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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2022-12-15 Architectural Review Board Summary MinutesPage 1 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW BOARD MINUTES: December 15, 2022 Council Chamber & Zoom 8:30 AM Call to Order / Roll Call The Architectural Review Board (ARB) of the City of Palo Alto met on this date in Council Chambers and virtual teleconference at 8:30 a.m. Present: Chair David Hirsch, Vice Chair Peter Baltay (arrived approximately 8:35 a.m.), Boardmember Osma Thompson, Boardmember Yingxi Chen Absent: Boardmember Kendra Rosenberg (planned absence) 1. Adoption of a Resolution Authorizing Use of Teleconferencing for the Architectural Review Board During Covid-19 State of Emergency MOTION: Boardmember Thompson moved, seconded by Boardmember Chen, to adopt the Resolution Authorizing Use of Teleconferencing for the ARB During Covid-19 State of Emergency. VOTE: 3-0-0-2 Oral Communications Veronica Dao, Administrative Associate III, stated there were none. Agenda Changes, Additions and Deletions Claire Raybould, Senior Planner and ARB Liaison, indicated that staff had none. Chair Hirsch asked if any new projects had come in. Ms. Raybould stated that no new major projects came in. Boardmember Thompson stated for the public that Vice Chair Baltay had arrived. Ms. Raybould stated for the record that Vice Chair Baltay arrived. City Official Reports 2. Transmittal of 1) the ARB Meeting Schedule and Attendance Record, 2) Tentative Future Agenda items and 3) Recently Submitted Projects Ms. Raybould displayed the ARB meeting schedule and said that the January 3, 2023, hearing was canceled, and the next hearing was scheduled for January 19, 2023. The agenda included a Study Session on the Fry’s Development Agreement related to the cannery building. The discussion at this hearing was related to the townhomes. There were no major projects submitted since the last hearing. Page 2 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Chair Hirsch stated that they needed to discuss the ARB’s decision on how many vacation days were allowed out of the year. All Boards had to do that. Ms. Raybould asked if he was talking about the number of hearings to be canceled. Jodie Gerhardt, Manager of Current Planning, explained that Chair Hirsch was talking about the ARB Bylaws and the number of meetings individual members could be absent. The Bylaws change generically said, “In compliance with State Law.” They should develop more internal policies and that could be agendized for January. Boardmembers just received training a few days prior so they should have the information from that meeting. Study Session 3. 3200 Park Boulevard/200 Portage/340 Portage [22PLN-00287 and 22PLN-00288]: Study Session to Consider a Request for a Development Agreement, Comprehensive Plan Amendment, Planned Community Zoning, and Tentative Map, to Allow Redevelopment of a 14.65-acre site at 200-404 Portage Avenue, 3040-3250 Park Boulevard, 3201-3225 Ash Street and 278 Lambert. This Study Session will Focus on Feedback Regarding the Design of the Townhome portion of the Development Plans. The Full Scope of Work Includes the Partial Demolition of an Existing Commercial Building That has Been Deemed Eligible for the California Register as Well as an Existing Building With a Commercial Recreation use at 3040 Park and Construction of (74) new Townhome Condominiums, a one Level Parking Garage, and Dedication of Approximately 3.25 acres of Land to the City for Future Affordable Housing and Parkland Uses. The Existing Building at 3201-3225 Ash Street Would Remain in Office use, and an Automotive use at 3250 Park Boulevard Would Convert to R&D use. Environmental Assessment: Draft Environmental Impact Report for the 200 Portage Townhome Development Project was Circulated on September 16, 2022 in Accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The EIR Comment Period Ended on November 15, 2022. The Proposed Development Agreement is Evaluated as Alternative 3 in the Draft EIR. Zoning District: RM-30 (Multi-Family Residential) and GM (General Manufacturing). For More Information Contact the Project Planner Claire Raybould at Claire.Raybould@cityofpaloalto.org. Chair Hirsch asked Ms. Raybould if the item included the whole project or just the housing. Ms. Raybould explained the full project included the entire site including the remaining cannery building. the Study Session was to focus and provide feedback on specific portions of the project. The current focus was the townhome project. Chair Hirsch asked if he needed to read the whole description. Ms. Raybould said that it was fine to read the title. Chair Hirsch stated that the ARB was discussing the housing portion and called for staff’s presentation. Ms. Raybould requested that he read the title first. Chair Hirsch introduced the project. Page 3 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Ms. Raybould explained the goal of the Study Session was to provide an orientation for the ARB on the project and to obtain feedback on the design of the townhome portion of the project. Another Study Session was planned for January 2023 on the cannery portion of the project. That Study Session would follow a Historic Resources Board (HRB) meeting which could inform the ARB’s discussion. She stated that the project was located along Park Boulevard and displayed a slide showing the project parcels. In accordance with the development agreement the parcels were labeled as they were intended to be subdivided into the cannery area, the townhome parcel, the City dedication parcel along Matadero Creek, the Ash parcel, and the Audi parcel. The Audi dealership would remain, but the parcel was being converted to research and development use from an auto services use. The project was within the North Ventura Coordinated Area Plan (NVCAP). NVCAP started in 2018 and was ongoing. The community provided significant input about what they wanted to see and how the site should be redeveloped. The input was used to identify key objectives for the City and Sobrato. Throughout 2021 numerous overlapping discussions were held around the site. Sobrato filed the 200 Portage townhome project in March 2021. The project was streamlined under Senate Bill (SB) 330. Sobrato also requested clarification from the City on the code language which allowed for retention of nonconforming uses specific to the research and development uses in the existing cannery building. Council held hearings in June and October 2021 and ultimately formed an ad hoc committee to explore shared redevelopment interests in the site. The ad hoc committee concluded in Summer 2022 and Council held a study session on its work to begin the public process for the development agreement and associated entitlements. Council allowed for the 91 unit townhome project to be placed on hold while the City completed the public process for the proposed development agreement. The draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for 200 Portage was released on September 16, 2023. It identified a 45 day review period which ended on October 31, 2023. The City extended the deadline to November 15th in response to public comment. [Unintelligible 28:21] was preparing responses to the comments on the draft EIR. The final EIR was scheduled for release in early 2023. There were a number of entitlements and legislative actions associated with the project including the development agreement, a Comprehensive Plan Amendment, a Planned Community (PC) rezoning for the majority of the parcels, a tentative map and final map for a total of 5 parcels, and an HRB review. All discretionary actions were being processed concurrently in accordance with the PC rezoning process and the HRB review process. The HRB would hear the matter on January 12, 2023. The ARB had another Study Session on January 19, 2023. Then there would be formal HRB, ARB, Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC), and Council hearings from February to April. The EIR looked at the 200 Portage townhome project which included 91 townhome units and demolition of a portion of the California Register eligible building and assumed retention of the rest of the site. No park space was proposed as part of the project. In accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) project alternatives were required. In addition to the “no project” alternative the City evaluated two build alternatives. Alternative 3 was the project that was before the ARB under the development agreement. The proposed project as well as the build alternatives had significant and unavoidable impacts on a historic resource. There were also impacts on biological resources, hazardous materials, noise, and traffic and transportation. Those impacts could be reduced to less than significant through mitigation measures. The development agreement objectives came from the community during the NVCAP process, and she displayed a slide of them for the ARB. She summarized the key negotiated terms of the agreement as demolition of a portion of the cannery building to develop townhouses, allowing the remaining cannery building to remain research and development space, allowing the Ash building to remain office space, a Page 4 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 conveyance of a 3.25 acre parcel of land to the City for open space, the development of an affordable housing project, and a $5 million contribution to the City for open space or affordable housing. Chair Hirsch interrupted to clarify the size of the parcel being conveyed to the City. Ms. Raybould stated that it was 3.25 acres. Roughly one acre of that would be used for an affordable housing project. Approximately 2.25 acres would be for parkland. Key considerations for the ARB included the design of the townhome portion of the project, feedback on design consistency with the Context Based Design Criteria, feedback on consistency with the goals of NVCAP, and feedback on consistency with the ARB Findings. The proposed development agreement was not considered a housing development project as it was not 2/3rds housing and had legislative actions associated with it. The project would also be in a PC zone and not one of the use districts. The ARB had latitude