the plaques and the door signs -- are oriented to pedestrians and the entrances to the building are hidden internally around the corner. I think that sort of explains much of the additional signage. I do like the halo-lit. I do like the logo of the Citrine Hotel. If we can work around with dimmers then I think that is probably preferable to film, which I would imagine won’t last or won’t age nearly as well. Yeah, that is where I am on this one but I think the hotel is coming along well and I look forward to hearing what the other Board Members think of this project. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Alex. Grace, would you like to take us further, please? Board Member Lee: Sure. I want to thank Sheldon for a very clear report. Randy, it's nice to see you; thank you for your presentation. I have similar comments as Alex and I will be brief. Just stepping a little bit back, I want to say it is wonderful to see this project moving forward on San Antonio. Signage is one of those wonderful pieces and can be quite difficult but what I find the signage -- and I am happy to see here -- is that it begins to breakdown the scale of the walls and it really begins to define the overall new building and environment. Signage is so important for wayfinding. Alex, thank you for alluding to the pedestrians and that we need this for the pedestrians. Also, on the vehicular scale, I feel like the proposed application here is rather well balanced and actually works quite well with the architecture. The other piece that I wanted to mention is that I appreciated the comments about brand recognition and marketing; however, I think signage does sometimes -- especially with the brand -- become something that we don’t want to be; something that we see the same everywhere. I understand the importance of a logo and how that actually works with Marriott and all of that, but I think it is actually more important that it works with the architecture. If there is a way to balance that equation in terms of being true to your marketing and brand recognition but also working well with the architecture, I think that is the goal for us to discuss today. Like Alex, I would be definitely in favor of some kind of dimmable LED as proposed by the applicant. My concern when I first saw the package… what a wonderful package, I can see everything and I can read everything but when I saw that logo, particularly as a cabinet box lit up… I appreciate this wonderful motif and the Lemon Verbena. It is rather delicate and my worry that is with the background being this white acrylic face we want to make sure [distortion]. That is really the only comment that I have. Perhaps that is something that we, as a Board, can discuss in terms of adding that as a condition. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Grace. David, your turn, please. 6.a Packet Pg. 127 City of Palo Alto Page 10 Board Member Hirsch: This is the first sign project that I have seen. It’s been fascinating to be [distortion]. [Adjusting Audio.] Board Member Hirsch: This is the first sign project that I've seen here in Palo Alto and I am unfamiliar with other areas of the country here where we don’t talk so much about signs. It is interesting to see how much detail is carried through to this very element on these buildings. I agree with the other Board Member’s comments here, Alex to begin with and Grace to follow up on pretty much everything they have said. I would like to add that I think the idea of having a sign down low in front and then on the building is appropriate to the traffic street here and those two locations are good for identity for the hotel and for the visitor to find their way to it. It is very interesting this idea of two hotels sharing a courtyard. Yes, Alex’s comment about the different signage you need on the inside because that becomes private space there. I think that you need that identity and it is really well done. I really like the differentiation of the two hotel sign types and the Citrine is particularly attractive as a graphic design with a flower as well. It is interesting to see that and I am curious to know if some of that decoration is actually carried into the hotel but you don’t have to answer that now. I can wait until I see the hotel completed. The color change in all of that I think it is important to note that it relates nicely to the color of the building, and, of course, it relates some way to the type of service that is going to be provided by the two buildings, which is, again, reflected in the graphics there. I can certainly say that I am proud to be part of approval here on what all has been done. I think Randy did a good job on this one; good signage. I don’t have as much knowledge of the detail as Grace was talking about or how it was constructed. I do absolutely agree that being able to (inaudible) signs down is a good idea and something we can work with you on as it proceeds so that it isn’t overwhelming at night time but can be seen because certainly clients will come late to this building. Great job. Thank you. Chair Baltay: Thank you for your comments, David. Osma. Vice Chair Thompson: Thanks. Yeah, thank you so much, Sheldon, that was a really excellent presentation; very clear. I have seen a couple of sign projects and I do have a bit of critique on the drawings. I did feel like a lot of the images were really low resolution. I had a little bit of a hard time envisioning what that sign would look like because of that resolution but I feel like Sheldon’s presentation really cleared a lot of my concerns. I really appreciate that. I do think the halo-lit is probably the best choice. The indirect light is a lot nicer to look at. For the cabinet on the Hotel Citrine, I do have a concern, and, again, it might be the resolution of the drawings, but I can see the panels that make the wall behind it and they have spacing that is a design. The seams between the panels is a design and currently the way the cabinet is placed in the drawing that I am looking at, which is drawing 10 of 16, that cabinet does not seem to be aligned with the panels in any way that makes sense. Am I allowed to share my screen so that we know what we are looking at or I can ask Sheldon to pull up this image? Chair Baltay: Absolutely. Go ahead. Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. I am looking at this image and you can see -- again, it’s not great resolution -- that the patterning of the wall that’s behind the sign doesn’t have a very strong relationship to where the location of the cabinet is placed. I appreciate that the verbiage of the letters is just above this horizontal, which makes sense, but I wonder if there might be an option to either have this centered in a bigger panel or at least shifted a little bit so that it makes sense with the panel spacing. That’s my only concern with how the sign is placed in terms of it being harmonious with the rest of the façade. Otherwise, in terms of it being a dimmable cabinet, I don’t have too much issue with that. I do think it is important that we monitor the brightness of that just because everything else will be halo-lit and indirect. This definitely has the danger of being overpowering. I also hope it -- I'm sure, I mean it’s a hotel -- is cleaned regularly so bugs aren’t showing through there. That was my main comment. If we could have a subcommittee or something under consideration for that item I think that is important. Other than that, I can recommend approval. 6.a Packet Pg. 128 City of Palo Alto Page 11 Chair Baltay: Thank you, Osma. I will say I am in concurrence with my colleagues. I thought Alex’s comments were appropriate regarding the fact that the hotel buildings are inward-facing, and that’s a good distinctive justification for the exception. Osma, I am afraid I don’t agree with you regarding the horizontal shifting of the Citrine. I think -- when I was out there yesterday, at least -- the patterning of the tiling and the material behind that is fairly indistinct. It is really tough to notice too much how it is related and when you are seeing this from far away I think that’s a detail that is just not that relevant on this project. I think also it's probably a real hassle for these guys to shift that. I am sure they have set that stuff, technically, within the building already. Yes, Randy, would you like to add clarification to that? Go ahead, if you'd like. Mr. Popp: Yeah, thank you. I’ll just respond quickly that the comment that Chair Baltay just made is, I believe, very accurate. The patterning of the panels themselves is very subtle relative to the surface finish of that material. It’s not nearly what the drawing describes and there is almost no way to get that to represent in the drawing. I apologize for that. The intent here, really, is to have this sort of random patterning of material and have a sign that is centered. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Randy. Randy, that’s enough. Thank you. Mr. Popp: Thank you. Chair Baltay: Okay. I have a minor concern, I guess, regarding the wall signs and their size and whether we grant an exception for that or not. Sheldon, I was asking about the size because by my measurements, even if you take a rectangle encompassing both the CAN sign and the text you're only at about 95 square feet. That would put it below the need to have an exception. I am curious as to how we came up with those measurements. I think the size of the sign is fine, I am just not sure what the best precedence is to be setting is. I went through this last night pretty carefully reading the various definitions of area in the sign code and I think you could argue whether you can’t these as separate pieces, the text and the CAN. That makes it down to about 25 square feet. Even if you're more conservative and call it one rectangle, it’s about six feet high by fifteen feet and nine inches wide. I just don’t see where 136 square feet comes from. Mr. Ah Sing: I did check, under your measurements we still need to count the other signs that are along that plane. In the interior, they are still exceeding the amount that they're allowed but along San Antonio Road that would put it under. If the 96 square feet would then put that sign under the threshold for that wall but the other sign in the interior is still over when you consider the other signage. Chair Baltay: Okay, yeah I did t run the math on all of these. The question, then, for staff, I guess, is that when you're doing a master sign program does that then let us justify that they’re using the overage of square footage on other facades on the facade in question? The sign program is what's allowing the exception or do we have to find specific findings as you’ve put in your list here, the fact that it’s a hotel and things like that? Jodie, can you help me out with that, or Sheldon? Mr. Ah Sing: There is a section in the code about combination of signs. It is very specific if you have a free-standing sign and your other signs you can have are very specific and that’s where the master signing program comes into play but it also does allow you to move the sign area around a bit. The sign exceptions are still in play. You would still need to consider the individual aspects of a sign. In particular, here we have a freestanding sign that is a clear exception there for those. You can only have one freestanding sign and then besides the signs are also too big. Chair Baltay: Okay. To my colleagues, my concern is that I don’t want us to be granting sign exceptions all the time and I think the findings, the justification, has to be logical. I don’t think saying that it’s a 2.0 FAR building logically allows bigger wall signs. The wall signs are regulated by the area of the wall. The building size doesn’t really relate to that so the FAR shouldn’t matter. I just don’t think that’s a good justification to put in here. According to this justification, every hotel with a 2.0 sign is going to be bigger and I don’t think that’s appropriate. I think that only applies to the wall signs on the Citrine project if one 6.a Packet Pg. 129 City of Palo Alto Page 12 of them is actually measured okay. I guess I think if the other ones are bigger than what’s allowed by the code they should be made smaller. It’s not that big of a deal and there’s no justification for that. I think the justification Alex mentioned about the buildings being inward-facing and the fact that there are two hotels, not one, is plenty for the monument signs in the front. It’s fine to have two of them and the fact that they have this curving wall thing as the structure, that all makes sense. That seems to be a unique exception to justify a sign exception. I am having a hard time making the exception just on the wall signs on the area based on the language in the findings here. What I would like to do at least is change the language under finding number one to strike the stuff about FAR and rather stick to the justification Alex offered that it is two hotels and they're inward-facing. I think we are just opening up Pandora’s Box if we allow the larger FAR to be the purpose for a sign exception. Ms. Gerhardt: Thank you, Peter, for that conversation because we do want to limit these exceptions as much as possible. Sorry for the interruption. This is pandemic, kids are at home and the school is calling kind of thing. Chair Baltay: No, I have got the phone going off the hook here, too. Ms. Gerhardt: The particular wall that you're asking about is what? Chair Baltay: I am saying that the wall signs on the Citrine building, there is one facing San Antonio, which perhaps the area is less than we think and it okay. Then it seems the combination of wall signs facing into the courtyard is collectively larger than the amount allotted. It must be close and if you recalculate the areas it may be okay but Sheldon says it’s over by a little bit. What I am saying, I guess, is that I can’t find a justification to make a sign exception to have larger wall signs because the building is inward-facing or because it is a larger building; the FAR is bigger. Those are not reasons for me to justify that. That’s what I am concerned about is that we are… they are great looking signs and they seem to fit the buildings just fine but I don’t think that’s the proper justification for this thing. Ms. Gerhardt: Okay. Sheldon, we have recalculated the San Antonio elevations and what numbers did you ultimately come up with? Mr. Ah Sing: I would concur with Chair Baltay at 96 square feet. Ms. Gerhardt: Okay, meaning that it is within the limits then? Mr. Ah Sing: for the San Antonio frontage and then we would take into account the other signs on the interior it still exceeds, not by much as Chair Baltay… Chair Baltay: I mean, I guess I would like it if we could just see that the numbers make it not exceed at all. If you were to take that CAN sign and letter sign and treat them as separate pieces then easily the problem goes away. The definition requires they be separated by one and a half times the dimension of one of the pieces. It’s a little bit tricky but it’s very close. I don’t want to get into the parsing on that. What I would like to do is have us modify the rationale for finding number one to remove the FAR justification and instead stick to the fact that this is two hotels on one parcel and that the hotels are inwardly facing as the rationale why this sign exception is granted. My other thing is that I would like to see us have a strong condition regarding the brightness of the Citrine sign. I think it would be fine if staff were to check that but I would like it to be a condition where somebody goes out there in the evening and really does see it be adjusted to satisfy that it is not a big spotlight on to the greenhouse community across the street. Otherwise, it’s a four-foot by two-foot spotlight if you turn up those LED’s it could be quite bright and that is potentially a real nuisance to the neighborhood who was pretty upset and took some persuasion for this project to begin with. It seems an easy thing. Unfortunately, I agree with Alex who thought the film probably won’t weather well if you try to force that kind of a fix on a sign like this. If the LED’s are dimmable that’s an easy solution and the applicant is willing to do it. I would like to see a strong condition on that, though. Again, I would like to modify finding one and make sure we have a good condition of approval on the CAN sign and I support this project. Any other comments 6.a Packet Pg. 130 City of Palo Alto Page 13 following up on what everyone else said? Does anyone else support Osma’s concept about the aligning of the Citrine CAN sign, for example? Would anybody like to make a motion for us? Okay. Board Member Lew: [Distortion] make it formal and second it. Chair Baltay: If you could, Alex, please. I would rather it not always come from the chair all the time. MOTION Board Member Lew: I will move that we recommend approval of the project subject to modifying finding number one to remove references to floor area and larger buildings, and to add to that finding that there are two buildings on one site and they are internally facing. Then to add a condition of approval that staff review the Citrine cabinet box signs at night and to review the illumination levels of those signs at night. That’s it. Chair Baltay: I can second that. Grace, would you like to second? Board Member Lee: Either way. I am fine with you seconding. Chair Baltay: Go ahead, Grace, you second then, please. Board Member Lee: Okay, I’ll second. Chair Baltay: Okay, so the motion has been made and seconded. Would anybody like to address that motion? Jodie, can you clarify that that condition is feasible that we can actually check the CAM lights? Ms. Gerhardt: Yes, that’s absolutely feasible. Chair Baltay: Okay. Vinh, can we have a roll call vote, please? Aye: Baltay, Hirsch, Lee, Lew, Thompson (5) No: (0) MOTION TO APPROVE PASSES 5-0. Study Session 3. Study Session for ARB Review of Draft Objective Standards (Continued from 10/15/20) Chair Baltay: Thank you very much. Thank you for the great application everybody. Why don’t we move right along? Does anybody need a break? This next one is going to be quite a bit to go through. Let’s move on to the study session now. Is that, right, Jodie? I am trying to find it in the agenda here. Vice Chair Thompson: That’s right, it’s a study session. Ms. Gerhardt: Yes, sorry, my mute was not working. You are correct. Chair Baltay: Okay. Let me figure out which one. I can’t find the introduction for this one on my screen right this instant. Bear with me one second here. [Setting up presentation.] 