REPORT TO PLANNING COMMISSION
SUBJECT
Title
Study Session on the Draft El Camino Real Specific Plan
Report
BACKGROUND
Over the past few years, the City has been developing a Specific Plan to implement the City’s General Plan goals and policies for the El Camino Real corridor. The Specific Plan will provide detailed guidance for the development of future land uses including urban design elements to implement the City’s General Plan vision for the transformation of the corridor from low intensity, automobile-oriented uses to a more urban, mixed-use environment supporting a significant residential population. This vision was established in 2010 with the adoption of the current General Plan, and several residential or mixed-use projects were subsequently developed along the corridor, but without a Specific Plan, they did not follow a cohesive set of design principles and the community was frustrated by their lack of input into the City’s policies for the corridor. The City Council directed staff to initiate the preparation of the Specific Plan with a focus on community engagement in order to address these concerns.
Following a two-year community engagement process, a full draft of the Specific Plan was made available for review and comment on the City’s El Camino Real website in May 2020. On September 30, 2020, a community open house was held via Zoom to review the Draft Plan with the Community and receive feedback. The Draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for the El Camino Real Specific Plan was made available for a 45 - day public comment period beginning on December 10, 2020, and which ended on Monday, January 25, 2021.
DISCUSSION
The planning frameworks are the impetus of the Specific Plan, are reflected throughout the elements of the Specific Plan, and include:
§ Focus development at key activity nodes
§ Respect the character of adjacent neighborhoods
§ Create memorable public open spaces
§ Enhance connectivity along and across the corridor
§ Improve multimodal access and safety for all travel modes
§ Promote a range of housing options
Land Use Plan
The Land Use Plan will guide future development and redevelopment activities within the area toward multi-modal supportive uses and improvements, including: an increase in housing density, new development that appropriately transitions to existing adjacent residential neighborhoods, and more intensive development and public improvements focused at key nodes, which will include a concentration of retail, services, housing, and new public gathering areas.
The strategy of the land use framework is to focus more intensive development and public improvements at key nodes or “Activity Centers.” These Activity Centers are, in most cases, based on existing centers of commercial and pedestrian activity and are aligned with the major intersections along the corridor. The density of uses at Activity Centers, and regional traffic and visibility, will provide ideal conditions for vibrant regional-serving shopping destinations. Between the Activity Centers, the “in-between” areas are a less intensive mix of commercial and residential uses.
The Specific Plan build out projection represents an estimate of build out associated with the proposed land use plan through the horizon year of 2040, and would include the development of 6,200 housing units, compared with existing conditions, and a reduction of approximately 395,000 square feet of commercial space, when compared with the existing General Plan land use designations.
El Camino Real Right-of-Way
Currently El Camino Real largely functions as a major vehicular thoroughfare. The proposed Specific Plan outlines implementation strategies to transform the corridor into a true “Complete Street” with quality pedestrian, bicycle, and transit facilities.
To achieve a Complete Street, the design of the El Camino Real right-of-way would include narrower travel lanes and enhanced pedestrian facilities, including wider sidewalks, street trees, landscaped medians, and enhanced signage and lighting, as well as a continuous cycle track (separated/protected bikeway) and bus boarding islands without increasing overall right-of-way requirements. To achieve this right-of-way vision, at a minimum, the removal of on-street parking on El Camino Real is required as parcels redevelop.
Design Standards
The Specific Plan provides standards and guidelines to achieve the future vision for El Camino Real. These standards and guidelines will apply to all new development in the El Camino Real Specific Plan Area, as well as public improvements and extensive renovations to existing structures.
The standards, as drafted in the Plan, provide specific requirements for elements such as; height, intensity, and setbacks, and are organized by character area/land use designation. A key standard of the Specific Plan is providing new development that appropriately transitions in height and scale to existing neighborhoods. New development adjacent to residential neighborhoods would incorporate a range of transition strategies including a 45-Degree Daylight Plane for building volumes, increased building setbacks, and upper-story step backs.
Additionally, there have been recent changes to state law that affect the City’s authority to regulate housing projects. First, the “Housing Crisis Act” prohibits the City from reducing the residential density of a parcel below the density that existed on January 1, 2018, unless the City simultaneously upzones another parcel to accommodate the lost development potential. The draft Specific Plan will almost universally increase the maximum density along the corridor, with just a few exceptions. The few parcels that will decrease in density will be more than offset by this overall increase.
Next, the “Housing Accountability Act” (HAA) prohibits the City from imposing development standards and criteria on certain housing projects if those criteria do not qualify as “objective standards.” An “objective standard” under the HAA involves no personal or subjective judgment by a public official and is uniformly verifiable by reference to an external and uniform benchmark or criterion available and knowable by both the development applicant and public official prior to submittal. This requirement applies to 100% residential developments, as well as mixed-use developments where at least 2/3 of the square footage is residential. (Mixed-use developments with commercial space taking up more than 1/3 square footage could still be subject to subjective criteria.) Therefore, the Specific Plan standards are currently being modified to include objective standards that align with the new state laws. The intent and purpose of the standards will remain the same, but will be reworked in order remove subjectivity from the approval process for applicable housing developments.
Finally, a number of other laws provide expedited processing for qualifying affordable projects. Since 2018, Chapter 17.40 of the City Code has required all housing developments of 10 or more units to provide at least 15% of the units at affordable prices or rents. For housing developments with 20% of the units affordable to lower income households, or 100% of the units affordable to moderate income households, the HAA requires the City to approve the development irrespective of any design considerations, whether objective or not. For housing developments with 50% of the units affordable to lower income households, SB 35 (2017) requires that such projects be approved administratively without any public hearing.
Next Steps
The remaining tasks in the Specific Plan work program include updating the Draft Plan to include objective standards, incorporate comments from the public, as well as, from other City departments and outside agencies as appropriate, responding to comments on the DEIR, and then presenting the Final EIR and Final Draft Plan to the Planning Commission (PC) for their recommendation and to the City Council (CC) for adoption.
ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW
The action being considered is a study session only and does not constitute a “project” within the meaning of the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) pursuant to CEQA Guidelines section 15378(a), as it has no potential for resulting in either a direct physical change in the environment, or a reasonably foreseeable indirect physical change in the environment.
An Draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) has been prepared for the Specific Plan, and circulated for a 45-day review period beginning December 10, 2020 and concluding January 25, 2021. The EIR will be brought to the Planning Commission for consideration when the Specific Plan is brought forward for a recommendation on adoption.
COORDINATION
This report has been coordinated with the City Attorney’s Office.
PUBLIC CONTACT
Public contact was made by posting the Planning Commission agenda on the City’s official-notice bulletin board outside City Hall Council Chambers. A complete agenda packet is available on the City’s website and in the City Clerk’s Office at least 72 hours prior to a Regular Meeting and 24 hours prior to a Special Meeting. A hard copy of any agenda report may be requested by contacting the City Clerk’s Office at (408) 615-2220, email clerk@santaclaraca.gov <mailto:clerk@santaclaraca.gov>.
Staff
Prepared by: Lesley Xavier, Principal Planner
Reviewed by: Alexander Abbe, Assistant City Attorney
Approved by: Reena Brilliot, Planning Manager