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PC 04-08-02CITY OF CUPERTINO 10300 Torte Avenue Cupertino, CA 95014 (408) 777-3308 APPROVED MINUTES OF THE REGULAR MEETING OF THE PLANNING COMMISSION HELD ON APRIL 8, 2002 SALUTE TO THE FLAG ROLL CALL Commissioners present: Staff present: Auerbach, Chen, Saadati, Chairperson Corr Steve Piasecki, Director of Community Development; Ciddy Wordell, City Planner; Colin Jung, Senior Planner; Peter Gilli, Associate Planner; Eileen Murray, Assistant City Attorney. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: March 25, 2002 Regular Planning Commission meeting: It was noted that Com. Patnoe was no longer a Planning Commissioner and was not present at the March 25, 2002 meeting. MOTION: Com. Auerbach moved to approve the March 25, 2002 Planning Commission minutes as amended SECOND: Com. Chen VOTE: Passed 4-0-0 WRITTEN COMMUNICATIONS: Chair Corr noted receipt ora letter from Mayor Lowenthal to the Sunnyvale City Council relative to concerns about the Planned Juniper Network's corporate campus. POSTPONEMENTS/REMOVALS FROM CALENDAR: 3. Application No.: TR-2002-02 Applicant: Lake Biltmore Apartments Location: 10159 So. Blaney Avenue Director's minor modification with referral to the Planning Commission to remove tbur trees and replace with eight trees at an existing apartment complex. Planning Commission decision final unless appealed Request postponement to the Planning Commission meeting of April 22, 2002 MOTION: Com. Saadati moved to postpone Application TR-2002-02 to the April 22, 2002 Planning Commission meeting SECOND Com. Auerbach VOTE: Passed 4-0-0 Planning Commission Minutes I April ORAL COMMUNICATIONS: Mr. Gary Schmidt, owner of three parcels on Stevens Creek Boulevard, updated the Planning Commission on the progress on his parcels in the vicinity of Hamasushi's, Chilis and the l?,lancy Center. CONSENT CALENDAR: Application No.: TR-2002-01 Applicant: Cupertino Plaza Professional Building Location: 20245 Stevens Creek Blvd. Tree removal permit to remove two Bradford pear trees and replace them with two 24" box Bradford pear trees MOTION: Com. Auerbach moved to approve the Consent Calendar SECOND: Com. Chen VOTE: Passed 4-0-0 OLD BUSINESS 4. General Plan study session. Tentative subject: preferred development alternative Staff pre~ntntinn: Ms. Ciddy Wordell, City Planner, presented a brief overview o~' the prcl'crrcd alternative. She reported that the preferred alternative is the suggested development allocations for the various land use types for the General Plan amendment, and should reflect the viskm and guiding principles that have been discussed in previous meetings and the one to be discussed will reflect the Planning Commission's and others' expressed interest in creating more o1' a vibrant Heart of the City, downtown, walkability, and connectivity. One of the basic conclusions o[ the preliminary idea of a preferred alternative is that the non residential development will be decreased from what the General Plan allowed and the residential development will be increased. The overall General Plan development will be about the same as it was in the existing General Plan or just be redistributed. Concentrated development in the downtown and Vallco; mixed used in these non residential areas will be more common. Ms. Wordell said that in the past, the development allocations were strict in that if there was a certain amount of development in a particular area, the General Plan was amended if one area ran out and wanted to borrow IYmn another area. She said the concept is that they could set some development allocations by arca and monitor those and if another area was growing in the desired manner, they could borrow I¥om another area without changing the General Plan; but it would be a conscious decision. Mr. Peter Gilli, Associate Planner, referred to Exhibit A and reviewed the alternative buildout. I lc illustrated where most of the non residential development is focused; and said the crossroads arc downtown village, north DeAnza, Homestead Road, City Center, Stevens Creek Boulevard, East Stevens Creek Boulevard and Vallco Park. Overall there is a reduction in the commercial industrial and hotel developments and about a 10% increase in the amount of residential units over the 1993 General Plan with the 2001 housing element. Jobs are projected to decrease slightly:jobs per unit ratio will improve by about 10% for housing unit to be optimal, lie said thc total trips which are peak hour trips based on a calculation in the General Plan will go up by less than 2% Planning Commission Minutes over the existing General Plan buildout. Relative to the area of significant development, thc first is the downtown village which will be a mixed used downtown area predominantly commercial and residential; there will be office, but there are not allocations for additional office square I'ootagc to the area; there will be an increase in people because of the residential units to the area, and there will be more peak hour trips in the area due to the additional retail and residential uses. In the City Center area, which includes town center, there is projected additional development to crcatc a mixed use urban center that will compliment the downtown village. There is not any additional hotel, but there are additional residential units and commercial square t'ootagc; with ti small increase in office square footage as well. Stevens Creek Boulevard is part or the I leart o1' thc City plan from DeAnza Boulevard to the west to the marketplace and Portal Plaza shopping center to the east. He noted the FAR in the downtown village is proposed at .33; typically a commercial FAR is .25; Stevens Creek Boulevard will be .25 and there will be a residential