to provide feedback on the design since it was a PC rezone. The PC zone district ordinance would set the development standards for the site. Staff encouraged the ARB to provide comments within the context of the key negotiated terms of the development agreement. She recommended that the ARB call for the applicant’s presentation. Chair Hirsch called for the applicant’s presentation and explained they had 10 minutes. Evan Sockalosky, Arc Tec, stated that Ms. Raybould had done a great job of introducing the project. His firm was the architect for the cannery portion of the project, which would be presented to the ARB in January 2023. He introduced Tim Steele and Robert Tersini with Sobrato, David Burton with KTGY, Morgan Burke with the Guzzardo Partnership, and [Micarious Mathu with Kier + Wright Civil Engineers 38:06]. There were 5 parcels in the overall development and this project involved Parcel 1. Parcel 3 was the cannery building that would be discussed in January. He showed an enlargement of the two parcels they were developing. The cannery building included 380 and 340 Portage and would be redeveloped into Office R&D with a small retail portion. There was also a parking structure being developed to offset the loss of parking for the park dedication. He noted that the right side of the drawing reflected the townhome portion of the project and introduced David Burton to give the rest of the presentation. David Burton, KTGY, explained that the building layout and design was intended to create maximum engagement with the street and an active and attractive streetscape. There were 12 buildings over the site and each building had one or two elevations that faced streets. The six buildings at the center of the site faced a landscape paseo that connected interior Streets A and B. the buildings had front doors facing the streets and elevations were articulated to read as fronts. The density was about 30 dwelling units to the acre based on the net site area and 19 dwelling units to the acre based on the gross site area. Buildings had four floorplan types which were combinations of 3 and 4 bedrooms and ranged from 1,800 square feet (sf) to 1,980 sf. The building design gave expression to individual units and had projecting bays that gave rhythm to the street frontage. The primary exterior materials were stucco, horizontal cement siding, and fiber cement panels. There was also some brick veneer and metal roofing elements used as accents. The front doors to the units were painted in a variety of bold colors. The intention was to comply with the City’s design guidelines as much as possible. He noted that if it were up to them they might have varied the roofline more, but that they did not do so in order to respect the 35’ height limit. He showed the color schemes and noted that there were 3 of them in order to provide visual diversity across the site. The building design was modern but they wanted the homes to feel welcoming and used color to that effect. The darker colors were used closer to the ground in order to develop the pedestrian scale and streetscape. Page 5 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 He showed on the site plan where each of the color schemes would be located and noted how the schemes interacted with the neighbors. Finally, he showed a view of the townhouses and how they interfaced with the cannery building. They were of similar height and nicely framed Street C, which ran between the buildings. Chair Hirsch asked if there was a landscape plan at this point. [Note-must have received nonverbal confirmation that there was not 45:40]. He called for ARB questions. Boardmember Thompson asked if there were public comments. Ms. Dao stated that there were none. Chair Hirsch asked who wanted to start with questions. Vice Chair Baltay wanted to understand the overall site dimensions of the project. Tim Steele, Sobrato, displayed an aerial view of the project site and explained that anything outlined in yellow was part of the approximately 14.65 acre site. Vice Chair Baltay explained that he was trying to understand the spaces between the townhomes. He mentioned Elevation AR2.0.1 and asked for the space between the buildings. He measured the space to be 32’ at the drive aisle and 22’ at the paseo. Mr. Burton said that was correct, it was 32’ from garage to garage. The buildings stepped in a bit at the upper levels so there it was 26’ clear between buildings. Vice Chair Baltay confirmed that there was 26’ clear between the building faces up above and 32’ at the garage doors. On the paseo he scaled it to be 22’ at the base and 20’ above. He asked if that was correct. Mr. Burton thought it was closer to 21’ above and 22’ was correct at the base. Vice Chair Baltay explained that he thought that information would be important to the ARB’s discussions and thanked the applicant for the clarification. He asked staff to further explain which guidelines the ARB needed to consider and work under. He noted that the Contextual Based Design Guidelines were 8 pages long. He asked if that was the standard that governed the project. Ms. Raybould said that was correct, but that the PC rezoning allowed flexibility to modify anything within Title 18 of the Municipal Code. They wanted to know how the project complied with the Context Based Design Criteria as part of the ARB Findings. The ARB needed to evaluate if it was consistent with their Findings which included the Context Based Design Criteria, the Comprehensive Plan, and the zoning. Vice Chair Baltay understood that there was deviation for the PC zoning and the negotiated agreement. He just wanted to understand that it was the Context Based Design Criteria and not the new Objective Standards. Ms. Raybould said that was correct. The new Objective Standards did not apply but the ARB had some latitude under the PC ordinance and could speak to the Objective Standards as a means of feedback on the project. Page 6 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Vice Chair Baltay noted that Municipal Code 2120240 governed the width of streets in developments and noted that they should be no less than 32’ wide. Some of the other criteria implied that was intended to be the driving width. He requested staff’s justification for the project. Ms. Raybould explained that private street width included everything in what was determined to be the right of way. Staff never interpreted that to mean there was a 32’ driving width. Vice Chair Baltay stated that Section B of the Code said that if a private street was a public parking strip of at least 6 feet then it allowed the reduction to 26’. That implied the 6’ parking would come out of the 32’ reducing it to 26’. He asked if that was what she meant. Ms. Gerhardt explained that when a city discussed the right of way it was talking about the entire street. Curb to curb was the drive aisle, but right of way included sidewalks, planting strips, and other related things. Section A included a 20’ setback, but Section B she was not as familiar with. Staff needed additional time to verify the information. Vice Chair Baltay said that he was just trying to determine which codes applied to the project. Ms. Raybould stated that staff always interpreted it to mean that they needed a 32’ right of way, which meant that there could be no buildings within the right of way. They allowed landscaping bulb outs. The applicant would be requesting a map with exceptions for a 26’ total street width because the upper built portions of the building encroached on the street. They were proposing a 32’ width at the ground level. Ms. Gerhardt clarified that the public parking strip was not for parking but for landscaping. Vice Chair Baltay heard that the project was not going to comply with Section 21 regarding width because the building cantilevered into the space. The clear public right of way was 26’. Ms. Raybould said that was right and noted that the staff report indicated that the applicant would request a tentative map width exception, which was subject to the PTC and City Council’s approval. Vice Chair Baltay noted that Ms. Gerhardt had previously told him that the source of the width of the streets came from some sort of public referendum and requested background information. Ms. Gerhardt indicated that Ms. Raybould had more current information. Ms. Raybould could not recall the date, but there was a townhome development proposed a few years prior with raised concerns about parking and narrow streets. The intent of the drive aisles was to have streets wide enough to provide parking. The ultimate language did not specify that parking had to be provided. With the current project they could not put parking in front of the garages, but guest parking would be allowed on the streets without garages. Vice Chair Baltay thanked staff for the clarifications. He asked the landscape architect to point out where the native species of trees would be planted. He could only identify one native species on the paseo and asked if that was correct. Morgan Burke, Guzzardo Partnership, said that Vice Chair Baltay was correct and that they needed to identify more native species for use within the site. He indicated that they planned to study it further. Page 7 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Vice Chair Baltay thanked him for the clarification. Chair Hirsch said that he wanted to take the ARB on a “side trip” before returning to the questions and responses. He requested they put up the site plan and asked them to explain the garbage collection. Mr. Burton displayed the site plan and explained that the 8 buildings on the lower section of the site had individual trash pickup with a traditional garbage truck on the apron behind their garage doors. The four buildings at the north end of the site would have a trash enclosure. Homeowners would place their trash behind their garages and the Homeowners Association (HOA) would have a concierge service take them to the trash enclosure for centralized collection. It was a hybrid system they worked out with the City. Chair Hirsch asked if they discussed the plan with Sanitation. Mr. Burton said that they had. Ms. Raybould stated that discussions were ongoing, and they had not looked at a revised design for the dead end aisles. Everything