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7.A. - Page 33 of 41 <br />SIERRA CLUB <br />Serving San Mateo, Santa Clara and San Benito Counties <br />Protecting Our Planet Since 1933 <br />February 19, 2020 <br />City of Redwood City <br />Attn: Lindy Chan, Senior Planner & Diana O'Dell, Principal Planner <br />Community Development Department <br />1017 Middlefield Road <br />Redwood City, CA. 94063 <br />lchan@redwoodcity.org <br />dodell@redwoodcity.org <br />Re: Proposed Sequoia Station General Plan Amendment <br />The Sierra Club's Loma Prieta Chapter, Sustainable Land Use Committee (SLU) has reviewed the <br />preliminary statistics on this proposal and we have serious concerns about the scope and nature <br />of the proposal as currently envisioned. <br />SLU encourages the development of higher density, mixed-use developments near downtowns <br />and major transit stations to encourage walking and transit to improve health and reduce traffic <br />and local greenhouse gas emissions. To this end, we have created a set of Guidelines' to evaluate <br />proposed developments. This proposal meets our criteria for a TOD, but does not meet our <br />criteria for a balanced development because of the intrinsic extreme jobs/housing imbalance. <br />Although the current 2010 Redwood City General Plan and Zoning allow for this imbalance, it does not <br />mean it is the best way to develop this site in 2020. Conditions have drastically changed since the <br />original General Plan was adopted. <br />Bay Area job growth has outstripped housing growth 19:1 over the <br />past ten years. <br />From our research, it appears that Redwood City presently has a good jobs/housing balance of <br />approximately 1.5 jobs per household overall, so the planning code has worked well so far, but <br />there are several large new developments either approved or in the pipeline that threaten to upset <br />this balance including the Sequoia Station proposal. <br />Below is a summary of Commercial Office projects and residential units demand created by them: <br />Sequoia Station (not yet approved) <br />1.6M SF Office + Could support up to 10,666 jobs' which would require 7,111 <br />175,000 SF Retail + residential units to maintain an acceptable Jobs/Housing <br />440 Residential Units Balance'. This equals a shortfall of 6,671 res. units <br />1601 El Camino Real <br />530,000 SF Office + 3,533 new jobs = need for 2,356 units = shortfall of 1,816 res. units <br />28,840 SF Retail + <br />540 Residential Units <br />3921 East Bayshore Road, Suite 204 Palo Alto, CA 94303 650-390-8411 Page 1 of 3 227 <br />