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2016-04-26 Parks & Recreation Agenda Packet
AGENDA IS POSTED IN ACCORDANCE WITH GOVERNMENT CODE SECTION 54954.2(a) OR SECTION 54956 PARKS AND RECREATION COMMISSION Regular Meeting APRIL 26, 2016 AGENDA City Hall Chambers 250 Hamilton 7pm *In accordance with SB 343 materials related to an item on this Agenda submitted to the Commission after distribution of the agenda packet are available for public inspection in the Open Space and Parks Office at 3201 East Bayshore Road during normal business hours. Please call 650-496-6962. Attention Speakers: If you wish to address the Commission during oral communications or on an item on the agenda, please complete a speaker’s card and give it to City staff. By submitting the speaker’s card, the Chair will recognize you at the appropriate time. I. ROLL CALL II.AGENDA CHANGES, REQUESTS, DELETIONS III.ORAL COMMUNICATIONSMembers of the public may address the Commission on any subject not on the agenda. Areasonable time restriction may be imposed at the discretion of the Chair. The Commission reserves the right to limit oral communications period to 3 minutes. IV.BUSINESS 1.Approval of Draft Minutes from March 22, 2016 Parks and Recreation Commission Regular Meeting – Chair Lauing – Action – (5 min) ATTACHMENT 2. Update on the conceptual plans for the re-building of the Palo Alto Junior Museum and Zoo - John Aikin/Cody Anderson Wasney Architects – Discussion – (60 min) ATTACHMENT3. Proposed conceptual design on Quarry Road Improvements and Transit Center Access Project - Shahla Yazdy, Transportation – Discussion – (30 min) ATTACHMENT 4.Parks, Open Space, Trails and Recreation Facilities Master Plan - Peter Jensen – Discussion – (45 min) - Results of the Revised Goals and Policies document ATTACHMENT - Results of the Community Prioritization Challenge ATTACHMENT 5.Other Ad Hoc Committee and Liaison Updates – Chair Lauing - Discussion - Parks and Recreation Commission web page - Commissioner Hetterly (15 min) - Community Gardens - Vice Chair Knopper/staff Bourquin (10 min) V. COMMENTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS VI. TENTATIVE AGENDA FOR MAY 24, 2016 MEETING VII.ADJOURNMENT ADA. The City of Palo Alto does not discriminate against individuals with disabilities. To request accommodations, auxiliary aids or services to access City facilities, services or programs, to participate at public meetings, or to learn about the City's compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990, may contact 650-329-2550 (voice), or e-mail ada@cityofpaloalto.org This agenda is posted in accordance with government code section 54954.2(a) or section 54956. Members of the public are welcome to attend this public meeting. ATTACHMENT DRAFT 1 2 3 4 MINUTES 5 PARKS & RECREATION COMMISSION 6 REGULAR MEETING 7 March 22, 2016 8 CITY HALL 9 250 Hamilton Avenue 10 Palo Alto, California 11 12 Commissioners Present: Jim Cowie, Jennifer Hetterly, Abbie Knopper, Ed Lauing, David 13 Moss, Keith Reckdahl 14 Commissioners Absent: Anne Cribbs 15 Others Present: Eric Filseth 16 Staff Present: Daren Anderson, Catherine Bourquin, Rob de Geus, Peter Jensen, Kristen 17 O'Kane 18 I. ROLL CALL CONDUCTED BY: Catherine Bourquin 19 20 II. AGENDA CHANGES, REQUESTS, and DELETIONS: 21 22 23 24 III. ORAL COMMUNICATIONS: 25 26 27 28 IV. BUSINESS: 29 30 1. Approval of Draft Minutes from the January 5, 2016 Parks and Recreation 31 Commission Retreat. 32 33 Approval of the draft January 5, 2016 Minutes as submitted was moved by Commissioner 34 Hetterly and seconded by Vice Chair Knopper. Passed 7-0 35 36 Draft Minutes 1 DRAFT 2. Approval of Draft Minutes from the February 23, 2016 Regular Meeting.. 1 2 Approval of the amended February 23, 2016 Minutes as corrected was moved by 3 Commissioner Hetterly and seconded by Vice Chair Knopper. Passed 7-0 4 5 3. Update on the Status of the Baylands Boardwalk Feasibility Study. 6 7 Chair Lauing: The next item of business is an update on the status of the Baylands 8 Boardwalk Facility Study. I want to make sure who I have the speaker card here for. 9 That's a later one. Thank you. For the Baylands Boardwalk Feasibility Study, there's a 10 discussion targeted for about 40 minutes. Who's going to lead that? 11 12 Daren Anderson: I'd like to introduce Megha Bansal and Hung Nguyen, both engineers 13 with Public Works Engineering. They'll give you a briefing on the Baylands Boardwalk. 14 15 Chair Lauing: Thank you. 16 17 Megha Bansal: Good evening. I'm Megha Bansal, engineer, Public Works. In October 18 2015, we presented preliminary findings from the Baylands Boardwalk Feasibility Study 19 to the Commission. The Study is now complete, and today we would like to provide an 20 update on the Study, its findings and discuss the next steps. The agenda for today's 21 meeting includes project overview. We will present findings from structural and site 22 conditions assessment of the Study, improvement options identified in the Feasibility 23 Study, and recommendations will be discussed. A high-level schedule with key 24 milestones will be presented. Also we would like to get your feedback as we move 25 forward and discuss any questions you may have. Starting with the overview. As 26 presented in previous meetings, the existing Boardwalk is deteriorated. It was closed in 27 2014 due to structural deficiencies and safety concerns. The City then hired Biggs 28 Cardosa Associates to conduct the Feasibility Study and provide to us its current 29 condition and provide recommendations for short-term and long-term improvements to 30 the Boardwalk. The Feasibility Study includes the repair, rehabilitation and replacement 31 options. Also based on preliminary findings of the Study, minor repair was performed to 32 a 200-foot segment of the Boardwalk. That includes a section from Nature Center to the 33 first overlook of the Boardwalk. That was the only portion that had fair to satisfactory 34 condition. This portion of the Boardwalk is now open to the public. The last of the 35 structure is in poor condition, and I will discuss that next in the structural assessment. As 36 I just mentioned, the Boardwalk is structurally unsound. The structure includes a 37 superstructure and a substructure. The superstructure is basically the deck and railing of 38 the Boardwalk. The substructure includes foundation and supports, posts and bracings. 39 All these structural components exhibit heavy weathering and excessive corrosion. Some 40 of the structural components are missing; some sections are broken. Especially damage 41 to the foundation has led to the segment of the structure. That is why the Boardwalk is 42 Draft Minutes 2 DRAFT undulating and uneven at certain areas. The Study also looked at several site constraints 1 including environmental conditions, subsurface conditions, hydraulic conditions and 2 access and ADA compliance issues. Environmental conditions. The project is located in 3 an environmentally sensitive area that has several endangered species such as salt marsh 4 harvest mouse and Ridgway rails. Implement any major improvements to the Boardwalk 5 would require assessment of the environmental impacts, constraints, mitigations and also 6 approval from various permitting agencies. Subsurface conditions. The existing project 7 site consists of highly compressible and plastic clay soil that also contributes to the 8 settlement of the structure as well as it cannot support heavy loads. Also, there is shallow 9 groundwater in the area. Due to the close proximity to the Bay, the soil and water in the 10 area is expected to be corrosive in nature. Next is hydraulic conditions. The Feasibility 11 Study includes analysis of the tidal effects, storm surges and sea level rise. Based on the 12 current projections, the existing Boardwalk would be flooded at 100-year still water level. 13 In other words, there is 1 percent annual chance of flooding of the existing Boardwalk at 14 current condition. By 2030, there is 10 percent annual chance of flooding of the existing 15 structure. That means with time the probability of flooding increases. Considering 50-16 plus years of design life of the proposed Boardwalk and considering moderate climate 17 change effects, the existing Boardwalk deck would need to be raised to reduce frequent 18 flooding. The next item that was investigated was access and ADA compliance issues. 19 The existing Boardwalk has many ADA compliance issues partly due to the original 20 design and also due to the structural damage and settlement issues. Some of the key 21 issues are noncompliant slopes, handrails, guardrails, cross-slopes, passing spaces and 22 resting areas, etc. Now, I would like Hung Nguyen to provide an overview of the 23 improvement options identified in the Study and also the recommendations. 24 25 Hung Nguyen: Good evening. The Study provide for option for us to consider two rehab 26 option and two replacement option. The two rehab option will involve salvage of most of 27 the material out there, as much as we can. The width of the Boardwalk will stay at 4 feet; 28 nothing change. We will have ADA compliant challenge due to the settlement of the 29 Boardwalk. We can make it a little bit better, but there no way we can make the slope in 30 compliance. We will provide for new railing. Although, railing will be in compliance, 31 the sloping we cannot solve that issue. The design life of most of this rehab option ran 32 from 25 to 50 year for the first option and 30 to 60 year for the second option. The 33 reason that it have a little bit longer duration design life because we're going to move 34 some of the foundation out from the ravine that create underneath the Boardwalk 35 currently. It will provide a little bit more better (inaudible) for that. In term of cost, most 36 of the option will cost around $1.4 to $1.7 million to rehab, both of the option. There are 37 two replacement option. Both of the option will have 5-feet wide Boardwalk that will 38 provide ADA compliance. We have an opportunity to replace the decking foundation. 39 The proposal from the Feasibility Study is we move the foundation out more to prevent 40 the channel right in the middle of (inaudible) the foundation in the future. The 41 Replacement Option 1 similar to what we have right now in term of how the decking 42 Draft Minutes 3 DRAFT layout. We will have longitudinal timber decking, about 2x8 and 16-feet long laying on 1 longitudinal. The design life for both these option is about 50 to 75 year, and the cost are 2 pretty much the same. The foundation, we are entertaining two option; one a helical 3 screw which we will have to investigate on corrosive nature of the Baylands. We have to 4 do study before we can find out how much corrosive we have to treat the foundation. 5 The second option is timber post. The second option has more element. It still have 6 timber decking but lay on a transverse option. It provide a smaller construction material 7 which in turn will be cheaper to construct and easier to transfer in and out of the project 8 site. The second option also will require less heavy equipment in terms of (inaudible) 9 and install the Boardwalk. The Study recommend us to choose Option 2 to go further in 10 design. Staff have Study, and we concur to that option. Like I mentioned before, the 11 foundation (inaudible) we still have to investigate further to determine which option we 12 will go to. In terms of schedule, we hope to go to Council by the end of April to have 13 Council approve the Study and provide funding and approve the design contract with 14 Biggs Cardosa to move on Phase 2 design. We will return to the Commission in summer 15 of 2016 to provide an outline of the conceptual design and seek feedback from the 16 Commissioner to further design to the conceptual design. By 4/2017, we expect the 17 design development will be completed. This will be when we will go into a site and 18 design review process, go to ARB, Planning and Transportation Commission and the 19 Park and Rec Commission also for recommendation. As mentioned before by Megha, we 20 will have to do extensive environmental assessment and the CEQA clearance. This 21 process, right now, we expect to last about a year. It's all depending on what type of 22 permit we have to get from the agency. Hopefully it'll be less than a year, but right now 23 we expect the worst case. If everything go on schedule, we expect to start construction 24 next fall. The construction duration limited to the breeding season of the bird (inaudible) 25 generally from September 1st to January 31st. We are thinking a 5-month construction 26 period probably enough for the type of project. If you see my schedule, I have the second 27 phase. In case we have any unexpected delay during the design process, we might have 28 to go to a second phase which will happen the following fall which will be fall 2018. 29 With that, I will end our presentation. If you have any comment or question, we can 30 answer that. 31 32 Chair Lauing: That's it for the presentation? Commissioners have any questions or 33 comments? Yes, David. 34 35 Commissioner Moss: I've been to a number of the public meetings. I really was hoping 36 that one of the rehab options would be cheaper and faster, but this iteration shows how 37 quickly we could get Replacement Option 2 and for about the same price. I am strongly 38 in favor of that Replacement Phase 2. We could get something in the fall of 2017—I 39 mean, starting construction fall of 2017. I hope that, if you can't get it all done in that fall 40 and winter, Phase 1 still gives us something to walk out another 100 feet or 200 feet, and 41 you save the far, far end as opposed to only putting in the substrate all the way through 42 Draft Minutes 4 DRAFT and leaving us for another year with nothing. The other thing is that I want to make sure 1 that when you raise the elevation, I want it to flood at least once a year at the king tide, 2 because that is spectacular to see. When you raise the level, it should be with the idea 3 that it's going to flood once a year. Not many times a year, but once a year. It sounds 4 like the Replacement Option 2 differs from Option 1 just because of the transverse versus 5 longitudinal. If that's easier to maintain and easier to do, go for it. That's all I have. 6 7 Chair Lauing: Keith. Commissioner Reckdahl. 8 9 Commissioner Reckdahl: Overall, I'm happy. I'm not happy with waiting a year and a 10 half for the Boardwalk. I really wish we could go in on this. It's been over a year since 11 it's not been used, and it's going to be another year and a half. I understand that the—is 12 there any way that we could get a partial okay to start doing part of it? Break it up into 13 two pieces instead of one big bite. 14 15 Mr. Anderson: It's unlikely. Our experience with the regulatory agencies would 16 certainly not indicate that's possible. We'll certainly pursue and request the quickest path 17 possible. That may include phasing as an option be part of the discussion. To be really 18 frank, it's highly unlikely. 19 20 Commissioner Reckdahl: I understand. 21 22 Mr. Anderson: Just to point out, we do have the first 200 feet open right now that was 23 repaired. There is some access (crosstalk). 24 25 Commissioner Reckdahl: That was actually done a while ago. 26 27 Mr. Anderson: Yes. 28 29 Commissioner Reckdahl: I appreciate the City was very reactive about that. Looking at 30 the schedule there, when is the screw versus timber decision going to be made? Is that at 31 the 35 percent or is that at the 100 percent? 32 33 Mr. Nguyen: We will expect that to be resolved at 35 percent. 34 35 Commissioner Reckdahl: Do we have any evidence—they were going to give us 36 examples of where these screws are being used in mud. Have they given us any 37 examples that we can go inspect? 38 39 Mr. Nguyen: Yes, we will require that. 40 41 Commissioner Reckdahl: We have gotten them? 42 Draft Minutes 5 DRAFT 1 Mr. Nguyen: We have done investigation. We have provided example to the 2 Commission back in October. We can follow up that information again to you, if you 3 want. 4 5 Commissioner Reckdahl: We've looked at the screws. How long have they been in the 6 mud? 7 8 Mr. Nguyen: The historical data, we don't have that at that point. We can certainly take 9 a look at it. 10 11 Commissioner Reckdahl: I'm very nervous that we're going to put these screws in. 12 Daren's been under there and seen the bolts. That's a very bad environment. Between the 13 mud and the saltwater, it'll eat away at stuff. My understanding is that if we go the 14 timber route, we still have some adjustment also on the timbers. Is that true? 15 16 Mr. Nguyen: At this point, that's something that consultants say that we can do in the 17 future. It could be challenge. I can say that. In term of bracing the deck up with ... 18 19 Commissioner Reckdahl: With timbers? I thought they were going to have timbers in 20 the mud and then have some type of metallic screw that could be adjusted on top of the 21 timbers between the timbers and the (crosstalk). 22 23 Mr. Nguyen: That's something I haven't heard from them, but we can check with them. 24 25 Commissioner Reckdahl: For the metallic screws, how much play do they have? If we 26 wanted to raise it, how much additional height could we get out of each screw? 27 28 Mr. Nguyen: We couldn't get an answer from them last time, but they say it could go as 29 high as 12 inches. 30 31 Commissioner Reckdahl: How many inches? 32 33 Mr. Nguyen: 12 inches. 34 35 Commissioner Reckdahl: 12 inches. That 12 inches can be done along the whole path? 36 If we wanted to even it, we could do that. If we wanted to grossly raise the whole 37 platform by 12 inches, could we do that by adjusting each screw or is there some support 38 halfway down that won't have those adjustments? 39 40 Draft Minutes 6 DRAFT Mr. Nguyen: We don't have the exact answer for that. We have asked them for case 1 study, but we haven't gotten anything yet. That's something we will look into when we 2 continue the design process. 3 4 Commissioner Reckdahl: They also mentioned about—what was the term? Composite 5 decking. They said recycled materials. What does that mean, composite? What material 6 is that? 7 8 Mr. Nguyen: Composite can be any recycled material out on the market now. A fill 9 which I don't have it on top of my head at this point. We certainly will entertain that 10 option. 11 12 Commissioner Reckdahl: Is it plastic or is it ... 13 14 Mr. Nguyen: I hope we don't use plastic, but that's one of the product considered 15 composite. 16 17 Commissioner Reckdahl: It's open for consideration, what we could use? We could use 18 almost anything. 19 20 Mr. Nguyen: Yes, right. 21 22 Commissioner Reckdahl: That's it. Thank you. 23 24 Chair Lauing: Commissioner Knopper. 25 26 Vice Chair Knopper: Hi. The CIP was funded for the Feasibility Study, but there is no 27 current CIP for the actual 1.4 to 1.8 price. Correct? 28 29 Mr. Nguyen: That's correct. 30 31 Vice Chair Knopper: When I'm looking at this schedule, it just seems really aggressive 32 based on how many agencies have to approve this because of the endangered species out 33 there. I was just wondering if you—obviously you guys are confident that this is the 34 schedule. Just based on being on this Commission, I can't possibly imagine that—it just 35 feels very fast, I guess is what I wanted to say. The other issue that I wanted to talk about 36 was the sea level rise statistics that you have in this report. I've seen a map of Palo Alto 37 with NOAA's sea level rise. They have it at 3 feet. There's a very specific red line as to 38 what's going to be impacted. It's really far into Palo Alto. The timing is a little more 39 aggressive as far as it happening sooner, I guess is what I'm saying. I was just wondering 40 if the moderate climate change sea level rise, you're confident on those numbers? 41 42 Draft Minutes 7 DRAFT Ms. Bansal: The numbers are basically predictions based on, like you mentioned, NOAA 1 and moderate climate change effects. What we have in the Study is basically 3 feet in 2 2100. Since we are considering the design life to be 50 to 75 years, what we have in the 3 report is based on 2075; that's approximate end of useful life of the proposed Boardwalk. 4 The sea level rise is interpolated, and that is about 2 feet. 5 6 Vice Chair Knopper: I guess the one thing—thank you for that. The thing that I'm 7 thinking about is I know with a budgetary perspective as to what the City—all of the 8 different projects we have, and that we know that this is a flood basin. It's just going to 9 increasingly be one. We have so many projects and park things to do. Is this a lot of 10 money for this? I guess that's my question. Is this a lot of money for a project that we 11 know we have endangered species, we've got six regulatory agencies we have to deal 12 with. Is it the right project for this amount of money? I guess is my question. 13 14 Mr. Anderson: Maybe I can help with this one. It's a challenging one. You're right, it's a 15 high-ticket item. We're looking at $1 million, a very lengthy, staff-intensive process to 16 get it through the regulatory process. It's expensive in terms of staff time and the funding 17 for the construction itself. You're right, the CIP money is tight. I would say this is our—18 within the City of Palo Alto, this is probably the most popular piece of trail there is. That 19 includes all our parks. Maybe the Magical Bridge a close second. It's right up there. I'd 20 say it's high profile. It's part of taking care of our infrastructure. It's important, but I 21 think that's really kind of a Commission/Council decision if it's the right one. It'll go 22 through that regular process like all the projects do. It's just politically sensitive. I think 23 it's likely to be funded, but it's really out of my hands I'm sorry to say definitively. 24 25 Vice Chair Knopper: Thank you. 26 27 Chair Lauing: On that issue, it might also be more of a "because it's part of our heritage 28 and infrastructure" as opposed to if someone came and said, "Let's build a Boardwalk." 29 That might get a different reception than it's been here for whatever it's been, 60 years of 30 history or something like that. 31 32 Vice Chair Knopper: One of the things that I was thinking about is a lot of the Baylands 33 needs conservation and habitat rehab. We're constantly low on money to do something 34 like that. My thinking or questioning is does it make sense to take this large amount of 35 money and provide the public the opportunity to enjoy the Baylands without the 36 structural, where we're providing more environmental impact for the habitat versus 37 putting in a physical structure that we know is short term as far as City timing is 38 concerned. 39 40 Chair Lauing: Other comments? Commissioner Hetterly. 41 42 Draft Minutes 8 DRAFT Commissioner Hetterly: Most of my questions were already covered, but I had two more. 1 One was the rehab option includes salvage of materials. Are there any materials that can 2 be salvaged for other use under the replacement options? 3 4 Mr. Nguyen: We prefer not to use any product from the old Boardwalk for the 5 replacement option. Option for us to salvage the material and then use it on different 6 project, we can either give the material away or donate to some agency or city who have 7 the use of the product. 8 9 Commissioner Hetterly: I'd like to see that as part of the plan. I think that you said that 10 Replacement Option 2 involves a wider foundation than Replacement Option 1. Is that 11 right? 12 13 Mr. Nguyen: Option 1 will have the current footprint right now which is 4-feet wide. 14 The replacement will have a 5-feet wide Boardwalk to be ADA compliant. That's why 15 we have to provide a field study for the agency to see the effect of widening the footprint 16 another foot or so. 17 18 Commissioner Hetterly: That's what I thought you said. I was just wondering if you 19 anticipated increased impacts in your CEQA analysis as a result of that wider (crosstalk). 20 21 Mr. Nguyen: We have met with the interagency back in December of last year in San 22 Francisco. We have proposed this option. They have concern but not something that we 23 cannot overcome. They request us to do some study, which we have in the contract at 24 this point, for them to review. 25 26 Commissioner Hetterly: Thank you. 27 28 Chair Lauing: I just wanted to make one comment. I think a lot of the citizens are going 29 to look at this and say, "We're basically just building a deck, and the construction takes 5 30 months, and this is going to take 2 1/2 years." We know why. You say it's going way 31 too fast. I think most people are going to say it's going way too slow. The only reason I 32 raise that is because we just want to be sensitive as this moves along to communicate it 33 well to the citizens, obviously to the Council as well, so they're patient that it has to be 34 done right and there are all these mitigating factors out there like the salt water and the 35 environment and the critters and so on. 36 37 Commissioner Reckdahl: (inaudible) comment? 38 39 Chair Lauing: Sure, go ahead, a follow-up. 40 41 Draft Minutes 9 DRAFT Commissioner Reckdahl: The only thing I wanted to add is that we're constrained to start 1 construction in the fall. As a result, since we can't hit this next fall, we have more time 2 the following fall. I don't think we should just slow roll it. We've seen before how things 3 can pop up and slow it down. If we're going to slow roll it, I think we have plenty of time 4 to 2017. We may miss that date, and now all of a sudden we have another full year that 5 we have to wait. I would want to get as much design done upfront. If we sit on the 6 design for 6 months, that's fine. I'd rather sit on the completed design that's been 7 approved than find out at the last minute that we're not going to hit our target. 8 9 Mr. Nguyen: That's in our minds. We create the schedule with that in mind. We going 10 to have another meeting with the agency at the 15 percent design level to gauge their 11 comment at an early stage so we can proceed on design at full speed. Hopefully we can 12 wrap it up by the time that they issue the permit for us to go out for construction. 13 14 Commissioner Reckdahl: Thank you. 15 16 Chair Lauing: Commissioner Moss. 17 18 Commissioner Moss: (crosstalk) said, if there's any way that we can start the 19 environmental clearance and permitting early in summer and finish—maybe not have 100 20 percent construction document to start the process so that we could even start the 21 construction early in fall 2017, that means end of August instead of end of October. 22 23 Mr. Nguyen: That's something that we definitely try for. We will push the consultant to 24 provide some of the study that agency require as soon as possible. We can present that 25 along with the 15 percent at the meeting. 26 27 Chair Lauing: Thank you. 28 29 Mr. Nguyen: Thank you. 30 31 4. Parks, Open Space, Trails, and Recreation Facilities Master Plan. 32 Revised Policy Definition 33 Revised Policies 34 Draft Dog Park Policy 35 Draft Park Restroom Policy 36 37 Chair Lauing: The next item on the agenda is what we call the Master Plan, the Parks, 38 Open Space, Trails and Recreation Facilities Master Plan. We have one speaker on that. 39 If Mr. Lewis would like to speak. Mr. Lewis, we're going to do 3 minutes. Thank you. 40 41 Draft Minutes 10 DRAFT Gabriel Lewis: Good evening, Chair Lauing and Parks Commissioners. My name is 1 Gabriel Lewis. I'm an intern speaking for the Loma Prieta Chapter of the Sierra Club and 2 the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society. I'm also a Palo Alto resident, and I spent a lot 3 of my childhood playing in the parks and open spaces that you oversee. Your work 4 matters very much to me personally. I want to thank you for doing it. The Parks, Open 5 Space, Trails and Recreation Facilities Master Plan has already improved greatly thanks 6 to your efforts. I appreciate your receptiveness to our comments and recommendations. I 7 find it encouraging, inspiring even, that my City strives to take care of its natural 8 ecosystems. On that note, I wanted to talk about the recent joint letter that the Audubon 9 Society and the Sierra Club sent to the Commission. It contains a number of specific 10 edits and additions that you can see in front of you, but the ideas behind it are as simple. 11 The aim is to create more space for nature, for native trees and vegetation, for birds, for 12 wildlife in Palo Alto's parks and open spaces. This has been our aim for Palo Alto's 13 Urban Forest Master Plan as well which we have also been involved in writing. What 14 gives me hope for achieving this aim and what makes it so tremendously important to me 15 is that more space for nature does not mean less space for humans. On the contrary, it is 16 in these places with thriving natural ecosystems that we can learn and relearn the qualities 17 that we call human, a sense of play, of wonderment, of beauty. Our City needs these 18 qualities. My generation—I graduated from Gunn in 2009 when Palo Alto's mental 19 health crisis began—needs these things most of all. I hope you will adopt this letter's 20 recommendations as you've so graciously done in the past. Thank you. 21 22 Chair Lauing: Thank you very much. I have two other cards that are specifically around 23 dog parks. You're welcome to speak now. We have a number of things to go through 24 that are relative to general policies, and then we're picking up dog parks as one of the 25 policies. It might be more appropriate for you to come when we get to that. I'll leave it 26 at your option. Let me identify you please. This is Barbara Millen specifically speaking 27 about dog parks. Barbara Millen, and then we'll get to the next speaker as well. 28 29 Barbara Millen: The report that was sent out today or yesterday was a culmination of 30 almost a decade of work by the community, the dog park owners, people on the Parks and 31 Rec Commission and a variety of other people. I guess you can hear me, right? Do I 32 need this? 33 34 Chair Lauing: It's being recorded, so that's better. 35 36 Ms. Millen: I was just recognizing the decade, at least a decade, of work of people in the 37 community and on the Commission who have been working toward a more dog-friendly 38 community. After reading the report over in the policy that's being suggested, I was very 39 pleased. I think it's not everything that we all wanted. I had a couple of greyhounds, and 40 they would have loved several acres to run around. For the most part, I think it's going to 41 meet the needs of most dog owners in the community who want to stay local and meet 42 Draft Minutes 11 DRAFT their other neighbors at a fairly local park, where a lot of conversation goes on and a lot 1 of support goes on. The fact that we're planning, I guess, six should, I would hope, make 2 it so that the local neighbors won't have too much objection because there shouldn't be a 3 lot of traffic going to any particular place, I hope. Anyway, I just found it very 4 reasonable and well presented. I want to thank all those who are responsible and hope we 5 can get it done. 6 7 Chair Lauing: Thank you. Come back more often with those kinds of comments. Our 8 second speaker on dog parks is Herb Borock. About 3 minutes. 9 10 Herb Borock: Thank you, Chair Lauing and Commissioners. Thank you for giving us 11 the opportunity to speak now. I support the staff recommendation and the ad hoc 12 committee's recommendation. There are just two minor points I'll start off with. In 13 Attachment B, the aerial of Mitchell Park doesn't include the number of feet of fencing. 14 It's left off the number and just says linear feet. Also at the top of page 2 of the staff 15 report, the relative sizes of the Hoover Park and Greer Park current dog parks don't seem 16 correct to me. My recollection is that the Hoover Park one was larger than Greer Park 17 before Hoover Park was expanded. You might want to go back and look at the plans or 18 look at those. In regard to the fact that you considered off-leash areas separate from the 19 dog parks, you can't do that because the Municipal Code requires dogs on leash. That 20 was adopted by the voters. From an initiative petition; it can only be changed by the 21 voters. The existing dog parks came after that. I guess if someone took the City to court 22 about those, it would be the open texture of the law. Nobody considered dog parks when 23 that initiative measure was adopted. Eleanor Pardee Park was previously considered for a 24 dog park and met with neighborhood opposition. That was some time ago. The 25 population has changed in terms of number of dog owners, so there might be a different 26 response from the community. However, one thing I've noticed. We do have bathrooms 27 at the district parks of Rinconada Park and El Camino Park, but nowhere north of Oregon 28 Expressway are there bathrooms in any neighborhood parks. There are no dog parks 29 north of Oregon Expressway. That's been due to neighborhood opposition in the north. I 30 think it's perfectly okay to go on the other side of Oregon Expressway for that. For El 31 Camino Park, the area that's been identified, I believe, is a good area and should be used 32 and pursued. For a long time, it's been a considered a possibility of extending Quarry 33 Road there, so that buses from the bus island can make left turns going south on El 34 Camino. The ones coming from the north would not be able to make a left turn cut in 35 there. You previously considered on the other side of an extension of Palo Alto Avenue. 