6.a Packet Pg. 131 City of Palo Alto Page 14 Chair Baltay: We are doing a study session for ARB review of draft objective standards, which is continued from October 15, 2020. I guess we start out with a staff presentation. There are no disclosures on the study session. Jodie and staff, take it away. Ms. Gerhardt: Yes, thank you very much. I am actually going to have Jean Eisberg with Lexington. She has been helping us a great deal on these objective standards and she has some other members, Chris, as well as possibly Jeremy, that will be helping as well. Thank you. Go ahead, Jean. Jean Eisberg: Okay great. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. We are going pick up where we left off a month ago on objective standards. You’ll recall that we made a lot of progress. I am just going to do a very quick recap and then we are going to move forward and if time allows we will try to go backwards again and provide some feedback and revisions based on the feedback that you gave us at the last meeting. We have four more topics that we’re going to go through. We will try to keep to about ten minutes per topic and then again, if time permits we will go back and take a look at some of those previous topics. We made it through some of the big picture items in terms of the relationship between the building and the street, the public realm, access, and building orientation, and building massing. We are going to pick up back on façade design, go through residential entries, open space, and the example of materials. We have been working with you as a full Board and with the subcommittee of Board Members Thompson and Hirsch over the past year. We are meeting again today for our fifth meeting and based on what happens today we will figure out where we are going to go next. We may come back to the Board as a whole; it’s also been discussed bringing the Board and the PTC together. The PTC is very interested in hearing your feedback on the architectural side in terms of the objective standards. I will revisit this once we get through today. I am not going to go through my whole presentation. I will pause after each section to have questions and discussions among the Board. You’ll recall that we started façade design last time. Again, the way that this objective standard draft is organized we have a series of intent statements that are the subjective guidelines and those are drawn directly from the context space design criteria. Then on the right hand side of the slide you can see the sections that include all of the draft standards, which are requirements and are written to be objective. Last time we talked about the intent statement and we talked about base, middle, and top, and you'll recall that the Board’s recommendation was that we actually we remove the base, middle, and top guideline from the intent statement but keep it as a standard. Essentially, a project that is looking to meet objective standards, for whatever reason, would need to show that that base, middle, and top. If they did not want to do that they could instead meet the intent behind this intent statement excluding the need for a base, middle, and top. They could come to you in a very modernist box form and at the discretion of the ARB that project could be considered and approved. Just briefly running through what that looks like, we had, again, our base, middle, and top set of standards. We did get some feedback last time on the graphics. Chris and has team have made some revisions to those graphics, specifically to focus in on the specific element that relates to that standard. Instead of showing windows everywhere, if the standard doesn’t relate to the windows we are just talking about on the upper left corner here that step back or recessing of the façade that’s what is shown in the diagram. Those are some changes to the diagrams that you'll see next time around. This is where we left off on façade articulation. We had some changes in the packet numbering but you'll notice that the packet you received was the exact same set of standards as last time. If you’re looking at your old packet from October it is packet page 34. If you're looking at the packet from today’s meeting its packet page 56. I do have the standard up on the screen. I know it is very small font but this is just to provide a visual queue for the discussion. Chair, I was going to pause there if you want to go through façade articulation. Chair Baltay: Okay. Does anybody have anything to comment on regarding façade articulation? Vice Chair Thompson: I have a question and this is just an inquiry for when it is a good time to discuss this. I think there has been comments on the graphics and exhibits and, I guess, I am wondering -- we just saw an update -- do we want to talk about that as a separate item from the text? Chair Baltay: Yes, Osma, I think we should discuss the format and graphics as a separate thing maybe as we finish all of this. I think it might be a bit of a discussion. I don’t want us to get bogged down on 6.a Packet Pg. 132 City of Palo Alto Page 15 that quite yet. Does anybody else share that thought that we might want to just discuss that as a whole amongst the Board. Board Member Lee: I just wanted to thank you. I watched the video from the last meeting. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend and I am wondering if it is at all possible to talk about the slide previous? The base, middle, and top and the requirement of two or more. Is that now closed? Are we moving forward now just to the faced articulation or I just wanted to check in. Ms. Gerhardt: I think we are fine going back to just the base, middle, and top but then we wanted to going from there and we can come back around a second time as needed. Board Member Lee: Is that okay, then, as a group? I just wanted to clarify the two or more of the following four techniques. I don’t recall if you discussed that on the video from last meeting. Is that something that’s agreed? Chair Baltay: The base, middle, and top thing? Board Member Lee: Yeah, just the two or more of the four techniques. Is something that we are all comfortable with? Board Member Hirsch: I would like to see us -- I agree with Grace -- talk about this in detail. I have some further thoughts regarding the way in which we seemingly decided that the way they would use base, middle, and top might really not work very well. My feeling was it should reverse; it should go into the earlier… it should not become a standard by itself. Board Member Lee: I guess that was my question, too, like David. I wasn’t sure if there was an agreement in the last meeting that it would come out of an intent statement and become a standard? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah… Chair Baltay: Let me address, I guess, because I think I pushed for this. My argument is that building a building with a base, middle, and top is not in and of itself a design. It’s a technique when you design the building to give it a scale or a proportion that we somehow relate as more human. It seemed to me more appropriate to put that down as an objective technique if somebody wants to use it but there are other ways architects build buildings that meet these other design intents without a base, middle, and top. By forcing a base, middle, and top on every building, which is what would happen if you put it in the design intent, you sort of tie the hands of architects who want to do something different. I feel that it is possible to design a building that meets these other design intents without having a defined base, middle, and top and I didn’t want to see us get locked into that. I think it is harder to define in an objective fashion but there are many buildings that have been done well that way. Board Member Hirsch: One comment to make here is if you'll notice that the illustrations of a base, middle, and top is a discreet, smaller scale building with minimal dimension rather than a larger building. Therefore, it might not apply very well to other types of buildings, or it might. A building that’s in a conceptual situation with other buildings that also have a base, middle, and top. I think that originally it was put in the more subjective portion of this presentation as just one possibility rather than in the design portion here where it is being a specific requirement. Chair Baltay: But isn’t that what we are doing, David? By putting it in the specific thing we are saying that the specifics are one way to demonstrate compliance. If you put it in the intent that every building has to meet the intent regardless of the path you take to get there. Board Member Hirsch: I think there were alternatives in the intent section. Isn’t that true? 6.a Packet Pg. 133 City of Palo Alto Page 16 Board Member Lee: Jean, do you mind just scrolling and going back to the previous slide so we see the intent statements? Vice Chair Thompson: I guess, are we not (crosstalk). Sorry, go ahead. Board Member Lee: Osma, go ahead. I do have a thought here but go ahead. Vice Chair Thompson: No, go ahead. I cut you off. I’ll go after. Board Member Lee: No, I appreciate this intent statement and when I see these bullet points my feeling is, Jean, if you go to the next slide a lot of the language shows itself under the objective standard. Do you see how under base, middle, and top we begin to use a similar language of one, two, three, and four. My feeling is that the intent is already… I guess my issue is really this two or more of the following four techniques. I love these four as options and strategies. The graphics I don’t love but at the same time I think it is wonderful to have these four statements. I see this language in the intent. I AM JUST wondering if we need this base, middle, and top as an objective standards. There definitely is more -- to be fair when I see one, two, three, and four we point to architectural features in a way that is much more detailed; however, the intent statements… does anybody agree? I feel like this language shows itself in the intent statement. I am just not sure (crosstalk). I agree with you, Peter. I think that the base, middle, and top in the objective standard you have the option in the intent to go to the ARB where there might be a discussion, right? Even moving it to the objective standards, however, I wonder if given what we are trying to do it might be more effective to think about options of techniques as a illustrative examples in the standards without us a specific number of two or more -- that’s one piece. Then the second is how we define base, middle, and top is really in the one, two, three, four, right, in terms of these options? That’s my reading of this. Chair Baltay: Okay, Grace. I am not sure, Grace, I see that one, two, three, and four ate part of what define base, middle, and top. Board Member Lee: These are techniques, right, in terms of (crosstalk). Chair Baltay: Yeah, they are techniques. They are trying to put objective wording to a technique of our façade design. I think you could argue that any one of those may be sufficient. Board Member Lee: Right (crosstalk). Chair Baltay: That’s the feedback staff is looking for from us. Board Member Lee: Yes, I do not think you need two or more of the following techniques. Vice Chair Thompson: Do you think it’s one or more? Board Member Lee: Well, is it? Are we too prescriptive in the numbers in terms of choosing one, two, three, or four? Ms. Gerhardt: We need to be very prescriptive in this area because if a project meets this test then it may not come before the ARB and it will be reviewed by staff. Staff needs clear direction. Board Member Lee: I am hearing that from Jodie and I understand. I almost feel like the intent of this standard… it is an intent, really, that all of these techniques, the variation, variation, variation again, and these different easy is part of our intent. That’s why I feel like maybe it should move back to the intent and maybe… Chair Baltay: Grace, I am not sure if… the intent is a broader envelope that covers these objective standards but it allows for additional ways of doing it. What we are looking at right now on the screen is 6.a Packet Pg. 134 City of Palo Alto Page 17 designed to be bullet points they can check off. If you put this back into the intent then how does an applicant know what they specifically have to do? Vice Chair Thompson: That actually is related to the thought I had earlier where if we are getting rid of that line in the intent statement if we don’t want to say articulation of the building base, or ground floor, body, or middle, and top four corners we should replace that with an intent statement that says these things. That articulation of buildings should break down scale via building modulation, facade articulation, and fenestration. Board Member Lee: To me, that would be very appropriate. Chair Baltay: I think that’s a good point, Osma. Can we go back to it? Can you say that again, Osma? Articulation of the building should break down scale via building modulation, façade articulation, and fenestration. Chair Baltay: Yeah, I think that makes perfect sense. Does everybody else? What do you think David and Alex? Board Member Hirsch: Can you say it again? Vice Chair Thompson: Hold on, let me write this down. Articulation of buildings should break down scale via façade… Chris Sensenig: I have it written down. Articulation of the building shall break down the scale via building modulation, facade articulation, and fenestration. Scale of the building. Vice Chair Thompson: Which are three of those points on the base, middle, and top because I think the fourth one is a combination. Chair Baltay: Add fenestration variation or some adjective on fenestration. Every building has fenestration. Vice Chair Thompson: Fenestration pattern. Board Member Hirsch: (Inaudible) fenestration. Chair Baltay: Pattern, Osma, something. Vice Chair Thompson: Number four is… Board Member Hirsch: (Inaudible). Mr. Sensenig: How about variation of fenestration and material patterns? Chair Baltay: Sounds good. Vice Chair Thompson: Sounds good. Board Member Hirsch: Yes, as one. Chair Baltay: What we are proposing is that we change this third bullet point on the intent statement for façade design to be what we just drafted. Does everybody agree with that? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah, I can agree with it but I object to the use of the next part of it which is the specific requirement. 6.a Packet Pg. 135 City of Palo Alto Page 18 Chair Baltay: Let’s not come to the next section which is if you want to do a objective standards what are the standards that you have to meet? We are all on board with this s far? Grace, this is addressing your concern? Board Member Lee: I think that is much better than the previously we axed out. Chair Baltay: Okay. That’s great. I agree. Let’s go to the objective standard. This screen here. I am afraid, Grace, if you didn’t have at least two of these someone could very easily comply just by having a variation in fenestration, and that’s such a loose definition that most every building can be made to fit that standard. I am concerned. I think we should keep the objective standards tight. David, you're saying you have some issues with this. How would you like to see it changed? Board Member Hirsch: You are right. It would be a problem bringing it in to be reviewed and then it isn’t so specific. Frankly, that’s what I like about it. I am having a personal problem with the idea of creating objective standards period. Chair Baltay: Okay, but right now we are not debating the philosophy of objective standards. We are just trying to provide guidance on the standards. Board Member Hirsch: They will be, Peter. I think it’s a mistake to think that they won’t become… Chair Baltay: I can’t hear you, David. You're too far from your… Board Member Hirsch: I think that it’s a mistake, really, to think that these will not become put into stone in the future and people will use to go this direction will be avoiding a review by an agency like ours. Then we will get cookie-cutter buildings. Chair Baltay: That ship has sailed, David. We need to decide how we can write objective standards that reach as close as we can to our intent. Is there anything in these written standards… for example, do you think we should have only one of them apply not two or more? Or the opposite, should we do all four of them? Board Member Hirsch: I am for all of these standards being applied. I think that the original… Chair Baltay: Grace, why wouldn’t it be okay to just require all four of these to be applied? They are all something that almost any good building would meet these four design intents, I think? Board Member Lee: I think so, too. I think all four are excellent; however, I think my issue is with base, middle, and top to be honest. I think it is base, middle, and top and the graphics that I am objecting to. At the same time I am not strongly objecting to but I want to step back. I saw the timeline, Jean and team, thank you… will this draft be public for stakeholders? For example, professional development and designs to actually review and give comment? I saw in the video -- and I really appreciate it -- there