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From: <br />To: <br />GRPGN Gvnol <br />suhia.. <br />Regarding Sequoia station d pment type (or trend divtric[ <br />Date: <br />Malay, January 25, 20214:90:05 PM <br />CAUTION: This email originated from outside your organization. Exercise caution when <br />opening attachments or clicking links, especially from unknown senders. <br />Regarding Sequoia station development types for transit <br />district <br />I am concerned that this development is still proposing over 1,200,000 of office space. This <br />would be more than double the amount if office that was built under the original DPP. For <br />comparison, San Francisco has an annual cap of 875,000 sf for large commercial space <br />development. And the full allotment can only be utilized if SF has met its Regional Housing <br />Needs Allocation for the prior year. I understand that large scale office development can be an <br />important source of funding for development of affordable housing, but if the number of <br />affordable units provided/fun led by a project does not exceed the new demand that is created <br />by that project, then it does not make sense to go in the direction of massive scale office <br />development. <br />I have many other concerns such as traffic. It sounds great on the surface that they are relying <br />on Caltrain as the main source of traffic mitigation, but when you look deeper at the math, it is <br />apparent this approach assumes a lot of new Caltrain system capacity that currently is only a <br />plan. I am concerned about assumptions on service that possibly will not happen for decades <br />(or even at all) so until concrete progress is made regarding design, funding and an assured <br />timetable for delivery is established, any development approved today should be linked to <br />actual current transit capacity. <br />Lastly, I really wanted to see much more housing in the mix. The number of housing units <br />proposed is way too small for a project of this scale. I realize some are claiming anything other <br />than primarily office development is not economically feasible, but to that I say there are <br />many ways to perform a financial assessment, and the value of a site is equally dependent on <br />who the developer is. We know others have found housing projects to be profitable so I <br />suggest we advocate modeling a primarily housing project that holy meets the needs of our <br />community and be patient for a developer with the right mindset to come to the table. <br />In conclusion, I support the continuation of retail at this site but the scale of the primarily <br />office space project as currently proposed is just too large and does not align with the needs of <br />Redwood City. Housing is what we need. <br />Regards, <br />Jim Gemand <br />