36 The way it was presented was will Stanford oppose it because of near the creek. You 37 need to separate those two. Palo Alto has a lease for another 17 years in El Camino Park. 38 The terms of the lease are that Palo Alto has site control, so it's only if somebody wanted 39 to make a legal challenge for that one due to nearness to the creek. Stanford by itself 40 could not have stopped the use. The change of areas which you're not considering 41 immediately such as the Hoover Park area for alternative, I think the tragedy of the 42 Draft Minutes 12 DRAFT commons, that is I've seen small numbers of people and small numbers of dogs get along 1 quite well there, but I don't know what would happen if it became a legal area. The 2 reason why it's small is because it's against the law. While you have equity, which I think 3 is good, we already have one in Mitchell Park. You're already starting with one in the 4 south, and Mitchell Park without expansion is big enough to meet the criteria. If you 5 recalculate the Hoover Park, it may become close. Thank you for your time. 6 7 Chair Lauing: Thank you for the comments. That's the speakers on that. Now we'll have 8 a presentation on the status of the Master Plan and what we're going to cover tonight. 9 Kristen. 10 11 Kristen O'Kane: Peter Jensen from Public Works Department is here to present on the 12 Master Plan. 13 14 Peter Jensen: Good evening, Commissioners. Peter Jensen, Landscape Architect for the 15 City of Palo Alto, continuing our ongoing discussion of the Palo Alto Parks Master Plan. 16 Tonight we're going to delve into some of the policy questions that we still have for the 17 discussion with the Commission. As we do that, we're going to dovetail Daren's 18 presentations in, because they go along with some of those specific policies. When we 19 get to a specific policy that starts to talk about walkshed or the dog off-leash policy, then 20 Daren will do his presentation specific to that policy as well. It'll be not as we normally 21 do where they'll each have their own headings as an agenda item, but they will just be 22 incorporated into this presentation itself. To start off with that, I don't know if Rob or 23 Daren had anything to add with that. Let's then go forward. First of all, we just wanted 24 to start the conversation. There had been further conversation with the ad hoc group 25 about the definition of a policy. That was part of the staff report, so we wanted to throw 26 that out there now. The updated definition that we're using—we can discuss it further—27 is the value-based framework that provides clear direction and guidelines and action or 28 actions towards achieving a goal. That's basically our current definition that we're 29 working with as far as the policies go. We can have a brief discussion about that if 30 anyone has any questions about it or we can move on and have our further discussions 31 about the specific policies that we want to talk about. 32 33 Chair Lauing: Are there any questions about that? We can just go with that as the 34 definition then? 35 36 Mr. Jensen: Sure. As part of the package that you got, the updated policies, you have a 37 clean version, a redlined version that had quite a few redlines on there. You can see the 38 extent of work that went into it. A spreadsheet summary that gave an idea of what the 39 comments were per the Commissioners and how they related. That spreadsheet also 40 signified some of the policies that still need further discussion. That's what we're going 41 to go through here tonight. That first one, which staff continues to discuss with ourselves 42 Draft Minutes 13 DRAFT and we'd like to bring you into that, is the Policy 1.B which deals with the 5 acres per 1 1,000 residents. I think how we'd like to proceed with that tonight and what our 2 discussion is, is recommending to follow basically what the Comprehensive Plan is now 3 using which is the National Park standard that gives a lot more flexibility to the 4 requirements of parkland and gets away from the specific Quimby Act which was the 5 5 acres per 1,000. I don't know if you want to have ... That's a current policy in the 6 Comprehensive Plan, the National Recreation and Park Association standard guidelines 7 for locating and developing new parks, recognizing these are representing long-term 8 aspirational targets. What they do is they basically break it down into two different park 9 types. A neighborhood park, which are parks less than 2 acres and having 2 acres of 10 neighborhood parkland should be provided for each 1,000 people. District parks, which 11 are larger park areas above 5 acres, also the same requirement, though, 2 acres of district 12 parkland should be provided for each 1,000 people. There was then some question on 13 what are current parkland and what we have and how we're meeting that now per this 14 policy. For the smaller neighborhood parks, we are currently 88 acres deficient. For the 15 larger-scaled district parks, we are 2.87 acres deficient. Not too far there off from that. 16 That's basically staff's recommendation, to keep following that, but we do want further 17 input from the Commission on maintaining that as the policy. I will open it for 18 discussion on that unless Rob or Kristen have anything they want to add for that. 19 20 Chair Lauing: Just a format question. Do you want to take each one of these and delve 21 into discussion or do you want to go over all of the ones that you think are on the table 22 for discussion? At some point, we need to ask the Commission if there are any other 23 ones that need further discussion. 24 25 Mr. Jensen: I think we have five main ones that we want to talk about. I think we should 26 have the discussion after the presentation of each. At the end of the five, we can have 27 more discussion about other policies that Commissioners have questions on. 28 29 Rob de Geus: I would agree with that because some of these topics are a little complex. 30 As you've read Daren's staff report, he's done a lot of thorough research. I think it's good 31 to hear the presentation on the particular policy item and then discuss it, if that works for 32 the Commission. 33 34 Chair Lauing: Yeah. 35 36 Mr. de Geus: Specific to this one, we've honestly struggled with this policy. Should we 37 keep the policy? Should we amend the policy? It's clearly a very ambitious policy, if we 38 were to keep it, 88 acres short. It is the standard that the National Recreation and Parks 39 Association has. It's an old standard, but they haven't updated it. That's the one we have. 40 We have gone back and forth on what we think would be appropriate here. It was in the 41 Comprehensive Plan initially from 1998 and served, I think, the Plan well. As we have 42 Draft Minutes 14 DRAFT batted it around, we think keeping it is probably the best course of action. Then have a 1 set of sub-projects, programs that actually are more actionable specific to how we're 2 going to actually add parkland, which I know we have some ideas about. That's where 3 staff landed on this, but we're very curious what the Commission thinks. 4 5 Chair Lauing: Comments? 6 7 Council Member Filseth: (inaudible) data. The City of San Francisco, which is one of 8 the most dense urban areas in the nation, actually meets the standard of 4 acres per 1,000 9 residents of in-town park space. 10 11 Chair Lauing: Was that all? Okay. Commissioner Hetterly. 12 13 Commissioner Hetterly: You all know I already think—I certainly think we should keep 14 the standard. I think it'd be a huge mistake to give it up. I don't believe that the current 15 Comp Plan includes this final clause, recognizing that these represent long-term 16 aspirational targets. I think that's floating around in the update process. I don't think that 17 we should consider them long-term aspirational targets. I think the reason that we're at 18 this deficit—10 years ago our deficit was significantly smaller. What we've done is add 19 more population without adding more parks. I don't think that just because we failed to 20 follow our adopted policy and add parks as we added population that we should say, "We 21 didn't do it, so let's make it easier." I am strongly opposed to reducing the targets. We 22 absolutely need to keep them in. I like the idea of developing programs to sort of 23 prioritize where and how we're going to make some forward progress towards meeting 24 them. 25 26 Chair Lauing: Others? Commissioner Moss. 27 28 Commissioner Moss: You're saying that having just 2 acres per 1,000, we're 88 acres 29 deficit. Our policy says 5 acres per 1,000; we're five times that much. Is that what you're 30 saying? 31 32 Mr. de Geus: There's two different standards that are used. One is related to the Quimby 33 Act which is 5 acres of parkland per 5,000 population. It's not developed parkland; it's 34 just parkland. That would include all of our open space land as well. In fact, we would 35 meet that standard if we were to use that as the standard. We had written it a little 36 differently in the staff report which is not actually the current standard. It talked about 37 developed parkland. The National Recreation and Parks Association standard is 38 different. It talks about neighborhood parks which are 2-5 acres and district parks which 39 are 5 acres and above. It says essentially that we need, what is it? 2 acres per 1,000 for 40 both of those. 41 42 Draft Minutes 15 DRAFT Commissioner Moss: If we're 88 acres deficit now ... 1 2 Mr. de Geus: For neighborhood parks. 3 4 Commissioner Moss: ... for neighborhood parks and our population is growing, I don't 5 understand why you just keep it to residents. We're growing with the number of 6 employees and the number of customers coming to our businesses. That's growing even 7 faster than the number of residents. The fact that you would not include them in your 8 calculation, the bottom line is that the ratio what we have now in our policy is just 9 impossible. Even this is going to be impossible, to come up with 88 acres and growing. I 10 don't know why we would put something in that's really impossible. 11 12 Mr. de Geus: That's a good question. We struggled with some of the same questions. 13 The reason we landed on keeping it is because it does come from somewhere. It comes 14 from the National Recreation and Parks Association which is sort of the recognized body 15 for parks and recreation and how to grow programs and parkland. If we were to create 16 something new and different that's unique to Palo Alto, we think maybe it loses 17 something, it loses some credibility. To the point about how we get there, I'm not sure 18 how we get there, but that's the challenge. That's what we need to try and figure out. 19 Maybe we don't get there. I think we all agree that we want to be ambitious and try as 20 best we can to add parkland. I think your point about workers in Palo Alto, the 21 population doubles every day, I understand. That's only further exacerbating the need for 22 additional parkland. I totally agree. 23 24 Chair Lauing: Commissioner Cowie. 25 26 Commissioner Cowie: Could you all help me with the math a little bit here? 88 acres 27 would be enough parks for what, 44,000 people? Did I do the math right? Right? Are 28 we really that far off? The population of Palo Alto is 70 maybe now. We have only 29 enough neighborhood parks for 25,000, 26,000 people today? 30 31 Mr. de Geus: Using this standard. People will have different opinions about whether the 32 standard is really the right standard. 33 34 Commissioner Cowie: Does that jive though with the number of acres of neighborhood 35 parks that we have today? It seems like the statement of the problem seems high to me. 36 37 Mr. de Geus: I have to pull up the math here. Maybe take another question, and we can 38 come back. 39 40 Commissioner Cowie: The other thing that I think we ought to consider in assessing how 41 we're doing—I mean, this is a pretty harsh scorecard—is the environment that surrounds 42 Draft Minutes 16 DRAFT the City of Palo Alto. Certainly there is a lot of open space that is not within the 1 incorporated city limits of Palo Alto, but I'm not sure that counting that at zero is the 2 appropriate way to look at it. I'm not making these points to suggest that we should not 3 be aggressively seeking to expand our parks by any means. I wonder whether the 4 scorecard is harsher than it should be. 5 6 Chair Lauing: Did you mean by the surrounding area outside of Palo Alto city limits? 7 8 Commissioner Cowie: Yes. 9 10 Vice Chair Knopper: You're not including in this calculation either Foothills Park or 11 Baylands, none of even the Palo Alto open spaces in this calculation either. You don't 12 even have to go outside Palo Alto for the calculation. 13 14 Commissioner Cowie: I'm assuming that Foothills and Baylands are incorporated in the 15 second category of the district parks. 16 17 Vice Chair Knopper: Right. 18 19 Chair Lauing: They're not, right? 20 21 Vice Chair Knopper: No. 22 23 Chair Lauing: That's separate; that's open space. 24 25 Vice Chair Knopper: It's open space, so it's not even in the calculation at all. If you did 26 put it in the calculation—correct me again if I'm wrong, because I am often. If you did 27 utilize the open space, we wouldn't have the deficit of 88.1. We would be fine per our 28 67,000 residents approximately. However, this is for neighborhood parks. 29 30 Commissioner Cowie: Right. I guess what I'm saying is I'm not sure the standard really 31 takes into account our facts and circumstances. I'd hate to set a standard that there's no 32 way we're going to meet, at least not within anyone here's lifetime. I'd rather set a goal 33 for something that we can actually achieve. An aggressive goal, mind you. That's, I 34 guess, the way I'd look at it. 35 36 Chair Lauing: Are you back, Rob? 37 38 Mr. de Geus: Yeah, for feedback. We have 174 acres of developed parkland. We have 39 44 acres of parkland that is below 5 acres, I think. We have 130 acres that is above 5 40 acres. With the district parks above 5 acres, we get close to the standard which would be 41 132 acres. With neighborhood parks, we're not even close. 44 acres, the standard is 2 42 Draft Minutes 17 DRAFT acres per 1,000; that's 132 acres. That's the deficit. I think your point is a really good 1 one. If we were just to look at that standard, it's looks pretty negative. There's a whole 2 suite of policies in a park system that we need to think about and the context of all of that. 3 The quality of our parks, the accessibility of our parks, the magnificent and abundant 4 open space we've set aside are all important contextual points. Yes, this looks bad, but 5 there are a lot of good things as well. Should we still add urban parkland? We should 6 because we are below this standard. Are we likely to get to this standard? Likely not. 7 Does that help? 8 9 Commissioner Cowie: Yes. 10 11 Mr. Jensen: One of the things that Rob was touching on before is that, I think, everyone 12 is in agreement that we need to add parkland by this calculation, by the simple fact of it. 13 Whatever the policy is that aligns us with our goal, I think that the programs underneath 14 it can actually be the items that have the most impact, because that's actually how we're 15 going to be doing those things. I think there can be good work done in that, even though 16 maybe the goal is not as attainable. At least we can set out a pathway to try to get there 17 as best as possible. I think the other key aspect is Rob saying this is set up on something 18 that is adopted nationwide, that most cities have, because it is a recognized figure. To go 19 outside of that and create a policy is not something that is done a lot, because there is no 20 then backup out there to do so. Those are some things to consider. 21 22 Commissioner Hetterly: I'd also throw out there that I think it would be a terrible mistake 23 if we started trying to count our open space acreage as somehow meeting these targets, 24 because the function of a neighborhood park is really completely different from the 25 community benefits and uses of open space. Also, I think the fact that we're behind by 88 26 acres for neighborhood parks just highlights even more the importance of focusing our 27 efforts in that particular area. 28 29 Chair Lauing: Are you saying you would support what's being proposed here? Leave it 30 at 88 and do something about it, recognizing that that's going to take decades. 31 32 Commissioner Hetterly: Yeah, I support keeping the current policy. 33 34 Chair Lauing: Commissioner Reckdahl. 35 36 Commissioner Reckdahl: I agree. I support the current policy also. We're not going to 37 get there tomorrow. We know that. We should be working towards it. We haven't added 38 parkland for a long time. Heritage Park is the last park that I can think of that we added. 39 The Friends of Palo Alto Parks helped a lot with that. I'm just afraid that if we don't have 40 this policy, we won't add any more parks on our own. We really need to keep our feet to 41 the fire. It's a quality of life issue. You saw with dog parks how hard it was to find spots 42 Draft Minutes 18 DRAFT for dog parks. There's so many competing uses; it's only going to get worse. We need to 1 start adding some land sooner rather than later. 2 3 Mr. de Geus: Once we have self-driving cars, who knows what we're going to be able to 4 do. 5 6 Chair Lauing: Eric. 7 8 Council Member Filseth: I shouldn't be part of this discussion, because I'm an observer. 9 I think I would note that this is the group that certainly the Council and the rest of the 10 City is going to look to, to lead thought on policy in this area. If you say we should do X, 11 then the Finance Committee and the Policy and Services Committee and other groups in 12 the City aren't going to challenge that. What we do here, this group, has a huge impact, 13 so decide carefully. The other thing is bear in mind that there is a lot of stuff that we 14 don't know. For example, this came up in the Council meeting last night briefly. The 15 Fry's site is, just as an example—there's likely to be a big change there one of these days. 16 People are already arguing about what we're going to do with it and who's going to get 17 how much of it and so forth. There's steps that we can't see deterministically but that 18 may happen. That's why you have policies. 19 20 Chair Lauing: As I see some of the discussion here on the risk side, it's sort of like if we 21 have 88 acres deficit and it's totally impractical for the next X decades, will Council or 22 others just throw up their hands and say we shouldn't do anything because we can't get 23 there? I think that's the concern that you're hearing voiced on the side of do we change 24 that or not. 25 26 Council Member Filseth: I think Council will look to this group. 27 28 Chair Lauing: Pardon? 29 30 Council Member Filseth: I think Council will look to this group as to what to do. 31 32 Chair Lauing: Any other comments on this? Do we feel like we've thought about it 33 enough? Do you want an actual vote on each policy that's under discussion here? 34 35 Mr. de Geus: I don't think that's necessary, no. 36 37 Mr. Jensen: We'll move to the second one, which is 1.C now and was 1.D in the previous 38 draft. This talks about the walkshed and the nearest park or preserve to be a half mile or 39 quarter mile preferred from residents. The previous policy had recommendations of 40 specific elements. Those elements have been removed. They included restrooms, dog 41 parks, things of that nature. The recommendation now is to simplify the policy just to 42 Draft Minutes 19 DRAFT call out parks being in the walkshed with those other removed. I'll open it up for 1 discussion. 2 3 Chair Lauing: Anyone? Commissioner Knopper. 4 5 Vice Chair Knopper: I agree with the change. 6 7 Chair Lauing: The deletion or the ... 8 9 Vice Chair Knopper: Taking out the specific elements and using the revised language. 10 11 Chair Lauing: Any others? Commissioner Reckdahl. 12 13 Commissioner Reckdahl: I agree with the change. I thought it was a little 14 micromanaging having all those details in it. The only thing is "ensure." Is that too 15 strong of a statement? Should we say a standard? We were talking about how many 16 acres per person; that was called a standard. This sounds more mandatory. If we are 17 going to make it mandatory, then we should make it mandatory. Right now, this is, I 18 think, meant to be a goal and not meant to be "thou shalt by the end by the calendar year 19 ensure that everyone in the City is within a half mile." I just want to make that more 20 clear about what's the ramifications of "ensure." 21 22 Mr. Jensen: To go along further with this, one of the aspects that was removed was the 23 restrooms. We'll now go into the restroom. I'll let Daren do his presentation, and then 24 we'll have further discussion on that specific policy. 25 26 Chair Lauing: We're going to do that before we go through these other ones, synthetic 27 turf and staff? 28 29 Mr. Jensen: Yes. 30 31 Daren Anderson: In our February Commission meeting, we reviewed MIG's first draft 32 on the park restroom policy which called for providing a restroom in every park unless 33 there was an adjacent public restroom available or the site was under 1 acre in size. 34 Some Commissioners explained that they needed more information to make a 35 recommendation on a policy like this. In response, I created this spreadsheet, Attachment 36 A in the staff report, Park Restrooms. In that spreadsheet, it talks about the size of each 37 park, if it has an existing restroom, if it would require a restroom under the MIG policy, 38 and then lastly if staff recommends a restroom for that particular park. The spreadsheet 39 illustrates that we have 14 parks with restrooms. MIG's policy would result in adding 13 40 more parks that currently don't have restrooms. As I analyzed these 13 parks and walked 41 them, envisioning how a restroom would fit, six of them did not seem appropriate to me. 42 Draft Minutes 20 DRAFT The criteria used to determine if a restroom was appropriate was the size of the park, the 1 number of amenities that would draw someone to stay in that park, and the amount of use 2 we typically observe. The revised policy that staff is proposing is to add restrooms in 3 parks that are approximately 2 acres in size or larger, have amenities that encourage 4 visitors to stay in the park and have relatively high levels of use and where there aren't 5 nearby public restrooms. There were seven parks that fit that criteria. In the staff report, 6 I included the program to support it and suggested adding restrooms to those potential 7 seven sites, Bol Park, Bowden, Eleanor Pardee, Johnson Park, Ramos Park, Robles and 8 Terman. If you would like, we can get into the details for the six that I do not 9 recommend and why, but it's in the staff report. I'll leave that to any questions you may 10 have. That concludes the presentation on the restrooms. 11 12 Chair Lauing: Questions on those? I just wanted to echo one that a speaker talked about 13 which is that Eleanor Pardee, (a) was just renovated, and (b) the neighborhood said no 14 thanks. Just so we're aware of that, and we would of course have to do public outreach, 15 but we're likely to get the same answer. I take it that we're willing to go out and kind of 16 resurvey just to see based on the Master Plan findings. 17 18 Commissioner Reckdahl: How do we envision these being implemented? Are we just 19 putting these on the shelf, and the next time that park gets renovated we'll put a bathroom 20 in? Are we going into parks and renovating them right now? 21 22 Mr. Anderson: The recommendation would be to re-fund the previously funded CIP for 23 park restrooms where every other year a park restroom was installed. 24 25 Commissioner Reckdahl: We'll go through every other year and add one. 26 27 Mr. Anderson: Unassociated unless it happened to match up neatly with a restoration, 28 but it would be unaffiliated with any like whole renovation of Pardee or any other park. 29 30 Commissioner Reckdahl: Also, I have some questions about how that works. What are 31 the hours for restrooms? 32 33 Mr. Anderson: Typically they follow the regular hours of the park. It's sunrise to 10:30 34 for the urban parks. Different for open space where it's cyclical with the sunset. 35 36 Commissioner Reckdahl: Who opens them? Do we have ... 37 38 Mr. Anderson: It varies. We're increasingly going to auto locks, so they auto unlock in 39 the morning and auto lock in the evening. 40 41 Commissioner Reckdahl: What about cleaning? How often are they cleaned? 42 Draft Minutes 21 DRAFT 1 Mr. Anderson: They're cleaned every weeknight, I believe, by—this is handled through 2 Public Works, and they have a contractor that does it. I believe it's every weeknight. 3 4 Commissioner Reckdahl: Every weeknight. Do we have any problems with broken 5 items, the sinks or toilets, in the restrooms at all? 6 7 Mr. Anderson: We occasionally have issues with graffiti and some vandalism, for sure. 8 9 Commissioner Reckdahl: Is this going to be a big hit to the maintenance or is this going 10 to be a small, just drop in the bucket, for the parks? 11 12 Mr. Anderson: We're pretty close in our relationship with Public Works who manage 13 that aspect of the operation, the cleaning, the replacements and issues relating to that. I 14 know their perspective is we need to build into the request additional funding for their 15 contractor and long-term replacement and issues that pertain to their maintenance 16 operation. Concurrent with kind of the—I think associated with the CIP submittal will be 17 something to buttress and fulfill their maintenance budget requirements. 18 19 Commissioner Reckdahl: Thank you. 20 21 Chair Lauing: Commissioner Moss. 22 23 Commissioner Moss: There have been complaint in the past from near neighbors that 24 say, "If you have these bathrooms in there, you're going to get homeless people or you're 25 going to get drug activity, things like that." Is there some provision in there to have 26 additional funding for public safety? 27 28 Mr. Anderson: I think that could possibly be achieved through elements like lighting and 29 through engineering to a degree so that it's situated in such a way that it doesn't lend itself 30 to camping and hiding out. The auto locks is one thing that's helped in the past to 31 improve certain areas. I can tell you that historically El Camino Park was heavily 32 inundated with people camping out in that restroom adjacent to it. Part of the problems 33 were again engineered. There were access to electrical outlets which we know 34 exacerbates that problem. We resolved that through design to no longer make that 35 available, and it's changed the use to some degree at least so far in El Camino. We've 36 seen the same in other recent park restroom additions. Hopefully we could do the same 37 for these new ones we're proposing. 38 39 Commissioner Moss: Security cameras if necessary? 40 41 Mr. Anderson: It's possible. I think that's possible. 42 Draft Minutes 22 DRAFT 1 Commissioner Moss: The last question is are there groups of stakeholders who are 2 specifically asking for these bathrooms or is this more of a "we should have bathrooms 3 because it's the right thing to do"? 4 5 Mr. Anderson: When we did the outreach for the Parks Master Plan, when people were 6 writing in on parks what they wanted, much like dog parks almost every park came up 7 with "we'd like a restroom, we'd like a restroom." 8 9 Chair Lauing: I do think that's a fair question about is there going to be more security or 10 police. I think we should go into this knowing that there's not going to be, presuming that 11 there's not going to be. 12 13 Mr. Jensen: I would encourage the Commission, if you would like to see a sample of a 14 newer bathroom, the Juana Briones bathroom is a good one to look at. It's a prefabricated 15 structure. It is very well built and stout and has good lighting and the locks on the doors. 16 It has all the features that make a current bathroom and removes those things that we 17 think about with the old park bathrooms. It's much more secure. 18 19 Chair Lauing: Other comments? Commissioner Hetterly. 20 21 Commissioner Hetterly: I like the recommendation. I wonder if there's any prioritization 22 among those parks or you would just do outreach to all of them and prioritize based on 23 that or based on cost? 24 25 Mr. Anderson: That's a good question. They have not been prioritized yet. Maybe some 26 of the outreach, we'll have to check with MIG to see if some of the outreach, maybe the 27 number of requests for restrooms as people wrote it in the bubble, if that will help inform 28 where our priorities should be. We could also use some staff observation. Eleanor 29 Pardee, for example, really jumps out at us because we get so many complaints about 30 people urinating in public there. That's one that pops out, but it doesn't necessarily have 31 to be the first. I think a little more research to determine what the priorities should be. 32 33 Commissioner Hetterly: Another possible criteria would be the age of users. If you have 34 a park that's used heavily by young children, that might be one that moves up on the 35 priority list. 36 37 Mr. Anderson: Good suggestion. 38 39 Commissioner Hetterly: Thanks. 40 41 Chair Lauing: Definitely. Anything else? Sounds like we're good to go. 42 Draft Minutes 23 DRAFT 1 Mr. Anderson: Thank you. 2 3 Mr. Jensen: The third policy to review tonight was 2.C. This one talks about the 4 synthetic turf and natural turf. staff has submitted a recommendation in the staff report 5 for maintaining the synthetic turf fields that we have. Reviewing the process are the 6 development of synthetic turf in the future to make determination if we want to expand 7 that as well as also increasing and enhancing the natural turf fields that we have to 8 increase capacity on those. I'll open it up to discussion for that specific policy. 9 10 Vice Chair Knopper: Can I ask a—I'm sorry. 11 12 Chair Lauing: I was going to say comments. Go ahead. 13 14 Vice Chair Knopper: One of your points is synthetic turf fields should be striped for 15 multiple sports to maximize use. Is there a reason not to? 16 17 Mr. Anderson: That's a good question. When we recently looked at how we're going to 18 stripe Stanford-Palo Alto, we were debating because there were some standards for 19 lacrosse. As we started to spec out what it would look like, it could get really confusing 20 with the amount of lines. You do have to be thoughtful for how you're doing this because 21 it can get convoluted so quickly. We looked at the El Camino example, walked it with 22 the manufacturer of the turf itself and some of the folks that participate in lacrosse, and 23 came to an agreement on the style that's reasonable, that you can definitely still 24 differentiate between the two sports, but it's not so overwhelming that you can't figure out 25 what's going on. I think there is a reason to be cautious, and maybe three or four sports 26 might be overkill and soon be difficult. If there were a third or fourth sport, then we'd 27 have different striping. 28 29 Vice Chair Knopper: I was just going to ask besides soccer and lacrosse is there a third? 30 Football? Do we stripe for football? 31 32 Mr. Anderson: So far we haven't had that issue come up, but it could. It'd be something 33 we'd have to be careful and cautious about and proceed with thought and care. 34 35 Commissioner Reckdahl: Are there only two colored lines at El Camino? I thought they 36 had three colors. 37 38 Mr. Anderson: I couldn't tell you off the top of my head. I'm not sure. 39 40 Chair Lauing: I think this idea of at this point staying up to speed on what the current 41 trends are, which are going to change, is kind of the only thing you can do. It's been so 42 Draft Minutes 24 DRAFT controversial, but there's been so many scientific advances or not depending on your view 1 of it that it strikes me that at this point saying, "Stay up to speed on it," is probably good 2 until such time as you can make more of a definitive decision. Any other comments on 3 this one? Commissioner Hetterly. 4 5 Commissioner Hetterly: I have a question. Are you proposing to retain the first part of 6 the original recommendation 2.C, to design and maintain high quality turf fields with 7 adequate time for resting to support maximum use in parks, blah, blah, blah, or is that 8 being replaced by a separate policy for synthetic turf and a separate policy for natural 9 grass? 