else had been resolved. Boardmember Thompson asked the architect about the design intent behind the distribution of where each palette went on the site. Mr. Burton said that mostly they tried to distribute the three color schemes so that they would get each color scheme along each street frontage. They wanted to provide visual variety no matter where one was looking from. The building in the upper right corner of the site was chosen to relate to the neighboring building. Boardmember Thompson asked if that was Building B4. Mr. Burton did not know the numbers of the buildings off the top of his head. Boardmember Thompson stated it was a warmer beige. Mr. Burton said that was correct and it had a darker brick base. Boardmember Thompson asked if there was any intent to provide more architectural diversity beyond the color palette. Mr. Burton stated that they liked the rhythm and consistency of the bays the way they developed them. They thought there was a nice cohesiveness and rhythm to the site. The color was used to provide the variety. Boardmember Thompson asked if there was consideration given to the sun’s location and how it affected the site. Mr. Burton said that they always tried to provide as much distance between the buildings as possible for sunlight. The dimensions of the site meant that the current layout was as ideal as possible in terms of solar panels. Boardmember Thompson asked if they studied a scheme where the aisles went true north/south. Page 8 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Mr. Burton said that the current scheme worked out where they were parallel to the street and able to create a good streetscape. That dictated the rest of the site’s layout. Boardmember Chen requested clarification on the short term bicycle storage and where the racks would be along the street. Mr. Burke said that they had the information but was unsure if it was in the submittal. They showed staff a markup of where they intended to put the short term bicycle parking. He believed there were 8 spaces, and they were located around the site within 200’ of every residential door. They would provide the information formally in a forthcoming submittal. The placement had been studied. Boardmember Chen inquired about the mailbox locations and designated parking spots for deliveries. Mr. Burke said that the mailboxes were at either end of the paseo and to the north on Street A. He was unable to speak to the parking spot. Mr. Burton did not believe they had designated a spot but there were on street parking spots at all of those locations. Chair Hirsch called for follow-up questions. Vice Chair Baltay said that the Objective Design Guidelines had them consider how units would have privacy from other units. He read Section 6, Statement H aloud and asked the applicant to explain how they achieved privacy in the project. Mr. Burton said that it was mostly visual separation combined with the landscaping. They did not do a specific study. The way that the building flipped caused the major windows to offset a bit, but he had no specific information. Chair Hirsch called for ARB discussion. Vice Chair Baltay thought the application was through and complete and thanked the applicant and staff for their work. He reminded the ARB to focus their comments on the townhome portion of the project. He understood it to be a negotiated contract with the City and the project before the ARB was the design of the townhomes. It was not for the ARB to renegotiate the deal. With respect to the site plan things were functional. He appreciated the access off of Park and agreed with Boardmember Thompson’s question about if they had considered orienting the major drive aisles differently. He thought the elevation could be more textured along Park if they did that. Dead end drive aisles also set the project up for difficult situations for trash collection and general living in the end unit. He suggested they loop the road and connect it back to provide more landscaping by the R1 neighborhood. He commended the project for including guest parking and thought 35 spaces was wonderful. There were curb drop off areas along Park and he thought that was important for deliveries. One concern was that the space between the units at the paseo was too tight. A 20’ wide space that was 35’ tall was too narrow and felt like a tight urban alley and not a paseo. The 74 homes needed a more landscaped thoroughfare. It was a shame that it was not wider. Since the ground floor units were at grade they needed to landscape areas in the front so the area of the paseo would only be 6’ to 8’ and that was not a paseo but a pathway. He recommended an aspect ratio of 1:1. The buildings should also step up and be recessed backwards rather than inwards. Page 9 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 There was no grade separation between ground level units. He understood that they were at grade due to the height limit, but some separation was important and was spelled out in the Objective Design Standards. that level of privacy was also required in the Contextual Standards as well. Objective Standards 18.13.060(b)5 required three different building types and he interpreted that to mean three types of housing. The ARB was told that the agreement allowed for 74 townhome units, which was a single type. He just wanted that pointed out for the record and stated that it also went to a question Boardmember Thompson asked about architectural variety which he thought was lacking. The purpose of the regulations was to get greater variety and that was something which the project lacked. His largest issues were with the massing of the building. there was not sufficient variety between individual building masses. That was required by the Contextual Guidelines. It was important for the neighborhood to have a variety of different building types, sizes, and designs. The massing of the buildings was identical and just changing the color palette three times was insufficient. More variety of height, projections, and entry doors were required. That was missing from the project which was not residential feeling. The project needed both vertical and horizontal articulation, so he suggested a greater use of roof eaves, window bays, porches, and entries to break up the massing and provide visual interest. He further requested more elements that defined entries, broke down the mass, and signaled human habitation. The intensity of the masses needed to be broken up and things near the door needed to be human scale. There was not sufficient privacy between the units as they were mirrored. He encouraged that they consider changing the floor plans to promote privacy. The ARB did not expect perfect privacy, but the Objective Guidelines gave examples of angled windows and other solutions. Being only 20’ from the neighbor was very tight and would cause people to leave their windows closed. He suggested they consider angled windows, vertical offsets, and greater plan variation. Greater variety in open spaces would be encouraged. Stepping the buildings in and out would create different types of open spaces at the ground level. He encouraged the applicants to provide more variety to the floor plans and open spaces. With the colors and materials he agreed that they were playing off the brick of a neighboring building but encouraged them to go out into the neighborhood more for context. The brick was not a large proportion of the neighborhood and was an inappropriate contextual response. The long elevations were too repetitious, and the palette was not sufficient to provide greater variety. With landscaping the project needed a greater variety of native species planted in the residential section. A magnolia was not the most majestic tree they could choose for the paseo, and he encouraged more thought there. He repeated that his major issue was that there were too many of the same building types or plans and wanted more variety. Chair Hirsch thought Vice Chair Baltay summed things up nicely in his comments and stated that the other Boardmembers would add to his thoughts. He wanted to discuss the project as presented relative to an alternate. He understood that the ARB was not allowed to consider a rezoning of the site but thought that 74 units on the site was insufficient and with the alternate consideration that might be better. In order to clarify concerns and create discussion around the issues there was a good alternative. He requested that Ms. Raybould display the alternative. Ms. Raybould displayed the image and apologized for being unable to rotate it. She pointed out Park and Olive for the ARB’s reference. Chair Hirsch explained that the subcommittee had studied townhomes, but by the time the project was in process most of the work was done. Therefore, they could only make suggestions which would Page 10 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 hopefully be useful. He noted that the subcommittee was familiar with the applicant’s other projects and some of them were particularly good. The alternative showed a series of cul-de-sacs and the subcommittee determined that was a way to deal with many issues. End units would face the paseo and the Fry’s building. He read the alternate project description aloud for the record. The townhomes were indicated on the diagram in purple and there were two types of townhomes shown and a multi-story building in orange. This alternative provided for less repetitive linear streetscapes and a landscaped common use paseo without entries facing it. He then showed an example of a cul-de-sac with two car garages and requested that they imagine the paseo coming out of the end. This site plan also minimized vehicular conflict. He pointed out the access to the garage and noted that the one way direction of the traffic was the only real conflict on the street. The current project would always have vehicular conflict. The alternative project required a zoning change and so was outlawed by the agreement. That was a shame and he noted that Palo Alto faced significant housing requirements and the site could contain more units, more varied units, a different massing, and an improved paseo. The paseo could continue to a raised courtyard accessible to all ground floor units and the environment would