was the question can we as a group receive some summaries or some understanding on what other cities are doing in the Bay area? I know that there have been some stakeholder processes, right, in terms of input from folks who might have some direct knowledge and experience building in the area. This is a really important document and I just want to make sure there is a form for that. I think it is important. Also, I understand your timeline and you would love to have something in place in case projects come through; however, can you just comment on that for us? Chair Baltay: Let me first, Grace, in our preliminary meeting the other day I asked staff that we finish this second hearing of preliminary review and then that we have full-blown Architectural Board review of this entire thing before it gets passed on to the Planning and Transportation Committee. Then I suggested that the Planning and Transportation Committee meeting might be better with representation from the Architectural Review Board, perhaps the members of our committee there rather than the full 6.a Packet Pg. 136 City of Palo Alto Page 19 Board. Just so you know that was my formal request as Chair to staff. Jodie, what's your take on how the process is going to go forward? Ms. Gerhardt: I think we did talk about finishing this first round, coming back with a second round, and then going on to the PTC. I am getting a little more anxiety that we are going to have projects coming in to the City that want to use the SB35 or the SB330 State regulations. That is starting to become more of a reality. The timeline on this needs to continue and we need to finish this. Again, we can make the box as small or as large as we want by saying two items here we have made a medium sized box that projects can fit into and go forward quickly. It is fine, too. We are here. Staff is here talking to the ARB. We want to use your professional expertise to understand what makes a high quality project because we still want to get that high quality even if we are streamlining the process. Chair Baltay: Jodie, I know this is directly what we are talking about but can we address the question of whether we get stakeholder feedback, say from other design professions in town? Ms. Gerhardt: Yes. Chair Baltay: Is this information we are looking at as part of the public records that is available right now to anyone who wants to see it, right? Ms. Gerhardt: It is. Anything that the Planning Department does is public information. Anyone can request it, however, we also for all of our projects we put them all on the webpage. Anything that comes before the ARB or any other public hearing has a webpage and is available out to the public. I want to say that I have also contacted at least a handful of architects and told them about these public hearings and things and let them know they can participate. I think sometimes when it is not part of an actual project they may be working on other things. Chair Baltay: Grace, do you feel that we are actually doing public outreach of a sufficient nature for this given what Jodie just said? Board Member Lee: No, I just recall in the past -- Jodie, you are doing a terrific job and I really appreciate this, and we are coming onto the holidays and we are in this (inaudible) -- when there were green building guidelines and when there were some important things coming up there was actually kind of a (inaudible) to really hold a meeting that might include not only designers but also development consultants. I think that it is more than architects that we need to reach out o given the impact of something like this. The other piece that I want to mention is if we go back to this and look at it further, I want to offer… I am so sorry but my feeling is we don’t need the words base, middle, and top and the graphics. My worry is that we are writing a recipe for cookie-cutter architecture to occur in our City. My reaction to the graphics and t the words base, middle, and top is just that. I do think we want to include language and maybe this is just something… I would love to hear from other Board Member what you think about this. These are terrific Things to have. I think I am reacting to the graphics and those words base, middle, and top as a tag ling. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah, I think… Board Member Lee: I apologize for it. It is something that really does stick in my mind as an impediment. Vice Chair Thompson: I think that’s important and that is actually part of why I was wanting to suggest that we talk about the graphics first just because I do think it is clouding a lot of how we are interpreting. This is everything, right? It’s not just the words. It is also the graphics. Then as far as your issue with the terms base, middle, and top, I would be open to considering other terminology that achieves similar design intent which could be scale and façade or something. Like scale and façade modulation and maybe there is ways… I think when David and I first had a chance to look at it there are other ways to consider this perspective of how we perceive a building. There is the pedestrian speed, there is the 6.a Packet Pg. 137 City of Palo Alto Page 20 vehicular speed, and there is also the close and the distant. I think base, middle, and top are talking about distances of perspective, like when you are standing right at the building versus when you are across the street verses when you are really far away. There could be other ways. I think as architects we still care about those approaches to a building. We still want a building to function well at those different distances or scales. Maybe there is a way to articulate that. If we agree that we feel that base, middle, and top isn’t the right terminology maybe there is a way to approach the standard. Chair Baltay: Let me make a plug for keeping that terminology in the objective standard. For the past 500 years or so in western architecture public buildings have had this basic base, middle, and top; I think from Renaissance Florence on out. That was developed, in part or became in part, as a guide to architects who weren’t so skilled as a way to keep the urban pattern working. I think it is a very functional way to describe to architects who are more workman-like how to get there. The other terminology we are using is all so varied in its understanding and interpretation that you really open the door, then, to potentially very poor buildings that are just big boxes. Using the term base, middle, and top is something that anybody can look at past history and see what it means. Additionally, we have other guidelines in town that require a base, middle, and top, for example along El Camino in the El Camino design guidelines which are still in place and in effect for all other types of buildings. All of this is just for commercial buildings. Removing that specific language just for this particular housing leaves a big inconsistency. You could say it even leaves us rewriting a design guide which is established. I think it is incumbent upon us to keep those established guidelines, as well. There is a process to change them, perhaps, but we have to do that. I think we should, in the objective standard, leave base, middle, and top or some language that reflects that notion that the building has a cap, a cornice, a parapet, a roof. That the building has a base, a heavier piece of stone that sets it in the ground. I don’t support removing that language from the objective standard. Board Member Hirsch: Can I comment on it, too, here? Chair Baltay: Sure, please. Board Member Hirsch: Maybe the first who raised the issue that we shouldn’t be using base, middle, and top for objective standards… while you are right that are buildings that work well with base, middle, and top really you don’t find that to be prevalent today. Most architects are certainly something… the selection of the illustrations here is very intentional because the small scale of the building allows you to really see it as a base, middle, and top but as soon as you get to the larger scale programming -- which you are really studying the building from the inside put in many cases rather than the outside in specifically -- choosing a design for a building has to do with the designing the building in both ways. There’s planning it and creating a faced. I don’t see that base, middle, and top is a definition of the way design is really performed today unless it is specifically for contextual reasons because building adjacent to it have followed those particular standards. I can’t agree with you, Peter, on this one. The context planning, frankly, I got through the first part of the review of this and then came up to this particular section, and then I took a look at existing context planning and the context section is really fantastic. Somebody has put tremendous thought into the context and I find that all of these one, two, three, and four are very much a part of context planning in the present code. My feeling is that we should go back and look at the context planning and say how can that be objectified? If it can’t be then maybe we as an organization have to say, you know we can’t accept this state requirement. By the way I think the Council feels the same way about the other aspect of the State program. There is certainly a tremendous objection to the fact that the State is requiring this objective standard. That objective standard means that our Board doesn’t participate in those. Even if you say okay you can come in with the objective standards and then avoid coming to an ARB why is that a requirement? What is it about our work that causes this to be in stone in some way the way it would if you just do this, this, and this you're going to have an acceptable building. I think we are important in this process. Look at the whole process and what delays projects, I don’t think that is really us. If you want to say, okay you're going to do this in one session here you have to then abbreviate it and then actually the review by Planning has to be abbreviated and the design has to come to us anyhow. I don’t think eliminating ARB by creating a 6.a Packet Pg. 138 City of Palo Alto Page 21 separate category of objective standards is a good idea. I think that we should object to it and I think we might find support in the City by just doing that. Chair Baltay: David, that’s a larger topic that what we are trying to cover right now. I think you'll find that all of us on the ARB would agree with you, fundamentally, that that is correct. Board Member Hirsch: If that’s correct then that what we should say. We think that… Chair Baltay: Can we compromise, David, instead and agree that as our public support of this thing we also want to issue a statement, essentially condemning this objective process altogether. Then maybe have our subcommittee, you and Osma, draft up what that is and we can discuss the language of that. But honestly, David, we have been given one meeting by the staff now and they have worked very hard to put these details together. I think we owe it to them to give them feedback on this whether or not we think it’s the best way to go forward. What you are talking about is fighting what Sacramento has passed on to us and that’s just not appropriate right now to be arguing about that. The result is we get nowhere. If we take the task that has been put to us by staff through the City Council, they want feedback on this stuff. Board Member Lee: Peter, if I may, I agree and I am very happy to accept this draft as its crafted knowing that we are going to have another discussion. Maybe we should move forward knowing that this is an area where we want to revisit and really just thank the staff for all of this. We should just move forward and start reviewing the rest of Jean’s presentation. Board Member Lew: I actually have comments on this item. Chair Baltay: Yes, Alex. Board Member Lew: I generally agree with (inaudible). I look at this with regard to existing approved projects to see how they would comply or not comply. I think we have got some problems here with 1(c), which is the ground floor setback. I looked at quite a number of projects and a lot of them would not meet this requirement. I think there are projects that are on 50-foot wide lots with garages entrances that would not meet this requirement. I also think there are some projects on corner lots that would not meet this requirement. I can forward you the examples. Chair Baltay: Which slide are you looking at? Which section are you talking about? Board Member Lew: On this screen it is number 1(c) under base, middle, and top. Chair Baltay: Yes. Board Member Lew: I think on the screen diagram it is 1(b), the text is 1(c). Chair Baltay: Okay, I am sorry. Okay. I didn’t follow that. Okay, upper floor setbacks. Continue, please. Chair Baltay: First the ground floor setback. Vice Chair Thompson: Alex, are you noticing that most projects actually tend to step out the bottom part of their building? Board Member Lew: The issue is that the requirement two feet for 80 percent length of the façade. I am just looking at projects and they are nowhere near 80 percent. They are more like 20 percent, 30 percent. I think that the formula is too strict given the different sizes of lots. I think we need to look at that a little bit more carefully. 6.a Packet Pg. 139 City of Palo Alto Page 22 Mr. Sensenig: To clarify a second, one with the base, middle, and top standard as a whole you only need to choose two of the four green one, two, three, four. Then out of one, you only need to select one of A, B, or C. The goal of the base, middle, and top as a whole is to provide flexibility in architecture to try to get away from that cookie-cutter aspect but still provide objective standards. This was trying to go for a more, I would say, modern approach where you are floating the ground floor and have a setback like ground floor façade. You can meet number on through A or B. Board Member Lew: I appreciate that. I will look at those particular projects and see how they comply with A or B. I think they would. I think we still would be careful about the 80 percent of the ground floor. Chair Baltay: What percent would you recommend, Alex? Board Member Lew: I am not sure but it sounds (inaudible) fairly restrictive on the many smaller lots that we have in town. Chair Baltay: What if we could propose the following: we are going to revisit this once more. Let’s all come back to these specific numbers as Alex is pointing out. This is a fairly complex interaction of concepts here. I would like to keep us moving along. Could we try to come to closure on the language of the base, middle, and top up above? We have had a lot of opinions on that. I would like to get a straw poll whether we leave it this way or we ask the staff or subcommittee to revise it. Let me just say I am in favor of leaving it as it is. Who else agrees with that as compared to revising it? Board Member Lew: I would agree. Chair Baltay: Alex agrees. Okay. Osma, what’s your opinion? Vice Chair Thompson: I am also okay with keeping it. I think I could go either way but I want the intentions to be met one way or the other. I would be fine to keep it. Chair Baltay: Grace? Board Member Lee: Sorry, I am on the fence here. Chair Baltay: It’s just a straw poll. David, you’ve made it clear you don’t support this language. Board Member Hirsch: I can’t support base, middle, and top. Chair Baltay: Okay. Right now what I have heard is a 3-2 straw poll to keep this way. What I would like us to do is leave it for now. We are going to come back once more at our next discussion of this and hopefully everybody will have thought about it a little bit more and we can try to crisply work through this particular thing. Can we go on to the next slide then, staff, please? This is where we started façade articulation, right? Does anybody have any comments about the contents here? Why don’t we keep moving through all this, then? Board Member Hirsch: I have some comments to make. I really think my objection to the way a lot of this has been stated is that it is stated either too specifically or too general. It isn’t the way one designs a building, for sure. You don’t design it with a four-inch cornice projections, or two-inch window recesses. You don’t make buildings that way. I think I have a lot of experience with larger-scale buildings. I can say this with some clarity that I think all of these very datums, four inches in depth, a minimal of two inches in depth including a change in material… these are specifics that are way too specific for designing a building. 6.a Packet Pg. 140 City of Palo Alto Page 23 Chair Baltay: What would you recommend, David, for item number three? If you had to tell and architect what to do for their datum and you just had one sentence to give them and they had to follow it what would you say? Board Member Hirsch: I am in favor of saying emphasize the depth of the window but I am not in favor of saying four inches. Chair Baltay: If you don’t have any number how do we let staff evaluate whether it’s sufficient? Vice Chair Thompson: I just want to also remind everybody the way this is written that architects only have to comply with one of these items, not all of them. It is a menu. If an architect doesn’t like number three he doesn’t have to do number three is what I am saying. I just remind everybody that that is the case. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Osma. That’s a good point. Okay. David objects to item number three being… Board Member Hirsch: The review process prior to getting to an ARB because we want to do all of them, or whatever; you want to do a series of things that make it more than just the minimal, what happens? Who does the review of these? How is this reviewed? You say okay it takes care of one, three, and five, and you don’t need four, and, therefore, and it’s not there but it makes an okay building, who ,makes that decision? Ms. Gerhardt: David, I do think we need to have more of that kind of discussion about the process. I think it is possible that these types of projects could still come before the ARB but there are time restrictions when we talk about SB35 projects. When we come back to you next we will have more ideas about process because I don’t know if planners are best equipped to figure out what a four inch datum line is. I can’t even say the word, so there you go. But maybe it is also a subcommittee of the ARB that is helping us review these streamlined projects. Maybe the process, again like we say, that is something we can chew on a little bit and talk about next time. Chair Baltay: Okay. Can we flag item number three? Board Member Hirsch: Jodie, I think that is a very good comment. How it is done; the process is very important and that you are flexible with some thinking on that (inaudible). Chair Baltay: Let’s go on to the next slide, compatible rhythm and pattern. Jean, did you want to discuss this at all or should we jump right into it? Ms. Eisberg: Feel free to jump right in or I am happy to talk you through it. Chair Baltay: I don’t have any notes of my own to add to this. What does anybody else have to say? Board Member Hirsch: I think arbitrary recesses in buildings that have no function are not design. Chair Baltay: I agree. Should we add a statement that these have to be functionally rational too within the building and let the planning staff figure that out? Do you think that is realistic? Board Member Hirsch: I didn’t agree that the recesses are reasonable at all. Chair Baltay: Okay. You're suggesting that we should remove the recesses as one mechanism of complying, then? Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t agree. 6.a Packet Pg. 141 City of Palo Alto Page 24 Board Member Lew: I don’t agree with that, either. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t agree. I mean, it is true when you are not thoughtful about where those recesses go then that is not good, but part of façade design is breaking down the scale of your building and a recess is one of the very many techniques that architects use, amongst other things. Board Member Lee: How do you feel if we remove number two under A, where one is calling for facades less than 100 feet and that there is a need for recessing. I am wondering, David, are you reacting to the specific (crosstalk) dimensions? Board Member Hirsch: Yes. Chair Baltay: I found, Grace, these all made sense to me. If you had to specify it is about the right numbers. Board Member Lee: I didn’t have any notes on this. I am just trying to fond how we might all agree. Vice Chair Thompson: I thought I heard Board Member Lew say something but then I didn’t actually hear what he said. Board Member Lee: Go ahead, Alex. Board Member Lew: I support this section and I don’t want to remove the recessed item. Chair Baltay: Okay, let’s keep moving on. David, I hear more or less insufficient support for this one. If you want to marshal some arguments at our next discussion you can, of course. Emphasize building elements and massing. I thought this was good. Board Member Hirsch: Once again, my concern is that the way it is written it is either overly specific or overly done. Chair Baltay: That’s been noted, David. Board Member Hirsch: I am saying it again because I am saying it specifically, in this case, item one is includes five feet in width could say approximately or a minimum of five feet in width, not a specific connection. Chair Baltay: I don’t keep arguing about it. Who else has an opinion about this piece? Vice Chair Thompson: I’m fine with it. Board Member Lee: The only thing… Vice Chair Thompson: Oh, go ahead. Board Member Lee: … I did note is that the shared residential entry has a minimum of ten and with just knowing other projects that are less than that I wonder if anybody feels like a range might be better or eight feet might be appropriate since we don’t know how many entries are shared. Ten feet seems generous for three entries or two entries. Chair Baltay: I support cutting it to eight feet if you think that’s better. Vice Chair Thompson: We just have to define the minimum. We don’t need to define a range. Board Member Lee: That’s right, just a simple minimum. 6.a Packet Pg. 142 City of Palo Alto Page 25 Board Member Hirsch: Just a minimum. I agree with that. Chair Baltay: What do we think? Is ten feet the right number? Board Member Hirsch: Could be less. Chair Baltay: Less than that, David? Board Member Hirsch: It can be less, yes. Chair Baltay: It can be less. Can we say eight feet then? Does that sound good? Vice Chair Thompson: I am fine with eight feet. Board Member Lee: Sounds good. Chair Baltay: Okay, staff, can we change that to eight feet, please, in width for item B? Ms. Gerhardt: Okay. Chair Baltay: Any other comments on this section? Okay, can we go on, please? Okay, ground floor character. Vice Chair Thompson: Sorry, can we go back one? Sorry. I know we just left this one. For item 2(a), do we feel like two feet… do we want to make that less for the primary building entry? Do we feel good about two feet? Chair Baltay: I think two feet is a minimum. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah, it’s a minimum. Chair Baltay: I wouldn’t go less than that, no. Vice Chair Thompson: Any other thoughts? If I'm alone, that’s fine. I was thinking it could be less, one foot. I am okay with two feet if everybody else is fine. It doesn’t seem like anybody else (crosstalk). Let’s keep going. Chair Baltay: Let me jump in with what I had on this one. I think the minimum height should be 12, not 14. Board Member Lee: I had also noted 12. Chair Baltay: Is that right? I had the same thing on both storefront retail and non residential ground floor. The other comment I have is on item E(3). I think it is okay to have an awning run the length of a building constantly. The first sentence, I don’t think that’s an absolute requirement to have it be broken up. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t know that I agree with that. I think depending on the canopy choice. There are some examples I can think of especially if it is a metal-glass canopy that crosses a really long length it can appear very fortress. Chair Baltay: I am thinking of the Peninsula Creamery downtown has that red and silver thing that runs the length of the block almost. Vice Chair Thompson: I am looking it up. 6.a Packet Pg. 143 City of Palo Alto Page 26 Chair Baltay: It is something I flagged, anyway, as a question mark. Anybody else have opinions about that? Board Member Lew: Peter, I had similar thoughts as you on this one. Chair Baltay: Okay. Grace and David? Board Member Hirsch: I want to go back to B. Are we saying that there will not be a ground floor (inaudible) ground level up? Chair Baltay: Let’s first finish my question about the awnings, David, then we will come to your question. Board Member Hirsch: Okay. Chair Baltay: The question is should awnings be allowed to be continuous across a façade? So far Osma says no, Alex and I think yes. Board Member Lee: I think yes. Chair Baltay: Grace thinks yes. What do you think, David? Board Member Hirsch: I think yes. Chair Baltay: Okay. Staff can we change the language of that to remove that shall not extend, please? Then, David… Vice Chair Thompson: Wait. Are you saying that it needs to extend the whole façade or that it just can? Chair Baltay: I just don’t want to prohibit it from extending the whole façade. Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. Mr. Sensenig: Then we should delete all of three, correct? Board Member Lee: We want to delete it, right? Chair Baltay: Osma, would you like to rephrase it so it covers your concern somehow? I just don’t want to prohibit it from certain features on buildings. Would you like to say, maybe, it has to be integrated with the windows? Vice Chair Thompson: Hold on. Board Member Hirsch: Then you would eliminate it from being continues from a whole building or a section of a building. Chair Baltay: That’s where the graphics are failing us because on this example they are showing it makes sense to do it this way but there are other examples you can pick out. Vice Chair Thompson: I am actually looking at the creamery and they do have one part of their façade that is continuous but the rest of it is segmented. Chair Baltay: Would that building meet this standard? Vice Chair Thompson: Are we putting a limit on how long they can be at all here? 6.a Packet Pg. 144 City of Palo Alto Page 27 Mr. Sensenig: No, there is no limit and maybe an in-between here is to stop after the phrase individual segments shall be installed over each storefront entry or set of storefront windows, period. Then eliminate the shall not extend across wall sections across multiple windows or over columns. Chair Baltay: I am fine with that. Vice Chair Thompson: I actually think the creamery would meet this standard because the parts… it doesn’t have an awning where it extends over a wall section. The part that it does extend it is store front the whole way. We are saying that if it is storefront the awning can extend the whole way. Is the idea that we don’t have awnings over blank walls? Board Member Hirsch: It doesn’t serve much of a purpose. Mr. Sensenig: Generally, yes. Vice Chair Thompson: Can I just share what I am looking at really quick so everyone can see? Chair Baltay: Sure. Vice Chair Thompson: If you look on this side the awnings are segmented and I don’t know that it would make sense for it to continue all the way here. Then on this side it is mainly storefront and glass the whole way. Chair Baltay: Yeah, I guess, Osma, these awnings extend pass the frame of the windows and they are effectively continuous. This is what I think should be allowed. Let’s craft the language to allow this. Do we agree with that? Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah. Chair Baltay: Where do we stand with that language, then? Mr. Sensenig: I think I just need to delete shall not extend across wall sections, across multiple windows, or columns. The period would be… Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. We are basically not saying… Mr. Sensenig: Yeah, we would keep the top part and just cross out the bottom. Chair Baltay: I am fine with this. Alex and Grace? Board Member Lee: That’s sounds (crosstalk). Chair Baltay: I want you to remove the part that says shall not extend across the entire façade. Mr. Sensenig: At the very end, though, it does say that it could extend across a set of storefront windows. Chair Baltay: I just don’t like the limitation of saying the entire façade. It seems to me there are some circumstances where that may come into play. Ms. Gerhardt: Okay. Chris, do you feel like you have enough information? Mr. Sensenig: Yes. Chair Baltay: Can we, as a group, agree this is a statement we will support the way it is shown now? 6.a Packet Pg. 145 City of Palo Alto Page 28 Board Member Hirsch: You're talking about (inaudible)? Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah. Chair Baltay: Grace and Alex? Board Member Lew: Yes, I am fine with it. Board Member Lee: Sounds good. Chair Baltay: Okay. David, what was your comment about item B, please? Board Member Hirsch: I asked what happens if you have (inaudible) that extends all the way to the end? Chair Baltay: I am sorry, I cannot hear you. Board Member Hirsch: What if you have a storefront that extends entirely to the ground? Chair Baltay: Item B… Mr. Sensenig: That is possible. What you are actually describing is the bulkhead. The standard says if provided it shall be between and 12 and 30 inches from finished grade. You can have glass extend directly to the ground, but if you are providing a bulkhead it should be of significant size. Chair Baltay: Do you accept that, David? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah. Chair Baltay: Okay. Is everybody in agreement with the comment I made, and Grace supported, about it being a 12-foot minim, not 14-foot minimum height? Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah, I am fine with that. Mr. Sensenig: I want to point out just to make sure that is read from floor-to-floor, not clear. Chair Baltay: That’s right. Vice Chair Thompson: Oh. Board Member Hirsch: No, it should be floor-to-ceiling. Chair Baltay: But why say a minimum? We’ve had situations, especially on residential stuff, where a developer wanted very tall base levels and then they are not able to get enough apartments above it without pushing the building over 50 feet. If you make this a minimum you guarantee that that is the situation. It is certainly possible to do retail in a 12-foot floor-to-floor structure. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t know that retail is very successful if it doesn’t have that extra height because a 12-foot floor-to-floor means that the floor-to-ceiling might be… Board Member Hirsch: Eleven. Vice Chair Thompson: Eleven, ten and a half. Chair Baltay: Yeah. 6.a Packet Pg. 146 City of Palo Alto Page 29 Mr. Sensenig: Or with duct being even less. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah. Chair Baltay: Let the applicant decide that. If they want to balance out their residential up above being taller why not let them choose. This is a… Mr. Sensenig: I would like to give an example. Here in Berkley there are a number of projects that have not had significant floor-to-ceiling heights in their retail spaces and they stay empty because they are not quality spaces. Chair Baltay: That’s a good point. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah, I feel like I remember reading somewhere unless retail is a certain height on the ground floor it is usually not very successful. We don’t want to allow for unsuccessful retail. There are ways (crosstalk). Go Ahead. Mr. Sensenig: For comparison, San Francisco and other jurisdictions set this at 18 feet. Very common is a 15-foot floor-to-floor. Ms. Gerhardt: This is a smaller group of projects that will be streamlined. If someone wanted to go less they could through an ARB process. Chair Baltay: I agree. I am willing to change. I think you guys are correct. Grace, what's your opinion? Board Member Lee: I agree. Chair Baltay: Okay. Let’s leave it at 14 then. Anything else on this ground floor character section? Mr. Sensenig: Hold on. I was trying to rewrite E(3) for a second and I am a little bit worried if we delete the first sentence I don’t quite know what the standard is. Chair Baltay: Chris, could you work on that offline and come back to us next time with something? You’ve heard our opinions about it. We have to get through all of this today. Vice Chair Thompson: I think he is saying he doesn’t have enough direction, though. Board Member Lee: If I may just add one comment for Chris. I just saw a situation when there is an architectural brow feature and I don’t know the word brow but it might actually offer weather protection. In that case it might extend further on some building’s ground floor. I just wanted to offer that. Mr. Sensenig: Okay. All right. I will come back with something. Chair Baltay: You can feel that our subcommittee on this thing is also at your service if you want to go back to David and Osma. They should be able to give you further guidance. Mr. Sensenig: Got it. Chair Baltay: Can we jump to item E, please, paring and loading. Vice Chair Thompson: You mean D. Chair Baltay: No, ground floor character we just did that didn’t we? Vice Chair Thompson: There’s a second part to it. 6.a Packet Pg. 147 City of Palo Alto Page 30 Chair Baltay: Oh, I'm sorry. Ms. Eisberg: The previous page was the store front retail scenario and this is other non-residential, which could be ground floor offices, where allowed, and residential ground floor. Chair Baltay: I support all of this. Vice Chair Thompson: I might have an issue with one. It is finished floor height iii(a). If we require that the ground floors are two feet above are we creating an accessibility issue? That was the critique on stoops; while a stoop is nice it is not very accessible and you have to do a lot of gymnastics to have a stoop and make it accessible. Mr. Sensenig: This individual iii(a) has been rewritten as a series of standard sin relationship to direction from the last meeting. The finished floor height for residential ground floor should be discussed as part of that larger discussion with the new standard. Chair Baltay: We are going to still come to that, Chris? Mr. Sensenig: Yes. Chair Baltay: Okay. Osma, we will patch that later on, then. Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. Chair Baltay: Any other… Ms. Eisberg: We will flag this on our end. Chair Baltay: okay. Can we keep moving then, please? Board Member Hirsch: Has anybody seen this situation where in the diagram you are actually going to have a parking situation like that? Chair Baltay: Yes, David, I have seen a number of apartment buildings in Redwood City have this sort of semi-submerged sub grade parking. Is that what you're referring to? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah (crosstalk). Chair Baltay: It is just so expensive to go down into the ground that they try to keep it (crosstalk). Board Member Hirsch: (Inaudible) on the perimeter of the building like that? Either you’re going to have a parking level and its going to go down but I don’t think it is going to go up like that nor are you going to have a pattern like that. Chair Baltay: Speak into your microphone, David. Get closer. Board Member Hirsch: I don’t see that you’re going to have a pattern as it is shown. Chair Baltay: You mean the parking on the second floor in there? Board Member Hirsch: Of course, yeah. Chair Baltay: I agree. We have to come to the graphics. 6.a Packet Pg. 148 City of Palo Alto Page 31 Vice Chair Thompson: Wait, sorry, what’s the concern? That the parking on the second floor isn’t a thing? Chair Baltay: The way it is drawn like this, Osma, is just not a realistic building. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t know if that’s true. There’s people that do this. Mr. Sensenig: This is a very common building type these days. Vice Chair Thompson: It is very common. Mr. Sensenig: It’s a concrete podium with wood frame above. The podium is at the courtyard level so the parking is within the concrete podium and then the wood frame above. I can point to multiple projects that are built this way. Chair Baltay: You put parking on top of the podium or within the podium? Vice Chair Thompson: It’s part of the podium. Mr. Sensenig: Within. Chair Baltay: Within. This is showing, to my eye, that it is on top of. You're showing a two-story podium here, basically. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah. Chair Baltay: Okay. That’s fine. My comment on this, for what it’s worth, is that I would leave it three feet above grade, not six. I think it should be closer to the ground. Mr. Sensenig: I am going to pin in the height above ground again to be overall discussion on finished floor heights. Then we should be consistent throughout the document. Chair Baltay: Fair enough. Good point. We can push that off until later then. Vice Chair Thompson: Sorry, just to make a comment about this. One of the virtues of having it stick up is that you can get open space ventilation in that garage. I wouldn’t want prevent something like natural ventilation, which would be cost effective and better for the environment. I think there should be an allowance for this height, as well, as it makes sense. Chair Baltay: Okay. Chris said we are going to come to that in a second. Should we just hold off on all of that until we get to the discussion of residential height and ground floor heights? Vice Chair Thompson: Sure. Chair Baltay: If we can, then, we can move on to the next big chapter. Is that okay with everybody. Staff, why don’t you tell us about this intent and stuff and we will go from here. Ms. Eisberg: Okay. The residential entry section is intending to provide human-scale details, enhance pedestrian experience, and, again, focus on that transition space between the public realm and the private space. This gets into discussions about individual building entries as well as lobby entries to residential buildings. We only have one set of standards here which is the ground floor unit entry. This is showing four different ways where one or more of these techniques would be employed either stoops, porches, terraces, or frontage courts. If you didn’t want to choose one of these options, again, of course, you would have the option to go to the ARB and meet the intent statement. 6.a Packet Pg. 149 City of Palo Alto Page 32 Chair Baltay: Okay. What do we think about the intent statement, everybody? It is kind of hard to argue with that, I think. Any other questions or changes to it? Vice Chair Thompson: No. Chair Baltay: David, what's your take on that? Board Member Hirsch: Can you go back to the diagram? Chair Baltay: The intent. I just want to get us to sign off on the intent of residential entries. Board Member Hirsch: I understand. The intent is good. Chair Baltay: Alex and Grace? Board Member Lee: Good. Chair Baltay: Good. Board Member Lew: It’s good. Chair Baltay: Okay. If we go to the individual sections, the first one is ground floor unit entries. Again, I had noted three feet for the height, not five, for the height. Is that something we are going to fit someplace else or is this what you're talking about, Chris, where we are doing it in more detail? Mr. Sensenig: This is what I am talking about in doing more detail. Vice Chair Thompson: This is a maximum number. I am fine with five. Chair Baltay: Is there a minimum… Board Member Lew: I’m okay with five. Chair Baltay: Sorry, Alex. You said five is okay? Board Member Lew: I understand your point about two feet but I have worked on projects where there is sloping site and in some cases they had to do five feet. It is okay. It’s not ideal but it can work. Board Member Lee: I agree. Chair Baltay: You're okay with five, Grace? David, what's your feeling? Board Member Hirsch: I’m sorry, you asked me, David? Chair Baltay: Yeah, we are doing a check on the height. What's the maximum height of a stoop? It probably applied to porches as well. I had suggested three feet but Grace, and Alex, and Osma, too -- I don’t know if I heard you say that -- think five feet is good. Vice Chair Thompson: Yea, I think five feet is fine. Chair Baltay: Okay. David, are you supporting that, too? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah, I am okay with that. Chair Baltay: Okay. Do we have a minimum height for a stoop? 6.a Packet Pg. 150 City of Palo Alto Page 33 Vice Chair Thompson: We could say zero but then it’s not a stoop. Chair Baltay: I always have an issue when you have residential stuff right at grade with the public right of way. It is much less high-quality apartmenting. Ms. Gerhardt: I think I had provided some analysis to Jean and Chris about… actually, someone did an evaluation on where a stoop or a porch should be in relation to how close it is to a sidewalk. I don’t know if they are ready with that information quite yet but I think we should think about that. The closer the porch gets to the sidewalk the higher up it should be to feel comfortable on that front porch. Chair Baltay: That makes sense to me, yes. Ms. Gerhardt: Here is some of the graphics that we have started with. Maybe we aren’t fully ready to explain yet but you can see the orange where as you get closer the floor needs to be higher up to give it some privacy and some differentiation. If maybe that feels better to people we can keep working on that. Chair Baltay: I think this looks good to me. Other Board Members? Board Member Lee: Good. Mr. Sensenig: Great. This is what I was putting a pin in earlier about required finished floor heights. Chair Baltay: Yeah, I like this. Vice Chair Thompson: It’s a cool graphic. Board Member Hirsch: It’s a cool graphic but does it make any sense? If this is a residential building is it stepped on every floor above? Vice Chair Thompson: No, no, it is showing the different options… Board Member Hirsch: Oh, okay. Vice Chair Thompson: … of how close it is to the sidewalk. It is showing a curve basically. As you get further from the sidewalk the lower to the ground the privacy is allowed. Chair Baltay: This is a great drawing right here in front of us. This really tells the story. Board Member Hirsch: Yes, it’s very good. Ms. Gerhardt: I want you to know the planner started this… Mr. Sensenig: I’d like to give credit to Jeremy Pott. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah, Jeremy did the drawings but I started the conversation. Vice Chair Thompson: Well done. Chair Baltay: This is good. I think this is doing a good job of discussing this. Would this apply to porches as well as stoops, then? Mr. Sensenig: Yeah because private open space associated with the unit would have to be -- at least when its facing a street -- at the finished floor of the unit. So, yes. 6.a Packet Pg. 151 City of Palo Alto Page 34 Chair Baltay: Okay. Any other feedback from the Board regarding this ground floor entry regarding stoops and porches? How about on terraces? Board Member Hirsch: How do you define a terrace? Chair Baltay: It serves multiple unit entries it says. That is a stoop, right? Vice Chair Thompson: The stoop looks like it’s only two and it seems like a terrace could do more than two. Chair Baltay: You know it when you see it, David, but I don’t know how to put it in words. It is true. I had written down to myself that the maximum height should be closer to 23¾ inches because you could do three risers at 7¾ inches without requiring a handrail. When you go to 30 inches you’ll need hand rails. I am not sure that’s a smart way to go about it but that was just my thought at the time. Mr. Sensenig: That’s a good idea on a flat site. Chair Baltay: I think you’ve got to leave that to the architect’s discretion. Mr. Sensenig: Yeah. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t have any further comments on this one. Chair Baltay: Okay. Anybody else? Board Member Hirsch: I would like to say that can’t we say a minimum of instead of just saying 30 inches above? Chair Baltay: You want to make it always at least 30 inches, David? Board Member Hirsch: No. Vice Chair Thompson: Are you talking about the terrace? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah. Vice Chair Thompson: It’s a maximum right now. You want to change it to a minimum? Board Member Hirsch: Oh, let me see. Okay. Chair Baltay: It needs to be something you can get a wheelchair up to so you don’t want to get huge ramps or anything on it, right? Vice Chair Thompson: I think that’s why it’s a maximum. Chair Baltay: Yeah. I was just suggesting it be less than 30 inches but I can see circumstances where 30 inches makes sense. David, are you okay with that? Board Member Hirsch: I guess so. Chair Baltay: Grace and Alex, any… okay. Frontage court, any questions or thoughts about that? Where does the number 25 feet come from? How was that determined? 6.a Packet Pg. 152 City of Palo Alto Page 35 Mr. Sensenig: I believe it is the distance a window needs to be from another window in a residential unit without having special size limits. Board Member Lew: I have a general comment about the frontage court. Chair Baltay: Okay. Board Member Lew: I think we have had a couple projects -- we have one on Hamilton and we also have one at the Stanford University Terrace project on California Avenue -- where they have [distortion] buildings and they have tried to do some transparency into the courtyard but it is not really a frontage court. On the Stanford project, the public can see into the courtyard but it is gated. It’s not exactly a frontage court. It’s an internal courtyard that is open. Then it seems to me like that type of project isn’t included as one of these options. That may be better. Not my [distortion] but I just wanted to throw that out there that there are courtyard building types. Chair Baltay: Isn't that what they call a terrace, Alex, where they have here a 42 inch hedge and 40 percent transparency? Could we try to define the difference between the frontage court being open and a terrace potentially closed off more? Chris, do you have a sense about this? Mr. Sensenig: What's the name of the apartment complex again? I am trying to understand exactly what you're talking about. Board Member Lew: Sure. At Stanford University there is a project called University Terrace on California Avenue. It is in the research park. There are two condominium buildings that are built around courtyards that are partially open. We also have a courtyard building that was recently approved by the ARB on Hamilton. I think it is maybe Hamilton and Webster. Ms. Gerhardt: 565 Hamilton, the most recent one? Chair Baltay: That’s quite closed off from the street. I think there is some visual screening in there, isn’t there? Board Member Lew: The original idea was to have it more open. Anyway, I just threw that out there for consideration. How would that fit? I think that project doesn’t have individual entrances to the ground floor units. Chair Baltay: That’s true, it didn’t. Board Member Lew: It had handicap ramp issues that the Board talked about. Let’s just throw that out there and think about it. I don’t know how it would fit in with this particular standard. Board Member Hirsch: Can I ask Chris how did you come up with the maximum frontage court depth shall be 50 feet or a ratio not to exceed two feet in depth to one-foot in width? Did you hear that? Mr. Sensenig: Yes. Board Member Hirsch: Okay, thank you. Vice Chair Thompson: It is basically saying that it can’t be a tiny opening on the street and the super deep inside. Mr. Sensenig: Right, yes. (crosstalk). Board Member Hirsch: Maximum frontage court depth shall be 50 feet. Depth shall be 50 feet not to exceed 2:1 depth. The width; that means it’s deeper than it is wide. 6.a Packet Pg. 153 City of Palo Alto Page 36 Vice Chair Thompson: Is that assuming a certain lot size? Mr. Sensenig: I am not exactly sure on this. I need to think about it for a second. Maybe we don’t need to have a maximum depth. Board Member Hirsch: I am sorry. I'm not reading from local buildings but in New York it was just the opposite. It had to be twice as wide as it is deep. It’s called an outer court (inaudible) dimension. Ms. Gerhardt: Maybe we can have Chris go back and look at this, but is the consensus that we want the opening wider? You want it wider than deeper? Board Member Hirsch: Yes, for me, anyhow. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t know. There are some cool projects that have… sorry. Go ahead. Chair Baltay: I agree with Osma. I don’t know that it… Board Member Lee: I'm not sure about it. Vice Chair Thompson: There are some cool projects that have really deep, narrow courtyards but it is cool. It works with the design. Chair Baltay: My apartment building on 110th Street. David, in Manhattan had a very long, very deep, and very narrow entry court that worked pretty well, actually. It was like 75 feet by 20 feet. Board Member Lee: Also, I just wonder if -- Chris, you can correct us -- the motivator is privacy, right? Some of the reasons why we are doing this here is for entries. Maybe that’s something to think about in our next discussion. Mr. Sensenig: Yeah. I think another motivator here or a thought behind it -- I need to check back in with the rest of the document -- is the frontage court does not subtract from the amount of building that needs to be up to the build-to line because it is creating a semi-public space that is engaging the street in a appositive way and creating visual interests. It is still holding the building edge without the form of the building necessarily holding that edge. There are a few different sections to meet in the objective standards that I would have to go back and think of their relationship to one another. Ms. Gerhardt: Chris, if we are talking about the build-to line and the graphic that I am seeing would not meet my test of the build-to line. If we want to change that we just need to write it out very specifically because I would have said this doesn’t meet the build-to line. Chair Baltay: Yeah, I think you need some definitions in here of what these things are. It’s not entirely clear. Mr. Sensenig: Yeah, let me go back and rethink that. Chair Baltay: Okay. Can we ask you to draft through that a little bit. To the Board, I would like to take a five minute break. I also wanted to finish this up by noon. We have got a couple of other things still to go over. Can we do a quick break right now? Board Member Lee: Sounds great. Chair Baltay: Okay. Five minutes everybody. It is 11:09, so at 11:14. Thank you. Vice Chair Thompson: Sounds good. 6.a Packet Pg. 154 City of Palo Alto Page 37 [The Board took a short break.] Chair Baltay: We are back in session. We are going to go into open space. Staff or Jean, could you present your intent on this one, please? Ms. Eisberg: Yes. Just to be clear, open space is regulated in two places in the code. The amount of open space that’s required for a residential project is regulated in the individual district regulations, and there are a few things that will be pulled out and put into this draft section of code that relate to the design of usable open space. I just want to make that part clear. The intent here is to provide various recreational opportunities, promote a healthy environment, and enhance the experience of living in Palo Alto. This section describes both common and private open spaces, and talks about integration into the site access and building circulation providing generous dimensions for usable open space, landscape elements that support plant growth in terms of soil depth, promote public health located easily accessible to both private areas of buildings, and promote sustainable practices and community safety through eyes on the streets. Our first section is private open space and then we will talk about common open space. Chair Baltay: Anybody have comments about these intentions before we go into the specifics? I am fine with them. Okay, let’s dive into private open space then, Jean. Ms. Eisberg: Okay. Here I should note that we do have pone new standard. If you are looking at your version of the staff report, item three was highlighted in yellow and we now have a new standard there. Chair Baltay: Yes. Okay. Vice Chair Thompson: I think that makes sense. Chair Baltay: Anybody have comments about the private open space requirements? I had noted to myself clear height of eight feet, not eight feet six. I am wondering if the minimum dimension if a circle , not a square, allows for more design flexibility. There are pretty small points. Anybody else have anything? Vice Chair Thompson: I would support the circle comment. Chair Baltay: Sometimes if you have a dog leg in a patio or something the circle can be an easier way to prove that you have sufficient area. Any other feedback on that? Can we just direct staff… can you guys try to come up with a less geometrically restrictive minimum area? Does that seem reasonable? Ms. Eisberg: Okay. Ms. Gerhardt: This is private open space. We are okay with the six-foot depth? Chair Baltay: Yes, I think six feet is a good dimension, at a minimum. Ms. Gerhardt: Okay. Vice Chair Thompson: Is there anybody else on the Board…. Ms. Eisberg: It’s just the diameter rather than the square? Chair Baltay: Yeah, I can just see… Ms. Eisberg: Or six feet in any direction? Vice Chair Thompson: It should be able to fit a six-foot diameter… 6.a Packet Pg. 155 City of Palo Alto Page 38 Chair Baltay: No, I think six-foot depth is important; six feet from the wall of the building to the exterior plane. If