10 11 Mr. Anderson: I would recommend keeping that first one as well as this additional 12 caveat in this recommendation you see before you that says we should hire a sports turf 13 consultant to do a full analysis. I would do both. 14 15 Commissioner Hetterly: I agree with that. 16 17 Chair Lauing: That sports turf consultant, they're specialized? They either do grass or 18 synthetic? 19 20 Mr. Anderson: I just came back from a seminar a week or so ago. While he has some 21 knowledge of the synthetic, it's really natural turf that they'll specialize in, and that's what 22 we'd hire him for. The care of the synthetic turf is so much easier, you don't need a 23 professional consultant to tell you how to care for it. The natural grass, there's so much 24 that goes into it, it's a real challenge. 25 26 Commissioner Hetterly: These bulleted proposed recommendations, they're basically 27 programs that would go under that (crosstalk) 2.C? 28 29 Mr. Anderson: Correct. 30 31 Commissioner Hetterly: Thanks. 32 33 Chair Lauing: Just to clarify that. They wouldn't actually be listed in the policies, this 34 big policy document? That's just suggestions of program implementation? 35 36 Mr. Anderson: Correct. 37 38 Chair Lauing: We had this debate a lot at the ad hoc, so I was just seeing what we've got 39 here, if this is part of the policy. Next up. 40 41 Draft Minutes 25 DRAFT Commissioner Reckdahl: What is the policy (inaudible)? Will this be the full policy or 1 is it ... 2 3 Commissioner Hetterly: Just the first sentence. 4 5 Commissioner Reckdahl: Just the first sentence. Commissioner Moss had to leave. His 6 comments were that he supports the recommendation. He thinks that it's not a simple 7 decision to get rid of synthetic turf, and it should be a case-by-case basis basically. 8 9 Mr. Jensen: That'll bring us to 2.E which was 2.D in last month's policy. This one's 10 talking about the on-leash or require dogs to be on leash policy. We're going to look at 11 Daren's presentation on dog parks as part of that. 12 13 Mr. Anderson: Thank you, Peter; appreciate it. As you know, we've discussed ways to 14 increase dog off-leash opportunities for quite some time. It's with great pleasure that I'm 15 able to share with you tonight a staff and PARC ad hoc committee recommendation 16 regarding this policy and program for dog parks that can be included into our Parks 17 Master Plan. During the process of developing this recommendation, we explored other 18 models such as the fenced and unfenced shared-use model and learned from other cities 19 who have experimented with these alternatives to dedicated sites. We've also learned 20 from community outreach and from stakeholders from the dog owner community, athletic 21 field users, open space and nature advocates as well as people who just aren't fans of 22 having dogs off-leash in parks. After listening and learning and conducting a 23 comprehensive analysis of our entire park system, we came to the conclusion that Palo 24 Alto's policy should be to actively pursue adding dedicated, fenced dog parks in multiple 25 neighborhoods, equitably distributed between north and south Palo Alto. While the size 26 of the dog parks are going to vary, we recommend that we should strive to have them be 27 at least a quarter acre in size, and the dog parks should not be placed in open space 28 preserves. The associated program to support this policy calls for at least six dedicated, 29 fenced dog parks from a list of 12 potential locations. I should note that the 30 recommendation acknowledges both Hoover and Greer's current dog parks are inadequate 31 in terms of their size, and that they should not be counted in their configuration towards 32 our minimum target of six dog parks. After the staff report was written, I met with 33 Stanford University staff and learned their concerns for one of these 12 sites; that's El 34 Camino Park. They've got two main concerns. One is that a dog park in the undeveloped 35 portion, that's the southern portion of El Camino that we've been proposed, would 36 interfere with future transit improvements for that area. Though the plans are uncertain 37 and the timelines aren't developed, they feel strongly that transit improvement will 38 happen. It's extremely important to Stanford, and they feel having a dog park there 39 would be an added complication because the dog owners would be reluctant to give it up 40 if and when this transit improvement ends up happening. Secondly, they're concerned 41 that dog park users would be driving to this site and using Stanford's two parking lots. 42 Draft Minutes 26 DRAFT That's the one for the Red Cross building adjacent to where we're proposing a dog park, 1 and then the nearby MacArthur Park restaurant's. Those are both owned by Stanford and 2 leased out. They are small parking lots, and the fear is that if you had a dog park there, 3 because it's in closer proximity to their two parking lots than it is to El Camino Park 4 parking lot and there are no residences in the immediate vicinity—it's a half mile 5 distance—that people would most likely be driving. It's very likely that they'd be 6 impacting negatively their existing parking lots. As we discussed this with Stanford, 7 there were a few other cons or negatives to consider regarding their input and that site in 8 general. One is that the future transit improvements are also important to the City. We 9 do know as staff and I'm sure the Commission's aware that takeaways can be difficult. 10 When you've allocated for something and a couple of years pass, removing that use 11 whether it's a dog park or a community garden or anything else can be challenging. It 12 could slow or cause impediment to something important like a transit improvement 13 project. The other thing to note is all the other proposed sites that we're looking at, the 14 other 11, are all within walking distance of a neighborhood; whereas, that's not true for 15 this particular one. It is most likely going to be a driving site predominantly, being that 16 it's a half mile distance from the very closest residence. Since we have so many other 17 options in north Palo Alto with this list of 11 to spend our limited resources on, it makes 18 less sense to invest it at a site where there's a good possibility we might be removing 19 those amenities and fences sometime soon. Because of these reasons, staff is proposing 20 that we remove El Camino from our list of 12 potential sites and focus on the 11 sites 21 instead. In selecting these locations, we looked for sites with at least a quarter acre of 22 space, that are not currently used for active or programmed recreation. Seven of these 23 locations are in north Palo Alto, that is, north of Oregon Expressway, and five are in the 24 south. Three of these locations have existing dog parks. That's Mitchell Park, which 25 would be expanded, Hoover and Greer, which would be relocated to larger areas within 26 those parks. This map of Palo Alto shows all the potential sites circled in red. I included 27 the nearest neighboring Menlo Park and City of Mountain View parks in blue just to 28 show that some of the periphery borders of our City could also be using some of these 29 other cities' dog parks as well. Two of these 11 sites, Eleanor Pardee Park and Bowden 30 Park, are recommended to be implemented in the nearer term. There's funding in existing 31 Capital Improvement Projects that could be used to add the fencing, water for dogs and a 32 few small amenities like benches to create very simple dog parks in these areas. Both 33 these parks are in the northern portion of Palo Alto, which doesn't currently have any dog 34 parks. I'm going to quickly walk you through this example of the aerial photograph you 35 see of Eleanor Pardee. This is in the north. It's .41 acres. It's scheduled to happen in the 36 nearer term. With all these sites—it might be a little bit difficult to see the cursor. I'm 37 trying to outline the nether area of turf we looked at. With every single park site, we 38 broke it down and looked at all the possibilities and configurations that could be used. 39 The one you see outlined in blue is that .41 acre. It ultimately settled to the top of our 40 selection process. There was another .22 acre piece right here that had possibilities too. 41 As we weighed the pros and cons with the ad hoc committee, we ultimately felt that the 42 Draft Minutes 27 DRAFT one you see before you is the best option. Different sites had multiple options. Some of 1 them had three. We picked the best. Some of them had just clearly one that stood out, 2 and some just were not suitable at all. There is another couple of reasons why we chose 3 Eleanor Pardee as a nearer-term. I'm just going to go through it really quickly. It's 4 centralized location in northern Palo Alto. It's walkable access from multiple 5 neighborhoods. It's large at 9.6 acres. It's got a pretty sizeable, unprogrammed, passive 6 use area which allows us to put in a dedicated, large dog park with minimal impacts to 7 other users. It's got a buffer space between the nearest residents, although not as large as 8 some place like El Camino, which was one of its pros. It's still sizeable. The second one 9 I want to walk you through is Bowden, also recommended for a nearer term. It's in the 10 north, .37 acres. While this park is not large—it's only a 2-acre park—it has an 11 unprogrammed, passive area that you see outlined in blue, that has very, very little use. 12 We feel this would have minimal impact on other park users or nearby residences. It's 13 accessible by multiple neighborhoods as you come through the Cal. Ave. underpass. 14 There's a Capital Improvement Project underway—at least it's done with the design—and 15 we should be starting that in the next few months. There might be a possibility, if we 16 move through the process quickly, that we can have it happen concurrent with the 17 restoration of the rest of Bowden Park. The process and timeline for adding these nearer-18 term dog parks, it's difficult to give you a definitive schedule. Each process seems to 19 have its own timeline. Whenever we go out to the public and things—they just have their 20 own timelines. The process would be, if you agreed with this recommendation, we could 21 proceed right away with this process. It would start with a public outreach meeting. 22 Again, this is a prioritized list, so we'd probably start at the top of the list. That would be 23 Pardee. We'd host that public meeting, collect feedback on this proposed dog park site, 24 bring the recommendation and seek approval from the Commission for a Park 25 Improvement Ordinance which would then go to the Council for approval. Then we'd get 26 a contract in place, go out to bids and install the fencing, the benches and the other 27 amenities. In summary, staff and the ad hoc committee believe this recommendation 28 reaches a good compromise between all the competing demands for this limited park 29 space that we have. It addresses our north/south Palo Alto dog park disparity, and it 30 presents a solid plan of action going forward to address Palo Alto's dog park needs now 31 and in the future. I'll defer to the ad hoc committee if there's anything you guys would 32 like to add to that presentation. 33 34 Commissioner Hetterly: I think you covered it. 35 36 Chair Lauing: I just wanted to say that this is a superlative report that was put together 37 by the collective ad hoc and staff. Just a terrific example of serious, serious work that 38 came into something that is now a very specific, comprehensive, actionable plan. Thanks 39 to our ad hoc and our staff for getting us there. 40 41 Draft Minutes 28 DRAFT Commissioner Hetterly: I would just add extra kudos to Daren. I think you just went 1 above and beyond the call of duty in helping drive this and putting in so much legwork to 2 pull out all the maps and give it some really thoughtful consideration. I want to thank 3 you for that. 4 5 Vice Chair Knopper: I concur. He and his staff worked so hard on this. It's truly a 6 remarkable document. Thank you. 7 8 Chair Lauing: Very clear, very visual, very easy to understand. Go ahead. 9 10 Commissioner Reckdahl: I agree. Very good, very thorough, very thoughtful. I 11 appreciate it. I will go back on my soapbox about El Camino. I think if you put a sign up 12 that said, "this is temporary," and just put a fence and did nothing else, there'd be use out 13 of it. It's really not that far from anywhere University north. If you look at the map ... 14 15 Female: (inaudible) 16 17 Commissioner Reckdahl: Yes. Anyway, we're getting two. I'm happy with that. I 18 would be more happy with three, if we could have got that El Camino. That is, I think, a 19 missed opportunity, but at least we have two. 20 21 Chair Lauing: What's the process that you'd like from us to get this thing moving? 22 23 Mr. Anderson: I think I've got my marching orders. We'll get going on the public 24 outreach next. I'll consult with my boss first. If he concurs, we'll get going on the public 25 outreach for Pardee. 26 27 Chair Lauing: The process before it comes back to us is that you have public outreach 28 for an appropriate amount of time and other kinds of considerations, and then we go 29 straight to a PIO? 30 31 Mr. Anderson: Given this one's gotten so much feedback, I guess it depends on the 32 outreach feedback. It's been so well vetted, the idea. If there's general support in our 33 public outreach, yeah, I think I would probably try to go for a PIO. 34 35 Chair Lauing: Once that's calendared here, speakers can still come in and speak for or 36 against the PIO. Yeah, Rob. 37 38 Mr. de Geus: I'd like to talk with the City Manager a little bit about next steps on this. I 39 think it's really good direction and good staff work. Big kudos to Daren and the ad hoc 40 committee. I expect there will be some resistance once we get out there. It's dedicated 41 spaces in parkland for dog parks. I think we should ... 42 Draft Minutes 29 DRAFT 1 Chair Lauing: There will, yeah. 2 3 Mr. de Geus: ... check-in with the City Council on this, particularly if it's in advance of 4 the full Master Plan coming forward, which will have a whole set of policies and 5 recommendations. We should do a check-in with the Council. I'm not sure exactly how 6 the City Manager would want to do that, but I'd be concerned if we just moved ahead and 7 started the public outreach and moved towards implementing these dog parks without a 8 check-in. 9 10 Chair Lauing: Right now, you have a study session planned for mid-May ... 11 12 Mr. de Geus: That'd be good timing. 13 14 Chair Lauing: ... for Council which would be ... 15 16 Mr. de Geus: Good timing. 17 18 Mr. Anderson: Sorry about that; I jumped the gun. 19 20 Chair Lauing: Not that I was reading your calendar or anything. 21 22 Mr. Anderson: I also wanted to acknowledge the ad hoc committee. Thank you so 23 much. This one's been weighing heavy on my shoulders for about 5 years. Just so 24 grateful for the great work the ad hoc committee did, really thoughtful analysis and 25 feedback and got this one across the line. Thank you. Good job. 26 27 Chair Lauing: That was a lot of parks to study. 28 29 Commissioner Hetterly: I just have one more question. In terms of moving forward once 30 we get clearance to move forward, which I hope will be fast—I want just to finish the 31 question before I forget it. I wonder if we could go out for the outreach and the PIO 32 process for both Pardee and Bowden simultaneously as opposed to sequentially. 33 34 Mr. Anderson: Good question. I'll have to look into that a little bit more, but possible. 35 36 Chair Lauing: Those are the ones that you had called out as needing further discussion? 37 38 Mr. Jensen: Yes. I will open it up for the Commission if they have any other questions 39 on the other revised policies. 40 41 Draft Minutes 30 DRAFT Chair Lauing: A couple of comments from the ad hoc, and other ad hoc members can 1 join in. Most importantly, we wanted to make sure that we didn't—I'm talking about the 2 whole policy document and not just ones we need further discussion on. We wanted to 3 make sure that it's all here; that everything is covered at least as a policy or a goal or a 4 program, to make sure we haven't missed anything. Secondly, if there are some that any 5 of you want to discuss at length, like we just did, or we think that we absolutely have to 6 hold on it because we need more research, then we should call that out as well. On the ad 7 hoc, we spent hours and hours and hours on this. I think it's quite fair to say that the 8 combination of staff and Commissioners couldn't come to a unanimous agreement on 9 each of these items that are set here for policy. Some of us think that they aren't all 10 policies, that they're programs. Some of us think that there's a lot of motherhood and 11 apple pie in some of the statements. Some of us think that some of the policies as stated 12 are actually ways to cooperate with your colleagues in other departments and all that. It's 13 all good stuff. What we, as an ad hoc, would like to get to tonight is if there are ones to 14 be called out for further discussion, that's fine. If there are ones that we've missed, that's 15 fine. Otherwise, we think we should hand it back to staff with all that input, and they 16 should just take it from here, and we just don't have to agree on all these policies and 17 programs as long as everything is there. If Jennifer or Keith want to add to that. 18 19 Commissioner Reckdahl: I concur. 20 21 Chair Lauing: With that, we'll go back to the other two agenda items. Are there specific 22 policies that we think need more chewing or that we've missed as long as we're looking 23 through them? 24 25 Commissioner Hetterly: I think there were two more that were highlighted in the packet. 26 One was Foothills Park and whether or not to expand access for nonresidents. There was 27 one about ... 28 29 Chair Lauing: I did see that one pop up again. 30 31 Commissioner Hetterly: ...designating park-like spaces as public spaces. I'm not sure I 32 quite understand what that's getting at. I'd like to understand that a little more before we 33 sign off on it counting as a policy. 34 35 Chair Lauing: Let's take that in order. You're on page 2 at the bottom, 1.J. That's been 36 moved to 1.J, explore options to expand access to Foothill Park for nonresidents. As an 37 ad hoc member, I asked for that to be taken off before, and it's back on here. I think that's 38 a project or an investigation. I don't see it as a policy to go look into something. I don't 39 see it as being appropriate. Other comments? 40 41 Draft Minutes 31 DRAFT Commissioner Reckdahl: I concur. I think it's a program. Certainly we can encourage 1 it; we can discourage it. I don't think it rises to the level of being a policy. 2 3 Commissioner Hetterly: I think whether it's a policy—whatever you call it, we shouldn't 4 do it. 5 6 Chair Lauing: You're sort of saying as a policy we shouldn't do it, is what you're saying. 7 8 Ms. O'Kane: Commissioner Hetterly, is it even with the language that leaves it to a 9 future decision, you're not comfortable with that because it says explore? 10 11 Commissioner Hetterly: I think it encourages moving in that direction, and I don't think 12 that's a direction that we've discussed as favorable. I certainly don't support that 13 direction. I don't know how everybody else feels about it. 14 15 Chair Lauing: That could come up as a separate agenda item for discussion at some 16 future Commission meeting. We could explore the pros and cons, and then it'd be 17 incorporated later as a policy recommendation or not. Is that what you're saying? I'm 18 just trying to summarize. 19 20 Commissioner Hetterly: I'm saying if staff wants to include something like this in the 21 Master Plan, then we should have a full discussion about whether we think that's the 22 direction we should go. If you don't, then the current policy is not to have a policy 23 encouraging that. We would just leave things as they are, and that would be fine with 24 me. 25 26 Chair Lauing: What was the other one that you noted? 27 28 Commissioner Hetterly: Designate park-like spaces at public facilities such as King 29 Plaza, City Hall, Secrete Garden, as public spaces to recognize their role in providing 30 space for recreation programming, informal park activities, and enhancements to public 31 health. 32 33 Chair Lauing: Where is that on the written document? I can't find it quickly. 34 35 Commissioner Hetterly: It's on the giant matrix. 36 37 Chair Lauing: No, no, on this. 38 39 Commissioner Hetterly: I don't have that. Yes, I do. It's Number 5.C. No, it's number—40 yeah it was the old Number 5. I don't know what number it is. It's on page 5; it's the 41 Draft Minutes 32 DRAFT third item down on page 5. It was once 5.A; it was once 5.C. I don't know what it 1 currently is. 2 3 Chair Lauing: It's deleted. 4 5 Commissioner Hetterly: Why is it on the ... I'm confused then, because it was on the 6 chart. 7 8 Chair Lauing: Is it in pink on the chart? 9 10 Commissioner Hetterly: Yeah. 11 12 Ms. O'Kane: This is one that staff—we had a lot of discussions on this as well and went 13 back and forth on it. I think what happened is in the document we deleted it and then we 14 continued to have the conversation and decided we needed to talk about it even more. 15 Peter, can you explain what this is getting at, this policy? 16 17 Mr. Jensen: The policy itself was to basically cite those open spaces that the City does 18 have, that are not currently parkland, and cite them that they are open space, and they are 19 used as parks. I think the debate that staff was having is that if we do denote these spaces 20 as parkland, any type of then renovation to them, especially for King Plaza which is 21 basically a green roof, would then require a Park Improvement Ordinance to reconstruct 22 it or whatever it was going to be in the future. Each of these spaces have a very specific 23 use already. They don't need to technically be deemed as parkland. They are going to be 24 mostly kept as they are. staff eliminated that to eliminate the future conflict of having to 25 have these as parkland and having to have a Park Improvement Ordinance then to 26 renovate them should things change in the future. They are (crosstalk). 27 28 Chair Lauing: Are you saying you're comfortable that it's deleted? 29 30 Mr. Jensen: Yes. 31 32 Chair Lauing: I think we are as well. I think a lot of our feedback was that as well. 33 34 Mr. Jensen: Staff is recommending that we do delete that. 35 36 Commissioner Hetterly: Thank you. 37 38 Commissioner Reckdahl: I don't want to go off on a tangent here, because we had 39 discussions about definitions of policies and stuff like this. Now, we're considering 40 programs. Are we looking at programs that are satisfying the goals or looking at 41 programs that are satisfying the policies or looking at programs that satisfy either one? 42 Draft Minutes 33 DRAFT 1 Ms. O'Kane: Programs would satisfy the policy. The hierarchy is the goal, and then a 2 policy, and then you could have a project or a program under the policy. 3 4 Commissioner Reckdahl: The reason I ask is—for example, on Goal 3, it says create 5 environments that encourage active and passive activities for health, wellness and social 6 connections. None of the policies address social connections at all. The areas of focus 7 talk about enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming. None of the policies 8 address those. If that's the case, if the hierarchy is that everything from the goal flows 9 into the policies, then we need additional policies under that goal. 10 11 Mr. de Geus: Projects and programs should support both policies and goals is the way I 12 see it. 13 14 Commissioner Reckdahl: If that's the point, we can design the programs to satisfy the 15 goals and/or the policies. The policies are just there to give us more flavor on what the 16 goal has. I have no problem with that. If we only are looking at the policies when we're 17 choosing programs, then we need to add more. 18 19 Mr. de Geus: I think the way to think about it is that we have goals, and we address those 20 goals by having specific policies and by having specific projects and programs that move 21 the goal. 22 23 Commissioner Reckdahl: As long as we're free to pick programs that satisfy the goal but 24 no policy, I'm happy. I have another comment about Goal 4. Is this good ... 25 26 Chair Lauing: Yeah, because we're doing anything that's missing. We're going to be 27 done with policies as of tonight. 28 29 Commissioner Reckdahl: This is really for Peter and Daren. Goal 4 which talks about 30 natural habitat, we don't have anything there about native plants. When we were doing 31 the Bol Park planting, Peter had a nice discussion about the importance of native plants, 32 because we have bugs and birds and all that need these native plants. If all we're worried 33 about is water consumption, we have all these nonnative, low-water plants. That may not 34 be consistent with the bugs and the animals around. That seemed to be a very compelling 35 reason to at least have a preference, not necessarily mandatory, but a preference for 36 native species. I think that would be worthwhile to put as a policy. We're not making it 37 mandatory; you can plant nonnative because we have a lot of competing issues in parks. 38 We should have a preference for native species. That's one thing. Do Peter and Daren 39 concur with that. 40 41 Draft Minutes 34 DRAFT Mr. Anderson: I do agree. I think that almost always the native plant typically is water 1 tolerant, drought tolerant. It's often the preferred one for that rationale too. Plus in all 2 our nurseries, the Acterra and Baylands one, that's all we grow, native plants. I 3 absolutely encourage the use of those as a preference. 4 5 Commissioner Reckdahl: The second one—Peter, do you want anything? Are you 6 happy? Also on Goal 4, we don't talk about wildlife at all. Wildlife is very important in 7 the parks and especially in the open space. I think we should have a policy on there. It 8 doesn't have to be anything great, but something that says we need to take care of the 9 wildlife or encourage wildlife or take care of the wildlife. (inaudible) That's the only 10 other issues. I'm done. 11 12 Chair Lauing: Go ahead. 13 14 Commissioner Cowie: I think actually both points that Keith raised here are noted in the 15 letter we got tonight. I think there's some other interesting points raised in here as well. I 16 thought they addressed both of those issues pretty well. Something to consider. 17 18 Chair Lauing; Did you have others, Keith? 19 20 Commissioner Reckdahl: No. 21 22 Commissioner Hetterly: I agree. I think that letter from the Sierra Club and the Audubon 23 Society—I support all of their recommended revisions. I think we ought to incorporate 24 those. Also, as I was thinking about this earlier for dog parks and for this, it made me 25 look back at the—I mean, for park acreage and for this—at that memo we wrote back in 26 September 2014 about the impacts of growth and development, the letter the Commission 27 sent to Council. I was looking back at the recommendations we had included that we 28 wanted them to consider as they were considering any plan for growth, that they were 29 committed to these types of things. They include not only increasing park fees and 30 building inventory and pursuing opportunities to build inventory, but also reliable and 31 sustainable mechanisms to address a growing gap in maintenance funding. I don't know 32 if we have anything—it seemed like our plan ought to do what we told them that they 33 should do. I'd like to look back at those and see if we can construct some policies that 34 achieve those goals. I can read them out loud for folks who probably don't have them in 35 front of them. That was one. Another was quality measures to monitor the health of our 36 parks and recreation facilities in the face of growing demand and use and to evaluate 37 services to rapidly growing and changing demographic groups. I think we do have—it 38 might have the latter in here, but I'm not sure if we had the first, how we keep track of 39 wear and tear. Maybe that's built into the maintenance piece. 40 41 Chair Lauing: I think it is. 42 Draft Minutes 35 DRAFT 1 Commissioner Hetterly: The last one was quality measures to monitor impacts on habitat 2 and ecosystems and conservation plans to preserve and protect them. We've got the 3 conservation plans in there, but I don't know that we've come up with any quality 4 measures to monitor impacts or if that's something that we could do in the context of this 5 Master Plan. I'd like staff's thoughts about it, and the Commission's as well. 6 7 Vice Chair Knopper: With regard to the conservation, I do agree with you that the 8 language—I just received the letter tonight from the Sierra Club and Audubon Society. I 9 do agree with including their language and their edits. I think any opportunity we have to 10 be extremely clear on that. What was the first point? I agreed with it, but I can't—there 11 were some ... 12 13 Commissioner Hetterly: Reliable and sustainable mechanisms to address gaps in 14 maintenance funding. 15 16 Vice Chair Knopper: Right. Thank you. That's nowhere in here, correct? 17 18 Chair Lauing: 6.C comes a little bit close to that. Review and update existing guidance 19 for development, ops and maintenance of parks. 20 21 Commissioner Hetterly: Which one—I see. 22 23 Chair Lauing: It doesn't say dollars, but that's implied. 24 25 Commissioner Hetterly: I'm not sure dollars is implied there at all. These are ... 26 27 Chair Lauing: That's what I said. No, I said it's not there. 28 29 Commissioner Hetterly: (crosstalk) I don't think they're even implied. I don't think they 30 come into play at all in 6.C. 31 32 Chair Lauing: If you're updating guidance for how to do maintenance in the parks and it 33 costs more, then I figured that was implied. 34 35 Commissioner Hetterly: I don't think that's implied. 36 37 Vice Chair Knopper: It says efficiently, so I suppose that implies that you would make 38 the appropriate cost decisions with regard to that particular point. 39 40 Commissioner Hetterly: I guess what I would look for then is staff's thinking on whether 41 there is something we could put in this plan that would make it easier for you to secure 42 Draft Minutes 36 DRAFT the funding necessary to keep up the maintenance necessary to meet the growing needs. 1 If there is, I would love for the Commission to be able to support it by putting it in the 2 Plan. 3 4 Ms. O'Kane: We can certainly take a look at it and come up with some language that 5 might satisfy the previous recommendation. The one on evaluating demographics, we 6 did add Policy 1.I that says periodically collect and evaluate data on the changing needs 7 of the community and adjust programs and plans accordingly. 8 9 Commissioner Hetterly: I think that does it. 10 11 Ms. O'Kane: For the measures to monitor impacts to wildlife and habitat, I don't 12 remember the exact language. I think the conservation plans, like you said, will help 13 achieve that. We'd have to really look at that. I'm not sure how we would collect that 14 data as part of the Master Plan, but we can talk about it and see if it's going to be 15 addressed in the conservation plans or if it's something that could be addressed here. 16 17 Commissioner Hetterly: Okay. 18 19 Ms. O'Kane: What was the other one? It was measuring something else. 20 21 Commissioner Hetterly: It was quality measures to monitor the health of our parks and 22 recreation facilities in the face of growing demand and use. I think what we had in mind 23 then was sort of keeping track over time are we wearing things out faster because of 24 greater use. It was figuring out how to measure that, so that we could tie it to cause and 25 effect. 26 27 Ms. O'Kane: We'll take a look at those. 28 29 Chair Lauing: Anything else on policies? One more. 30 31 Commissioner Reckdahl: I'm looking through—Commissioner Moss left me his notes. 32 I'm looking through it. He does note that Policies 5.E and 5.I are identical. We should 33 just delete one of them. Also, he was saying again this discussion of policies versus 34 programs. 6.I, he thought those would be programs and that we should have a higher 35 level policy that says we should cooperate with our neighbors and other people. These 36 would be programs under that. That's it. 37 38 Chair Lauing: I think it's a wrap. That was some collective work. Thank you, Peter. 39 40 Mr. Jensen: Thank you very much. 41 42 Draft Minutes 37 DRAFT Chair Lauing: Daren, Kristen. 1 2 V. COMMENTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS 3 4 Chair Lauing: The next item on the agenda is Comments and Announcements. I think 5 all you Commissioners have been getting comments. I just wanted to reinforce that the 6 financial disclosure is due on April 1st. For you new Commissioners, have a lot of fun 7 with that. For us old Commissioners, have a lot of fun with that. It's kind of a pain but 8 essential, and we all signed up for it. 9 10 Commissioner Hetterly: There's an ethics training coming up in April, the annual ethics 11 training. 12 13 Chair Lauing: One got postponed. 