be very different with a variety of housing typology. The Council had looked at the possibility of six-story buildings so it was possible that they could have a greater building mass resulting in more units. The bicycle storage for the multi-story building and townhomes could be on the corner and would have easy street access. Depending on the layout the site could hold more than 100 units. The discussion about typology and how that reflected in the detail of each of the building types was a significant part of the discussion and he agreed with Vice Chair Baltay regarding variation. There were special considerations that ensured the alternate project would not happen, which he thought was unfortunate. The paseo in the alternative was without conflict at the entryways and was wider than the current project. It also continued across the street and into the courtyard of the multi-story building. Unfortunately, the density of the alternative project exceeded the zoning and rezoning would be required. At a recent Council meeting they were in favor of higher density. Sobrato needed to consider creating “a place” for the paseo to lead and noted that under the current site plan there was no space for that. Finally, the bicycle path was exceptionally important to the neighborhood. He spoke to someone with Planning and Transportation who felt it was reasonable to put the path on the opposite side of the street, but that was a major consideration. Ms. Gerhardt asked Chair Hirsch if she could make some clarifications. Chair Hirsch said that she could. Ms. Gerhardt indicated that staff had separate discussions with Transportation. There were bicycle lanes on both sides of Park Boulevard currently. Any changes made would enhance the bicycle lanes versus changing or moving them. The City wanted to move to a bicycle boulevard on Park. Therefore, staff did not want to move the bicycle paths. Staff would speak to Transportation further. Chair Hirsch said that this project had a number of cars going to a garage which was a new issue and would affect the bicycle lane. The access to Page Mill and the Oregon Expressway also interrupted the bicycle lane. Ms. Gerhardt assumed that the environmental review would take that intersection into account. With Park Boulevard Transportation told Planning to keep the number of driveways onto the boulevard to a minimum. Page 11 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Chair Hirsch stated that impacted another suggestion in his diagram, which was a one way loop for traffic. He suggested providing an area adjacent to the paseo for garbage collection for the townhomes with a mail drop or a place for a transformer. To summarize he stated that the ARB and PTC should meet together to discuss the issues. A project of this size required more than a series of linear houses in one direction. The possibility of creating gathering spaces within the community needed to be explored and had options in this alternative. Using a cul-de-sac scheme would change the whole nature of the project and he wanted to raise it even without the particular hope that it would really happen. Often the ARB made comments on façade improvements, but this project needed more than that. Boardmember Thompson thanked the applicant for the application. She noted that she had not seen Chair Hirsch’s sketch before the meeting, so it was hard to respond to that. With configuration she had heard that the current configuration was quite long and monotonous and she agreed with those comments. She recommended they consider reorienting the drive aisles to true north/south. Vice Chair Baltay noted that would create visual interest on the street. If the paseo could connect Park to the commercial corner at 340 Portage and the neighboring park she would recommend that. It was not similar to Chair Hirsch’s setup but probably did not discount his thoughts. Currently the paseo was set up so that it would be in shade most of the time, but if it was oriented north/south it would have light despite the building height. That might also provide opportunities for throughput driveways. The trash collection, mailboxes, and bicycle parking needed more thought. The current configuration of the drive aisles meant that there were no eyes on the street. The precedent project mentioned by Chair Hirsch had the same problem. People would want to gravitate to the bigger street, but there were no eyes on it. There were balconies at the second level, but she worried about the street level and pedestrians. Eyes on the public areas allowed projects to thrive. She was pleased the applicant discussed the design intent and stated that engagement with the street was important. She agreed with that but thought that garage door facing streets would minimize engagement. The bedroom at the street level mentioned by Vice Chair Baltay was probably Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) accessible, so she understood that but still thought it was in a bad location. It meant that there would be closed windows and no engagement on the ground floor. Based on that she recommended other ways of creating engagement like porches or stoops for outdoor living space. The current design read very closed off and needed to be more inviting. The applicant mentioned a desire for visual diversity, but the current design did not achieve that since they were the same buildings, and the color palettes did not help in creating visual diversity. She agreed with Vice Chair Baltay that they could add roof eaves, angled windows, plan variation and other things like balconies, window placement, and shading options. She spoke of a solid/void dynamic and called for more consideration of how the sun hit the site and affected the façades. Currently people might get lost because everything was so similar. She stressed that architects could not keep making the same building over and over as it was not good for the future. The building type selected could allow for diversity without much added cost and she thought that was very important. The palette had promise, but the ARB had identified stucco as a low quality material. The findings required high quality materials. Additionally, the color boards all looked the same, so she requested that they put the color on the materials for the next hearing. She appreciated the wood color and the textures. The warmth was welcome, and she thought it could be even warmer, especially given the applicant’s design intent to be warm and earthy. There was much to be done in terms of reconsidering the orientation, and the façade character and depth. There was also a lot of promise in the project, but it was currently a hard sell. Page 12 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Boardmember Chen thanked the applicant and stated that her colleagues covered everything and she did not want to repeat the comments. She noted that several mature trees were being removed and referred to Sheet L6.2 and Trees 43 to 51, which were listed as redwoods in fairly good condition. She recommended keeping the trees and providing another open space area. Ms. Gerhardt asked Boardmember Chen to repeat the page number and tree numbers. Boardmember Chen repeated that she was looking at Sheet L6.2 and Trees 43 through 51. Also on Sheet L6.3 there was Tree 104 which was being removed for a parking spot. She asked if that could be saved by reconfiguring the parking area. The paseo concept was good, but the proposal was too narrow and due to the orientation would be in shadow most of the time. Based on that she recommended that it be widened. With the building massing and form she agreed that it was too consistent and that it needed variations. Since the project was next to the historic cannery she requested to see the relationship between the buildings. If the buildings were related to the neighborhood they might have more interesting elevations. On Sheet AR2.1.2 it showed the building next to the single family zoning and she thought that they needed to put more thought into the design related to the daylight plane instead of cutting the corner. On the existing elevations she noted the metal roof between the framed boxes and stated that the element did not belong to the building. Based on that she suggested they rethink the architectural elements on the elevations. She encouraged variation on the building height, window types, and materials rather than just changing the material’s colors. Chair Hirsch stated that he would summarize the conversation and then confirm that that he had gotten all the comments. Boardmember Thompson was concerned about eyes on the street, the orientation of the buildings relative to the sun, solid and void, a greater variety of high quality materials, and variety in the typology of the buildings and possibility for variation. Boardmember Chen was concerned about trees and the paseo width. The paseo width was a common concern for the ARB. She was also concerned about the lack of variety in unit types and the project’s relation to the historic building. The applicant talked about precedent of colors within the neighborhood but stylistically they did not discuss the relationship to the cannery building and the past industrial uses of the site. They should look for consistency in how they approach the design and the variation in the materials. Vice Chair Baltay was concerned about contextual issues, street widths, the visual relationship between window lines, privacy, and limitations on dimensions including the paseo. He asked the ARB if he had missed anything in his summation. Vice Chair Baltay thought that the summation was fine. He asked if he could respond to his colleagues’ comments. Chair Hirsch indicated he could. Vice Chair Baltay was taken with Boardmember Chen’s idea about responding to the cannery building. He reviewed the prior public hearings on the project and the negotiated agreement. The community wanted to preserve the historic nature of the building, but he did not get it and see the historical significance. He stated that was flat out wrong and noted that the staff report discussed [Thomas Fu Choo 1:54:53], a Chinese immigrant and a groundbreaking figure in the canning industry. [Mr. Choo] provided jobs to many people in Silicon Valley before the tech industry, which