you say six-foot in any dimension you could have some really weird spaces, but a six-foot diameter circle, or about that, you lose a lot of flexibility but still requires the six-foot. Ms. Eisberg: Okay. Vice Chair Thompson: We are saying the space should be able to fit the circle in it. Chair Baltay: Yeah. That’s also a common standard (crosstalk). Go ahead. Board Member Lew: I have a general comment if we are done with the six-foot dimension. Chair Baltay: Yes, go ahead. Board Member Lew: It’s a general comment about where open space is required. Chair Baltay: Okay. Board Member Lew: There are a lot of planned community projects that don’t have private open space, say like 725 Alma, 801 Alma, 488 Charleston, and Wilton Court. I guess my question is with this code and standards are we trying to get that type of project to fit within the objective standards or are we just saying that those could still use the planned home community process with the Council and they could exclude the open space though that process? Ms. Eisberg: That’s the distinction and let be clearer about my preface remarks. The district regulations regulate the amount of usable open space that is required in a project or in a specific district. In the case of the PC, the Planned Community District, there may not be an open space requirement. In that case that project may be exempt from that requirement and, therefore, this would not apply. However, if private open space was being provided in a project including in a PC zone these regulations would apply. (Crosstalk) Chair Baltay: Go ahead, Alex. Board Member Lew: I think that is my understanding as well. I am just throwing out there is we are trying to capture a wider net of projects then I think that this would be an issue for some of the non- profit housing developers. Chair Baltay: Are you suggesting… Vice Chair Thompson: Can I get a little bit more clarification? Are you saying that those projects don’t have private open spaces for each unit? Board Member Lew: Yes, that’s correct. They have common open space but they don’t have private open space. That’s been an issue with the Council on occasion. Some of the Council members feel very strongly about the private open space who voted no on some projects because of the private open space. I am just saying that we do have quite a number of projects in town that don’t have it. Vice Chair Thompson: Interesting. Ms. Gerhardt: Maybe what we can better do is show you the code itself as well. I am looking at the multi-family districts that do require 50 square feet of private open space. They would adhere to these objective standards as well. 6.a Packet Pg. 156 City of Palo Alto Page 39 Vice Chair Thompson: I want to see other code language that does stipulate private open space per unit and certain square footage for affordable housing and for multi-family otherwise. Ms. Eisberg: Right. The RM districts require private open space but I believe the commercial mixed use districts allow you to provide any combination of private or common. The project that Board Member Lew may be referring to chose to do common for whatever reason. Board Member Lee: Alex, I thought this would not apply to affordable housing because the private open space requirement would be trumped by an overall open space requirement that might be connected to direct funding for an affordable housing project,. That’s why id dint mark it up for affordable housing at all. Am I mistaken? I understand affordable housing will come in as a PC but I understood that this would not apply to 100 percent affordable or 50 percent plus. Ms. Gerhardt: It just depends what zone the project is in. In the commercial zones the requirement for open space is 150 square feet and there is a footnote that that 150 square feet per unit can be provided either as private or common or whatever combination. Board Member Lee: Okay, thank you, Jodie. In that case, I am with Alex. This would be a real challenge for an affordable housing project to comply with these dimensions. Ms. Gerhardt: If it is in a commercial zone they could provide zero private open space. Board Member Lee: Okay. Ms. Gerhardt: But they would have to have that much more common. Board Member Lee: What I am understanding, Jodie, is the option for many of these projects given are for an affordable housing developer to choose the common open space per the zoning requirement. Vice Chair Thompson: I think this… oh, sorry. Ms. Gerhardt: If they are in a commercial zone they have options for how to provide the open space. Vice Chair Thompson: I think we are provided provisions. Mr. Sensenig: I think what might be missing from this standard and causing confusion is it should just say if private open spaces are provided they shall meet the following standard. Vice Chair Thompson: Right. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah. Vice Chair Thompson: I don’t know that that is necessary to write. That was my understanding as well that per the other code provisions if the project chooses to provide private space to these units we are not saying how many or whatever, we are just saying if you are giving people balconies these are the requirements and if you are not we have other requirements for common space in terms of size. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah. I am not seeing an open space requirement in the PC section of the code. Chair Baltay: Alex, are you suggesting (crosstalk). Go ahead. Board Member Lew: I am just pointing out that there isn’t a requirement in the PC zone and it seems to me the overall intent of the state requirement is to get these adorable housing projects in under the objective standards. If we are requiring it, it would be a problem in an RM zone, right? It seems there 6.a Packet Pg. 157 City of Palo Alto Page 40 are work around in the commercial zones. We should just be cognizant of what we’re doing here on this particular item. To me, this is the big issue on this particular item. Vice Chair Thompson: Alex, I don’t think this item is requiring it, though, right? It is just saying that if it is required through other means then this is what the direction is. Board Member Lew: But I am saying the bigger issue and the bigger discussion is the intent of the State’s requirement, right? The State is trying to get these projects that have been going through these long three-year planned community processes and get them through an expedited process with objective standards. I am saying this would cause a big hiccup for an affordable housing developer because (crosstalk). Ms. Gerhardt: Only in a RM zone. Board Member Lew: Only in a RM zone. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah. Board Member Lew: I just want to make sure that we understand that. I am not necessarily arguing to change anything but I think we should just throw that out there for discussion. Ms. Gerhardt: Part of Jean’s larger project is to look at the code in its entirety. That is something that we can think a little bit more about. Board Member Lew: Okay, thank you. Chair Baltay: Alex suggest, really, to be requiring what the open space is for some of these projects in this standard. Board Member Lew: Sure. I do want to say that the reason why the affordable housing developers don’t like to do the private balconies is because they can’t manage and maintain them well. That’s the reason why they don’t like to do it. Some of them, others do include them. For staff, we have the AF overlay zone for housing projects, like on Stanford Research Park property, and that AS zone does not require private common open space. The projects that have been built haven’t actually included it but it is not required. Pay attention to that one, too. Again, that is mainly commercial zoning with a residential overlay. Ms. Gerhardt: I will look at the Stanford AS zone that you’re talking about. I think we might have built all of those areas. I was looking at the AH combining district. That is a combining district that goes with the commercial zone. Okay, that wouldn’t work but I was just thinking maybe we could attack it that way but I think I understand the concern. I will go back and talk to Jean and Chris about how to address that. Vice Chair Thompson: I still don’t understand the concern but maybe I am the only one. Ms. Gerhardt: In multi-family when you have to do the 50 square feet of private open space and affordable housing may not want to do that 50 square feet of private open space for a variety of reasons. Do we want to give them more leeway? Board Member Lee: I think it would be very important to address that head on and thank you, Alex, for bringing that to attention. For some reason I just didn’t see this for a situation for a multifamily where affordable housing would be a proposal. Vice Chair Thompson: I do think there are other code provisions that stipulate whether affordable housing is required to have open space or not. I don’t know that that’s the intent for these guidelines. 6.a Packet Pg. 158 City of Palo Alto Page 41 These are about aesthetics; they are not about counts as much or requirements. I guess what I am saying is if an affordable housing developer finds somewhere in the code that he is not required to have as much open space or something he doesn’t have to look at this code section. Ms. Gerhardt: That’s correct but there is the rest of the code that we are not seeing right now. I think that’s where Alex’s comment is going and its maybe not to this piece but to the rest of the larger code. Chair Baltay: Jodie, can you report back to us next time we look at this what the actual implications are of private open space on affordable housing projects in residential RN zones? I think Alex has a very legitimate point and we want to be sure we have consciously decided on it. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah. I can just say that RM properties have to have 50 square feet of private open space and that may or may not work for affordable housing. Chair Baltay: Let me get a straw poll with the Board then. Would we support putting in this regulation an elimination of that? For an affordable housing project it is not required? Ms. Gerhardt: I don’t know that it would go here. It would go into the code itself, but I still would love the straw poll. Chair Baltay: I would support that. I think affordable housing is very important and the balcony requirement can be a big limitation. Vice Chair Thompson: I do not support that. I think developers can find a way to put the balconies and that open space is critical to the enjoyment of living there. Chair Baltay: Okay. Vice Chair Thompson: For reference, I have been working with a non-profit co-op affordable housing community and the issue of balconies got brought up a lot in our outreach shareholder meetings. Especially during the pandemic, everybody was saying the only saving grace they have is to go out on their balcony and feel safe and be outside, especially in the early lockdown from March to June. I think just because a developer doesn’t want to pay for it doesn’t mean that we should compromise the living quality of the people that live there. Chair Baltay: Well put, Osma. The rest of the Board, chime in on this one, please. Board Member Lee: definitely with Peter. I am with you and I do not think this should be a requirement for affordable housing. I do not want inhibit in any way the review and approval of building housing with this requirement. Chair Baltay: Thank you, Grace. David and Alex. Don’t all speak at once here. Vice Chair Thompson: I think David might not know he's still on mute. Chair Baltay: Alex, what’s your thought? Board Member Lew: I am very torn with this one. I think the open space is really important. I don’t want to prevent units from being built if the balcony is an issue. I think it just needs more outreach and debate before I weigh in on this one. Chair Baltay: Okay. I don’t think we are going to have the last word on this topic. My guess is this is the kind of thing that goes to City Council but they certainly would value our opinion. Does anybody have anything to add on this? Is David still with us? 6.a Packet Pg. 159 City of Palo Alto Page 42 Vice Chair Thompson: I think he is on mute. [Adjusting Audio.] Board Member Hirsch: I agree with Osma, in part, but I think it’s a balancing act. If a project can afford more open space on the ground floor for everybody or on the rooftop then individual balconies are not so significant. I feel it is kind of a trade off. General open space for all residents is another aspect to this. Public housing or affordable housing ought to have a certain amount of outdoor space for everybody. The reasons Osma expressed I think private outdoor space like this is also a good thing and could be used in conjunction with general outdoor space as a requirement. Chair Baltay: Okay. Why don’t we leave you and Osma’s column on that one? Jodie gets a real split vote for this. Common open space, any questions or comments about that? Minimum dimension of 12 feet, for example, what do we think? Vice Chair Thompson: Is that enough for social distancing? Chair Baltay: That’s a good point. Maybe you should take that into account. It’s big right now. Ms. Eisberg: I just want to add if you're looking at the screen this is the place where staff reviewed the open space draft standards and recommended a change to that first item. Instead of a minimum dimension of 12 feet, the recommendation is that it’s a minimum size of 200 square feet and minimum dimension of 10 feet. Vice Chair Thompson: Are we risking long, narrow spaces with that, potentially? Chair Baltay: Yeah, why not leave it 12 feet? Is there a rationale for the change? Ms. Eisberg: If it wasn’t Jodie then it might have been Amy and I don’t know if she is on the phone. Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah, I am not remembering on this one. I think common open space needs to have a minimum size as far as the dimensions. Do we want to do the circle idea again or… Vice Chair Thompson: I think that might be a good idea because I was just thinking what if someone has 100-foot length and then they are meeting that ten feet with that 100-foot length and then they just offset two feet for a planter box or something to say they have 200 feet of open space. Chair Baltay: You're saying you think 12 feet is the right dimension, Soma, for the minimum? Vice Chair Thompson: No, I am just staying the way that it is written is that it could lend itself to unusable spaces. Mr. Sensenig: What might be needed here is a minimum dimension to be considered common open space but potentially a requirement that there is at least one minimum size circle that can fit into the common open space that I would argue would be much greater than 12 feet. The minimum dimension is more about how big a space needs to be in a dogleg or a flag-shaped open space to consider the pole of the flag as part of the open space. Chair Baltay: Sixteen-foot diameter circle gives you approximately 200 square feet. That might be restrictive; 16 feet is a big dimension for a building. Vice Chair Thompson: I would say we can keep… we have the six-foot diameter circle for the private; maybe we have it a little bit bigger like an eight-foot or a ten-foot diameter and call it a day. Chair Baltay: I don’t have strong feelings about this. 6.a Packet Pg. 160 City of Palo Alto Page 43 Board Member Hirsch: Does the open space have any relationship to the number of units in the building? Chair Baltay: Sure, in the code it does, yes. That’s how it is determined how much you need. Vice Chair Thompson: let’s speed up on this. It’s 11:40. Chair Baltay: Does anybody else have any other comment son open space? Okay. Then, do we have the section on rooftop open space? Is that something we want to discuss? It has been a hot-button issue around Palo Alto. Ms. Eisberg: On the rooftop open space I just want to mention this is an existing code section that currently lives in the CDC district and in the CN district. We pulled it out of the district regulations and put it here. Chair Baltay: Okay. This is what is done, then. Ms. Eisberg: Its under little b. Chair Baltay: Okay. Ms. Eisberg: Then, under little A is a cross-reference to a section that the ARB discussed maybe two years ago about specific standards for rooftop gardens. Chair Baltay: I think we are going to leave it as it is right now. It is to the code; that’s good. Board Member Lee: Sorry, Peter, can I just add one thing to the b(i) and b(ii)? I assume that percentage of the required usable open space, 75 and 60, would be revisited if we are talking about an affordable project to move that is being proposed for any of those sites? Board Member Hirsch: Yeah. Chair Baltay: Jodie and crew, is that the case? Ms. Gerhardt: I think this (crosstalk). Ms. Eisberg: I would say yes, frankly, because if this moves to this section of the code a developer could -- instead of meeting this specific standard -- meet the intent statement and then the ARB would find that the development has met the intent statement. Board Member Lee: I guess this for our further discussion just to make sure we are safeguarding affordable projects and we all agree in terms of open space requirements. Chair Baltay: I had noted for myself when reviewing these standards that I didn’t see anything about landscaping or privacy in here. Am I missing something or is that something that’s not necessary? Ms. Eisberg: If you are looking at the packet -- I am going to stop and share for a minute -- at the end of open space we are next going to talk about materials. Then we proposed to move two existing subsections into this section of the code. Right now there are visual screening and landscaping standards in -- this is the wrong code reference -- I think it is 18.40, and there are lighting standards. Those standards would move into this section of code. That is why it is not otherwise discussed. Chair Baltay: Okay. Are we still waiting for a draft of these things from you? Ms. Eisberg: Those right now have not been proposed to change. 