14 15 Commissioner Hetterly: That's the one. It was in March; it got postponed. (inaudible) 16 17 Chair Lauing: Yes, Council Member Filseth. 18 19 Council Member Filseth: I actually have one. It happens I'm also the Council liaison to 20 the Friends of the Junior Museum and Zoo. They want to make sure that everybody 21 knows that everybody here is invited to their launch tomorrow at 5:30. You must have 22 been deluged with emails by this already (inaudible). 23 24 Commissioner Hetterly: Could you speak up a little? 25 26 Council Member Filseth: The Friends of the Junior Museum and Zoo is having their 27 launch party for their proposed project tomorrow at 5:30. They want to make sure that 28 everybody on the Parks and Rec Commission is invited. 29 30 Chair Lauing: Other announcements from staff? 31 32 Rob de Geus: Just on that topic of the Junior Museum and Zoo and the Friends, we got a 33 staff review of the redesigned plans today actually. It moves considerably off the park 34 which, I think, you'll be very pleased to see. I hope you will be. They plan to come back 35 to the Commission next month. Excited to show you the updated plans. I think they've 36 done some really hard thinking about that. 37 38 Chair Lauing: On the next item of agendas, that was my first item, are they going to be 39 ready to come back next month. 40 41 Mr. de Geus: They are. They'll be ready. 42 Draft Minutes 38 DRAFT 1 Council Member Filseth: My understanding is that they're going to have posters about 2 that tomorrow. 3 4 Mr. de Geus: I also wanted to mention we had the Cubberley Community Day over the 5 weekend. Staff put a lot of work into it. I want to thank Commissioner Hetterly for 6 being there and participating and helping staff out with some visioning of the future of 7 Cubberley. Thank you. It was a very, very nice event. 8 9 Kristen O'Kane: Did you want to give an update on the golf course? 10 11 Mr. de Geus: You could probably do it better than I, to some extent. The golf course, we 12 do have some good news. It's starting to move along both on the flood control project 13 and the golf course. The flood control project has its permits. There's a meeting with 14 PG&E on the 24th, this week. The first step will be to move the PG&E line away from 15 where the new levee will be built. That will have further impacts to the golf course. The 16 golf course permits are moving along rapidly now. We've got some good news from Fish 17 and Wildlife and the Army Corps. We don't have our permits yet, but we're much, much 18 closer than we've ever been. There is even a possibility that we could be ready in the 19 summer to actually begin. 20 21 Chair Lauing: I've never heard you use those two words in one sentence, "golf course" 22 and "rapidly." The whole time we've been on this project. 23 24 Mr. de Geus: I hope I don't regret it. 25 26 Ms. O'Kane: I just have one announcement. For those of you who have teens in your 27 life, we are hiring for multiple summer positions, counselors, assistant site directors and a 28 site director and also some lifeguards. If anyone knows of any teens looking for a 29 summer job, they can go to cityofpaloalto.org and click on job opportunities. 30 31 Chair Lauing: What's the age range for that? 32 33 Ms. O'Kane: Fifteen and up. 34 35 Chair Lauing: Up to 19 because that's teens or ... 36 37 Mr. de Geus: We hire a lot of young adults too, if you're in college. 38 39 Chair Lauing: Peter. 40 41 Draft Minutes 39 DRAFT Peter Jensen: The community garden project is moving along very rapidly. By the end 1 of the week hopefully, we're done with 90 percent of the project. By the end of next 2 week, we'll be done with that. I did have discussion today. Megha, who presented earlier 3 for the Boardwalk, is also project manager for Bowden Park. She's helping me with that. 4 That should kick off at the end of next month, renovations to Bowden. 5 6 Commissioner Hetterly: I'd like to just make a quick comment unrelated. There was a 7 great article in the Weekly last week, I think, about the Bryant Street Garage Fund that the 8 City runs to fund grants to local teens, whatever idea they have, to promote a project. I 9 thought it was really phenomenal coverage and reflected fabulously on the City and 10 (inaudible). 11 12 Commissioner Reckdahl: Can we back up to the community gardens? We're retrofitting 13 which gardens? 14 15 Mr. Jensen: We retrofitted all three of the gardens actually, the Rinconada, Eleanor and 16 Johnson Park. Rinconada and Eleanor are completed except for some mulch in the 17 pathways that needs to be done. They are working on Johnson Park this week. We did 18 find that whoever did Johnson Park in the past did a very good job and plumbed it all 19 very well. I won't tell you how it's plumbed, because I don't want to incite people who 20 want to go out there and dig it all up. We're going to maintain it like it is. We did change 21 out all the hose bibs. We are going to update how the system is connected to the main 22 water source and add some more backflow protection, that and better drinking fountains 23 to offset basically the savings that we had to make that system better. All three of them 24 got upgraded. They're engineered now so if there's two or three people with water on, 25 then that person in the back corner should also be able to get water at the same time, 26 which is definitely a big bonus for that project. 27 28 Commissioner Reckdahl: What is the status of the community gardens down at—what's 29 the community center? Ventura. We are organizing that or they're still organizing that? 30 31 Daren Anderson: They're still managing and organizing it; however, they did adopt our 32 policies regarding community gardens. 33 34 Commissioner Reckdahl: Going forward, they're going to still do the management, but 35 they're just going to be following our policies? 36 37 Mr. Anderson: Yeah. 38 39 Chair Lauing: No other announcements? Let's move on to the tentative agenda for 40 April 26th. 41 42 Draft Minutes 40 DRAFT VI. TENTATIVE AGENDA FOR APRIL 26, 2016 MEETING 1 2 Chair Lauing: The zoo was first up. That's probable. Do we think we'll have any dog 3 park action coming back? That's only 4 weeks out. 4 5 Vice Chair Knopper: No. Leave Daren alone. Leave him alone. 6 7 Chair Lauing: Good point. I retract that question. Have a good night's sleep, Daren. I 8 just want to point out to the Commission that a number of you are signed up for various 9 ad hoc committees. If there's action to be done, please initiate that in your respective 10 committees. Let us know in advance if you want a specific report out in any subsequent, 11 upcoming meeting. Looks like dog parks might be done, for the two of you. Hooray. 12 Other agenda items so far? 13 14 Commissioner Hetterly: I think we'll be ready with website for next month. 15 16 Chair Lauing: Website, okay. 17 18 Commissioner Hetterly: As long as Catherine gets healthy soon. 19 20 Chair Lauing: Do you know of any other things? 21 22 Kristen O'Kane: We'll give an update on the Parks Master Plan, but we won't go into any 23 detailed discussion. 24 25 Chair Lauing: I think that's it, unless people have other things. 26 27 VII. ADJOURNMENT 28 29 Meeting adjourned on motion by Commissioner Hetterly and second by Vice Chair 30 Knopper at 9:58 p.m. 31 Draft Minutes 41 TO: PARKS AND RECREATION COMMISSION FROM: COMMUNITY SERVICES AND PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENTS DATE: 4/26/16 SUBJECT: UPDATE ON THE CONCEPTUAL PLANS FOR THE RE-BUILDING OF THE PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSUEM AND ZOO. RECOMMENDATION The Friends of the JMZ and CAW Architects are seeking a “Vote for Support” for the Alternate Design. BACKGROUND The Park and Recreation Commission reviewed designs for the Junior Museum & Zoo (JMZ) at two prior meetings, in February 2015 and July 2015. Staff and the design team has heard the comments from those meetings and made significant revisions to program and design. We believe that the design that we are presenting today successfully addresses your comments while still meeting the JMZ’s project goals. JMZ Mission Statement and Integration with Rinconada Park The Palo Alto Junior Museum & Zoo (JMZ) mission statement, “to engage a child’s curiosity for science and nature through hands-on inquiry-based activities and inspiring encounters with live animals,” directly aligns with the mission of the Palo Alto Community Services department “to engage individuals and families in creating a strong and healthy community through parks, recreation, social services, arts and sciences.” The JMZ is a treasured, local museum, zoo, and education center uniquely situated in Rinconada Park to serve Palo Alto families and children. The museum and zoo are a valued amenity and integral aspect of the visitor experience at Rinconada Park. With 150,000 annual visits, JMZ provides a strong start for children; JMZ is integral to Rinconada Park and the park is integral to the JMZ The Palo Alto Junior Museum & Zoo (JMZ) works closely with researches and professionals to provide a rich environment that stimulates children’s natural curiosity and creativity. The science of brain development is providing concrete evidence that there is real power in play. Research tells us that play motivates and enhances children’s cognitive and social-emotional growth. We also know that play-based learning environments are more effective than classroom, memorization-based, learning environments at teaching our children. The JMZ provides a strong start for learning in young children learning in eight ways. Each way works to leverage the unique assets that the JMZ offers to nurture the passion and skills for learning, promote seamless linkages between formal and informal learning, and engage children from low-income families so that they, too, can participate in the new learning landscape. 1. The JMZ increases the availability of high quality early learning experiences to all children. 2. The JMZ engages and supports families as their child's first teachers. 3. The JMZ supports the development of executive function and deeper learning skills in children through literacy and STEM-based experiences. 4. THE JMZ positions children for meeting expectations of the common-core state standards. 5. The JMZ adds capacity to early learning networks and improve student achievement. This year more than 19,000 children on the peninsula will benefit from JMZ science classes. 6. The JMZ creates seamless linkages across early learning and early grades. 7. The JMZ provides learning during the summer when many children are vulnerable to losing ground. 8. The JMZ builds community though a vast array of partnerships. Rinconada Park has been and will continue to be the best place to grow the JMZ because the location leverages the park, community center, scout facilities, children’s library, and art center to integrate indoor and outdoor experiences, live animals, and collections to provide a strong start for young children. JMZ Programs and Project Goals The current JMZ building (built in 1941) and zoo (built in the 1969) are not adequately sized or designed to accommodate the JMZ’s vibrant programs, current requirements to support living and non-living collections, expanding educational programs, and current accessibility or seismic code requirements. The goal of the proposed re-build project is to provide the JMZ with adequate storage and support space to meet standards for zoo accreditation, museum accreditation, and provide adequate storage and prep space for the on-site and off-site educational programs. In addition, the goal is to improve circulation to allow universal access for children with disabilities to all exhibits and areas of the facility, which requires considerably more space than allowed for in the existing facility. The re-build JMZ will better serve its current, local visitors and schools while still maintaining an intimate experience for children to explore science and nature. DISCUSSION Rinconada Park Long Range Plan and Existing Conditions The existing JMZ building is located in a complicated and constrained corner of the city owned parcel including Rinconada Park, the parking lot, the girl scout building and Lucie Stern community center. There are a number of existing site constraints as well as goals from the Rinconada Park Long Range Plan that our design team is striving to work within for the JMZ re-build project. The site constraints include an existing utility corridor that runs under the existing zoo, adjusting to appropriate property line setbacks (the existing building does not meet setback requirements), the Rinconada Park boundary line (currently the existing zoo sits in the park and museum outside of the park), and preserving a number of heritage and special specimen trees surrounding the existing facility. The Rinconada Park Long Range Plan outlines a number of goals for the shared area of the site surrounding the JMZ including maximizing parking stalls and clarifying circulation in the parking lot, creating a strong park arrival experience from Middlefield and Lucie Stern, and integrating the park visitors experience with the Zoo through art installations, educational features, and possibly views into the zoo. Previous PRC Presentations and Comments At the February 2015 PRC meeting, we presented a design and footprint for the new JMZ, which responded to the site constraints, zoning regulations, and included the program space requirements outlined by the JMZ staff and Friends of the JMZ. This design proposed to expand the zoo footprint as well as add a zoo support building in the park - totaling 11,000 SF expansions into parkland. While the commissioners were in support of the JMZ mission and the goals of this project, there were concerns about the reduction of park open space with the proposed zoo footprint. At the July 2015 PRC meeting, we presented three design alternates studying options for reducing the footprint in the park: zoo program and square footage reduction, moving the zoo support building to the park arrival area, increasing the building footprint along Middlefield. The comments received were that design alternate showing a 10% zoo program and square footage reduction still posed too large of an expansion into the park and the other two design alternates compromised parking and existing trees, which will be major issues with the community. The charge from the commissioners was to preserve parkland by minimizing zoo expansion and relocating the zoo support building out of parkland, preserve heritage and mature specimen trees, maintain the parking count per the long-range plan design. Program Reductions and Efficiencies Since the July 2015 PRC meeting, the design team along with the Friends and the JMZ Staff have worked to simultaneously reduce the construction budget, long term operational costs, and find efficiencies in the program space requirements. Through this process, we have reduced building program square footage by making the lobby an exterior space, creating efficient visitor and staff circulation, finding efficiencies in open office layouts, and relocating the zoo support building to be part of the main museum building. In the zoo, we have optimized the size and quantity of animal exhibits while creating an exciting vertical, multi-layer experience without large ramps (large space and cost requirements). These program efficiencies, reductions and creative thinking have opened up new possibilities for fitting the new JMZ building on this tight and complicated site. While we have lost some space and features in these reductions, the design team, Friends and JMZ Staff believe this revised design still meets the project goals to meet accreditation requirements and create an exciting new facility for the treasured Palo Alto JMZ. Proposed Design The proposed design addresses the previous PRC comments: • Minimize the zoo expansion in parkland • Move the zoo support building out of the parkland • Preserve the heritage and specimen trees as well as the two large mature shade trees in the parkland • Maintain increase parking stall count and clear vehicular circulation The proposed design removes the zoo support building from the park. Only the exterior, open-air zoo is located in the park - consistent with the existing zoo condition. The proposed design locates an exterior lobby for the JMZ under the large mature pecan tree taking advantage of this grand site feature while also locating exterior program area over the existing utility corridor. The zoo support building is located on the first floor of the main museum and education building (completely outside of parkland). The reduced program square footage and creative space layout creates a more efficient and dense building footprint (reduces long-term operational costs) and simplified building mass (reduces construction costs). The small classroom building with glassy butterfly exhibit on the second floor creates opportunities for shared park resources and free park visitor experiences. The proposed design creates an inviting park arrival area between the Girl Scout Building and the new classroom/butterfly building allowing the park experience to expand beyond its boundary: new trees, benches, signage, public art, and potentially a science/nature themed exhibit. The proposed design creates opportunities to activate and enrich both the zoo and park visitors experience along the edge between the zoo and the park. The zoo wall enclosure can be a sculptural, artistic, educational feature allowing the zoo experience to spill out into the park. POLICY IMPLICATIONS The proposed recommendations are consistent with Policy C-26 of the Community Services element of the Comprehensive Plan that encourages maintaining park facilities as safe and healthy community assets; and Policy C-22 that encourages new community facilities to ensure adaptability to the changing needs of the community. This project is subject to California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review. In January 2015, staff launched a joint environmental study for the Rinconada Park Long Range Master Plan and the Junior Museum and Zoo Project with the help of consultants David J Powers and Associates. The CEQA review includes preparation of technical studies to analyze exiting conditions and identify potential impacts, preparation of an Initial Study and the filing of a Mitigated Negative Declaration. Preparation of Technical Studies for the environmental review started in January of 2015 and to date we have completed reports for Air Quality, Arborist Assessment, and Noise Assessment. Two studies are nearly complete including an updating the Historic Evaluation Report and a Transportation Impact Report. Once these reports are completed, staff will prepare the Initial Study and the Mitigated Negative Declaration required for this project. By the end of June 2016 the CEQA analysis is expected to be complete. ATTACHMENTS Proposed site plans and elevations for the alternative concept design for the Junior Museum & Zoo. PREPARED BY John Aikin Community Services Senior Program Manager City of Palo Alto Cody Anderson Wasney Architects Palo Alto PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO PARKS & RECREATION COMMISSION MEETING DRAWING PACKAGE FOR APRIL 20, 2016 "You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation." - PLATO MISSION STATEMENT: To engage a child’s curiosity for science and nature by encouraging exploration to build a foundation for understanding and a lifelong respect for nature. STIMULATES CHILDREN’S NATURAL CURIOSITY & CREATIVITY NURTURE THE PASSION & SKILLS FOR LEARNING LEVERAGE RELATIONSHIPS WITHIN PARK C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. JMZ MISSION AND INTEGRATION WITH RICONADA PARK APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. JMZ MISSION AND INTEGRATION WITH RICONADA PARK APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO PA PRC MISSION STATEMENT The purpose of this Commission is to advise the City Council on matters pertaining to the activities of the Open Space and Parks Division and the Recreation and Golf Division (the two Divisions) of the Community Services Department, excluding daily administrative operations. C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN AND EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN AND EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO PA PRC MISSION STATEMENT The purpose of this Commission is to advise the City Council on matters pertaining to the activities of the Open Space and Parks Division and the Recreation and Golf Division (the two Divisions) of the Community Services Department, excluding daily administrative operations. GM WM BOL AD SSCO SSCO WM SSCO WM WM CATV AD SSCO AD SSCO AD AD AD AD AD AD AD GM WM EM GM WM WM GM WM WM WM AD AD PHONE EB EB EB MH EB EB EB EB EB EB EB SDCO SDCO BBQ N38°1 8 ' 0 0 " E 241.15' S51°4 2 ' 0 0 " E 800.58' N00° 0 9 ' 1 4 " E 210 .00 ' S89°57'00"E 100.98'N00 ° 4 5 ' 3 5 " E 11 .82' N86°55'00"E 143.62' N79°01'58"E 30.30' N86°13'31"E 91.27' S80°35'12"E 147.74' N89°47'18"W 1494.83' AD AD AD EBEB WVB EBEB E EB EB EBEB EB WVB BBQBBQBBQ BBQ EB EB 6' WOO D FENC E EXISTING JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO EXISTING ZOO WALTER HAYS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL LUCIE STERN COMMUNITY CENTER RINCONADA PARK EXISTING PARKING LOT GIRL SCOUT BUILDING HOPKINS AVENUE MI D D L E F I E L D R O A D KEL L O G G A V E N U E PARK BOUNDARY C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN AND EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN AND EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO EXISTING CONDITIONS: SITE PLAN C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO PA PRC MISSION STATEMENT The purpose of this Commission is to advise the City Council on matters pertaining to the activities of the Open Space and Parks Division and the Recreation and Golf Division (the two Divisions) of the Community Services Department, excluding daily administrative operations. C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN AND EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. RICONADA PARK LONG RANGE PLAN AND EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO EXISTING CONDITIONS: FACE TO PARK EXISTING CONDITIONS: ENTRY TO PARK C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. EXISTING CONDITIONS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO PROPOSED LOOSE IN THE ZOO WALTER HAYSELEMENTARY SCHOOLSCHOOLPARKING LOT UTILITY COORIDOR GIRLSCOUTBUILDING RINCONADAPARKCHILDREN PLAY AREA DROP-OFFSTAFFPARKING MI D D L E F I E L D R O A D GROUPPICNIC AREA ENTRYPLAZA PARKARRIVAL NEW SPECIMENTREE PROPOSED ZOOBUILDING SHARED TOTPLAY OLDERCHILDRENPLAY ADULTEXERCISE PROPOSED JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO WALTER HAYS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL RECONFIGURED PARKING LOT NET POSITIVE: 20 SPACES 120 SPACES TOTAL JULY 2015 DESIGN EXPANDED ZOO FOOTPRINT IN PARK ZOO SUPPORT BUILDING IN PARK MUSEUM & EDUCATION CENTER BUILDING MUSEUM & EDUCATION CENTER BUILDING C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PREVIOUS PRC MEETING SITE DIAGRAMS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO FEBRUARY 2015 DESIGN FEBRUARY DESIGN OUTLINEPARK BOUNDARY EXISTING MUSEUM AND ZOO ZOO (EXTERIOR) ZOO SUPPORT BUILDING ZOO (EXTERIOR) ZOO SUPPORT BUILDING 10% REDUCTION SINCE FEBRUARY SCHOOLPARKING LOT GIRLSCOUT BUILDING CHILDREN PLAY AREA RECONFIGURED PARKING LOT DROPOFF MI D D L E F I E L D R O A D NET POSITIVE: 20SPACES120 SPACES TOTAL GROUPPICNIC AREA SHARED TOTPLAY CHILDRENPLAY OPEN GREENSPACE O F F UTILITY COORIDOROUTDOOR ANIMALMANAGEMENT AREA ENTRYPLAZA PROPOSED LOOSE IN THE ZOO PARK ARRIVAL SERVICE ENTRY DAWN REDWOODCOURTYARD PROPOSEDMUSEUM & EDUCATIONBUILDING (2 LEVELS) EXTERIOR LOBBY CLASSROOM RINCONADAPARK ADULTEXERCISE WALTER HAYSELEMENTARY SCHOOL STAFF PARKING ZOOINTERACTIONZONE C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN DIAGRAM APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN DIAGRAM APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO APRIL 2016 PROPOSED DESIGN 50% REDUCTION SINCE FEBRUARY REMOVED ZOO SUPPORT BUILDING FROM PARKLAND EXPANDED ZOO FOOTPRINT IN PARK FEBRUARY DESIGN OUTLINEPARK BOUNDARY EXISTING MUSEUM AND ZOO ZOO (EXTERIOR) SCHOOLPARKING LOT UTILITY COORIDOR LUCIE STERN COMMUNITYCENTER GIRLSCOUT BUILDING CHILDRENPLAY AREA RECONFIGURED PARKING LOT DROPOFF MI D D L E F I E L D R O A D HOPKINS AVENUE NET POSITIVE: 20SPACES120 SPACES TOTAL GROUPPICNIC AREA KEL L O G AV E N U E SHARED TOTPLAY OLDERCHILDREN PLAY OPEN GREENSPACE B U S D R O P O F F UTILITY COORIDOROUTDOOR ANIMALMANAGEMENT AREA ENTRY PLAZA PROPOSED LOOSE IN THE ZOO PARKARRIVAL SERVICE ENTRY DAWN REDWOODCOURTYARD PROPOSED MUSEUM & EDUCATIONBUILDING(2 LEVELS) EXTERIOR LOBBY CLASSROOM RINCONADA PARK ADULTEXERCISE WALTER HAYS ELEMENTARYSCHOOL SHADEDGROUPPICNIC AREA GIRL SCOUTFIRE PIT SECONDARYENTRY STAFF PARKING ZOOINTERACTIONZONE C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC.PROPOSED SITE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM AND ZOO SCALE: 1" = 30'-0" N C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO SCHOOLPARKING LOT UTILITY COORIDOR LUCIE STERN COMMUNITYCENTER GIRLSCOUT BUILDING CHILDRENPLAY AREA RECONFIGURED PARKING LOT DROPOFF MI D D L E F I E L D R O A D HOPKINS AVENUE NET POSITIVE: 20SPACES120 SPACES TOTAL GROUPPICNIC AREA KEL L O G AV E N U E SHARED TOTPLAY OLDERCHILDREN PLAY OPEN GREENSPACE B U S D R O P O F F UTILITY COORIDOROUTDOOR ANIMALMANAGEMENT AREA ENTRY PLAZA PROPOSED LOOSE IN THE ZOO PARKARRIVAL SERVICE ENTRY DAWN REDWOODCOURTYARD PROPOSED MUSEUM & EDUCATIONBUILDING(2 LEVELS) EXTERIOR LOBBY CLASSROOM RINCONADA PARK ADULTEXERCISE WALTER HAYS ELEMENTARYSCHOOL SHADEDGROUPPICNIC AREA GIRL SCOUTFIRE PIT SECONDARYENTRY STAFF PARKING ZOOINTERACTIONZONE C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SITE PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO MAINTAINS INCREASE IN PARKING COUNT CLARIFIES VEHICULAR CIRCULATION AND DROP OFF ONLY EXTERIOR SPACES IN PARKLAND PROTECTS HERITAGE & MATURE TREES FEATURES SPECIAL SPECIMEN TREES NO BUILDINGS IN PARKLAND ZOO INTERACTION ZONE MAINTAINS INCREASE IN PARKING COUNT ENT R A N C E LO B B Y ENTRY TO'UNDER' ANIMALEXHIBIT ANIMALEXHIBIT ANIMALEXHIBIT ANIMALEXHIBIT ANIMALEXHIBIT TEA C H E R PR E P COL L E C T I O N STO R A G E CLIM A T E CON T R O L E D STOR A G E COL L E C T I O N S HU B 1,54 0 SF 200 SF SHO P 840 SF SHO P OF F I C E 115 SFGEN E R A L STO R A G E 115 SF JAN.CLOS. FAMILYRR STAIR UP EXPERIMENTEXHIBITS1,700 SF FEATUREEXHIBIT400 SF FREIGHTELEVATOR EXIT STA I R CLASSROOM1000 SF CRRESTROOM TICKETING ANDRECEPTION ENTRYLOBBY 230 SF GUESTSTORAGE100 SF QUEUING CONTROLPOINT PECANTREE ENTRYLOBBY LOW SCREEN WALL NET T E D EN C L O S U R E CANOPYABOVE SE V I C E EN T R Y LOOSE IN THE ZOO 12,725 SF TREEHOUSEABOVE ZOO ANIMALMANAGEMENTAREAEXTERIOR3,285 SF EXISTINGBOBCATEXHIBIT UP SER V I C E COR R I D O R INTERACTIONZONE RAINBOWBRIDGE POND SAND &SOIL ANIMALEXHIBIT INTERACTIVEEXHIBIT INTERACTIV E ART WALL INTERACTIVE ART WALL STUMPMAZE VIE W S TO Z O O SOCIALLAB150 SF 280 SF CANOPYABOVE DAWNREDWOODTREE DAWNREDWOODCOURTYARD ANIM A L PR O G R A M RO O M FOO D PR E P HER P ZO N E ANIM A L CON T R O L #2 ANIM A L CON T R O L #1 2,50 0 SF WOR K AR E A DRY STO R A G E QUA R A N T I N E LARG E AN I M A L ENC L O S U R E S 150 SF 200 SF 8'X10 ' 122 SF 82 SF 150 SF 55 SF 8'X10 ' 8'X10 ' 8'X10 ' 10'X 1 0 ' CAR R I E R S SML & M ANIM A L ENC L O S U R E S STO R A G E BUIL D I N G SU P P O R T 100 SF 250 SF OPE N OF F I C E EDU C A T O R S OPE N OF F I C E ADM I N AN D FR I E N D S STA F F OF F I C E S 2,20 0 SF CON F . ROO M CA S H RM STA F F BRE A K ROO M 150 SF SMA L L CON F . 100 SF COP Y ROO M 125 SF BABYSPACE200 SF LOW FE N C E ZOORESTROOM TE A C H I N G KIT C H E N BU I L D I N G SU P P O R T GE N E R A L ST O R A G E MEN'SRESTROOM WOMEN'SRESTROOM STAFFR.R. STAFFR.R. VESTIBULE STOR .SMA L L CON F . 100 SF SCHOOL PARKING LOT UTILITY COORIDOR RECONFIGUREDPARKING LOT DROP-OFF SHAREDTOT PLAY RINCONADA PARKOPEN GREEN SPACE BU S D R O P O F F UTILITY COORIDOR ENTRY PLAZA PARK ARRIVAL DAWN REDWOODCOURTYARD WALTER HAYSELEMENTARY SCHOOL EXT E R I O R SE R V I C E CO O R I D O R ZOO INTERACTIVE ZONE C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. FIRST FLOOR PLAN APRIL 6, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM AND ZOON SCALE: 1/16" = 1'-0" C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - FIRST FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - FIRST FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - FIRST FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - FIRST FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - FIRST FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. ALTERNATE DESIGN OPTION - SECOND FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. ALTERNATE DESIGN OPTION - SECOND FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SECOND FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SECOND FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN - SECOND FLOOR PLAN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. SECOND FLOOR PLAN APRIL 6, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM AND ZOON SCALE: 1/16" = 1'-0" OPEN TO BELOW DN EXIT STA I R DN STAIR TEMPORARYEXHIBIT1100 SF FREIGHTELEVATOR SCIENCESTUDIO500 SF VIE W S TO FE A T U R E EX H I B I T B E L O W OUTDOORCLASSROOM COVERED800 SF BUTTERFLYEXHIBIT 750 SF BATEXHIBIT 440 SF DOUBLECONTAINMENT250 SF CA N O P Y WA L K ZOO'UP' VIE W S T O Z O O BE L O W TREE FORT DN LOO S E - I N - T H E - Z O O ENC L O S U R E AB O V E LOOSE IN THE ZOOROOF OVERLOBBY BELOW ROOF BELOWNON-ACCESSIBLE ELEV.MACHINE100 SF CLASSROOM1000 SF RES T ROO M ZOO SUP P O R T ANTI-ROOM144 SF BRIDGE BRID G E MECH.ENCLOSURE(EXTERIOR) SCHOOL PARKING LOT UTILITY COORIDOR RECONFIGUREDPARKING LOT DROP-OFF SHAREDTOT PLAY RINCONADA PARKOPEN GREEN SPACE BU S D R O P O F F UTILITY COORIDOR ENTRY PLAZA PARK ARRIVAL DAWN REDWOODCOURTYARD WALTER HAYSELEMENTARY SCHOOL EXT E R I O R SE R V I C E CO O R I D O R ZOO INTERACTIVE ZONE C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2014 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. PROPOSED DESIGN APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO GATEWAY INTO RINCONADA PARK DAWN REDWOOD TREE FEATURED IN COURTYARD ONE STORY MASS ALONG MIDDLE- FIELD ROAD BUTTERFLY EXHIBIT ON DISPLAY FOR PARK VISITORS EXTERIOR LOBBY UNDER PECAN TREE FEATURE EXHIBIT ON DISPLAY FOR PARK VISITORS C A W A R C H I T E C T S . C O M 6 5 0 . 3 2 8 . 