was exactly what historic preservation was about. He asked why the project could not do more to bring the historical context into the City’s consciousness. He did not know if that would happen through architectural forms or through street names, but he Page 13 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 suggested the applicant take the challenge and make the City remember and celebrate its history. He repeated that he appreciated and supported Boardmember Chen’s comments about historical preservation. In response to Chair Hirsch’s presentation he stated that he disagreed and believed the ARB should not design the project from the dais. Further, fitting 74 townhomes on the site was tight and presented issues that were not easily resolved. He was comfortable allowing portions of the project to be taller and denser in some places to allow for the same amount of housing. The townhomes did not need to be the exact same kind of building and would support a design typology that allowed for taller buildings in some places. He asked if his colleagues agreed that it was acceptable to exceed 35’ in some places to achieve the greater good. Boardmember Thompson agreed with Vice Chair Baltay and was open to a taller structure to allow for more open space. She liked the idea of harkening to the cannery’s architecture. However, she had looked at the renderings for the new cannery structure and the material palette was cold. Some of the forms were nice and could be added to the townhomes, but she cautioned that the applicant should keep a warm palette for comfortable living. She further appreciated the comments on the trees and stated that she had been unable to visit the site. If there were nice redwoods she wanted them preserved. Boardmember Chen indicated that she had additional thoughts on the trees and circulation. It was not necessary to keep all the streets rigid and linear; they could curve in order to preserve the trees. Chair Hirsch said that much of his sketch grew from the subcommittee work on townhomes. He was enamored of the idea of cul-de-sacs as they were an interesting prototype for housing. He repeated his reasons for the preference but noted that the site was very tight. He reminded the ARB that the sun found its way to different places by reflecting and refraction. Based on that it was impossible for the applicants to design something diagonally on the site. Boardmember Thompson asked why he thought that was as half of the site was on the diagonal. The project would not lose square footage. Chair Hirsch said that there were many different conflicting relationships on the diagonal because other streets had perpendicular connections with specific traffic. It was hard to end diagonals. Boardmember Thompson offered San Francisco as an example. Chair Hirsch noted that he had been playing off the idea of the paseo, which he thought was nice. It was hard to do a paseo on a diagonal. Boardmember Thompson stated that she did not want to discount the idea without study. Chair Hirsch said that many of the criticisms of the site were worth studying. It was unfortunate that things would be studied as the project was already in progress. That was bothersome to him as the comments were interesting. He and Vice Chair Baltay were concerned that [“the process was not 100% here” 2:02:25] where the ARB could comment on something that would never be built. He believed his suggestion would never be built because the zoning would not be changed at this point in the process. He hoped Sobrato would speak to the Council and request latitude to create more units. If they built higher buildings they could have more units. Several members of the ARB agreed that more height was a good idea. Based on that they could do it in a more efficient way and have a taller building. He repeated that his idea got the Page 14 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 traffic off the streets where it would otherwise be problematic and created an interrelationship between public and private areas. He asked if anyone had further comments. Vice Chair Baltay thought Boardmember Thompson’s concept of diagonalizing the whole thing was as valid as any other ARB suggestion. There were issues that had to be worked through, but the site had a bias in one direction that was worth studying. The project was zoned PC and that meant they were creating their own zoning. Suggesting they make the building higher was not crazy or illegal. PC zones were planned and it was important to remember that. Chair Hirsch agreed. Ms. Gerhardt asked if the applicant had questions. Chair Hirsch said that the ARB wanted to know that as well. Mr. Burton stated that the comments were clear and thanked the ARB for the items to consider. Chair Hirsch thanked the applicant and called for a 10 minute break. The ARB took a break 4. Ad Hoc Committee Report: Objective Standards Phase 2 for Townhomes Chair Hirsch [audio begins and he was already speaking 2:17:16] … used Google to view places that were out of town. He displayed a map of the 7 various townhome projects around Palo Alto. The next slide showed the other townhome projects on a map of the Bay Area. Boardmember Thompson asked why the item had to be heard that day and for the goal of the discussion. Chair Hirsch suggested she ask the question following the presentation. Vice Chair Baltay said that the recently passed Objective Standards fell short regarding townhomes. He thought the ARB saw that in the last two townhome applications they heard. The purpose was to determine if the ARB had suggestions for the Council and staff about how to fine tune the Objective Standards relating to townhomes. The subcommittee was created to research the topic and the presentation was their report. Chair Hirsch agreed. Vice Chair Baltay suggested they listen to the report. Boardmember Thompson said that Vice Chair Baltay’s comments were helpful. Chair Hirsch stated that in some ways they took an amateurish approach to the project. They needed Planning to help as the language was not complete. He looked forward to working with staff on the language for the document. He continued pointing out the projects on the map of the Bay Area and suggested that Boardmembers visit nearby sites. He asked Boardmember Chen to discuss Neighborhood Context. Boardmember Chen explained they separated the item into 8 topics they wanted to cover and the first was Neighborhood Context. Under that heading they separated the discussion into three different points, Page 15 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 the first one being a site close to a historic district or building, the second was [audio skip 2:22:15], and the third was a site adjacent to low density residential areas. She displayed a townhouse project in Paloma, a historic district. The railroad ran in front of the site and the building had warehouse elements. Vice Chair Baltay noted that the project felt like a railroad somehow. Ms. Raybould reminded the ARB that they went through a majority of the presentation at the last hearing. She wanted to make sure they weren’t reviewing the same material. Boardmember Chen stated that they added some slides. Chair Hirsch said that there were new slides and many aerials that they did not have previously. They also wanted to get feedback. Boardmember Chen showed another slide of the Arbor Real in Palo Alto. It was a corner treatment facing two major streets. The subcommittee liked the corner building and how the street trees filtered the building. She showed a photograph of a corner unit at the JCC townhomes. The next slide was of an apartment building in Mountain View, but the subcommittee thought it illustrated a better transition from a higher density zone to a lower residential zone. Chair Hirsch interjected that the street trees were also important on the major street. Boardmember Chen said that for townhomes on a major street there were five things they wanted to point out and have design teams select two or more items. She stated that she would not read the text listed on the slides. With corner units they felt they were the anchor of a project and therefore they needed more detailed requirements. The corner unit would not have to meet every requirement, but the subcommittee was considering requiring projects to meet two or three of them. She suggested the ARB determine if they wanted to add more requirements. Chair Hirsch noted there were three parts to Community Circulation, 1) vehicle access and parking, 2) pedestrian/bicycle paths, and guest parking. The next slide was of a rental project, but it illustrated the podium scheme that might work for townhomes. Podiums were more expensive so he hoped supportive housing could find funding that would make it feasible. The photograph showed a central garbage collection area which was close to the perimeter of the site and would accommodate easier garbage collection. The next slide showed a cul-de-sac and featured colors and materials that were nicely done. The end unit faced El Camino and dead ended in a dark element. He suggested they imagine that open or with a connecting element that was a story higher. There were many options on how to treat a unit that closed a cul-de-sac. The next slide showed an aerial view of a series of cul-de-sacs on El Camino. The ones that were not pedestrian oriented were a dead end. The trees in the area were fully grown on the avenue and therefore needed to be mandated with appropriate setbacks. The next aerial view was of Livermore and was similar to the cannery project with the paseo behind it with a sloped roofline. Later they planned to show an elevation of the project that was quite different from the roof lines. The project had different typologies. The next slide showed a townhome in Mountain View with a central courtyard and a perimeter roadway surrounding the project featuring guest parking. The guest parking was extremely convenient for any unit in the project. He noted that the units at the front were setback further and suggested that the requirements ought to follow the Downtown requirements where they had an area for planting trees. Page 16 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 There was easy circulation in and out of the development and one side was