6.a Packet Pg. 161 City of Palo Alto Page 44 Chair Baltay: Okay. Ms. Eisberg: We can provide reference to them. Chair Baltay: Okay. Any comments from the Board, then, on these topics? Vice Chair Thompson: In the next version would we see a copy of those standards here or is it just a reference to… are we expected to go to the other section to look at that? Ms. Gerhardt: I think we can make sure and add them but if you're wanting to get ahead of the game they are in the code section right now. If we move them to here we are actually giving people more flexibility because a streamlined project could meet the objective standard and go through or if they wanted to do something different they could go to the ARB; whereas right now they are required to meet that code section. Chair Baltay: You're saying the material section is already in the code? Ms. Gerhardt: No, sorry. I am talking about visual and lighting. Chair Baltay: Okay, that’s fine. How about the material section, then? What are we doing about that? Ms. Eisberg: Let’s move on to that page. You may recall when we spoke in February, the Board had a lot of different opinions on how, or if, we should regulate materials including concerns about over regulating materials, particularly for affordable housing. This is an example that Chris has done for another community. Instead of setting up materials that are allowed as primary materials, or secondary materials, or accent materials, or materials that are completely prohibited, such as vinyl siding and chain link fencing. Rather than a prescriptive set of standards, it is more of a formula that the Board could review when reviewing a project or staff could review when reviewing a project. Chair Baltay: Back in February, what was our reaction? Refresh my memory, please. Ms. Eisberg: There were concerns about being too prescriptive or requiring materials that may be too expensive, particularly for below market-rate housing. Chair Baltay: Okay. To my colleagues on the Board, what do we feel about something like this? Is this appropriate, necessary, over kill? Board Member Hirsch: I think it is a good idea. I noticed that vinyl siding is in this list. Will that be eliminated? I think, otherwise, it is very well encompassing and… Chair Baltay: Vinyl siding is prohibited on this list. Board Member Hirsch: No... Ms. Eisberg: The legend up here is P, S, A, and N: primary, secondary, accent, and prohibited. Board Member Hirsch: Oh, okay,. Fine. I missed that. Vice Chair Thompson: Oh, I see. Ms. Eisberg: The N’s at the bottom of the page -- again, this is an example from another community -- are showing prohibited materials: T-111 plywood, vinyl siding, vinyl fencing, and chain link fencing. The decision making about stucco is important as to if stucco can be a primary material. Obviously, we see many buildings where stucco is a primary material and not just a secondary material. Likewise, cement siding. 6.a Packet Pg. 162 City of Palo Alto Page 45 Vice Chair Thompson: Do we have something like hardie board on there somewhere? Board Member Hirsch: It should be fiber reinforced cement. Vice Chair Thompson: There we go. Chair Baltay: How about the rest of us? What do we think? Board Member Hirsch: I'm not sure why its secondary material? I mean the selection of the S and the P is a question here. Chair Baltay: The question now is if we should have them produce something like this for us. Board Member Hirsch: Yes. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah, I think we should. Chair Baltay: Osma is in favor of it. David is in favor of it. Grace and Alex, what do you think? Board Member Lee: I think it is great. I had a question on design standard S1(c) but we can talk about it later. This is a great direction. Chair Baltay: Okay. Alex, are you in favor of this? Board Member Lew: I am in favor of it. I do have some comments. One, is either there are lots of new materials. We have the wood-like materials that are made with plastic and aluminum. We also have that new category of materials called prismatic metals. You will see some now on San Antonio Road in Mountain View. I think there is a line in here that says you can have something approved by the Planning Commission and I do think we do need something like that for all the other materials that we don’t even know about. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah. Board Member Lew: All the things in the future. I think that is very important. Chair Baltay: Could you leave a category here for new materials to be approved by the Architectural Review Board? Can it be put on the list? Ms. Eisberg: Yes. Chair Baltay: Okay. I support this as well. Why don’t we get you guys to put this together for our package here? Board Member Lew: One other (crosstalk). Chair Baltay: Go ahead, Alex. Board Member Lew: One last comment on metals. Chair Baltay: Yes. Board Member Lew: This has come up before like on the junior museum, Castilleja, and the fire station, that there are different grades of how they are painted. I think that is really important because I think we should try to distinguish that in there because they do fade a lot. They get a lot of chalkiness on the surface. For example, there is a CVS in midtown which has a red metal roof and it faded to pink. All the 6.a Packet Pg. 163 City of Palo Alto Page 46 neighbors were complaining about the pink roof. I think we should try as much as we can to address the quality issues in there. There are different grades of paint for the metal. I know it’s kind of picky but I think we should try to do it. Don’t just say corrugated metal but let’s include the specifications of the paint. Ms. Gerhardt: Alex, I know on roof material there is usually a warranty period and sometimes we will regulate based on the warranty period. Is that the same with paint? Board Member Lew: I think we could probably do it that way because on the cheaper paints they have a very short warranty. That might be the way to do it. Then there is a comment on one line in there about ceramic tile. There is about a million porcelain tiles about there and some of them are good and some of them are awful. I don’t know how we regulate that. I think maybe as you have it saying that it is only a secondary material is probably the easiest way to address it. That’s potentially big for a project. Chair Baltay: Okay. This is the kind of detail that will benefit tremendously from us reviewing it offline when staff provides us with an initial list. If I can ask everybody when we do get that list next time we look at this to really focus in on these kind of things, like what is the best way to regulate painting on metal finished, for example. What I would like to do before we finish this topic is discuss the graphics and what we can do about it. What I would like to suggest is that we ask our subcommittee working on these objective standards to take an active role to work with the consultants to come up with graphics that more accurately result what we do in two here in Palo Alto. Maybe we can all chime in if we think that is an appropriate thing to do and one or two comments on the graphics. Is that okay? It is really important to present this carefully and it has tripped us up some. I think the public will have an even harder time with it. Vice Chair Thompson: I have actually made some sketches or some edits to some graphics that I could share with Jean and Chris during our subcommittee meeting. If the other three members of the board have something like that to share with us is that okay to send those to us so we can share it with Jean and Chris as part of coordination? Chair Baltay: If you send them to Jodie she can decide the best way to get them to you as a subcommittee member. You shouldn’t go directly to your colleagues, Osma, I don’t think. Is that right, Jodie. Ms. Gerhardt: It would be best if I collect everything. Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. Chair Baltay: Are we in agreement that perhaps we could have our subcommittee go back to the consultants and see if we can just come up with a better way to do this or improve graphics a little bit? Board Member Lee: I really thank the subcommittee for your extra work. Chair Baltay: David, are you on board with that? You're on the subcommittee, right? Board Member Hirsch: Yes. Yeah, I think we should give thought to how those graphics work and maybe compare them with other graphics that are already in the code. They are pretty good. If I might take a moment to go back to the materials, isn’t it possible to put some regulation in the design standards that master what Alex was mentioning under S1 (inaudible) on the Board, Jean and Chris? Mr. Sensenig: The example of the materials is from Beaverton. We will change this for Palo Alto. It was just an example. I would really like to hear everyone’s comments on the graphics before we conclude today. That is important for us moving forward. Board Member Hirsch: I am fine with doing that. I am just referring this to you to look at. 6.a Packet Pg. 164 City of Palo Alto Page 47 Chair Baltay: David, I didn’t understand your comment about materials but do you have something you want to add to this? Board Member Hirsch: I think that some of the issues of the quality of materials should be addressed in design standards on that page the way it is shown there. We haven’t discussed that presentation. Ms. Gerhardt: I think from a staff perspective we agree that we need high quality materials. I think we will work of off warranty numbers, something that is objective, we will try to put that in the next draft. This section is very drafty. We can stay at a high level right this minute and we will have another round to speak about more specifics. Board Member Hirsch: Fine. Chair Baltay: Let’s do a round of comments on the graphics that we have been presented so far just to give them as much feedback as possible. My biggest critical comment is that a lot of these building are things you just wouldn’t see in Palo Alto, the five and six-story boxy apartment buildings. I think it is just more important to have buildings that are closer to what is in our community. That’s mu single biggest issue. Who else wants to chime in on this? Board Member Lee: I will say I am actually fine with the graphics. The only worry is that -- I think Planning Commission was worried too -- those examples get a lot of scrutiny and then the worry is that is the example. If there is a way to present it like here is one example, or if there is a way to provide graphics that are different. Sorry, Peter, but maybe there is a need to actually look outside of our community and within our community of different architectural styles. Sometimes when I have worked with cities there are just photos of built examples in that city. That’s okay with me too, I just think it is hard sometimes when there is just one example then an applicant is going to follow that to the T, or have some misconception that that is exactly how it should be done. It is not an easy task. Thank you so much for trying to do this. Having said that, I think graphics are very important. I think we should have graphics in this document, absolutely. Chair Baltay: That’s good feedback, Grace. Who else has something to say about the graphics? Alex? Vice Chair Thompson: We can go Alex and then I can go after. Chair Baltay: You were ready to speak, Osma. What do you think? Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. For example on the next slide where we are talking about façade… something that could help in terms of cropping all of that stuff out. If we are talking about façade, we don’t need to see what the rest of the building looks like. I feel if you look at the propositions, this roof is taking up so much of it, and automatically your brain starts going to things like there is no elevator penthouse. It just starts going to places it shouldn’t be going. At least when you are talking about the thing itself I might recommend really being strategic with the crop and just show the item that you're talking about. I think the graphics are coming along. I like the general styles. The massing ones that we were seeing, the ones that didn’t have the articulation, concern me a bit probably because I think it showing the roof and stuff. If it is really about facade maybe that would solve that problem. I think -- adding to Grace’s point a bit more -- we have this tendency to try to be as general as we can and perhaps the danger of that is now you're encouraging very general architecture by accident. Maybe there is some merit. There is one graphic, I think, that had those David Baker window shades that are angled that have a bit of style to them, and maybe adding a bit of style to these drawings might actually make them a bit more palatable to look at, if that makes sense. Chair Baltay: Okay. Alex and David, we haven’t heard from you two about the graphics. Board Member Hirsch: Okay. I could start by saying that I think as I look back at the graphics in the existing context space of design criteria and I think that they are very good. For example, on one of the 6.a Packet Pg. 165 City of Palo Alto Page 48 figures, it does exactly what Osma is talking about and only shows a façade where there is a façade and eliminates a lot of the roof. Take a look, Chris, at the way in which those graphics are presented. There are sections through the building that show the commercial and the residential above that could well be defined with dimensions on them. The recesses are shown and then the rooflines are not, in some cases. When they are in massing drawings, they are shown just as simple massing drawings with recesses, et cetera, and the roof tops setbacks. In my mind, they are much less specific but more appropriate. Have a look. For example, here again, is another one that has recesses in the building in the front consistently along a series of them. There it is important because the front and the back of the building are treated the same way. The diagram is very good. Also, I note that in a lot of cases we are showing street lines as if there is a specific border and we are on a corner. I don’t think you should be really showing the street. A lot of these drawings put the building into a block without defining it as being at a corner. Have a look at these drawings, Chris; the ones that have been produced here for years in the present zoning are quite good. Mr. Sensenig: Thank you, David. I did a lot of them. Ms. Gerhardt: I was going to say… Board Member Hirsch: Get back to it. Chair Baltay: Alex Lew, do you have any comments about the graphics? Board Member Lew: I don’t have any comments. Chair Baltay: Okay. Jodie and staff, have you gotten enough feedback from us for this study session now on draft objective standards? Ms. Gerhardt: I’ll let Chris and Jean respond. Vice Chair Thompson: Sorry, can I saw one comment before we close this time? Chair Baltay: Of course you can, Osma. Vice Chair Thompson: I just want to address our discussion around affordable housing just briefly. There is precedent in other affordable housing projects of the past where they have not been built to the same architectural standard as market rate housing and they have failed as a result. I think it is incumbent upon us when we are creating these design guidelines to ensure the success of the design of these buildings. I know there is concern about rumors. I recently had a good conversation with Habitat for Humanity about one of their affordable housing projects and they wanted to keep the balconies because they felt it worked for the design. They felt their projects would be more successful that way and they were willing to make the design work and cut back on other things so that this could happen. I would like us to really focus and make sure that… we all want affordable housing but we want it to be successful and we need to create design standards that ensure that success and not try to cut corners where we think they might need to get cut because we feel like it won’t happen because the success is more important, I think. Chair Baltay: I can tell you, Osma, that I am listening hard to what you’re saying. I am not saying you are convincing me but I hear you very loud and clear. Board Member Lee: Peter, if I may, on this whole process I want to thank staff but also are we going to hear about the process moving forward in terms of how we talk to stakeholders like affordable housing developers, and architects, and people who have built on projects? Are we going to reach out to them? Chair Baltay: I thought that we had sort of covered that ground and realized that we were not going to do anything else, but, Jodie, why don’t you tell us what you think? This is a public hearing process, 6.a Packet Pg. 166 City of Palo Alto Page 49 Grace, and it is completely open and advertised and we are under a real tight time constraint at the same time. Board Member Lee: There isn’t a draft online besides our meetings? So, I am just wondering… Ms. Gerhardt: No, as I said, every project has a website where people can see all of the details. I am happy to take a second look at it and see if we can do an email blast or something of that sort. Board Member Lee: Yeah, that would be great. Ms. Gerhardt: I just don’t have a specific answer right this minute but we will look into it. Board Member Lee: Thank you so much. Chair Baltay: Grace, do you have access through your work, perhaps, with a group of Palo Alto architects you could take the lead in putting together… Board Member Lee: That is just what I was going to do if that is comfortable for everybody (crosstalk) cover more ground, right, to just reach out. Chair Baltay: If you could take the lead to work through Jodie to get her to put out an email blast I think our Board would support doing that. Josie, if you want us to collectively agree that’s a good idea that gives you cover. I support doing that. Osma, Alex, and David, do you support? Board Member Hirsch: Absolutely. Vice Chair Thompson: Yeah. Should we try to reach out to other entities like Habitat for Humanity and other people that might have good insight? Chair Baltay: That’s a good idea, yeah. I guess Grace is going to get Jodie the primary information but any other help you can give her to reach out would be good. Okay, anything else on this subject? Vice Chair Thompson: Maybe if there is a list that could be shred maybe we could help add to the list in terms of distribution. Chair Baltay: You have to go through Jodie. Okay, Chris, have you go the feedback from us? Yes, okay. Vice Chair Thompson: I have to jump off, Chair Baltay. 