density el' 35 dwelling units per acre which is the same as the Heart of the City. He said that they wcrc proposing .2 FAR on East Stevens Creek to de-emphasize the area as a main retail area and to promote residential uses. He reviewed Exhibit B, the comparison of the General Plan and Preferred Altcrnativc, including the downtown village, City Center area, Stevens Creek Boulevard, East Stevens Creek Boulewird, Homestead Road, No. DeAnza Boulevard, Vallco Park and Other Areas (remainder of thc City), as outlined in the staff'report. Com. Chen complimented staff on the excellent report and asked for clarification on development potential. Ms. Wordell said that commercial, office, hotel, and residential arc tl~e main catcgorics and the common denominator used in the past is amount of trips generated. When translating thc square footage of the rooms of the housing units to trips, it is slightly higher with the preferred alternative, but fairly close, hence it is more or less the same amount ot' traffic generation l'or all those uses. The numbers, square footage and housing units have changed, but the traffic impacts have not changed very much; the traffic needs to be analyzed particularly Ibr the downtown village. She said the traffic impacts were not known at this point, and will be brought forward. Com. Auerbach said that in discussions of policies for the land use element, they had discussed potentially having a policy of either limiting the amount of square footage to be built, if associated housing units were not built, or increasing the amount of square footage to bc built il' more housing units were provided. He questioned how it would relate to moving to a variable based FAR system, and whether they had abandoned the notion of linking housing in commercial development. Ms. Wordell said they had described three ways that would occur, but only one was a mandate, which was some of the bonus and pool square footage given to theoretically thc Apple property or the Compaq property. She said if square footage is desired, it is only il' thc commensurate housing is provided. The other two methods included more incentives; one that thc FAR for commercial is somewhat limited, and in order to maximize development, the only way to do that is to do mixed use, add commercial to theoretically come in with .just commercial, but thc potential would not be maximized. Com. Auerbach noted that staff was contemplating a minimum of three mechanisms by which people would be able to essentially increase their FAR by doing other things, lie referred to thc notation "additional units above 500 referring to the housing, may be needed to achieve a 1.8 jobs/housing ratio if that is the target ratio." He questioned if they would see a definitive jobs/housing balance analysis; although discussed tonight; and set a specific target to movc toward. Planning Commission Minutes 4 r~pril ~, ~_~t~- Ms. Wordell said she was not certain that more could be done than was described. Il'thc Planning Commission chose to move forward with what was discussed, it would be the buildup target, and could or could not happen based on what people chose to actually build. In response to Com. Auerbach's suggestion to add a column to the citywide and possibly each individual planning area relative to buildout, Mr. Gilli said that since the data was in a database, the added information could be included. He indicated they were presently at 1.84. Com. Auerbach questioned what mechanisms were in place if, after monitoring the numbers, they wcrc over-achieving in commercial and under-achieving in housing, lte noted they could revisit thc housing element every five years and if warranted, try something different to get back on track. Ms. Wordell said that, as required by law, they have done annual reviews, except during the General Plan review when an annual review is not required. She said it was also the time to address performance in the policy areas and the strategy areas. Mr. Gilli said that under the 1993 they actually built out the housing sooner than everything else. Befbre the housing clement was added or amended in 2000, the buildout would have been a 2.04 jobs/housing ratio, hence it would have been worse than it is now or projected to be. Mr. Piasecki reported that one of the reasons they did not propose offering the blankct provision tn increase the density of non residential in exchange for 2:1 in other areas, is that the numbers skewed, and the amount of density and development starts to get potentially very high. Stall' felt it was advantageous to focus the growth where they would like to see it and then provide market incentives; the use of the property can be maximized if mixed use is brought in; which is evident not only in Cupertino but also in surrounding communities where people are taking advantagc hi' it where possible. Stafffeels it is a powerful force to move forward with. Com. Auerbach said he was pleased to see that the Heart of the City was broken off into thc Stevens Creek Boulevard and East Stevens Creek Boulevard Plan. He said in thc case ol' North DeAnza, downtown village, City Center, Stevens Creek, they all are plans that encompass both sides of the street, whereas Vallco Park is an enormous area, and there is differential development on either side of the street. He said he welcomed ideas about that and about doing development on both sides of the street that have different targets and what it means to the streetscape when driving down the street and looking to the north and south. Mr. Piasecki said that relative to East Stevens Creek Boulevard, there are some shallow parcels and not much opportunity to provide a higher building form without having encroachment issnes with adjacent residential. He