emphasized as the major entry. The site plan was clear and the openness was very effective and enjoyable. The next slide showed the hierarchy between the plantings, front door, and the street, and what it looked like when it was done well. He noted that the units were a bit more expensive, and they were also separate townhouses. He displayed an elevation from a series of houses which showed a variation. The ARB needed to consider how variation was possible, even in the project they looked at earlier in the day. Each townhome had a unique presentation of details which added quality and personality. Boardmember Thompson asked if they could comment on the façades as Chair Hirsch went through them. Chair Hirsch said that they could. Boardmember Thompson noted the variation slide featured a very chaotic façade. she did not know if Palo Alto should aspire to that. The ground level had open space and the balconies were appreciated, but there were too many materials, grains, and styles. There were some good things, but there were a lot of bad things on the façade. Chair Hirsch indicated that they were unable to find perfect projects, but he thought that one was interesting as a sampling of treatments. Vice Chair Baltay thought it would receive an opposite response from the project the ARB heard earlier. They would have been told to do less. He thought that it made moves at the form level which were good. Boardmember Thompson wondered if they should look at examples that they did not want to see in Palo Alto and thought it might be easier to create a diagram or sketch that emphasized what they wanted to see. She worried that an applicant would watch the hearing and think the ARB would support a project similar to the example given, which was not the case. Vice Chair Baltay said that they should go on record. The projects were not necessarily supported as examples of good townhome design, but examples to stimulate the ARB to think about the issues. Chair Hirsch agreed that was correct. Vice Chair Baltay noted that Boardmember Thompson had a good point and that the examples were not models of design. He asked if that was correct. Boardmember Chen said it was. Chair Hirsch thought the ARB would choose half of the details from the building and repeat them. Boardmember Chen thought they wanted to show it to trigger discussion. there were a few things they liked and other things that they did not. No project was perfect, so they were separated into different categories. There was a separate category for materiality. They showed the project under Community Circulation because they wanted to show the frontage from the streetside. The building had a greater setback and landscaping along the street. Additionally, each unit had its own front yard or patio. Vice Chair Baltay asked what the setback was on the project. Page 17 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Chair Hirsch stated that he did not measure it but noted that there were no street trees even though it was a fairly major street. He agreed with Boardmember Thompson that they could have used less materials but liked the fact that they tried to individualize each unit. The project simply went too far. Boardmember Thompson agreed. One of the regulation suggestions mentioned grouping units, but she thought individuality or distinction was a good thing. Chair Hirsch moved to the next slide and stated that it showed the idea of wood shingling and other materials. Vice Chair Baltay asked if they knew how wide the space was between the buildings. Chair Hirsch said that they did not, but noted that the units on the right were end units and the ones on the left were front units. Vice Chair Baltay said that he asked the question because it was a paseo and he wanted to know how much space it took to function. Chair Hirsch thought they had more pictures. Boardmember Chen noted that the project had some narrow places and some wider spaces. The narrower ones were around 20’. Some of the units in the project were 2 stories instead of 3, so building height was somehow related to the width of the walkway. Chair Hirsch noted that the sun shone in either way. Vice Chair Baltay agreed that it did in the photograph but he did not know if it was sunny otherwise. He knew the JCC had nice public spaces. Chair Hirsch thought the scale between the buildings was the best part of the project. The next slide was an aerial view of a project and he pointed out the significant amount of guest parking. It was possible that there was parking there for other purposes. He confirmed that there was a good amount of parking in the project that they heard earlier. Ms. Raybould said that there were approximately 35 spaces and all of it was parallel or perpendicular parking along the main street. Chair Hirsch said that some of it was near the Fry’s building. Vice Chair Baltay thought that the ARB should refrain from further discussion on the earlier project. Chair Hirsch suggested they look at the diagonal landscaping scheme within the paseo. Vice Chair Baltay thought there were two paseos. Chair Hirsch said that there were multiple paseos. Vice Chair Baltay wanted to know how wide the paseos were compared to the height of the buildings. He noted that a 1:1 ratio made communities feel good. Objective Standards required numbers. Page 18 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Boardmember Chen explained they had another photo of the pictured project which was a view between the two buildings. It was narrow compared to the height. Vice Chair Baltay thought a good architect could make a narrow space work as it was routinely done in Europe. The ARB needed to determine how to objectify the requirements. Chair Hirsch said that there would be different kinds of diagrams. Boardmember Chen indicated that the next slide was still related to parking. Chair Hirsch noted it was Arbor Real and featured the cul-de-sac scheme. Boardmember Chen pointed out the guest parking. Chair Hirsch said that it was on the main street which was much wider. There was a good amount of guest parking there. He asked the ARB to remember the aerial photograph as they planned to show the garbage collection area later. Trash enclosures were a significant issue that needed to be addressed in the new standards. The next slide was text. Boardmember Thompson asked if the slide was the suggestion for the Objective Standard. Chair Hirsch said that it was. Vice Chair Baltay asked if tandem parking was currently allowed for 100%. Ms. Raybould said that it was 25%. Boardmember Thompson noted that the packet said 50%. Boardmember Chen stated that was due to a last minute change the subcommittee made the day before. Boardmember Thompson requested clarification on the suggestion. Boardmember Chen said it was 30%. Chair Hirsch noted that the ARB needed to discuss it. Vice Chair Baltay suggested 100%. Boardmember Thompson asked why they should limit it. Chair Hirsch asked if Vice Chair Baltay was speaking about guest parking. Vice Chair Baltay said that he was discussing tandem parking. When a family had two cars they could stack them. Boardmember Thompson asked for the reason there was a limitation in the code. Ms. Raybould thought the only reason was because they wanted the parking spaces to be as useable as possible. Tandem parking spaces were potentially less usable. Vice Chair Baltay thought that with single ownership tandem units made sense. Page 19 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Ms. Gerhardt explained that tandem spaces had to be for the same unit. The City would not allow it otherwise. With lift parking some lifts bring one’s car independently and that was acceptable. Tandem lifts needed to be for the same unit. Ms. Raybould had concerns with the discussion around guest parking because Council had made moves to eliminate guest parking from the code over the past few years. That aligned with State Housing Code as well. Asking for a requirement for guest parking might not be well received by Council. Boardmember Thompson thought several of the issues were really about zoning standards and not architectural standards. she was not sure why the ARB would dictate the percentage of tandem units or guest parking as it was not in their purview. Vice Chair Baltay pointed out that the functionality of a unit depended on parking. Guest parking was part of the basic functionality of a townhome and that was the ARB’s purview. He agreed the discussion boarded on zoning issues of a broader scale but the ARB needed to be careful not to limit itself. without guest parking it was tough to live in a townhome. Boardmember Thompson did not disagree, but thought it was not the correct forum to discuss the issues in. whether there was guest parking or not did not impact the building function or the architectural aesthetic. Ms. Raybould thought it could affect how the building looked. The discussion was about potential changes to the Objective Standards which were part of the Zoning Code. She clarified that they did not have clear direction from Council for staff time to work on the changes. They would need to present something to Council on the changes to the Objective Standards and then go through a process for the Zoning Code changes. Both the PTC and the Council would consider Zoning Code Changes. Chair Hirsch agreed that if they put something in there they could note that it did not conform to the current code, but the ARB felt it merited discussion. Then Council could give the topic more thought. Ms. Gerhardt thought they would need to provide rationale for changes. For example, she asked what the subcommittee’s reason was to increase the tandem parking from 25% to 30%. Tandem parking affected the floorplan of a garage so maybe that was the reasoning. Vice Chair Baltay explained that eliminating a two car garage in favor of a one car garage had design implications on the floor plans of the units. Boardmember Thompson understood that but asked why the ARB was experts on where tandem parking was and was not appropriate. Vice Chair Baltay explained that in townhomes having a greater amount of floor area be accessible was an important thing and an architectural issue that the Council would not consider otherwise. Once tandem parking was allowed other good things could