1 8 1 8 Copyright © 2015 by CODY ANDERSON WASNEY ARCHITECTS, INC. DESIGN OPTION - MODEL VIEWS IN PROGRESS APRIL 20, 2016 PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO PLANNING AND COMMUNITY ENVIRONMENT DEPARTMENT MEMORANDUM TO: Parks and Recreation Commission FROM: Shahla Yazdy DEPARTMENT: Transportation AGENDA DATE: April 26, 2016 SUBJECT: Quarry Road Improvements and Transit Center Access Project RECOMMENDATION Staff requests that the Parks and Recreation Commission provide feedback on the proposed conceptual design for the Quarry Road Improvements and Transit Center Access Project’s pathway connection plan. BACKGROUND The August 2011 Development Agreement between Stanford Hospital and Clinics, the Lucile Salter Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford, the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University and the City of Palo Alto obligated the City to design and construct enhancements of various pedestrian and bicycle connections between the Palo Alto Intermodal Transit Center and the Stanford University Medical Campus (SUMC). Stanford provided funds for these projects. Specifically, the agreement called for: 1) Improvements to Enhance the Pedestrian and Bicycle Connection from the Palo Alto Intermodal Transit Center to the existing intersection at El Camino Real and Quarry Road, including development of an attractive, landscaped passive park/green space with a clearly marked and lighted pedestrian pathway, benches and flower borders; and 2) Improvements to and within the public right of way to enhance the pedestrian and bicycle connection from the west side of El Camino Real to Welch Road, including way finding, wider bicycle lanes, as necessary on Quarry Road, enhanced transit nodes for bus and/or shuttle stops, and prominent bicycle facilities. DISCUSSION Staff has been working with design consultant, Siegfried Engineering, to develop the proposed concept plan (Attachment A) for the connection from the intersection of Quarry Road and El Camino Real and the Transit Center. The purpose of the project in this area is to provide safe, clear, and directly connected pathway system for travel by both bicyclists and pedestrians from the transit center to Quarry Road. The park area is a connection point between the crosswalk at El Camino Real and Quarry Road, El Camino Park, University Circle, and the Transit Center. The existing asphalt pathway consists of blind corners sharp turns, inadequate wayfinding signage, lack of transitional space, and an unsafe interface between bicyclists and pedestrians at the El Camino Real/Quarry Road intersection crosswalk. The proposed design consists of a Class 1, 8 foot wide striped asphalt bike path with 2 foot decomposed granite fines paths on both sides, for a total width of 12 feet (Per Highway Design Manual Figure 1003.1A). The alignment of the path provides a smooth and direct transition between the existing El Camino Park bike path, the crosswalk area, and the direct connection to the Transit Center. The proposed bike path is also consistent with the recently completed bike path at El Camino Park. The proposed alignment generally follows the criteria set forth in the Highway Design Manual Chapter 1000 for Bicycle Transportation Design, 2015 Edition. The proposed pathway provides for minimum centerline radius of 40 feet which corresponds to a design speed of approximately 12.5 mph. The desired minimum speed for a Class 1 bike path is 20 mph, however this is not achievable given the site constraints, therefore the path will be signed appropriately to limit bike speeds to 10 mph. In order to achieve an unrestricted 20 mph design speed in accordance with Table 1003.1 and Section 1003.1 (10), the minimum radius would need to be 90 feet, and the path would need to take a much more circuitous route and it would have to mitigate the numerous obstructions on the project site. In addition the proposed path alignment eliminates the existing sharp turn in the current alignment that has a roughly 15 foot centerline radius with horizontal obstructions that restrict the line of sight around the curve. In accordance with Figure 1003.1D the proposed alignment maintains a minimum horizontal distance from the center of the lane of 8.7 feet, which corresponds to the 40 foot minimum radius utilized. In short, the pathway successfully increases the design speed while taking a route that avoids the existing Oak tree grove, power poles, guy anchors, SFPUC Utility obstructions, and various sightline obstructions, all while taking advantage of the existing open space area. All visibility and pavement markings will be in accordance with MUTCD, Section 9C101 (CA). Bicyclists and pedestrians are provided new highly visible wayfinding signage at key transition nodes to help them navigate to their desired destinations. To address the tendency for pedestrians to take the shortest distance between two points, pedestrians are provided a separate 4 foot wide decomposed granite fines path connection to the crosswalk with proper visibility. The entire pathway system is to be lit by LED pathway lights to at least minimum safety standards in accordance with the Highway Design Manual Section 1003.1 (18). The fixtures will match the recently installed park light fixtures and poles. Landscape planting will be used sparingly due to maintenance concerns yet when installed it will be installed with the goal of improving the aesthetics at the street frontage and pathway intersections. The plant material will be harmonious and compatible with the newly installed plants located at the adjacent El Camino Park. The plants will be drought tolerant and irrigated with a drip system. The layout will be low accent shrubs and groundcovers. The views into the area and along the path will be clear. The remainder of the area to be covered with a 4” thick recycled mulch layer. Timeline The tentative project timeline, subject to change, is as follows: • ARB Board Review/Approval – May/June 2016 • Parks and Recreation Commission Recommendation/PIO – May/June 2016 (The Commission makes a recommendation to Council to approve a PIO) • Council Concept Plan Approval/PIO – June 20, 2016 • Final Design and Construction Document Completion – June 2016 • Council Approval of Construction Contract – Late Summer 2016 • Construction Completion– Spring 2017 NEXT STEPS Staff will go to City Council on June 20, 2016 for the PIO and to present the conceptual plans with feedback from PABAC, Parks and Recreation Commission and the Architectural Review Board. ATTACHMENTS • A–Park Concept Plan Prepared by: Shahla Yazdy Project Engineer, Transportation OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH OH O H OH OH O H OH OH O H OH E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E OH OH OH E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E T E L E FO R C O N T I N U A T I O N S E E L O W E R R I G H T FO R C O N T I N U A T I O N S E E U P P E R R I G H T EN D I M P R O V E M E N T S City of Palo Alto City Project Number PL-16000 Know what's R ARB 5 SITE & PAVING PLAN EL CAMINO PARK / TRANSIT CENTER CLASS 1 BIKE PATH 8'-0" Wide asphalt path, two-way traffic, centerline striped, 2'-0" wide clear shoulders each side. DECOMPOSED GRANITE PEDESTRIAN PATH 4'-0" Wide decomposed granite fines with stabilizer. Pedestrian connection to crosswalk. EXISTING DECOMPOSED GRANITE PATH Existing El Camino Park pedestrian path adjacent to and Connected to proposed improvements. EXISTING TREES Existing trees to remain and be protected during construction. LANDSCAPE ACCENT PLANTING Areas to be planted with low, drought tolerant plant material. Intersection and wayfinding signage accent. See planting plan ARB 13 for more details. BIKE PATH DECOMPOSED GRANITE SHOULDER 2'-0" wide pedestrian shoulder edge with d.g. and stabilizer. Redwood header installed. Unobstructed clearance. PATH SECURITY LIGHTS (9) 14' high light fixture. Pole with railroad strap smooth mount to match El Camino Park lights. CONCRETE SIDEWALK Sidewalk replacement area at bike path connection & bench pads. PALO ALTO TRANSIT CENTER EXISTING PARKING LOT EXISTING REDWOODS EL CAMINO PARK EXISTING AC PATH TO BE REMOVED See Demolition Plan ARB 4. BENCH 6 foot long backless bench. Product to match benches installed at El Camino Park. DUMOR 103-60PL 6' bench or equal. Recycled plastic Redwood color. Black powder coated frame. Embedment Installation on concrete pad. BARK MULCH Recycled chip mulch. 4" thick layer minimum. Landscape areas within the project site to receive City-supplied recycled chipped bark mulch. WAYFINDING SIGNAGE LOCATIONS (4) See ARB 9 for more details. ATTACHMENT ‘A’ DRAFT POLICIES Overview The project team has also been working on developing policies that will give overarching direction to City staff and the PRC, and will also provide a foundation for the projects and programs that will be included in the Master Plan. A cross-departmental work session was convened on January 25, 2015 to review and provide feedback on the draft policies. This document provides each of the six goals, accompanied by the relevant areas of focus and policies. The goals are numbered 1 through 6. Under each goal, the policies are numbered for reference (1.A, 1.B, 1.C, etc). The definition of a policy is a course or principle of action that provides clear guidance regarding recreation program provision, park maintenance and operations or future renovations and capital improvement needs for parks, trails, open space and recreation facilities. Goal 1: Provide high-quality facilities and services that are accessible, affordable, inclusive and distributed equitably across Palo Alto. Areas of Focus Distributing park and recreation activities and experiences across the city Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities Exploring new types of programs, classes, events and activities for all ages and abilities Policies 1.A Emphasize equity and affordability in the provision of programs and services and the facilitation of partnerships, to create recreation opportunities that: o Advance skills, build community and improve the quality of life among participants, especially Palo Alto youth and teens; and o Are available at a wide range of facilities, at an increased number of locations that are well distributed throughout the city. 1.B Use National Recreation and Park Association Standards as guidelines for locating and developing new parks. These guidelines are as follows: Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 2 • Neighborhood parks should be at least two acres in size, although sites as small as one-half acre may be needed as supplementary facilities. The maximum service area should be one-half mile. Two acres of neighborhood parkland should be provided for each 1,000 people. • District parks should be at least five acres in size. The maximum service area should be one mile. Two acres of district parkland should be provided for each 1,000 people. 1.C Ensure the maximum distance between residents’ homes and the nearest public park or preserve is ½-mile, ¼-mile preferred, that is evaluated using a walkshed methodology based on how people travel. 1.D Adopt the wayfinding signage used at Rinconada Park as the standard for Palo Alto parks and provide standardized directory signs for all large parks, preserves and athletic field complexes. 1.E Apply universal design principles as the preferred guidance for design solutions in parks, striving to exceed Americans with Disabilities Act requirements. 1.F Continue to apply the Field and Tennis Court Brokering and Use Policy as well as the Gymnasium Use Policy (as well as any subsequent updates) to guide the allocation of these recreation facilities with a preference for youth and Palo Alto residents. 1.G Encourage walking and biking as a way of getting to and from parks, supporting implementation of the Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan. 1.H Incorporate diversity in projects and programs to encourage and enhance citizen participation. 1.I Increase volunteerism by creating and promoting opportunities for youth and adults to participate in parks, recreation, open space events, projects and programs.. 1.J Periodically collect and evaluate data on the changing needs of the community and adjust programs and plans accordingly. 1.K . Goal 2: Enhance the capacity, quality and variety of uses of the existing system of parks, recreation and open space facilities and services. Areas of Focus Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community Enhancing capacity and quality of sports fields Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks Improving spaces and increased options for off-leash dogs Policies 2.A Sustain the community’s investment in recreation facilities. . 2.B Provide opportunities for creative expression in park and recreation facilities and programs. 2.C Design and maintain high quality turf fields with adequate time for resting to support maximum use in parks by multiple organized sports and casual users with areas large enough for practice or play. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 3 2.D Actively pursue adding dedicated, fenced dog parks in multiple neighborhoods, equitably distributed between north and south Palo Alto. The size of the dog parks will vary, but should strive to be at least .25 acres. Dog parks should not be placed in Open Space Preserves. 2.E Actively pursue adding park restrooms in parks that are approximately two acres or larger, have amenities that encourage visitors to stay in the park, have high level of use, and where there are no nearby public restrooms available. Goal 3: Create environments that encourage active and passive activities to support health, wellness and social connections. Areas of Focus Enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs Policies 3.A Implement the City’s Healthy City Healthy Community resolution with the community’s involvement. 3.B Incorporate artistic expression into park design and recreation programming (consistent with the Art Master Plan). 3.C Require that proposed privately owned public spaces that are provided in lieu of park fees meet Palo Alto design guidelines and standards for publicly owned parks, allow public access, and are designed to support self-directed exercise and fitness, incorporate natural ecosystem elements and comply with the policies of the Urban Forest Master Plan. Goal 4: Protect natural habitat and integrate nature, natural ecosystems and ecological principles throughout Palo Alto. Areas of Focus Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks Policies 4.A Connect people to nature and the outdoors through education and recreation programming. 4.B Connect natural areas, open spaces and vegetated areas in parks and on public land to create wildlife, bird, pollinator and habitat corridors by planting with native oaks and other species that support pollinators or provide high habitat values. 4.C Prioritize development of comprehensive conservation plans for Baylands Preserve, Foothills Park, Esther Clark and Pearson-Arastradero Preserve to identify strategies to balance ecosystem preservation, passive recreation, and environmental education. 4.D Support regional efforts to control the spread of invasive species and plant pathogens. 4.E Promote, expand and protect habitat and natural areas in parks. 4.F Identify and pursue strategies and opportunities to expand native trees and planting areas in urban parks. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 4 4.G Integrate and implement the Urban Forest Master Plan Policies and Programs as applicable to parkland in Palo Alto. 4.H In Natural Open Space, focus on development and activities that are compatible with the protection of nature. Goal 5: Develop innovative programs, services and strategies for expanding the system. Areas of Focus Expanding the system Offering more of the existing programs, classes, events Policies 5.A Identify and pursue strategies to activate underused parks and Recreation facilities 5.B Support innovation in recreation programming and park features and amenities. 5.C Expand the overall parks system through repurposing public land, partnering with other organizations for shared land, incorporating public park spaces on parking decks and rooftops and other creative means to help address shortages of available land. 5.D Explore and experiment with parklets and other temporary park spaces for both long and short-term uses. 5.E Encourage new parks and identified neighborhood needs as part of the Development Agreement process for new residential and commercial developments. 5.F Enhance partnerships and collaborations with Palo Alto Unified School District and Stanford University to support access and joint use of facilities where appropriate for effective delivery of services and programs. 5.G Pursue other/private funding sources for recreation programming, capital improvement projects and facility maintenance. 5.H Partner with Mid-peninsula Regional Open Space District and other land conservation groups to expand access to open space through new acquisitions and improved connections. 5.I Encourage new parks and identified neighborhood needs as part of the development agreement process. Goal 6: Manage Palo Alto’s land and services effectively, efficiently and sustainably utilizing quantitative and qualitative measures. Policies 6.A Continue to implement the Cost Recovery Policy for recreation programs, refining the cost figures and expectations using the most current information available. 6.B Limit the exclusive use of Palo Alto parks (booking an entire park site) for events by outside organizations that are closed to the general public. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 5 6.C Periodically review and update existing guidance for development, operations, and maintenance of Palo Alto’s Parks, Trails, Natural Open Spaces, and Recreation system based on the best practices in the industry and this Master Plan, including: o Park Rules and Regulations; o Open Space Policy & Procedure Handbook; o City of Palo Alto Landscape Standards; and o Tree Technical Manual. 6.D Incorporate sustainable best practices in the maintenance, management, and development of open spaces, parks, and recreation facilities where consistent with ecological best practices. 6.E Continue with the Integrated Pest Management (“IPM”) policy as written. While some parks may be managed as “pesticide free” on a demonstration basis, IPM should continue to be Palo Alto’s approach, grounded in the Best Available Science on pest prevention and management. 6.F Strategically reduce maintenance requirements at parks, open spaces, natural preserves and community centers while maintaining Palo Alto’s high quality standards. 6.G Continue to coordinate with and/or use other relevant City plans, including: o Urban Forest Master Plan; o Urban Water Master Plan; o Long-term electric acquisition plan (LEAP); o Water Reclamation Master Plan; o Recycled Water Project; o Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan o Comprehensive Plan; and o Others adopted in the future. 6.H Continue to involve other relevant City departments and divisions in planning, design and programming, drawing on the unique and specialized skills and perspectives of: o The Palo Alto Art Center; o Library, including Children’s Library; o Junior Museum and Zoo; o Children’s Theatre; o Public Art; o Transportation; o Urban Forestry; o Planning; and o Public Works. 6.I Participate in and support implementation of regional plans related to parks, recreation, natural open space and trails, such as: o 2014 Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District Vision; o Clean Bay Pollution Prevention Plan; and o Land Use Near Streams in Santa Clara County. 6.J Develop a proactive Asset Management Program for infrastructure requirements and costs. ATTACHMENT ‘A’ DRAFT POLICIES Overview The project team has also been working on developing policies that will give overarching direction to City staff and the PRC, and will also provide a foundation for the projects and programs that will be included in the Master Plan. A cross-departmental work session was convened on January 25, 2015 to review and provide feedback on the draft policies. This document provides each of the six goals, accompanied by the relevant areas of focus and policies. The goals are numbered 1 through 6. Under each goal, the policies are numbered for reference (1.A, 1.B, 1.C, etc). The definition of a policy is a course or principle of action that provides clear guidance regarding recreation program provision, park maintenance and operations or future renovations and capital improvement needs for parks, trails, open space and recreation facilities. Goal 1: Provide high-quality facilities and services that are accessible, affordable, inclusive and distributed equitably across Palo Alto. Areas of Focus Distributing park and recreation activities and experiences across the city Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities Exploring new types of programs, classes, events and activities for all ages and abilities Policies 1.A Emphasize equity and affordability in the provision of programs and services and the facilitation of partnerships, to create recreation opportunities that: o Advance skills, build community and improve the quality of life among participants, especially Palo Alto youth and teens; and o Are available at a wide range of facilities, at an increased number of locations that are well distributed throughout the city. 1.B Use National Recreation and Park Association Standards as guidelines for locating and developing new parks. These guidelines are as follows: Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 2 • Neighborhood parks should be at least two acres in size, although sites as small as one-half acre may be needed as supplementary facilities. The maximum service area should be one-half mile. Two acres of neighborhood parkland should be provided for each 1,000 people. • District parks should be at least five acres in size. The maximum service area should be one mile. Two acres of district parkland should be provided for each 1,000 people. 1.B Retain the standard of five acres of park land per 1,000 residents for developed parks and follow best practices for measuring service levels. This standard does not include developed or undeveloped open spaces. 1.C Ensure the maximum distance between residents’ homes and the nearest public park or preserve is ½-mile, ¼-mile preferred, that is evaluated using a walkshed methodology based on how people travel. 1.D Adopt the wayfinding signage used at Rinconada Park as the standard for Palo Alto parks and provide standardized directory signs for all large parks, preserves and athletic field complexes. 1.E Apply universal design principles as the preferred guidance for design solutions in parks, striving to exceed Americans with Disabilities Act requirements. 1.F Continue to apply the Field and Tennis Court Brokering and Use Policy as well as the Gymnasium Use Policy (as well as any subsequent updates) to guide the allocation of these recreation facilities with a preference for youth and Palo Alto residents. 1.G Encourage walking and biking as a way of getting to and from parks, supporting implementation of the Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan. 1.H Incorporate diversity in projects and programs to encourage and enhance citizen participation. 1.I Increase volunteerism by creating and promoting opportunities for youth and adults to participate in parks, recreation, open space events, projects and programs.. 1.J Periodically collect and evaluate data on the changing needs of the community and adjust programs and plans accordingly. 1.K Explore options to expand access to Foothill Park for non-residents. Goal 2: Enhance the capacity, quality and variety of uses of the existing system of parks, recreation and open space facilities and services. Areas of Focus Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community Enhancing capacity and quality of sports fields Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks Improving spaces and increased options for off-leash dogs Policies 2.A Sustain the community’s investment in recreation facilities. . 2.B Provide opportunities for creative expression in park and recreation facilities and programs. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 3 2.C Design and maintain high quality turf fields with adequate time for resting to support maximum use in parks by multiple organized sports and casual users with areas large enough for practice or play. Invest in tournament-quality high-wear sports field turf (see Natural vs. Synthetic Turf Analysis) at designated sports fields used full time for sports where lighting is possible. Policy Direction Needed: Should the policy be written to encourage more synthetic turf, to retain existing synthetic turf and replace it, to exclude synthetic turf, or to consider it on a case-by-case basis? 2.D Actively pursue adding dedicated, fenced dog parks in multiple neighborhoods, equitably distributed between north and south Palo Alto. The size of the dog parks will vary, but should strive to be at least .25 acres. Dog parks should not be placed in Open Space Preserves. 2.C2.E Actively pursue adding park restrooms in parks that are approximately two acres or larger, have amenities that encourage visitors to stay in the park, have high level of use, and where there are no nearby public restrooms available. Goal 3: Create environments that encourage active and passive activities to support health, wellness and social connections. Areas of Focus Enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs Policies 3.A Implement the City’s Healthy City Healthy Community resolution with the community’s involvement. 3.B Incorporate artistic expression into park design and recreation programming (consistent with the Art Master Plan). 3.C Require that proposed privately owned public spaces that are provided in lieu of park fees meet Palo Alto design guidelines and standards for publicly owned parks, allow public access, and are designed to support self-directed exercise and fitness, incorporate natural ecosystem elements and comply with the policies of the Urban Forest Master Plan. Goal 4: Protect natural habitat and integrate nature, natural ecosystems and ecological principles throughout Palo Alto. Areas of Focus Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks Policies 4.A Incorporate nature into recreation programs to connect youth and adults to the outdoors and introduce outdoor skills Connect people to nature and the outdoors through education and recreation programming. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 4 4.B Connect natural areas, open spaces and contiguous vegetated areas in parks and on public land as to create wildlife, bird, pollinator and habitat corridors by planting with native oaks and other species that support pollinators or provide high habitat values. 4.C Prioritize development of comprehensive conservation plans for Baylands Preserve, Foothills Park, Esther Clark and Pearson-Arastradero Preserve to identify strategies to balance ecosystem preservation, passive recreation, and environmental education. 4.D Support regional efforts to control the spread of invasive species and plant pathogens. 4.E Promote, expand and protect habitat and natural areas in parks. 4.F Identify and pursue strategies and opportunities to expand native trees and planting areas in urban parks. 4.G Integrate and implement the Urban Forest Master Plan Policies and Programs as applicable to parkland in Palo Alto. 4.E4.H In Natural Open Space, focus on development and activities that are compatible with the protection of nature. Goal 5: Develop innovative programs, services and strategies for expanding the system. Areas of Focus Expanding the system Offering more of the existing programs, classes, events Policies 5.A Identify and pursue strategies to activate underused parks and Recreation facilities 5.B Support innovation in recreation programming and park features and amenities. 5.C Expand the overall parks system through repurposing public land, partnering with other organizations for shared land, incorporating public park spaces on parking decks and rooftops and other creative means to help address shortages of available land. 5.D Explore and experiment with parklets and other temporary park spaces for both long and short-term uses. 5.E Encourage new parks and identified neighborhood needs as part of the Development Agreement process for new residential and commercial developments. 5.F Enhance partnerships and collaborations with Palo Alto Unified School District and Stanford University to support access and joint use of facilities where appropriate for effective delivery of services and programs. 5.G Pursue other/private funding sources for recreation programming, capital improvement projects and facility maintenance. 5.H Partner with Mid-peninsula Regional Open Space District and other land conservation groups to expand access to open space through new acquisitions and improved connections. 5.I Encourage new parks and identified neighborhood needs as part of the development agreement process. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 5 Goal 6: Manage Palo Alto’s land and services effectively, efficiently and sustainably utilizing quantitative and qualitative measures. Policies 6.A Continue to implement the Cost Recovery Policy for recreation programs, refining the cost figures and expectations using the most current information available. 6.B Limit the exclusive use of Palo Alto parks (booking an entire park site) for events by outside organizations that are closed to the general public. 6.C Periodically review and update existing guidance for development, operations, and maintenance of Palo Alto’s Parks, Trails, Natural Open Spaces, and Recreation system based on the best practices in the industry and this Master Plan, including: o Park Rules and Regulations; o Open Space Policy & Procedure Handbook; o City of Palo Alto Landscape Standards; and o Tree Technical Manual. 6.D Incorporate sustainable best practices in the maintenance, management, and development of open spaces, parks, and recreation facilities where consistent with ecological best practices. 6.E Continue with the Integrated Pest Management (“IPM”) policy as written. While some parks may be managed as “pesticide free” on a demonstration basis, IPM should continue to be Palo Alto’s approach, grounded in the Best Available Science on pest prevention and management. 6.F Strategically reduce maintenance requirements at parks, open spaces, natural preserves and community centers while maintaining Palo Alto’s high quality standards. 6.G Continue to coordinate with and/or use other relevant City plans, including: o Urban Forest Master Plan; o Urban Water Master Plan; o Long-term electric acquisition plan (LEAP); o Water Reclamation Master Plan; o Recycled Water Project; o Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan o Comprehensive Plan; and o Others adopted in the future. 6.H Continue to involve other relevant City departments and divisions in planning, design and programming, drawing on the unique and specialized skills and perspectives of: o The Palo Alto Art Center; o Library, including Children’s Library; o Junior Museum and Zoo; o Children’s Theatre; o Public Art; o Transportation; o Urban Forestry; o Planning; and o Public Works. Draft Master Plan Goals and Policies 6 6.I Participate in and support implementation of regional plans related to parks, recreation, natural open space and trails, such as: o 2014 Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District Vision; o Clean Bay Pollution Prevention Plan; and o Land Use Near Streams in Santa Clara County. 6.J Develop a proactive Asset Management Program for infrastructure requirements and costs. 1 ATTACHMENT ‘B’ COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION SURVEY CHALLENGE SUMMARY Introduction The City of Palo Alto has been actively working on the Parks, Trails, Natural Open Space and Recreation Master Plan (Parks Master Plan) for over a year, developing a strong understanding of the desires of the community, the strengths of the system and opportunities to improve on the already highly valued park system. Over the course of the project, the planning team has collected and analyzed a large volume of data and public input about Palo Alto's park, trails, natural open space and recreation system. The project team and the Park and Recreation Commission worked together to filter down the ideas and possibilities identified for the entire system into a set of “areas of focus” for enhancement. Each of these “areas of focus” captures a theme from the public input and system analysis, representing a direction for the ultimate plan. To obtain community input on how to prioritize the enhancements, the project team implemented an online interactive exercise called the “Community Prioritization Challenge” from August 28th, 2015 to February 15th, 2016. This online exercise was supplemented by an in- person workshop held on February 11th, 2016. The objective of the prioritization challenge was to elicit community input on how much emphasis to put on each of the areas in relation to one another, setting the relative priority of the projects and programs included in the Parks Master Plan. This summary reports the organization and results of the exercise as well as the workshop. Description of the Exercise The project team and the Park and Recreation Commission have been using a three-element breakdown of the system for clarity. These elements were also used to organize the information in the prioritization exercise: Parks, Trails and Natural Open Spaces: The public parks, trails and natural open COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 2 spaces, ranging from small neighborhood parks to urban plazas to the city’s expansive preserves. Recreation Facilities: The places and buildings or other structures that are the setting for programs, classes, sports, events and other formal or informal activities. Recreation Programs: The programs, classes and special events coordinated by Recreation Services and partner organizations. For this exercise, the areas of focus were broken down by the three elements of the plan. In some cases, an area of focus appears in more than one element, reflecting the multi-objective nature of this plan. The online exercise walked participants through the areas of focus under each element and also gave them an opportunity to prioritize across all twelve. The twelve areas of focus are presented below, both as a full list and organized by element as they were in the exercise. Areas of Focus Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community Improving spaces and increased options for off-leash dogs Enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming Distributing park activities and experiences across the city Expanding the system Enhancing capacity and quality of sports fields Explore new types of programs, classes, events and activities for all ages and abilities Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks Offering more of existing programs, classes, events Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities Areas of Focus by Element Parks, Trails and Natural Open Spaces Enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks Distributing park activities and experiences across the city Expanding the system Improving spaces and increased options for off-leash dogs Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities Recreation Facilities Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 3 Enhancing capacity and quality of sports fields Distributing park and recreation activities and experiences across the city Improving spaces and increased options for off-leash dogs Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities Recreation Programs Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community Explore new types of programs, classes, events and activities for all ages and abilities Offering more of existing programs, classes, events Distributing park and recreation activities and experiences across the city Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities In the first part of the exercise respondents were asked to indicate their priorities for each of the elements by allocating their $5 budget across the areas of focus. Any amount, or none at all, could be allocated to an area of focus as long as the total for all of them did not exceed $5. This process was repeated for each element. The second part of the exercise followed the same process but allowed each respondent to allocate a $10 budget across the full list of 12 areas of focus. This provided an opportunity to highlight the areas they see as most important across the entire system. The screen capture to the right is an example of the allocation process. At the conclusion of the online exercise, respondents could add any additional thoughts or comments for the planning team to consider. These open-ended comments are included in an appendix. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 4 COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 5 About the Respondents At the close, 731 respondents substantially completed the online survey (by answering each question at least partially). The majority of respondents reported living in Palo Alto (83%), with 6.3% living in a nearby community. Almost one-third reported working in Palo Alto (31%). A total of 6.6% of the respondents own a business in the City. Around 1% of the respondents described themselves as visitors. Data Analysis and Key Findings The response data was reviewed for errors and outliers, with a check for multiple or duplicate responses based on IP addresses and time stamps. An average level of investment for each area of focus, in each question was calculated based on the total number of respondents who completed the exercise. The data was also summarized for the number of responses up to each whole dollar, for example 83 respondents allocated between $1 and $2 to “distributing park activities and experiences across the city” in the first element. This breakdown allows a visualization of the distribution of responses. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 6 Part 1: By Element Tables summarizing the average responses and the visualization of the distribution of responses are provided below for each element. Findings from the planning team are presented following the tables and charts. Table 1: Budget allocation (out of $5) for areas of focus in the Parks, Natural Open Space and Trails Element - Average $ Allocated: The average budget ($ amount) that respondents are willing to invest in the particular area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $2+: Percentage of respondents who chose to invest more than $2 out of $5 in an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $0: Percentage of respondents who chose not to invest any amount to an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. Figure 1: % of respondents classified in intervals (by $ amount they allocated) for areas of focus in the Parks, Natural Open Space and Trails Element Rank Area of Focus Average $ Allocated Percentage of $2+Percentage of $0 1 Enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming $0.96 25%43% 2 Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks $0.82 22%48% 3 Distributing park activities and experiences across the city $0.77 19%51% 4 Expanding the system $0.70 17%57% 5 Improving spaces and increased options for off- leash dogs $0.68 18%66% 6 Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks $0.65 15%58% 7 Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities $0.40 6%68% COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 7 Table 2: Budget allocation (out of $5) for areas of focus in the Recreation Facilities Element - Average $ Allocated: The average budget ($ amount) that respondents are willing to invest in the particular area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $2+: Percentage of respondents who chose to invest more than $2 out of $5 in an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $0: Percentage of respondents who chose not to invest any amount to an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. Figure 2: % of Respondents classified in intervals (by $ amount they allocated) for areas of focus in the Recreation Facilities Element Rank Area of Focus Average $ Allocated Percentage of $2+Percentage of $0 1 Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community $1.17 34%37% 2 Enhancing capacity and quality of sports fields $0.81 22%55% 3 Distributing park and recreation activities and experiences across the city $0.69 14%54% 4 Improving spaces and increased options for off- leash dogs $0.68 17%67% 5 Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks $0.65 14%54% 6 Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs $0.58 12%62% 7 Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities $0.41 7%69% COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 8 Table 3: Budget allocation (out of $5) for areas of focus in the Recreation Programs Element - Average $ Allocated: The average budget ($ amount) that respondents are willing to invest in the particular area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $2+: Percentage of respondents who chose to invest more than $2 out of $5 in an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $0: Percentage of respondents who chose not to invest any amount to an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. Figure 3: % of Respondents classified in intervals (by $ amount they allocated) for areas of focus in the Recreation Programs Element Rank Area of Focus Average $ Allocated Percentage of $2+Percentage of $0 1 Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community $1.40 37%31% 2 Explore new types of programs, classes, events and activities for all ages and abilities $0.89 22%42% 3 Offering more of existing programs, classes, events $0.76 20%51% 4 Distributing park and recreation activities and experiences across the city $0.74 17%54% 5 Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs $0.71 14%54% 6 Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities $0.47 10%67% COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 9 Overall, each “area of focus” received some investment from respondents. This indicates that participants overall felt all of these areas of focus are relevant directions for the final plan. “Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community” appeared under two elements: recreation facilities and recreation programs. Both times, respondents allocated a high average amount to improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across Palo Alto (nearly 3 to 3.5 times higher than the lowest ranked area of focus in that particular element). In addition to the high level of support, this could also reflect a recognition by respondents of the high costs involved in community center improvements, relative to other potential “areas of focus”. “Exploring new programs, classes and events” was allocated more resources than “expanding existing recreation programming”, indicating a preference for new recreation options. In general, the top areas of focus (ranked according to average $ allocated) under each element usually received a higher percentage of respondents choosing to invest more than $2. Likewise, a higher percentage of respondents chose not to invest any funding in the lowest ranked areas of focus in each element. The exception to this pattern is “improving spaces and increased options for off-leash dogs”, which had a relatively smaller number of respondents allocated a larger amount of funding. “Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities” received the lowest average allocation of funding in all three elements. The definition of accessibility here includes both access across the community and removing barriers to access for people with different abilities. This lower investment could reflect some satisfaction with the distribution or availability of parks and facilities across the community. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 10 Part 2: All Areas of Focus Presented below are the results of the final portion of the exercise where each respondent was asked to allocate $10 across all 12 of the areas of focus. Findings from the planning team are presented following the table and charts. Figure 4a: % of Respondents classified in intervals (by $ amount they allocated) for top six overall areas of focus for investment Figure 4b: % of Respondents classified in intervals (by $ amount they allocated) for bottom six overall areas of focus for investment COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 11 Table 4: Budget allocation (out of $10) for all areas of focus in all three elements - Average $ Allocated: The average budget ($ amount) that respondents are willing to invest in the particular area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $2+: Percentage of respondents who chose to invest more than $2 out of $10 in an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. - Percentage of $0: Percentage of respondents who chose not to invest any amount to an area of focus within this element of the Master Plan. In general, the top responses in the full ranked list matched the top responses by element. “Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks” received the highest level of funding in the overall ranking, compared to ranking second when respondents prioritized “areas of focus” within the parks, natural open space and trails element A relatively smaller percentage of respondents chose to invest heavily (14% invested more than $2 out of their $10 budget) to “improving spaces and increase options for off- leash dogs” “Enhancing the quality and capacity of sport fields” ranked number 7 overall, and also received relatively large investments from a smaller group of respondents. 50% or more of respondents allocated at least some funding to “integrating nature into Palo Alto parks”, “improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community” and “enhancing comfort and making spaces more inviting”. “Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities” and “increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs” ranked the lowest in overall budget allocated by respondents. Rank Area of Focus Average $ Allocated Percentage of $2+Percentage of $0 1 Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks $1.08 13%50% 2 Improving and enhancing community center and recreation spaces across the community $1.06 11%47% 3 Improving spaces and increased options for off- leash dogs $1.05 14%66% 4 Enhancing comfort and making parks more welcoming $0.99 11%50% 5 Distributing park activities and experiences across the city $0.95 11%54% 6 Expanding the system $0.95 12%60% 7 Enhancing capacity and quality of sports fields $0.84 9%61% 8 Explore new types of programs, classes, events and activities for all ages and abilities $0.66 4%56% 9 Increasing the variety of things to do in existing parks $0.64 5%63% 10 Offering more of existing programs, classes, events $0.55 4%64% 11 Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks $0.48 3%68% 12 Improving the accessibility of the full range of park and recreation opportunities $0.45 3%71% COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 12 Open Ended Comments At the conclusion of the online exercise, participants were given the opportunity to provide any additional comments. 330 participants provided comments. The table below indicates the number of comments referencing topics that have been discussed throughout this planning process. These counts represent the number of comments that contained key words associated with the topic and indicate only how often they were mentioned, not if the commenter was supportive or critical. The complete set of comments is appended to this summary. Topic Key Words Number of Comments Off-Leash Dog Areas Dog, off-leash, leash 56 Trails, Walking, Biking Trail, bike, bicycle, walk, connection 55 Programming Program, activity, class, event 48 Sports Sport, baseball, soccer, athletic, field 46 Pool Pool, swim 33 Restrooms Restroom, toilet, bathroom 33 Nature Nature, habitat, environment, animals, plants 31 Tennis Tennis 27 Maintenance Maintenance, upkeep 8 Golf Golf 5 COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE SUMMARY 13 Prioritization Workshop Results City staff hosted an in-person workshop as a follow-up to the online Community Prioritization Challenge. This workshop was lightly attended (5 participants representing different recreation interest groups) but included a rich conversation about priorities. The online exercise was mirrored by a display board with all 12 areas of focus, on which each participant was asked to place sticky dots to indicate preferred investments. Each participant was given five dots to distribute across the areas of focus. This group added an additional option to the list while discussing the exercise. “Maintenance of what we have vs new capital investments with long term consequences” is the final line in the image of the results, provided below. 1 COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE APPENDIX A: OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS This appendix accompanies the full summary of the Community Prioritization Challenge, an online exercise contributing to the development of Palo Alto’s Parks, Trails, Natural Open Space and Recreation Master Plan. Of the 731 respondents, 319 took the opportunity to add open- ended comments at the end of the exercise. The summary includes an analysis of the number of mentions of key words related to high-priority topics in the planning process. This appendix includes the full text of the comments as provided. (1) I'd highly encourage the City to consider supporting Palo Alto specific non-profit organizations highly discounted rates for their meetings/events. (2) Green space exploration and eco-modeling opportunities for the youth and opportunities for training them using City Park and Rec Master Plans is HIGHLY beneficial for raising our kids as eco-aware citizens. 60% of Palo Alto owns dogs. dog runs in parks are TOO SMALL and often unhealthy for those of us who have therapy dogs we take to our local hospitals, Veterans, and senior centers. Palo Alto parks are under-utilized for a good part of the day yet Animal Services feels it important to hide behind bushes to give tickets; not very community minded, why does 40% of population feel it is so important to eliminate dogs from our wonderful parks? dog runs, to repeat, are too small and not clean. dogs need the opportunity to frolic off leash; happy, healthy dogs make excellent Community volunteers for those who are infirm. If Menlo Park can welcome the contribution dogs make to human lives by opening Parks to off-leash times, why can't Palo Alto? After all Palo Alto is supposed to be the epicenter of the Universe (1) Memorial trees and groves: Work with staff to develop policy. (2) Arastradero Road, upper part: Shade with oaks; close on weekends. (3) Foothills Park: - Test a nonresident weekday pass for cars (revenue generator). - Open park to all bicyclists from any direction any day. - Pursue a Bike/Ped trail easement from the main valley to Los Trancos Road in Portola Valley. (1) Reopen the snack bar at Rinconada pool to serve pool and park patrons year round. The old snack bar had two windows; one facing the pool picnic tables and one facing the outside of the pool area by the entrance/exit gate. (2) Install permanent sand volleyball courts at Rinconada and Mitchell Park. (1) Please improve the public swimming options. Rinconada is so heavily used by swim teams, there are very few hours that kids can actually have a fun free-swim. (2) Please improve the off-leash dog park situation and then please start enforcing the off-leash COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 2 dogs at grade schools. There are so many dogs running around at the schools that it is often uncomfortable for kids to play there. The owners always complain they have nowhere to take their dogs to run around. Please develop something for dog-owners (which I am not) and then enforce the rules that exist. (1) Expand bike trails to connect open spaces, parks, recreation facilities to all neighborhoods. (2) Open Gunn HS pool to the public for lap swim at designated times (Or add a community center/pool to Baron Park like Greenmeadow, Eichler, Rinconada, etc.). Move old McArthur Park bldg. to the Orchard in Baron Park, and create community center. (3) Offer dog training and certification with a 'voice control' dog tag, then make it possible to walk certified dogs off leash in open spaces. (4) Preserve more open space now and in the future. With the extreme 'over building' of Palo Alto, open space has never been more important. A minor detail. Don't waste money on yet another set of signs identifying the parks. The last set was a poor downgrade from the one before. Add bathrooms to every existing park. People will either use facilities or "nature"! Add restrooms and trash cans and maintain a daily schedule to clean restrooms and empty trash. Encourage citizens to report through the Palo Alto 311 App. Additional lighting (towards back of park), Picnic Tables, and better landscaping would be great for parklet at Hale and Palo Alto Ave. enjoy the Par Course -mini stations with suggested exercises at the Charleston slough, would like to see more else All great ideas, thanks! All of my money would go to improving and maintaining the golf course. This is a project delayed and poorly managed thus far. Get on with it. Allow dogs off leash in foothills park Areas near East Palo Alto need better lighting/security for kids to have activities there. Focus on cost effective high yield projects (e.g. turf Mayfield fields seem very well used all the time) rather than high cost low usage (e.g. batting cages at C) As a dog lover and hiker I would love to see a large area for dogs to enjoy the freedom and socialization of roaming free. I visited such a dog park in Ithaca and saw the behavior of many dogs exploring a 4-5-acre territory, interacting with one another and getting lots of exercise. The new Mountain View dog park is like a prison exercise yard; Mitchell park is somewhat better. The best places for dogs in this area involve traveling to Redwood City or across to Milpitas. Though the Milpitas dog park is smaller than I would like it is well maintained in a nice spot as part of an urban park with natural surroundings. I suggest such a place could be established in the new park land at Byxbee. I would also happily take my dogs to Arastradero or Foothills park if such an area could be provided there. As a dog-owner who is respectful of keeping dogs on leash, I do not like seeing other dog owners who do not obey this law and let their dogs off leash. A way to help alleviate this issue is by offering more dog parks. It would also be nice to offer big-dog and small- dog areas. As a Stanford resident, I would like to be able to register for regular classes and summer classes as a Palo Alto resident. By the time registration for non-residents opens, all the COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 3 good offerings are filled and our children, who attend a PAUSD school, cannot be with their friends. Also a comment regarding dogs in parks/playgrounds: There need to be more visible signs and reminders of which areas are for children only, dogs only and for both, and also of leash laws. Too commonly, dogs are off-leash and wander onto playgrounds while their owners stand by. As a stay at home mom with little kids I would love to see nice bathrooms at all of the parks. It would also be wonderful if Rinconada pool was updated/enlarged a bit and open longer throughout the year! As an English major with advanced degrees, I say, too much verbiage and repetition in this presentation -- try to be more succinct! As more schools are built, it is important to keep the recreation facilities in Palo Alto. Tennis courts and fields for a variety of sports is essential. As part of trying new activities, some cities, recently Menlo Park, have or are putting in bicycle pump tracks. This type of track takes up little space and is a great activity for all ages. Better to have these than kids digging up illegal ones. Also I would like to see is more indoor recreation for kids. I remember growing up as a kid being able to go to the local rec center on rainy days and late evenings. I don't know of any nearby. Menlo Park had one. As the parks are updated, they should be updated with accessibility in mind. Now that Olenka has proven that the Magical Bridge Playground draws children and adults of all abilities this should be built into the future for all parks. I don't think that extra needs to be expended to take these needs into consideration. Bathroom facilities and safety should be a top priority. Playing fields are a shortage around the city and is an issue so I would like to see Palo Alto create more parks and green space for our growing density. I also feel that Palo Alto is not utilizing our existing Open Space well and can offer a wider set of programs to draw people to use these areas more. As there are more children with special needs (especially autism) growing up to be adults, there are no programs in which Palo Alto offers classes or recreation programs for them. I really enjoy seeing the Magical Bridge playground, but there needs to be more recreational classes or vocational programs or day programs for these adult children. Please refer to City of San Jose Therapeutic Services, City of Santa Clara Therapeutic programs, and City of Sunnyvale too. There needs to be something in Palo Alto, not just high functioning adults, but also for lower functioning adults too. please help them. bathrooms bathroom bathrooms. Community spaces available a low cost to any groups are imperative more and better bike paths to parks and good bike locks, especially for trailers & cargo bikes (the modern minivan to move kids) Be nice to have more residents only facilities like Foothill Park. Better bbq's. Take a look at some of the newer parks in San Jose and Fremont. At the Happy Hollow location in San Jose and the Always Dream Park in Fremont they have large bbq's where you can cook for larger parties. That'd be great to see at all parks. Also more restrooms at parks that don't currently have them. I think parks would be more utilized knowing there's a restroom available. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 4 Better walking, running and biking routes that connect to parks, schools and work locations throughout city. Bike safety and accessibility is extremely important to me. Also, having a park in every neighborhood. For us, Seale Park and Hoover Park are the closest but inconvenient and out-of-date. There should be a green space in Midtown near the Walgreens area, south of Middlefield. By enhancing comfort at existing parks, I meant adding bathrooms where there are none (e.g. Johnson Park). I didn't see that on the description. Close the golf course and turn it into a super park. Add a Magic Playground somewhere else. At any given time, I walk by, from mid- morning until sunset, there are 50-120 people using it. That is a real community creator. Maybe use the relic golf course for another one, bigger, more spread out, with naturey type of things, too. Collaborate with the PAUSD to develop a multi-use shared space at Cubberley. Together with Mitchel Park, the Charleston Shopping area and Cubberly this part of town will anchor South Palo Alto. The area can be a truly exciting part of Palo Alto. Encourage the school district to be creative. How can we share this space well? Completely car-free bike lines connecting areas of interest across the city would be fantastic. Our shared roads are a good start, but with kids cycling and inattentive drivers, it would be wonderful if safer options were available. Concentrate on few things instead of trying to do too many things. Make what you have more valuable by enhancing and connecting instead of starting brand new things or parks Concentrate on what you have but look at all the parks as a system, including how do I bike/walk across parks. Make parks a destination. Don't spread resources too thin. Always better off to do a few things well vs. Doing many poorly. Connecting bike trails would be wonderful! Cubberley Community Center is a gem that needs to be preserved. I have lived in this area for about 14 years and one of the biggest assets for our community is the Cubberley Community Center and sports facilities. I started out at Cubberley taking my son to one of the fantastic preschools that reside inside Cubberley and as a new resident I was pleasantly surprised by the wide variety of businesses and services available. As the years went by, I continually made use of the many wonderful facilities at Cubberley whether it was the Friends of Palo Alto Library book sales, artists open studios, classes on composting, concerts at the Auditorium, tennis on the courts or summer basketball camp for my sons. It goes on and on!! Please make investments in Cubberley! Currently, our once-lovely Pearson-Arastradero Preserve (what a joke of a name!) is destroyed by over use. Please allocate money and resources to figuring out how to save this preserve. Maybe it is better managed as a PARK...designed for heavy usage like Stanford has done with the dish trails. The Arastradero trails are a mess, the owls and foxes are gone (too many people around). My preference is to manage it for nature as a PRESERVE which means you must keep the numbers of people way down. Maybe have a count gate that does not let any more people in after a specific count has COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 5 been reached. Maybe get rid of the destructive uses like biking and horse-back riding. But other ideas are asphalt the trails, make it illegal to step off of the asphalted trails, and increase ranger presence to enforce the rules. Whatever you do, SAVE its beauty from the current destruction. In addition, keep our Foothills Park pristine and quiet and peaceful with LOW USAGE. Definitely, do not open it up to the public. If you want to make money from it by letting the public see it, then manage it like Jasper Ridge; you sell tickets at $20 per person so that non-residents can ride a Palo Alto shuttle from the Palo Alto community center to Foothills Park (NO CARS IN THE PARK) and participate in a ranger-lead or docent-led walking tour. Dog owners are disproportionately owners as opposed to renters in Palo Alto, but are extremely underserved compared to other members of the public when it comes to accessing public space. In particular, almost all off-leash use is illegal in schools and parks. I would like to see (1) more and larger fenced and grassy areas for dogs; (2) off- leash recreation allowed at school playgrounds and at parks for dogs under effective voice control during specific hours (with paid clean-up afterward, if necessary); (3) dogs that are not under voice control and that are not good with other dogs legally allowed to run in fenced areas such as tennis courts during certain hours. Beyond this, my priorities are to have functional water (for people and animals) available at all parks and to have working and safe bathrooms available at larger parks. After that, better lighting along edges of parks so it is safe to walk near them at night. After that, more facilities to serve people of all ages, for both indoor and outdoor activities." Dos should not be a priority, especially not off leash. Each PA community garden is planting stands of milkweed (monarch migration stations). I would like to see milkweed areas in each park with signage about the monarch butterfly migration and how everyone needs to plant milkweed in their own gardens to restore the diminished monarch numbers. Eleanor Park. Please mark the recycling/trash containers appropriately. The colors don't mean enough to anyone. They should have multi-lingual signs indicating what can/can't be placed in them. Pleaser re-install the porta-potties in Eleanor Park. Enforce drug use and smoking inside and just around our parks. I am with my child at Boulware park on a daily basis. I can't recall the last time I haven't seen someone smoking (cigs or a joint) on the park grounds, or immediately off the grounds. Not sure why this seems to be the park to come out and smoke pot, but it is, and it is unfortunate that this is happening when there are kids around. Enforce leash laws for dogs!!! Maintain fields. The JLS athletic fields are uneven and puddle terribly. Expand and save open spaces before they all disappear, especially with all the tall buildings the city is allowing. Keep parks in natural biologic communities as much as is practical. Enforce leash laws in parks, particularly Heritage Park. Also either renovate or remove the empty and decaying building next to the park. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 6 Every neighborhood needs a place for runners to run away from traffic and off hard concrete and asphalt which damage ligaments, cartilage of knees and backs. Secundino Robles has a DGranite track, can all parks offer this? Next survey with dollar amounts, make it $10 across all sets - it is so much easier to allocate based on percent that way! Everyone needs more access to nature. Not structured, class-like activity, but restful, exploratory, discovery kind of access. And exercise is critical for all age groups. Expanding the park system and having off-leash dog play areas available throughout the city would be the two most important items. Finances should be used to increase capacity. Palo Alto is a growing city, and capacity increase is getting more impossible with time. Let other organizations spend money on programs, and make the capacity available to them. Make sure the money is spent proportionately with the number of prospective users. Foothills is wonderful, if you can get in! How about loosening restrictions on use so that more people can enjoy it? I live and work on the Stanford campus but our children go to PAUSD schools and the majority of our sales taxes go to Palo Alto but we cannot enjoy this park. free Wifi at the parks Hard choices. Especially in poor areas, experiences in nature - with good guidance - is hugely important. Also important to be inclusive of everyone - economic level, ability, location. Have MROSD take over Foothills Park Have off leash dog hours at parks (maybe for a minimal annual fee). improve sports facilities/fields. have A LOT more trails and bike paths. Greenbelts where dogs are also welcome. GET THE BIKERS OFF ALMA! It is just a lack of not knowing that Br Helping an important preschool like Casa dei Bambini find a permanent location within one of the larger existing parks. We are after all what also s Palo alto be an attractive locale for talent with families. The gauging of rents by the greedy will eventually create a total absence of quality childcare. The only ones that will be able to remain will be the powerhouses, Bing, and parochial/religious. Diminishing the preschool educational options for families will make our City unrecognizable from the progressive and community oriented roots of the near past. I lived in Palo alto and my children were raised in Palo Alto until they went to College. My parents live in MP and we have our school in PA for 25 yrs.! High quality dog parks needed. More parks in Ventura and Barron Park Neighborhoods Thank you. Hoover Park is getting better but still needs work. The dog park is so smelly. No one ever comes to clean it or put a new surface down. I've stopped going because I leave smelling urine (on myself and my dog). The exercise equipment desperately needs an update. MOST IMPORTANTLY: For the last three years, the City has told me that they would be inserting a cross walk on Middlefield to entrance of the park (at keys schools/church - Sutter). It is so so dangerous to see parents and children crossing with all the traffic. I have seen a lot of very scary situations. This, above all, needs to be addressed ASAP. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 7 I agree that the parks etc. need to be updated in Palo Alto. The aim should be to improve, update and encourage more resident usage for all age groups. Evening programs would be a good idea. Concerts, food truck events, free Zumba type classes, etc. movie events. ... Encouraging residents to walk or ride bikes is good too. Progressive events might be fun on a summer day for example. Good luck. It's a great use of public energy and finances. I always have to travel across the city or to the other side of the tracks to participate in any activities or use services. I want classes/activities that are offered in nearby parks or schools. I am a member of the Palo Alto Tennis Club. I enjoy playing mixed doubles tennis on Sunday mornings in Rinconada Park. The tennis courts are in need of repair in some areas. I have met some interesting people and hope this activity will continue to be available. I feel strongly that tennis courts and tennis activity should be a high priority in Palo Alto. I live in Palo Alto. I am a working mom of three tween teen boys. This city needs more safe activities for teens to do unsupervised in the evenings and on the weekend days. We need inside and outside game centers (ping pong, pool, foos ball. Outdoors) that are lit and have other things to do. The Mitchell Park library area is well used at finals, but it's not enough. Indoor art centers, builder centers, even places with puzzles and indoor gyms. If we don't provide safe activities, parties with drugs, drinking and hook ups are the alternative to a boring time at home. I am so tired of owners having dogs off leash all over the city - especially close to kid playgrounds. Everything thinks their dog is fine/safe. Dogs run up to kids on the playground or even just in the fields where the kids are playing next to the playground. It is infuriating and nothing seems to be done about it. I suppose more off-leash space is needed but I don't want to see it right next to our kid’s playgrounds. I love dogs but dog owners have really made me dislike most of the ones I have come into contact with. Please take this problem seriously before someone gets really hurt. I am very interested in upgraded/well maintained tennis facilities. I current play most of my tennis at the (public) tennis center in Sunnyvale, because: the courts are well maintained and well lit; they are able to be reserved (so that I can schedule a match ahead of time); the resulting tennis scene is thriving there -- lots of USTA teams and heavy use of the courts. I feel like tennis is a dying sport in Palo Alto due in large part to the quality of the available courts. I assume by facilities you include the pools. It would be great to open the pools during longer and more convenient hours in places like JLS and Terman, for those communities. Also to provide enough life guards so that people coming to Rinconada on weekends wouldn't have to wait in line to get in due to a lack of staffing. I do not want the City to spend Palo Alto residents' money to improve the park system for non-Palo Altans' benefit! I don't favor any increase in off leash dog runs I don't see a vision for Trails being supported beyond inside existing park lands. That is very limiting. We do have nice trails at Arastradero Preserve, Foothills Park, the Baylands, and Bixby park, but these are not the only trails we have, and these are usually a car drive from home. There are many more opportunities outside the footprint COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 8 of our Parks. Parks and Recreation has limited involvement on trails between highway 101 and Foothill expressway, where most Palo Altans live. Certainly, there is the Bol Park trail in Bol Park, there is also a new recreation trail off Loma Verde that could connect to Greer park, the pathway between Paly and Caltrain, the trail next to JLS in use now, plus many opportunities for paths on SC Water District land next to our creeks. The trail under 101 at Matadero creek is unofficial, but under constant use. All of these are within a short walk of members of our community. Please consider these as great recreation Trails in your planning. Parks and Rec needs help lead on these, or they will remain disconnected to our community, and un-built. I don't understand the desire for more off leash dog space. I live by Hoover Park and when I walk by it, I consistently see that the big dog park is empty but there is a large people with their dogs off leash on the athletic field. I find it important to Increase activities and open use for teenagers, like dancing outdoors, for families, like picnic, and for children, like swimming pools. I have been living here for last couple of years but I am yet to see any live community events in local communities. There are no live music (university ave does not count) programs, no community BBQ, picnic... summer did not feel like summer compared when we were in Seattle. Sad... truly. I have visited relatives in other communities and they have beautiful rec facilities (or even Menlo Park's). Ours is sad in comparison. Gyms at affordable rates, climbing walls, cheaper swimming, gym sports (gymnastics, basketball). Somewhere in San Mateo there were very nice soccer fields (why do we have to go to Modesto for tournaments??). Generally, it would be nice if we had facilities that lived up to the standards of the rest of the city. I don't think taking away the community gardens is a good idea but maybe limit them to people who don't own a house (apartment/condo dwellers) so the waiting list won't be so long (I assume it is still long - it used to be years long?!) I like our park system and feel fortunate to have the open space that we have. I hope we can find a way to allow dogs to better enjoy parts of it; walking my dog is one way I get out more often than not. I like real grass in the parks and fields. The grass needs water. Also, the trees need water. I live close to cubberly. I'd love to see that huge field turned to more than just a sports field. The fence around the field needs updating to a nice wood fence. One other thing I'm missing in our parks are food vendors. A small cafe where you can meet with friends and sip coffee in nature while kids are playing I live close to Heritage Park which is -- on a daily basis -- trampled by a number of employees of various businesses downtown. Great that they want to play ultimate Frisbee but the park is now essentially a dirt patch. In addition, there are a number of businesses that bring in many tents and have corporate parties in our public spaces. I doubt this happens in other parks throughout Palo Alto but if it's unavoidable these companies (Palantir, Pinterest, etc.) need to provide funding to the city to restore the park. I love the Menlo Park Burgess area (as an example of what to strive for! I am excited about more areas for outdoor performances. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 9 I propose the open space that formerly was the dump in Bixby Park be developed as a large off-leash dog run, where owners and dogs could run cross-country on paths. Owners with large dogs have little possibility for truly and legally exercising dog and owners together, disentangled. I would like to see current dog parks be upgraded to the quality of the new San Antonio Center dog park: clean, lit, usable in all-weather. I recently moved here from the Seattle area and it’s been really hard to find any place beyond a basic dirt patch that I can take my dog off leash. No place to hike or take a walk without finding signs that say NO Dogs, not even on leash! In Redmond, WA there was a 40 ACRE off leash dog area inside an even bigger park. People had a choice of paying yearly, monthly or daily rates for parking, participants cleaned up after their dogs, bags were at all the entrances and people were very good about not allowing aggressive dog behavior to disrupt or create havoc with other participants. It was a great place for people to bring their dogs, a good place for exercise human and canine alike. Dog clubs would come and on different days you'd see large groups of different breeds. it was a really fun place to go. Even those without dogs would come into the dog park to walk and enjoy the animals there. Volunteers would help annually to spread bark on the paths (Washington rains!) and they would also have fundraising/promo calendars, t- shirts, hoodies and hats to offset costs of maintaining the space. 40 ACRES! It is a special place and well loved by the community. Please, let us have a space close by where we can enjoy our dogs in nature that is not an overcrowded dirt patch. Thanks. I saw the last three tennis courts in Mitchell Park next to the Miracle Bridge playground converted temporarily to pickle ball courts by weekly taping. I wonder if we can have additional permanent pickle ball courts outside tennis courts. I STRONGLY support Integrating nature into Palo Alto parks. If wildlife is provided with a stable water source they will not seek shelter in people's backyards. I've driven past many dead raccoons and opossums on the Central Expressway from Mountain View and Palo Alto. Due to the drought I've even seen herons hang out in trees far from any natural water source. Strangely I've seen an entire family of ducks on Margarita Ave heading towards the power plant and a good Samaritan said she was going to walk near them as they headed to a nearby creek---Wildlife needs as much help as possible. Please integrate swales, and other rain harvesting techniques into the parks so they can function as examples for our local children and our families so they can understand that permaculture in an urban area is not only possible but very much needed. Plants which can help our insects such as butterflies and bees are also needed. I support expansion and distribution of parks and park amenities across Palo Alto. I oppose shared use of athletic fields with off-leash dog use. These are not compatible activities. I support greatly improving opportunities for recreation with dogs in Palo Alto. I think I would most emphasize keeping nature in our parks - rather than another playing field for organized games (only). Not very good for anything else then and not aesthetically pleasing. It seems like open space will be even more important as many parts of Palo Alto are being built up - that's where new acquisitions could also be valuable. I also think making sure to keep the infrastructure strong is of great importance and is often overlooked. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 10 I think it's time to update the Rinconada Swimming Pool. The facilities are very outdated esp. the changing area. I think that the pool facilities need to be expanded for adults, especially for lap swimming. More hours should be added to that program. I think that there definitely could be more nature integrated into Palo Alto parks, and I believe that is really important. I think the tennis courts at Rinconada need to increase to meet the increased demand. Also the tennis courts at Cubberly are dangerous to play on. Cracks in the surface need repairing. The netting around the courts need to be repaired or replaced. I think we already have nice parks throughout the city, but most seem to be geared to families, daycare providers, or other kids/ youth. While VERY important, I'd like to see them more welcoming and useful to adults and seniors. I think when planning new play equipment try to use more natural fibers instead of plastic, when possible. It would be great to allow off leash option between 6-8 am and then when it is dark 6-8pm and when it stays lighter out later 8-10 or something like that I wish there was a bocce ball court or two in Palo Alto parks. I would add very explicitly a system of public transportation that makes access to all these parks, libraries and community activity facilities, as well as schools, more seamless and effective across all of Palo Alto. Ideally, the vision should be to create and infrastructure for the future of Palo Alto where there is no need to use personal cars to timely and conveniently access any point in Palo Alto and take advantage of these public facilities. This should also include a plan for work commuters into Palo Alto and should be done in cooperation (and a city mandate) for large businesses in the area i.e. Google, Facebook, HP, Intel, etc..... I would like for Palo Alto to explore the possibility of having a Surf Wave Garden like the one being built in Madrid: wet-Madrid.com. I would like for the City to take the advice of the SC Valley Audubon Society's advocate given about 2 years ago that all the parks be outfitted with garbage and recycling cans that have lids that are animal-proof. Apparently Cupertino has had these for several years. The open cans and cans (especially in Rinconada Park) that are spilling their contents are too attractive to animals and leading to bad outcomes for the health of our wild creatures. I would like to have smoke reduced BBQ areas in all parks. Otherwise, the parks are quite well developed and suit me quite well. I would like to see improvement of the existing city and high school tennis courts - lights, paving and nets. I am also an avid hiker and appreciate the nearby trails. Thanks for asking. I would like to see more and better dog parks. We need one in north PA. Also rest rooms at parks where there are bar-b-q pits. I would like to see unlimited city park resources, e.g., grassy space, with a water source available, for the exercise and social aspects of canine-canine play of well-behaved, obedient dogs without being fenced in I would love to see Rinconada Pool remodeled, expanded and kept open longer during the year. My little kids would swim all year after school if the kiddie pool was open! It is also important to have clean functional bathrooms at all parks! COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 11 I would love to see us together take better advantage of our open spaces with more nature programming at the Baylands and Foothills Park, but the greatest need is in making recreation programming accessible to every Palo Altan. The "old" Palo Altans don't have the same financial freedoms as the "new" residents, and even for a family of four making what would elsewhere be a comfortable $60,000/year, it's a financial impossibility to join preschool recreation classes. There is also a great need for disabled children and adults in our community to have access to appropriate recreation opportunities. I would love to take my dog to Foothills Park, but the restrictions of no weekends/holidays renders this impossible. It is a beautiful park that I feel I am missing. I’d like to see the interpretive center at Foothills Park refreshed/upgraded I'd love more space in the Middle School recreation programs. I'd love to do something about our creeks. I talk to my neighbors who grew up, and spent time playing by Adobe creek as kids, and I wish I could do the same with mine. I'd love to see creek access where parks about the creeks: Seale, Hoover, Mitchell. Would love to see walking paths by the creeks, they are already there, just chained off. And instead of new bike bridge, just install intelligent doors on the existing tunnel that close access when water is high.... I'd love to have a place to play badminton in Palo Alto. I'd love to open up our creeks again. I envy the parents whose kids grew up in the 60's and whose kids played in the creeks. I'd love to see greater connectedness of green spaces - and more green spaces for just being in - think Forsyth and Daffin Parks in Savannah GA for example. I'd love to see some of the park space in the College Terrace neighborhood allocated to a space where dog owners and their dogs could exercise off lease. There are many dog families in our neighborhood and nowhere within walking distance to let them run off lease. I'd suggest to add activities for weekends to accommodate working people and their school age kids. If bike plans are part of this plan, painting bike lines in busy areas (like University Ave area) green so the lanes are clearly marked. Stop cutting down trees like on California Ave! If parks and open spaces could be open to off-leash dogs from 9PM-9AM would be greatly helpful! If this includes the art center, need more capacity and access to studios (specifically ceramics) I'm trusting that improving sports fields includes the tennis courts, which are heavily used and enjoyed but not fully maintained or supported, e.g. for watching, or for players gathering before and after. Important to have bathrooms at parks. Important to think of Sr's needs when planning new improvements in either facilities of parks. Keep bikes & walkers more separate. Improve the golf course Improve the surface of the tennis courts. Improve trails and signage in Foothills Park. Allow off-leash times in certain areas at certain parks across the city (7-8am and 6-7pm on weekdays and 8-10 on weekends?) Put up signage letting people know so those who want to avoid the off leash times can. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 12 In planning, include sufficient funding to maintain, replace, & upgrade facilities, parks, open space, trails, equipment etc. that will eventually degrade over time. We fully support a new, large and completely modern recreation building--just go around to other communities to see that our facilities are very sad in comparison. An indoor pool would be great. Incorporate more nature features in Palo Alto parks. I'd like to see an enhanced Public Swimming pool (like the ones you find in Europe) with longer opening hours for all ages and abilities, not only for lap swimmers and swim teams Increase bicycle accessibility and bike parking at parks, especially Mitchell Park Library and Community Center, as well as in Mitchell Park proper. increase ranger staff and pay. Increase the number of baseball and softball fields and provide more resources to maintain them. Increase the number of tennis courts. Add lights to some of the existing ones that don't have them increased and improved access to the baylands by foot or bike. Increasing health and wellness opportunities in parks and programs. My favorite part of this section is providing quiet places for relaxing in nature. I am not sure that there is a need for more lights for outdoor recreational activities. This might work at Cubberley, but any additional lights must be carefully considered so that nearby neighbors will not be bothered by the lights, the noise or the traffic! Indoor heated swimming pool Install bathrooms in the parks that don't have them. Integrating nature into the parks lets children (and adults) use their imaginations and play in non-specified ways (as compared to sports teams, play structures). It also attracts wildlife and creates a respite from daily activities, brings beauty into our lives (as compared to another lawn, swing set), and promotes dreaming and creativity. More nature, please!! I would also love to see a program of cooperative games instead of always competitive sports (fun as they are). What about more outdoor art opportunities to view and participate in? Plein air painting? Murals? Dance? It is important that we upgrade our parks to be like the Magical Bridge Playground. The park is always busy and being used by people of all abilities and all ages. It is a wonderful gem in our community. It really does seem that 'adding' off leash dog park space is a very minimal cost and would benefit a large number of residents almost daily. It would be great if larger parks could have a small restroom, but not necessarily for smaller parks. Trees, small shrubs, and other vegetation should be taken care of and preserved. More things to do in parks would also be good. It would be great to support the existing program that are limited by funding first and then look to improve the existing infrastructure and then focus on expanding and planning for a rainy day. It would be helpful to include a map of existing park and rec areas. I live in Los Altos and mentally included the community center into the poll here. It has been in the planning state for a decade now and does not seem to move forward. So I am not sure, whether this survey includes above or it if meant for Palo Alto only? COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 13 It would be lovely to have cafes in some of the larger parks where people could meet and enjoy conversation over a cup of coffee. This is done in parks in Europe with great success. Our climate is certainly conducive to it. Our aging population in Palo Alto would also be grateful for a way to be outside with minimal physical effort. It's a great part of living in Palo Alto. Juana Briones park needs a public restroom, as does Bol Park. Mayfield soccer turf needs to be replaced with new eco-friendly and human health friendly turf (not tire crumb based) There are insufficient large, well-maintain off leash dog areas in the city Just don't make the parks so welcoming that the homeless hang out, especially at night. You've already ruined the libraries by making them too welcoming to the homeless with all their belongings -- for heaven's sake, BEDBUGS in libraries??!!??? Keep Foothills Park closed to non-residents. Keep in mind that the population is aging and that over 20% of Palo Alto Residents are over 65 years old. Continue the community gardens. Many gardeners are seniors and the Community Garden is almost the only available program for the age group. Make the parks more accessible for Seniors. People using walkers and wheelchairs cannot go across grass but need paved sidewalks and benches. They enjoy being outside and watching children play! Keep it simple, do a few things well. Keep our tennis courts at Rinconada Park. Tennis is a healthy form of exercise and mindfulness for all ages. We have too few public courts. Keep trying to establish more adult dance exercise, yoga, etc. classes in south Palo Alto. Enjoy catalog is too weighted towards Lucie Stern or north locations. Thank you. Let us update our existing park facilities by renovating the buildings and systems in place. At the same time make changes for existing grounds to be used more effectively without having to expand the grounds. Let's invest in expanding and improving what we've got. Limit off-leash dogs. Make their owners clean up afterwards. Ticket those with off-leash dogs were not allowed. Park impact fees are calculated to buy more land. As we get more housing, we need more neighborhood parks to keep up. Our neighborhood parks already get crowded, especially on weekends. Prioritize playing field space for Palo Alto based teams and leagues. Living in South Palo Alto really all I want are things that in my end of the city. It would be nice to have other things but with a l long drive to get there I won't be able to use them. Yes, and for you bike people since I can't ride a bike, or a very long walk love the survey approach! Maintain Foothills park as a residents-only park, and hire more staff to better enforce the rules. Make programs more affordable for all school kids. Keep and purchase more open space for hiking. Do not allow Stanford to build houses on current open space west of Junipero Serra Blvd.-preserve parking for hikers. Make California street pedestrian only street, with increased parking facilities in parallel streets. Make classes more affordable; more drop in classes; but Palo alto has great parks! COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 14 Make sure that adequate resources are available to keep existing parks and facilities in good condition. It is always more exciting to start new projects but we have a lot of beautiful park space that must be maintained well. Making fuller use of the huge space at Cubberley should be a high priority. There's so much unused potential there. More and better run swimming opportunities for families with young children, please. Today my family tried to go to Rinconada for family swim and were locked out. We were told by other waiting families we had to get on the wait list, but we couldn't get on the waitlist until the staff person came out. It seems pretty mean-spirited to lock families out of the pool without even the option to ask the staff how long the wait will be to get in (or get on the wait list). Also a bummer because family swim will close for a long time starting very soon. More attention to improving park accessibility and range of activities for parents with children 0-3yrs. More bicycle lanes and trails. Promote bicycle commuting. More dog friendly environments. Discouragement if not outright banning of loud music in the parks. Huge groups moving in for the day (which is fine) and take over big areas (which is not necessarily fine) and blast music throughout the entire park (which is absolutely NOT OK!) Parks are meant to be a place to commune with nature and those that impose their music choices over the chirping of birds and laughing sounds of children playing are destroying the peace and quiet and natural environment that many expect in a park. More native plants including wildflowers. There are many opportunities to add native plants not just in the parks but in the city owned properties. As an example, that large grassy area by the utility compound at the frontage road and Colorado Avenue in midtown (next to 101) is an abomination! It could be a beautiful area with native shrubs, trees, and wildflowers. More dogs! More help for tennis, and the Palo Alto Tennis Club, for example a tennis house at Rinconada would be very helpful, the tennis courts are often used by non-residents or not-members of the Palo Alto Tennis Club. For example, if one (and one only) USTA team player is a Palo Alto resident, he/she can reserve the courts at a discounted rate for the whole team (15-20 players). It is not fair for the Palo Alto residents who pay the maintenance for the courts, or the Palo Alto Tennis Club which lost and still loses a lot of members because of this rule. More mini/pocket parks spread throughout the city. More off-leash dog parks with grass. Large, open space for running and playing. Mixed use, shared fields, waste stations, water fountain for dogs, all hours for morning, afternoon & evening to accommodate working adults. Thank you!!! More parks need to have a Magical Bridge. More parks, open space and community centers needed in Greenacres, Barron Park area (southwest area of Palo Alto). Shuttles needed in this area. Also more and IMPROVED services and centers for seniors. More parks. More public art in our parks, please! More sculptures or interesting art work in the parks. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 15 More tennis courts...better court surfacing. Our courts are in terrible shape. Lights for Cubberley More toilets. My favorite and most used park is Foothills Park. It is truly nature. This needs to be preserved and patrolled. Also, on a separate note I believe the City of Palo Alto needs to support citizen access to the Stanford Dish - this gem of open space is being taken back by Stanford, and they've been very ungenerous with providing parking, shutting down parking in the neighborhoods, not creating a parking lot with all of that land near the gate. I know the City has leverage over Stanford and so many of us rely on that preserve for our daily exercise! There is NOT enough parking, and pushing us over to Coyote Hill .7 miles away, and to cross Page Mill Road is ridiculously unsafe and simply too far away. Most of us only have 1-1.25 hours at lunch! Thanks My number 1 priority is better and larger off-leash dog areas. The dog parks now are too few and too small - Palo Alto dog owners deserve more. My top choice is to provide trails and a trail map connecting ALL of the city's parks, providing separated walk/ bike lanes on roads if needed. Including Foothills park, this should be 50+ mile system. My wife and I are 84. We enjoy hiking at the Arastradero Park, and Foothills Park. WE think our comfort and those of other older people would be much improved if a few benches were placed in strategic spots on the trails, or even if pieces of logs could be placed to provide seating opportunities. n/a Nature is very important to parks and open spaces. It should be a priority. I think expanding open spaces is important as Silicon Valley expands and urbanized. Health and wellness is also important for city people as natural areas have been show to improve health and wellness of individuals. Need more soccer fields and especially more lighted soccer fields. Kids do not have many options during the winter -- when it gets dark at 5 p.m. -- where they can play. Also, there is a huge problem with people with dogs letting their dogs run off leash in schools and parks. Addison elementary is really bad. MY kids were knocked down repeatedly by dogs whose owners let them run around off leash and were not watching them. It got to the point where my kids were afraid to play there. Kids should be able to play in the school playground without fear. Also, the playground should not be a toilet for pets. Need to enforce leash laws. Need to improve and update the Cubberly facility. It’s a wonderful resource which is underutilized and could be so much more!!!! Need to keep focus on tennis activities because it is rec for all ages. No dogs should be allowed anywhere near trails, parks, recreation centers, etc. whether they are leashed or unleashed. These lovely spaces are meant for people, not dogs. Many people do not feel comfortable around dogs. It is not right to allow selfish dog owners to bring their dogs everywhere with them. North Palo Alto has no off-leash area for dogs. Not having bathroom access in the parks near my home is very limiting. Off leash dogs in the parks (and school fields) is a problem. Many owners simply do not care, Fido needs to freedom to run and **** all over the park, someone else will clean it COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 16 up. Dog runs would be a great idea, if they were used more. Not sure what the solution(s) may be, but a bit more enforcement of leash regs might not be a bad place to start. Offer Bootcamp type classes outside, rain or shine, every day, throughout the day. Off-leash dog parks are sorely lacking in Palo Alto, especially in North Palo Alto. I have a dog that LOVES to fetch balls. I walk/run with him 2-3 miles each morning, but what really makes him happy and exhausts him is 20-30 minutes of fetching most evenings. It is simply not feasible for me to get to Mitchell Park daily to do that with him, I would spend 30 minutes on the road. And all of the decomposed granite in that dog park leaves him with open sores on his feet because he runs hard and skids on it, so it simply is not an option anyway. All of the elementary and middle schools in North Palo Alto (Duveneck, Addison, Walter Hays and Jordan) complain about dogs and try to keep them out, but there simply is nowhere else to go. Greer park is a sad excuse for a dog run. I would bet that we have FAR more residents in North Palo alto with dogs to exercise than are doing Community Gardening, yet we have two large gardening areas and nowhere for dogs. The prioritization seems very off. I know there are some concerns about a great dog park attracting out-of-neighborhood visitors. This seems like something that could be solved -- charge resident/non-resident fees if necessary, just like swimming pools, and it could easily pay for itself and keep a well maintained area. Or even staff a city-paid monitor on a school field (i.e. Jordan's field) in the early mornings or later evenings to ensure dogs are behaving appropriately and people are picking up. Have owners pay to play if needed to cover the cost of the monitor and reserve the right to refuse admission to those owners who don't follow rules (or whose dog can't keep to behavior requirements). We all have small yards which are really only appropriate for the running needs of very small dogs. The city wants us to cut water use and remove our personal lawns. If so, our dogs need a place to run! Plus, dogs that are getting exercise and being socialized are going to be better neighborhood citizens overall -- much happier and more mentally healthy, and far less prone to aggression, excessive barking, etc. Off-leash dog parks encourage neighbors and socialize and make for better-behaved pets. One aspect that does not seem to be included (at least it was not obvious as part of the accessibility improvements) is a better (green, frequent, free or affordable) public transportation system that will enable residents across Palo Alto to easily travel and enjoy the existing parks, libraries and community spaces. Open space planning will compensate for and balance denser housing models. It gives residents access to green space and visually breaks up the density of hardscape. This is an important long-term plan. Thank you for your work. open1 Our family would LOVE to see expanded hours / capacity and updated facilities at Rinconada Pool. Is that included in the updates to community recreation areas? Building more pools in general to increase availability would be awesome. I also think it's a high priority to have clean bathrooms at the parks. Thanks for sending out this survey. Our parks are great. With limited funds, put most of it towards acquiring land for new parks. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 17 PA parks are already beautiful and the envy of other towns. Please don't just add programs and art and buildings for the sake of doing something. Otherwise the parks will become too cluttered and defeat the purpose. Keep and add more plants; I didn't really see this in the plan unless that's what is meant by access to nature. Keep the parks' open space feel in the neighborhoods. Thanks for the opportunity for input. Palo Alto is far behind in the amount of city (not Foothills or Baylands) park land available that people can use and that will open up the crowded city feel that is being created here. We need more park space and we need to set aside funds to by large tracts of land and turn them into parks. This set aside by the city needs to be funded over many years so if a large parcel comes up that costs 20-40 million there will be funds available for purchase. Palo Alto is fortunate enough to enjoy great open spaces, parks, and facilities. Unfortunately, it seems that private clubs have priority access to many public facilities (Palo Alto Soccer Club, Stanford Soccer Club) and that nearby communities abuse the first-come, first-serve nature of some parks like Greer. It would be great if taxpayers here had privileged access to the city's resources, and it would be great to see better use of shared resources -- teams or clubs or groups with 90%+ local membership should get first choice in field slots. Palo Alto needs parks that attract the whole family. I lived in Palo Alto and plan to move back in a year or so. In the meantime, I'm living in Switzerland and have experienced parks and community spaces that far surpass anything P.A had to offer. Parks should include cafes or even mobile coffee carts for families to enjoy drinks/snacks together. The best thing is having community parks serve brunch on Sunday. The whole community joins even those w/o kids. Also there are adventure playgrounds where kids challenge themselves and get to take risks. These spaces continue to attract the older children to play much more than the basic parks we find in the Bay Area. Also we have a generation park where the play equipment is designed for parents and children to play together. Wide swings that fit multiple kids or parent next to child. Gross motor skilled puzzles that requires help of parent to complete therefore encouraging parents to get out and play with kids. Just my quick 2 cents... Love to see the city taking an interest to get the community involved. Palo Alto Parks, Trails, and Pools contribute to the community culture and character. They are what we value most in Palo Alto. More offices merely add traffic, parking issues and undermine the fundamental community qualities we appreciate. It is long overdue that we set our priorities, plans, and financial allocations appropriately. people drop food, leave trash, hair (dog haircuts) and growing mushrooms all dangerous for dogs. parks need to be cleaner. Need dog run at Peers Park (already facilities for tennis, badminton, putting, tennis, preschool, picnicking, barbecuing, climbing structures) Perhaps I wasn't reading the survey too carefully but it seems like there were a couple of areas that seemed either redundant or with plenty of overlap/encroachment. Suggest that future surveys do not confuse/muddle the response by making the choices EXCLUSIVE/non-overlapping so it is clear what the dollars are voting for. Perhaps maintenance falls under one or more of these priorities...but my overall priorities are for high quality maintenance of recreation buildings, park restrooms, grounds (e.g. seasonal plantings, including floral displays, annual pruning, pathways), COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 18 signage and general cleanliness. My second priority is to upgrade facilities--PA should have excellent gyms and an indoor, all year around swimming pool. Go to other nearby cities to see the type of facilities that are available. Please de-emphasize soccer and focus more on tennis, baseball and other traditional American sports. Palo Alto already has good tennis but one court with a ball machine for rent would be ideal. Cupertino has this. Please don't turn Rinconada Park into a noisy place. I have swum for years at the Rinconada pool and really, really want it to stay a quiet place to get some exercise. No Zumba, please! When it was added for a short time, the music was so loud and served so few people that I stopped going to the pool at those times. Thank you. Please fix the boardwalk at the baylands. Please improve the maintenance and upkeep of existing park landscapes. there are dead trees and very scraggly bushes, etc. in the park near us. A space that could be a welcoming one, is instead very bleak and uninviting. Please include more public art or creative planting to make existing parks nicer places to be. Updating facilities could also help. Please include South Palo Alto in your planning as it seems under-served. Please Install a bathroom(toilet) in the park like Eleanor pardee park. please keep foothill park available to CPA residents and their guests only. We created the park for the people of CPA to enjoy our beautiful natural environment and to protect the natural environment of the park. Nature needs quiet time and time to heal (as do people). Too many people (inviting people from outside of CPA) will stress the natural aspect of foothill park. Please keep Rinconada Pool a quiet place to swim. For example, don't allow loud exercise classes to negatively affect the peaceful atmosphere of lap swimming. Also, please keep our open parks quiet places that allow us to hear the sounds of nature, not the sounds of concerts or loud human activities. Thank you. please keep the neighborhood parks for local community uses. neighborhood parks have been massively used for sport activities, and it causes traffic and unsafe environments for the neighbors. Please keep the tennis courts in better repair. I slipped on a broken surface at Cubberly and suffered permanent brain damage. Rinconada has may cracked surfaces as well. Please keep up the good work of making the Arastradero Trails usable year around. Please maintain the existing tennis courts and add more if possible. The Rinconada courts need to be resurfaced, specifically Court 1 which has holes. It would be great if more courts were lit, like the three Hopkins courts. Please spend money on infrastructure, and not on programs and classes. Let others run such activities, utilizing the infrastructure that only the city can provide. Please water the trees in all our public areas. The redwood trees at Rinconada (east of the pool) are dying. And a block away the water (from the home construction with a basement) is pouring down the storm drain. This makes me very sad and discouraged about our city government. I prefer the diversity of beautiful trees in the parks; I don't care if they are native trees. Programs for children in Palo alto are fabulous. However, we lack programs for children with cognitive disabilities such as Autism. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 19 Provide better maintenance of existing facilities (i.e. tennis courts) Public gardening seems to be a new trend to develop, as well as offering more picnic areas, and opening Foothill park to everybody. Public toilets in parks!!! Please!!! It's not as if the kids aren't going, they are all still going in all the parks, only they do it behind (and on) the bushes and trees. Publicity about what is offered where can be improved. Detailed data on usage and class subscription participation should be available to the public. put toilets in Johnson park Re middle school after school sports -- considering the sizes of the grades, get more coaches and more teams. This is a great program that serves kids well, increasing health, activity and social connections, but there are only 25 spaces in 7th grade flag football, for example, and there is something like 300 kids. Reduce park areas dedicated to dogs -- the big dogs that run here scare the children and owners do not clean up after their pets. For example, remove the dog area in Hoover Park and expand the tennis courts here to include lights. Improve tennis facilities -- tennis courts in Palo Alto are overcrowded -- we often need to wait for courts. Some courts are not well maintained are often covered with leaves or bird droppings (ex., Mitchell Park). Remove surrounding bushes and trees from courts to help decrease maintenance cost. For example, tall hedges line the pickle court in Mitchell Park -- what are these hedges for? Balls always get lost in here and the hedges/bushes just drop leaves into the court all the time. Magical Bridge Playground is a great park -- using rubbery foam mats around all play structures instead of woodchips is definitely the way to go. Thank you! Restroom facility in Bol Park Restrooms would really help people with small kids or planning gatherings, not to have to coordinate everybody for a potty trip first or more disruptively, mid-gathering! I wonder if there are creative options that would be inexpensive, like Europe has crouch- pad toilet facilities that are cheap to build and to maintain by hosing down. That said, those aren't accessible to everybody, and accessibility is something I do value. Shade and drinking water are other amenities that I really value. I mention these because they were both potentially lumped in with making parks more welcoming, but the other details listed under that topic weren't nearly as important to me. Restrooms! restrooms! It's very difficult to deal with toddlers in parks with no nearby restrooms. I realize it's an invitation to transients but there has to be a way to stick at least port-a-potties in parks, Restrooms! restrooms! restrooms! - especially in parks with spaces for you children. Rinconada Swimming Pool needs to be renovated. Need to raise fees. Some of the tennis courts could use some resurfacing and fixing up. Another basketball court (only one at Hoover?) might be nice. An indoor facility (e.g. gym) would be nice if practical (cost and space) All-in-all PA does a pretty good job, but some of the parks are looking a bit scruffy. Specific to the Duck Pond: I personally find the place depressing. I feel bad for the domestic ducks and geese that have been dumped there (I had three ducks huddle under my truck so that they could drink the clean water dripping from my truck's a/c unit), the water is stagnant (I own ducks, so I know how quickly water can get gross), the COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 20 concrete and benches are covered in feces, etc. If I could in any way help with creating a new space that provided shelter and habitat for the critters, instructive information and resources for people who either want to feed the animals and/or dump their unwanted pets (e.g., contact information to local shelters and rescue groups), and educational spaces to teach people how to create their own front- and backyard habitat, I'd love to be involved. Start a community wrestling program. Stick to substantial allocations, eliminate the frivolous. Substantial = effort required. Frivolous = pure dissipation and distraction. Suggestion from my 13 y. o. son who uses the parks every day: Improve Greer skate park by adding a closer water fountain, adding on to the skate park in general (more ramps, rails, bowls, etc.) and possibly adding vending machines. I personally know that if these things were there, it would greatly improve the quality of the park and have a lot of people who go there regularly very happy, also might attract more people. Tennis and Pickle Ball very popular, so should support these activities. Community classes good also, helps well-being of citizens. Thank you for the great parks & great programs!! I feel very fortunate to live here and benefit from them. I have several suggestions: 1) I'd like to see bathrooms at Ventura and/or Robles parks near me. Then I could consider hosting birthday parties there. My husband & I work full time & we put our kids in camps for the summer. 2) It would be great to have more summer camps that offer all-day coverage and a variety of sports. Most of your sports camps are for one sport for part of the day, without a transition opportunity with care during lunch. I can't unfortunately pick up & drop off mid-day routinely. 3) Maybe you could collaborate with East Palo Alto on programs at Cooley Landing and other parks for mutual benefit. Thank you for this opportunity. Thanks for all of your work on this. It's hard to please everyone. Thanks for asking community opinion. But a word about the design of the survey - it was not easy to take, and I am not at all certain it actually reflects what would be my preferences. The activities need to be distributed so that garden plots are available in South Palo Alto and dog runs are available in North Palo Alto. Those parks that have very high usage need to be serviced more often and have more care. For example, when sports and picnics are scheduled during the busy season, there needs to be adequate garbage service to pick up the overflowing cans. Heavy usage of fields for soccer, baseball, etc., warrants a higher level of maintenance. Dry dusty areas, as well as vegetated areas need to be mulched regularly in our town parks, not just at Eleanor or our better parks. Provide more care and maintenance at Hoover Park. The Barron Park and Green acres’ neighborhoods lost a wonderful resource when PAUSD reclaimed the former JCC site. The school took the buildings, and they also limit access to Terman Park behind the buildings during school hours (which is most of the time). This was a huge loss for these neighborhoods and created a sort of desert of park and community services in this quadrant of the city. In my opinion, they need more park space and, at minimum, a community building with restrooms at Juana Briones COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 21 Park for meetings, classes, community gatherings. I don't live there, but I think I'd be really upset by this change if I did. The decay of Cubberley MUST be addressed. It's time to move forward planning with PAUSD to make better use of this prime real estate. Cubberley is well connected to schools and neighborhoods by bicycle and on foot. it is on a bus route. It is a wonderful location for programs for kids and seniors, in particular, because many of these people cannot drive. Even in its present terrible condition it is well-used and could be more productive for the community if the buildings were in better shape. Implement the recommendations of the Cubberley Community Advisory Committee. They did a good job. Build the facilities. Let the people generate the activities. People in Palo Alto are pretty clever about organizing their own activities. Walk through any park and you see volleyball nets and soccer nets set up. You see tai chi and Cross Fit classes. Many of these are organized by volunteers. The city can reserve the space for residents. Let the citizens get creative with it. I'm a dog owner. I never use a dog park. I think they are unsafe My two medium-sized dogs are regularly walked and run on leashes. They are well-behaved, and I can control their behavior, but I cannot control the behavior of large dogs owned by a large number of people who don't know how to train or manage their dogs. These animals are dangerous off-leash, in and out of the dog park. I think it would be nice to introduce more quiet, natural areas in our parks--both for people and for native animals. the bathroom in Rinconada pool can be improved --- floor is dirty. this can be done very easily without great cost; by just adding a mat that separate the outside & indoor (often wet floor) also would be nice to adjust the water temperature. The Baylands softball field needs to be upgraded. The boardwalk near the Baylands visitor center and the bay need fixing ASAP. Thank you from all the school trips, birders, docents, walkers, and naturalists. The canine population has been increasing in all neighborhoods of Palo Alto with inadequate open spaces to address their physical and mental health. Dogs need to exercise and socialize, and while walking them every day is ideal, it’s not feasible for everyone due to time or age restrictions. A well exercised dog is a happy dog least likely to pose danger to anyone. Providing open spaces in each neighborhood would also lead to informal hubs for like-minded people leading to better social connections and healthier communities. It’s a win-win for all! The city needs another pool since much time at Rinconda is reserved for the Palo Alto Swim team and community lap swim hours are limited and crowded. Plans for the parks and rec system have to take into account the tremendous growth in development and thus population in the city. I am not in favor of this increased development, but it appears to be unstoppable. The city, and for that matter, surrounding areas do not have any existing gun ranges for the citizens of Palo Alto to use. The existing gun ranges in the East Bay and South Bay are costly pack full and make profits every year from what we can see. So please consider putting in a nice shooting range for pistols rifles and shotguns. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 22 the duplication of some items and not others throughout the survey will seriously skew the results. I hope that the analysis of the data will be calibrated to compensate for these irregularities. The grass playing fields in Palo Alto are in terrible shape and in many places they are unsafe for our youth to play on. Most cities surrounding Palo Alto have more and better conditioned grass fields. We should be ashamed of the state of our fields. It’s time to launch a major capital improvement program to renovate grass playing fields. The Middle School after school program needs to continue to improve (it's better than it used to be). There are more kids that would like to participate than there are coaches/supervisors for at various schools. If kids want to participate, we (The City) needs to find a way to provide the coaches and facilities for them. It's tough since pay is low and hours are long and inconvenient for most people, but how can we get responsible high school/college kids involved to help fill the gaps? The most important project to me is to replace the metal bleachers at Rinconada Pool. My beautiful daughter was 2 years old when she ran and hit the corner of a metal bench on the bleachers with her upper lip. She needed 7 stitches to repair the deep cut, which crossed the vermilion border of her upper lip. She will carry with her the ugly visible scar that resulted the rest of her life. Please replace these bleachers. They are not safe!!! The Palo Alto Baylands Park should be highly prioritized for renovations and improvements. The park is a major nature asset of the City of Palo Alto. The parks and open spaces of Palo Alto are one of our crown jewels. But they would not be such a valuable asset without the dedication of the rangers and others who work there, providing assistance and information and helping us appreciate the natural beauty of these places; their services are often overlooked or taken for granted. The parks and OSPs are one of Palo Alto's greatest offerings. Glad this is expanding. Making it available to seniors and people with disabilities is an important component of the RMP. The parks without bathroom facilities are really not very user friendly for any activity longer than an hour or so (e.g. sports games, an afternoon or evening picnic or BBQ - anything where children - OR adults) might need to use the bathroom and have to leave the park to do so! The quality and accessibility of the tennis courts is of importance to me, because I often use the tennis courts, which are fortunately of the highest quality, and I am looking forward to the courts continue to remain the highest quality. The quality of the care the parks get is awful. There is no person responsible for each park so none of the work is coordinated. Several times water was turned off to fix irrigation and never turned back on at Hoover. The turf management is horrible. There needs to be somebody to call and comment to. Example Mitchell trash cans are filthy and get pressure washed every five years. In Mitchell another area newly turfed was allowed to die. Too many soccer cleats destroy the meadow there and no one policies the no play after rain rule. The reserve next to the airport is a huge disappointment. It needs to be developed in favor of the community, not the wild life. It could be an amazing outdoor space and instead it's unwelcoming and not benefitting citizens. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 23 The soccer fields at Greer Park need attention. We went to a youth soccer tournament last August run by the Stanford Soccer Club for teams from many cities. As Palo Alto residents we were embarrassed by the poor condition of a couple of the fields, especially what was called Field 5. There's a significant hump running about two-thirds of its length. This causes the ball to run preferentially off the edge of the field, so the players are at a disadvantage and the spectators on one side can't see the action on the other. Some of the Greer Park fields should be substantially improved if they're going to be categorized as sports fields. The tennis courts were not mentioned in the survey. The tennis courts are used by a lot of people, and it seems that the city forgot them in this survey. More people use the PA tennis courts than the PA soccer fields. Palo Alto is an international high tech capital, and I think it is very important that Palo Alto stays a tennis-friendly city among the high tech world. The way parks are used should take into consideration the residents that live next to them. Some parks are larger than others and the fields are further away from the homes. Others the fields are only 10 to 12 feet from the homes. The noise adversely affects quality of life for those residents and therefore this should be taken into consideration when deciding how to use these parks. The work done on Bixby Park is wonderful, but the amount of parking spaces is woefully inadequate for peak hours of usage. More benches along the trails would also be wonderful. These questions are redundant. If you are not sure what to do, here is a list: Spend the money to make sure the parks are clean and free of homeless people. Update the programs and classes to reflect new trends and populations. Reduce crowding in neighborhood parks by limiting sports to school properties only. Increase open space since the population density is increasing. They are wonderful! Thank you This survey seemed to ask the same thing over and over, which was unfortunate because it would've been nice to have more specifics within each area. For example, most families I know are desperate to have restrooms installed at all parks - maybe with locks in the evenings if there is a concern about attracting homeless people. To me personally, I feel as though the integration of nature into the parks of Palo Alto is of high importance, as well as preserving the nature already present. It is also necessary to allow wildlife to thrive in this nature, making it not only accessible for people, but animals as well. To me the most important task would be dedicating more open space to stay open space. I've seen more and more large houses being built on our foothills, disrupting the natural view. Within the concentrated city, more space should be committed to parks as well. As to comfort, providing drinking fountains at every park almost goes without saying, doesn't it? Each should come with a shorter companion fountain for those who can't reach. The other comfort issue would be restrooms. How about more flora in general? Rather than requiring large developers to provide only an art piece benefit, they should also be required to include some landscaping or planter boxes in each development. I also think more community gardens should be formed. Perhaps the schools could commit a bit of their lands for that. Dog space: Palo Alto could probably use a dog space in every park. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 24 Trail signage that directs you to the closest park (like you get for hospitals for example) or Swiss-style trail signs which indicate trail direction, difficulty level and length would be excellent! Two items I would like to see more of are: access to parks for people not using cars, e.g. sidewalks, trails, and bicycle paths (this includes family-friendly car-free access to Foothill Park and Arastradero Preserve) public restrooms and water fountains at all parks (since driving home to use the bathroom is not possible for people not arriving in cars) Updating Cubberley Community Center is a top priority. It is an underutilized recreational and cultural space in Palo Alto, which if renovated could provide significant functional and aesthetic value to residents, business owners, visitors and surrounding communities. I highly recommend serious consideration of this issue. upkeep of the sports facilities including grass fields and utilization of the parks We already have enough parks, without a lot of public fund, please focus on improving the current parks and make them more enjoyable. We also need to make sure that the streets and other areas adjacent to our parks are maintained in a way consistent with the desired uses of the parks. For example, homeless encampments should not be permitted to exist on streets abutting children's play areas in parks. Traffic calming measures should be considered next to crosswalks that lead to parks. Bike racks and other bicycle considerations should be sufficient to make biking to parks easy and safe. We should consider ways of encouraging neighborhood kids to gather in parks for spontaneous play rather than having every outdoor sport be part of an organized league. We desperately need a swim center in South Palo Alto. Private clubs cannot substitute for a community pool like Rinconada. Or consider enhancing the Gunn aquatics facility as a community asset, look at the Soda Aquatics Center in Moraga for a good example of this type of facility. We DESPERATELY need an off-leash dog area in NORTH Palo Alto. There are none. A one-two acre, fenced area in Rinconada and Eleanor Pardee parks would be ideal. Most of us are tired of being yelled at and kicked out of school playgrounds but the only reason we go there is they seem to be the only option within walking distance. We do not have enough lighted tennis courts and has been an increasing challenge the last 2 + years. We need to increase that. Also, provide a safe environment for dogs to play in nearby parks. We have 1/10 students in Palo Alto School District are special needs children. However, the recreation programs in the city provides very few programs for them. We love the parks and other things Palo Alto had. It will be wonderful to modernize the existing parks and activities. Great example is magical bridge park. We need another public pool! Rinconada reached capacity on the hottest days of the summer and residents had to wait up to an hour to get in. Crazy! We really need at least one more public pool for those of us not in a private pool club, or priority access for residents, or something so we can get in a public pool on a hot summer day without waiting an hour to get in. we need another swimming pool - there has been a line outside Rinconada all summer long - i.e. wait list. Please think about putting an aquatic center (that in maybe indoors COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 25 and outdoors) at park near the golf course - the current pool needs serious refurbishment - if we want to look like world players let start by having facilities that are too. check out the aquatics center in Hobart, Tasmania - this place is at the ends of the earth. we can do better Palo Alto (esp. with our increased property taxes) We need more art in parks Touchable friendly We need more parks near Crescent Park, not just in South Palo Alto / Cubberly. We also need to ensure public facilities paid for by PA taxpayers are in fact available to PA taxpayers, and not used so frequently by non-taxpayers. We need tennis courts and good maintenance of the tennis courts that exist. Courts are becoming run down and need to be refinished/refurbished We only have one public swimming pool in all of Palo Alto, and it's usually pretty busy. Another pool - or opening a school pool for public use after hours - and especially one in the South Palo Alto - would be really great. Thanks! We should look at a places like London where parks are so beautiful and inviting and it's such a pleasure and vacation like to go parks. Palo Alto parks are functional and better than most nearby cities. We could have beautiful parks and functional at the same time. I am grateful for all the parks here in Palo Alto but such a shame to have these wonderful spaces and not make them beautiful. What about the exercise stations as we use to have at Cubberley fields??? Fitness courses, etc.??? What's the feasibility of adding soccer facilities? (When) Can the former dump be converted into a soccer field complex? When I mention expand the system, I think foremost of expansion by Connectivity. It'd be nice if open, nature areas (parks) are integrated by safe walking/biking paths. If these paths were close to the commercial streets, people would walk/bike to those retail places more. The Chamber of Commerce can fund the trails in their area to maintain and beautify their section to attract customers and give back to the community. The Chamber of Commerce/community can fund the Trail Street Team, much like the Downtown Street Team. This seems like a more healing environment for the homeless and it's a choice program alongside maintaining the retail area. Community members can choose to work alongside the Trail Street Team and perhaps, create a partnership so the homeless aren't invisible but partners. Those days are supervised and facilitated to uphold the value and honor of the Trail Street Team. While oftentimes committees feel a need to keep doing more and more, a good effort would be simply to update what exists. This has been done well with playgrounds, and could also be applied to benches, tables, bbq pits, water fountains, bathrooms. Once everything we've got is in tiptop condition, then the committee will be in a position to start in on new things. Perhaps this a boring approach, but it leverages what we've already got, making it really nice for the folks consuming these assets. Why does the city work at a snail’s pace? I filled out such a survey 2 years ago. Why do I still have to use other cities amenities for my dog when I pay property taxes (over $ 25,000) to Palo Alto? Why not allocate certain hours of the day for dogs to be allowed off leash in one or more of the parks? Or why not collect a fee from dog owners who like to have off leash hours? the current dog parks are sad, dirty, and small. COMMUNITY PRIORITIZATION CHALLENGE OPEN-ENDED COMMENTS 26 With a growing population, we need more parks. Work to provide more space and more options for recreation. Don't fill open space with things dedicated to one activity. Preferences will change over time, but the need for open space will grow forever. Work with school district to allow the city to offer recreation programs at school facilities when school is not in session (summer). I am thinking particularly about Gunn and Termsn swimming pools to south Palo Alto community. Would be great to have more swimming pools for public use. Thank you and good luck! Would like the road paved so still can walk comfortably during the wet days. Would like to see fitness classes with times that accommodate working adults and safer biking access. Would like to see more indoor and outdoor at in public spaces. Would like walking and also ball room dance activities for seniors. In parts of China, seniors gather in the parks every morning to dance to recorded music or do Tai Chi. Would love to see a smattering of old-fashioned small kids' parks with swings and things to counteract the all-pervasive technology of the area. Also, I am a firm believer in the beneficial influence of dogs to our emotional health. As a suggestion, one of the areas that we could look into would be offering socialization classes for dogs and their humans that would avail themselves of dog parks. This could be made mandatory for use of the parks, with a reasonable fee. Would love to see more shade incorporated into parks and play areas. For example, the recently completed Magical Bridge playground has very little shade over the swings etc. Some of the parks and play areas are quite unimaginative, in general it would be nice to have shaded seating or more creative and attractive planting to really make them relaxing spaces to be. Would love to see some water fountains that kids could play in. New York has some great ones at parks. Water is recycled so not major waste. In particular, at Rinconada where the pool reached capacity early...would be great if there was a mini water feature to cover the overflow Yes, we need to find ways to share our parks with dog owners. A couple of hours of dog time in the morning would be one answer. We are already doing that now. Make it legal. And keep the Palo Alto Shelter open. Make us dog friendly You should really focus on making the parks more pleasant and enjoyable