said what they would anticipate by taking away some o1' thc Vallco Park bonus space and allocating it in other areas where they are trying to provide the dual side balance (which is one of the motivations behind allocating it to the Apple campns), is to try to externalize the Apple campus. What is anticipated is then the growth that occurs across thc street will also step down to be reasonably complementary, which is likely within one story o1' thc two to three that is anticipated in the East Stevens Creek area, but no higher than that. Thc result would be some stepping down to the street to provide some of the complementary image and also would bring the buildings up to the landscape areas on both sides of the street so the distinction won't bc so noticeable; and the attempt is to do it in a sensitive way to minimize the impacts on residential neighborhoods. He said it was a balancing act. Ms. Wordell clarified that the 2,325 units was in the existing housing element adopted last Ihll and is 2300 units above the existing build. Mr. Piasecki noted that it was a reduction of 1503)00 square feet being reallocated to North DeAnza Boulevard. Chair Corr opened the meeting for public input. Ms. Anna Pulman Black, Cupertino resident, said that she has resided in Cupertino since 1972 and was concerned about growth in the Cupertino community. She' said that soon there would bc no places left in Cupertino to live in. Mr. Gary Schmidt pointed out the three parcels on Stevens Creek he had an interest in and said it was his intention to proceed with the development plan if he was able to get control of thc Bhmcy Center. He said he would submit a modification to change the 14,000 square feet of office to residential and perhaps more than 14,000 square feet of residential. Chair Corr closed the public hearing. Com. Saadati said he was pleased with the updated map, and anticipated moving toward developing the areas to provide enough residential units for the people who live and work in Cupertino. He said he supported the plan. Com. Chen said she supported the plan and looked forward to having the traffic report. Com. Auerbach said he would welcome the opportunity to continue the discussion aftcr staff provides the numbers of where they were vs. the 1993 plan and how buildout would look; as hc felt he needed more time to study it. He said he felt in general that they were proceeding satisfactorily in the right direction, but that he still had some concerns. He said tbr a city of 50,000 there were a lot of development areas which was appropriate if it was monitored, as some prqjccts sit on the shelf for years before they come to fruition. He said it was good to be Ilexiblc to sec where the growth was occurring and help it along. Com. Auerbach said he was still concerned about East Stevens Creek and the development of the Compaq lands and would like to see the itcm again after receiving the additional data. Chair Corr said that he felt they were headed in the right direction with attempting to I'ulfill thc desire of the community for so long about having a downtown village, lie said he concurred with Com. Auerbach in terms of East Stevens Creek Boulevard to try and work more on both sides of the street. He said he was a proponent of mixed use; and relative to the downtown village, cautioned about having too many other similar developments in other areas that might detract from the downtown village. He said it would be a challenge to provide strong connections across Stevens Creek and between buildings along the street, and was eager to make that happen, and with the Vallco Park development, the hotel would be crucial to that and to ensure that it would happen. He said he felt the Homestead road area repeats the mixed village concept and hc expressed concern about attempting to do too much mixed village on Homestead and possibly detracting from what is planned for Stevens Creek. Mr. Piasecki reported that the community congress would be held in one month where the ideas would be tested, and staff would present the numbers to the Planning Commission in June. Planning Commission Minutes 6 April 8, 2002 NEW BUSINESS 5. Report on 2002 Planners Institute conference held in Monterey, March 20-23. The Planning Commissioners reported on their attendance at the Planners' Institute in Monterey, which included sessions on antennas, understanding design review, smart growth, green building, traffic and transit. Chair Corr recommended the speaker on smart growth be invited to make a presentation to the City of Cupertino. 6. Discussion of summer dates for Planning Commission meetings. Following discussion, there was consensus to cancel the July 22 Planning Commission meeting. REPORT OF THE PLANNING COMMISSION Environmental Review Committee: No meeting was held. Housing Committee: Mr. Piasecki noted that the committee met to prepare for a special meeting with the City Council in preparation for a special study session on the BMR program with the City Council on April 15. Mayor's Breakfast: Com. Auerbach will attend the April 9th breakfast. REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT: Mr. Piasecki reported that City Council approved the BJs restaurant use permit as recommended by the Planning Commission. He also reported that the City Council authorized a letter be sent to the Sunnyvale City Council relative to concerns about the planned Juniper Networks Corporate Campus. DISCUSSION OF NEWSPAPER CLIPPINGS: Mr. Piasecki briefly commented on the article "Plaza Lacks Pizzazz" relative to renovating shopping centers. ADJOURNMENT: The meeting adjourned at 7:50 p.m. to the Planning Commission meeting at 6:45 p.m. on April 22, 2002. Respectfully Submitted, Recording Secretary Approved as presented: May 13, 2002