4. Study Session on Ex-parte Communications between Architectural Review Board Members and Applicants, Developers and Other Persons Chair Baltay: Can you hold on one second, Osma. Can we push off the ex-parte communications discussion until next time, Jodie? Ms. Gerhardt: Yeah, that’s up to you. That’s fine. Let me make sure I let the attorney go. Chair Baltay: Oh dear. Has he been sitting in on all of this the whole time? Ms. Gerhardt: No, he just came in a half hour ago or something. We want to push off -- let me get to my agenda -- ex-parte? Chair Baltay: Does anybody else have an issue with doing that? I think that can wait. Okay, we are going to push ex-parte off until the next meeting. The last thing is I would like to get some feedback on our upcoming letter to Council. Osma, you can sign off if you don’t want to partake in that. 6.a Packet Pg. 167 City of Palo Alto Page 50 Vice Chair Thompson: Okay. Yeah, I really got to go. Thanks, guys. Chair Baltay: Thanks for your help, Osma. Chair Baltay: To the reaming Board Members, the last study session thing was that I would like to draft a letter to Council, an annual report, of the architectural review process. This will be the second year we have done that in a row. I would like to establish a precedent where the outgoing chair takes feedback from the Board right now, at one meeting, then drafts a letter of what it might be then circulates it through Jodie for feedback, and hopefully approval by the whole Board in the next meeting, or certainly by the end of the year. I think that is a good policy if we can get that going year after year with our Board. I am willing to start that this year. What I would like to do is get a round of feedback from everybody of what items -- not everything but a couple of things -- you might think are really important that the ARB has observed through our work that the Council should hear. If anybody has any feedback I would like to hear that so I can incorporate that in our letter. Ms. Gerhardt: Peter, before we get too far away, I am sorry to go back on the agenda a little bit but we do need an actual motion to continue the ex-part communications. MOTION Chair Baltay: Okay. I move that we continue the ex-parte communications study session to our next meeting, or should I say a date uncertain? Ms. Gerhardt: Next meeting is good. Chair Baltay: To our next meeting. Do I have a second? Board Member Lee: I’ll second. Chair Baltay: Okay. Moved and seconded. All those in favor? Roll call vote, please, Vinh. Aye: Baltay, Hirsch, Lee, Lew, (4) No: (0) Absent: Thompson (1) MOTION TO CONTINUE PASSES 4-0-1. Chair Baltay: Thank you. Ms. Gerhardt: Thank you. 5. Discussion Regarding the Annual ARB Report to Council Chair Baltay: We are now discussing our study session for the annual letter to Council. I am eager to hear people’s input or if there is a different process somebody thinks we should follow instead I’d like to hear that, too. We should be aware that the letter is something that is in our bylaws that we are required to present every year to the Council and Planning Commission. This is something we want to do. I can start this off by patting ourselves on the back in a sense. When I went out to the Marriott Hotel the other day looking at the signage stuff, I was really pleased with how it’s coming out. I think our input on that process has made an enormous difference on how it fits in and how it looks. It’s a much more handsome building than I thought it would be and I think that’s a large part because we pushed so hard on getting it to step back and worked on the massing of it. I would like to say that to 6.a Packet Pg. 168 City of Palo Alto Page 51 Council that I think, in that case at least, the Architectural Review process was productive. Anybody have anything else they'd like us to put in this letter on things to tell Council. Board Member Hirsch: The Council, at the last meeting, looking at and approving the recent San Antonio Road project commented on how much we had improved it and it was a pat on the back. Chair Baltay: Yes, there was a comment to that effect. What are some other things we’ve observed that we want to just mention to Council? Board Member Lee: I was wondering -- maybe it’s not appropriate -- if you are going to be speaking with them at the end of 2020, then, or in this letter we would be sending before the end of this calendar year? Chair Baltay: Yeah, my goal is that we should be sending this at the end of this calendar year and sort of at the end of this cycle of the board. We now have new Board Members coming on and new leadership and a new cycle. Board Member Lee: I think it’s a great idea. I just wanted to suggest that since Council priorities for 2020 have been housing and suitability and mobility, is there a way to showcase or highlight some of the projects where we feel like this Board has made an impact? Maybe that’s just a way to structure the letter. The other piece that I wanted to ask or consider is how we work with Council if there has been… I am not sure but it sounds like the Chair and Vice Chair meet regularly with somebody on the Council in terms of regular contact, and if we, as a Board, feel like there should be some kind of City Council liaison. I know that’s not offered right now to Boards but is there a way to be more aware of or in more communication with Council at important junctions during the year or maybe that has already occurred. I am sorry I came in late (crosstalk). Chair Baltay: There is not a whole lot of that that takes place and the little contact I have with Council is when I reach out to them on a case by case basis. We have a lot of contact with the staff. Board Member Lee: Yeah, I mean how you feel I thought maybe… I don’t know if that is something that the Chair would like to do but maybe that is a way to be more connected to Council throughout the year. Chair Baltay: I have always had the idea that the Chair or somebody appointed by the Chair should attend Council meetings whenever we have anything that references the work of our Board. We could try to formalize that and get them to accept that they want that. That’s just a way of communicating. What I have always found is that Council seems to have so many agendas and items going on that I hate to impose like “hey, our thing is so important. You have to listen to us.” Board Member Lee: Yeah, and I just want to say from these past meetings that Alex has been part of the North Ventura and then he is able to report back. Maybe there is some mechanism where something like that could happen where it is more communal efforts. I don’t know if that goes with Planning Commission, too, or HRB, but just in terms of the boards that deal with the physical environment and some of these Council priorities. I am just throwing it out there. Chair Baltay: Okay, I am going to make a note of it. I’ll put a paragraph in there and we can debate it as it’s written up. Any other thoughts on that? Any other thoughts from Alex or David? For example, we just had the discussion today whether outdoor balconies on affordable housing is a good idea or a bad idea. We can bring that up to Council. My guess is that there are not quite as connected on both sides of that story. That’s the kind of thing we see in the trenches, sort of speak, both sides of it. Council likes to hear our opinion on these things even if they're going to make the decision it might be really good to give them our feedback. Is that something we want to tackle? It’s a big topic. Board Member Lee: I think on that specific topic we are split and there hasn’t been a lot of discussion or input from stakeholders to educate us on where we stand as a group. That’s my feeling. 6.a Packet Pg. 169 City of Palo Alto Page 52 Chair Baltay: That particular one we are split, yes, but even just showing them what the issues are sometimes is useful. I agree on that one; we don’t have a clear direction. Are there other things like that? Board Member Hirsch: Of course I would like us to show the successful projects that we begin from beginning to end. That’s always what they're going to be most interested in. Then if we go beyond that… like last year one of our major comments was the street works and the delivery issues, and I don’t know if that really resonated with the Council very much. We considered it but it’s a transportation issue and I don’t know if it's a priority for them. I guess I am more inclined to make it more visual. It turned out they were asking us specific questions at the end of our presentations. Questions that they were interested in; the process and how it’s been working. It would be better if we were a little better prepared for some of those questions if we knew what the questions might be and to have specific answers (inaudible). Last year, I noted we spent a lot of time on trees over the expansion of buildings as a problem. It interested them, I will admit. It interests them. We should maybe look to see what other issues are like that that would be of interest. My opinion is we should concentrate more on our successes and that’s what they will be most interested in. Chair Baltay: Okay. The issue with the depth for planting trees over a garage is a big one and I think that was well received in the sense that it’s a rather technical, complicated thing but we have noticed it consistently affecting larger elements and we have put it out to the Council so they can see that. Board Member Hirsch: Yes, I know (inaudible). Chair Baltay: At the meeting the other night for the San Antonio apartment building that was just approved, the Council approved the individual building fairly readily as a 7-0 vote but they split right down the middle on whether they should extend the same zoning parameters to the rest of the neighborhood. Last year we mentioned to them that the San Antonio corridor could really use its own set of design guidelines or some standards as they try to develop that from one-story light industrial to four and five-story FAR 2.0 residential. Do we still feel that? Just, for example, another thing. Board Member Hirsch: It seems to me that talking about the street issues like that what we are going to get is a lot of different looking buildings happening on the street. I wonder what other Board Members feel about that because the one we just approved is a very bold specific design personality. What will the next one be like? Will we have a street that is made of all bold designs? The hotel itself is, as you say, (inaudible) and then what appears next to it? How will that speak (inaudible) and other buildings with similar design (inaudible)? Chair Baltay: The question right now is should we put that in our annual statement to Council that this is something they might want to think about or at least something that we have noticed as something that might be an issue. Okay, I am not hearing a whole lot of feedback from you folks. Should I write something up and circulate it, then? Board Member Hirsch: Yes (inaudible). Chair Baltay: We will work it out but I hate to write a bunch of stuff and then have nobody want to support it. Ms. Gerhardt: Peter, related to San Antonio guidelines, Council did direct us to come back with a corridor on survey or study I should say, but that’s more related to the street or the public improvements themselves not necessarily the land use and the design. Our objective standards that we were just working on could be applied to those projects and we haven’t talked about it as much but we could have specific standards for specific areas. If we want to add that to the objective standard somehow. Chair Baltay: I intend to put it in the draft of this letter that the City may be well served by having a design standard for the San Antonio corridor but I want to see if we get the Board beyond that. It’s a big 6.a Packet Pg. 170 City of Palo Alto Page 53 process and then the Council has to decide it is important enough to get the resources to go forward on that. This is just the first step saying, hey, this is an issue. David brought up with strong feelings the whole idea that this objective design frame was just not worth doing. Ultimately, we shouldn’t have these standards. We should just stick to the Architectural Review. This letter to Council is a good place to put that. If that is really how we feel as a Board, we say it here and tell them our piece and they can decide how to behave accordingly or take it accordingly. Is that something that we should put in this letter? Board Member Hirsch: I think I was voted down four to one. Chair Baltay: The letter is the proper format for that, David. I mean, if we have an issue on how the politicians are managing design review that’s where you tell them. Ms. Gerhardt: I think the only trouble with this one is that it is a state mandate. I think where we have the most control is how big or small are we making the box for objective standards. Chair Baltay: What I heard David saying is it is incumbent upon us to fight these things, even at the State level the City should be fighting it. Ms. Gerhardt: As long as we are fighting and doing the work at the same time. Chair Baltay: That’s what I tried to do is get us to do the work today but the decision to fight those things, David, is a City Council decision, certainly not us. Board Member Hirsch: Not ours. Chair Baltay: Look, they want to know from us what do we think about things and this is the opportunity to put it out there. Board Member Hirsch: That’s a likely question that’ll come back to us at the Council meeting. Chair Baltay: I think it’s a very valid question. It’s not clear to me what the Board as a whole thinks about it and we need to speak with one voice in this. Okay, even though. Does anybody have any other thoughts? Let’s tell them to me and we can go from there. Board Member Hirsch: (Inaudible). Chair Baltay: I can’t hear you, David. Board Member Hirsch: Could I just add one note on the (inaudible)? I mean, I want to commend consultants who are off-camera right now. They have done a lot of work. It’s a tremendous task and, Jodie, I know you coordinate with them and add a tremendous amount of information that they need to continue. Where am I going with this, now? The Board question is whether or not we are going to follow this is whether or not the code itself… is that inadequate the way it’s written. I mean, I really think there's an awful lot in our code that’s pretty good the more I read it. Therefore, I wonder if it has ever been thought that you look specifically at the code and language to make it more appropriate (inaudible). Why is it considered so subjective (inaudible)? That’s a philosophical question maybe but… Chair Baltay: Yeah. Look, David, let me draft this thing. There will be a paragraph about it and then we can work on it from there. Board Member Hirsch: Okay. Approval of Minutes 6.a Packet Pg. 171 City of Palo Alto Page 54 6. Draft Architectural Review Board Meeting Minutes for October 15, 2020 Chair Baltay: Okay. I just wanted to collect ideas. We are going long overdue here. Can we close this study session on annual report to Council? Next item on our agenda is approval of minutes. This is the draft Architectural Review Board minutes for October 15, 2020. Do we have any comments on those minutes? Board Member Lew: I have some corrections on phonetic spellings and I can send those directly to staff. Chair Baltay: What are the corrections, Alex? Are they more than just typographical? Board Member Lew: Its phonetic spellings like La Patesion Yuvete [phonetic]. Chair Baltay: Oh, okay. That’s fine. Anything else? Can we have a motion, then, please? MOTION Board Member Lew: I will move that we approve the [distortion] for October 25. Chair Baltay: So moved. Second on that? Board Member Hirsch: Second. Chair Baltay: Moved and seconded. Let’s have a vote. Staff, can we have a vote, please? Aye: Baltay, Hirsch, Lee, Lew, (4) No: (0) Absent: Thompson (1) MOTION TO APPROVE PASSES 4-0-1. Board Member Questions, Comments or Announcements Chair Baltay: Thank you very much. The next item is Board Member questions, comments, or announcements. The North Ventura Coordinated Area Plan working group update, Alex? Board Member Lew: Sure. On November 5th, there was a joint meeting with the Parks And Rec Commission to review naturalizing the creek. On December 9th, the North Ventura will be presented at the Planning Commission. I think that staff will present the three alternative concepts at that meeting. Chair Baltay: Okay. Anything else? Is that it? Ms. Gerhardt: I think that’s it. I think everyone is eluded to the 788 San Antonio project which we are very excited to see that get approved. That’s actually the first housing incentive program project. Then the Council also added the housing incentive program to the two blocks of San Antonio. We will hopefully see more projects along that corridor. Chair Baltay: Okay. With that, we are adjourned. Thank you everybody for a long and productive incumbent. Have a great day. Ms. Gerhardt: Thank you all. Adjournment 6.a Packet Pg. 172