happen and Council needed to hear that as a recommendation. Chair Hirsch stated that was why the subcommittee included it. Vice Chair Baltay thought that number of spaces per unit was a Council decision. Page 20 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Boardmember Thompson agreed. Vice Chair Baltay thought that tandem spaces had such an effect on the units that the ARB’s recommendation was important. Boardmember Thompson thought she would be more comfortable saying what should happen when there was a tandem space versus how many tandem spaces were allowed. If a project had tandem spaces then a set of standards would apply. Vice Chair Baltay thought that implied that when there was not tandem spaces the unit required a larger frontage. Projects had to achieve other goals related to entries that would cause wider units. That was a narrow focus and what the ARB needed to do was provide the decision makers with good information. He was certain they did not look at issues in the same way as the ARB. Chair Hirsch agreed that was the case. Vice Chair Baltay was comfortable discussing the issues but understood Boardmember Thompson’s points. They needed to be careful not to overstep their bounds. Boardmember Thompson was unsure that she was able to judge what the percentage should be. She noted that she had not studied Transportation Demand Management (TDM) and thought a TDM planner or someone who studied traffic might understand the trends in parking better. Vice Chair Baltay repeated that the ARB was not making statements about the number of required parking spaces, only how they were configured. It was for the TDM, staff, and the PTC to determine the number of parking spaces. Boardmember Thompson said that was good. However, stating a maximum was making a statement on that. Ms. Gerhardt explained it did not change the total number of parking spaces, only the configuration. They were discussing the difference between a two car garage and a tandem two car garage. Vice Chair Baltay indicated he was comfortable with tandem parking throughout a townhouse development. He thought the percentage should not be regulated. So long as a project contained the number of required spaces the configuration did not matter. He asked for confirmation that the R1 Zoning Code stated that tandem parking was legitimate. Ms. Gerhardt and others in the room agreed that was correct. There were many single family homes with one covered space and the second space was in front of the garage. That was allowed in R1 but was not done as much in multi-families because of the code section requiring a maximum of 25%. The ARB could make a Motion about the code section so long as they stated that they were looking at it from a certain lens and understood that the PTC and Council would do the same. Chair Hirsch stated that he had tandem parking at his home despite only having one car. He thought it was good that the issue generated a lot of discussion. Boardmember Chen explained that in their research they noticed that tandem parking was often used for the smaller units in the communities. That could be why they would limit the percentage of the tandem Page 21 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 parking. Another reason to increase it from 25% to 30% was because a 7 unit building could have two units with tandem parking and that was more reasonable. Boardmember Thompson asked if the other units had traditional two car garages. Chair Hirsch indicated that they did. Boardmember Thompson asked if that was successful or if the other units could have been more successful if they were tandem spaces. Chair Hirsch said that it was possible but that one needed to review the interior plans. Vice Chair Baltay explained that as a practicing architect he felt comfortable saying that they would have been more successful with tandem spaces. He always preferred a single car garage and more space for the building’s entry. Boardmember Chen explained most townhomes had bedrooms that perfectly fit above the two car garage. However, with natural light and other considerations that might not be the best solution. Boardmember Thompson said that her parents had a tandem parking situation, and it was not great. She wanted to discuss the architectural implications because a standard two car garage did take up frontage, but it left the other side of the unit open for living space. If the space was tandem then both sides of the building would be cheated a bit. Vice Chair Baltay thought that was a good point depending on the depth of the development. Boardmember Thompson asked for the average depth of a townhome. Vice Chair Baltay did not know. Chair Hirsch thought the ones they had looked at were about 42’. Vice Chair Baltay thought that meant Boardmember Thompson’s point was well taken. Ms. Raybould noted that many of the designs staff saw had more of a configuration with the parking on one side and living space and entry were on the other. It could be looked at in a different way. Vice Chair Baltay suggested they leave the choice to the architect and allow tandem parking everywhere rather than trying to focus on Objective Standards around the frontage. He wanted the architects to have more tools available in their toolbox. There were many issues with tandem parking about living with them and reselling the units. Tandem parking forced people to use guest parking more often because it was more convenient. The PTC needed to consider those questions and not the ARB. Chair Hirsch noted that at one of the Mountain View projects he visited he asked someone about who used the close guest parking and learned that the answer was whoever got there first. That person owned a smaller unit with one spot. Allowing for 100% tandem parking placed pressure on all the guest spaces. Vice Chair Baltay thought that in the 32’ right of way people would parallel park in front of their own garages in order to fit 3 cars. Chair Hirsch did not think that could happen as the street needed to be kept open. Page 22 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Vice Chair Baltay agreed that people were risking a ticket from the Fire Marshall. Chair Hirsch thought the Fire Department investigated the developments to ensure that did not happen. He suggested the ARB move on and called for the next slide related to building typology. Boardmember Chen noted that the slide was a site plan for the Arbor Real project, which was made up of townhomes and single family homes. There were cul-de-sac layouts and duplexes. Chair Hirsch noted that those were typologies and were quite different. Boardmember Chen called for the slide that was an aerial view of the Arbor Real and pointed out the different building types. The next slide was a site plan for a community along Bayshore. Units faced the major street and others faced the common open space. The project featured a variety of building types and she displayed them with an aerial view on the next slide. Chair Hirsch noted that there were eyes on the park. Boardmember Thompson requested to see the slide again. Chair Hirsch stated that there were eyes on the open space and he was sure it was well used. The development was older, so it was just open space. Current projects featured more furniture and landscaping. Boardmember Thompson noted that there was access from both sides of the units that was pedestrian friendly. It appeared that the units had both front and back doors. Chair Hirsch said that there were small courts with air conditioning units and parking provided access to the staircase which ran to the unit. Vice Chair Baltay asked Boardmember Thompson how she felt about the eyes on the street in the pictured project. Boardmember Thompson said that she was unable to tell without reviewing the floor plan or elevations. With the projects the ARB saw she was concerned that one side was all garage doors with no back entry, back porch, or landscaping. That meant there were no eyes or access on that side. A successful townhome would have eyes on both the front and back. Vice Chair Baltay thought it would be good to know the density of the unit counts on the properties. He asked if it took more space to accomplish eyes on the street or if it was a matter of design. He felt that they were just looking at denser designs. They should reaffirm Boardmember Thompson’s points about eyes on the street. Chair Hirsch asked if a percentage of a project should have an open space requirement. Vice Chair Baltay thought that was an objective standard and was exactly what the ARB was discussing. Boardmember Thompson thought the experience of a project was important. If people were driving then the garage door façade would be their experience and almost like a front door. Page 23 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Vice Chair Baltay noted that the project they were looking at seemed to be quite dense. He asked staff if they thought it was a matter of density or design. Ms. Gerhardt asked if he was questioning why the green space was in the center. Vice Chair Baltay stated that he was. Ms. Gerhardt assumed it was because of the common open space requirement. Vice Chair Baltay said that he meant to ask that independent of requirements was it just that the project had more space there or was it a design question. Ms. Raybould thought there was a common open space requirement. She liked that design feature and it was possible some of the private open space was placed toward common open space. Ms. Gerhardt indicated that the large open space was nice for parents to allow their children to play in. Vice Chair Baltay said that would work if there were eyes on the space. Ms. Gerhardt noted she was speaking about sitting on one’s porch. Ms. Raybould personally found the design nice. She agreed with Boardmember Thompson that it returned to units being designed with the same level of thought. If people were leaving the parking garage that was in effect a front door. Some thought placed on that side of the design with some articulation to have eyes on the street was a good point. That might be more difficult with entries, so she appreciated the idea of having stoops or entries that faced open space. That could also be done with porches, but personally she would rather have a porch facing a park versus a street. Chair Hirsch said that Sterling Park featured rentals facing Highway 101 and requested they return to the slide showing the site plan. He noted how many units had sold quickly. The maintenance of the edge on Bayshore was very badly kept. The street side was very dense and contained a mix of smaller and larger units. The typology of each project would determine what the developer did. Ms. Raybould thought that the units were rentals. Chair Hirsch said that they were rented. Ms. Raybould said that rental units would not be identified as sold. Chair Hirsch admitted that he did not know the full history of the project. He had simply spoken with a current tenant. He called for the next slide, which was a sketch. Circulation created the entire environment of the inside of the project. It applied the same idea as the last project with an interior center court. The entry featured a garage to garage typology and allowed for some of the interior space to be treed. The projects the ARB currently were seeing did not have that happen. Boardmember Thompson requested he repeat his last point. Chair Hirsch said that the space was capable of having trees. The plan for the units was wider to allow access to a garage and a tree on the street. Boardmember Thompson asked if the units had garages. Page 24 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Chair Hirsch said they did. Boardmember Thompson asked what the purpose of the center garage was. Chair Hirsch explained it was below grade visitor parking and the A unit was accessible from the garage below. Vice Chair Baltay confirmed that the center space was open public space above the garage and the experience was an open plaza. Chair Hirsch said that was correct. Ms. Raybould noted that the code did not currently count open space on the second story. She was not sure if the intent of that was related to visual impacts and privacy. Anything proposed with second floor open space was an issue because it required an exception. [Woman unintelligible 3:16:46] Chair Hirsch said that the parking was below. Ms. Raybould knew the ARB had strong feelings about adding guest parking but the Council recently made code changes to eliminate guest parking. They did that to align better with goals and policies to reduce reliance on vehicle miles traveled and single occupancy vehicles. It was also to reduce restrictions that made it harder to build housing and meet the housing development goals under the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA). Pushing for code changes to add guest parking [audio cut out 3:18:05]. Ms. Gerhardt believed Ms. Raybould was correct and they needed to be careful not to increase the total number of parking spaces, but the Bayshore project with all the spaces in two car garages did cause concern. It needed to be clearly stated that they were not discussing increasing the total number, but about potentially more undesignated surface spaces. Vice Chair Baltay thought guest parking might be the wrong term. He asked where home services such as cleaners would park or where delivery drivers would park. Many aspects of daily life required people coming in vehicles. The ARB wanted to accommodate that. Chair Hirsch suggested they think of the sketch as a project that could be on Bayshore. Bayshore had no parking and so he questioned whether it was fair to treat it the same way as a project that had street parking. There needed to be a planning reason to include the parking. Boardmember Thompson thought Ms. Raybould made a good point about being aware of Council’s conversations. San Francisco had zero parking requirements. Palo Alto was not there yet, but it was possible it could get there one day. Her main issue with many of the townhome schemes was how car centric they were. In the sketch the road was the center road for everything and she would rather see a scheme where the road was not the center. Much of Palo Alto was in a flood plane and many developers would not want to park underground and that meant the sketch was not very feasible. If that were a residential parking garage used to free up floor space in the townhomes that might work. She thought that was an interesting parti. It was great to look at existing projects, but she was interested in the “townhome of tomorrow.” She put the challenge to the subcommittee. Page 25 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Chair Hirsch called for the next slide. Boardmember Chen explained it was a community in Mountain View along Mendocino with a perimeter road and a central common space. The buildings faced each other, and the neighborhood was nice. It facilitated neighbors getting to know each other and children playing safely. There were five different unit plans and the blue units featured tandem parking. Vice Chair Baltay noted the design pointed out the risk created by tandem parking for narrow spaces. Chair Hirsch thought the site plan was interesting and noted the perimeter of trees. He stated that the name of the development was Summer Hill. Boardmember Chen said it was not. Summer Hill had a similar layout but larger open space at the center. Boardmember Thompson asked if there was pedestrian access along the perimeter. Boardmember Chen explained that the front doors faced the courtyard. Boardmember Thompson confirmed there was no pedestrian access on the perimeter. Chair Hirsch said there was access from the areas in the middle that were areaways between. They were smaller areas and usually contained mailboxes, but they functioned. Boardmember Thompson asked if it felt like a front door. Chair Hirsch thought so. Boardmember Chen explained that the dark green trees shown were large Redwoods to be preserved. She called for the next slide and explained it was an aerial view of the site. Chair Hirsch stated it was the elevation the Boardmember Thompson called “chaotic.” Boardmember Chen said there were too many materials. She called for the next slide which was text. The code required three different prototypes but for smaller developments it was possible that one prototype was fine. Vice Chair Baltay thought it would be helpful to have a discussion on typologies or amount of building types. When a developer wanted to build townhomes that was what they wanted to build, and many people wanted to buy them. He suggested they focus on the architectural design and call for greater variety of form types rather than typology. Requiring multiple typologies might not work and would result in less housing for Palo Alto. Boardmember Thompson might say that the role of the ARB was to get greater architectural variety or to control and regulate that. He suggested they try to define it before they tried to rewrite the Objective Standards. The question of typology in the Contextual Standards was vague and not realistic. Chair Hirsch said that what concerned him was people being eliminated from living in the community. A member of the PTC told him that their parents wanted to downsize to a single level apartment in a community. Mixes were important and were able to change density. He thought there was no problem so long as the forms were well defined. Page 26 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Vice Chair Baltay confirmed that Chair Hirsch thought the ARB should continue to require different building typologies. Chair Hirsch said that he believed that and was interested in mid-rise buildings and townhomes that had a neighborhood feeling. The ARB could not say what the population wanted because they did not know. Ms. Raybould stated developers looked at many aspects of a site when they decided what to build. What they would find is that the ARB could request different typologies, but developers probably would not provide them. Housing development projects with density bonus could request concessions or waivers to that allowance and probably would do so. Requesting a different project was difficult. She saw Chair Hirsch’s point about providing different types around the City, but that was different from requesting developers to build different unit types on one site. Boardmember Thompson saw value in having different types of townhomes if it was possible. What they wanted to avoid was cookie cutter monotony. It was okay to keep pushing for three different building types. If the architect could create the feeling of diversity even if the units were all townhomes she would not object. Ms. Gerhardt clarified that the three different housing types that were put in the Objective Standards clearly stated different types of units. A townhouse with a front door on one side and a garage on the rear was one type of unit. A rowhouse with the front door and garage on the same side was a different unit. Detached townhomes or condos could be named as a different type of unit. She agreed that cookie cutter was bad and that a variety of materials were preferred, but that was a separate standard. Boardmember Thompson advocated for different types of buildings as defined by Ms. Gerhardt. She suggested the ARB remember that they were discussing landscape and open space and postpone the rest of the discussion. She noted that Boardmember Rosenberg would be able to participate as well. Chair Hirsch agreed that was a good idea. As a person that came from a large urban city [audio skip 3:33:34] … he described houses four stories high with stoops and large buildings on the avenues. There was something interesting about a mix in a neighborhood that he loved. The blocks were organized by residential and commercial in the Park Slope neighborhood. There was value in different typologies and density would require Palo Alto to build higher. The Council had to consider the density issues, but that consideration should not be lost on the ARB. Vice Chair Baltay thought the discussion was great and that a lot of work needed to be focused on how to fine tune the standards. he suggested the subcommittee focus on suggesting changes to the Objective Standards. it was also important to define townhomes and perhaps building typology. The applicants needed clarity. Board Member Questions, Comments or Announcements None. Adjournment Page 27 of 27 Architectural Review Board Meeting Draft Summary Minutes: 12/15/22 Chair Hirsch adjourned the meeting.