The Grand Plan. Part 4. More density

Tonight,at a study session, the City Council will look at plans for two downtown surface parking lots that are slated to be transformed into high density housing and a five story parking garage. The public is welcome. Meeting begins at 5:30 in conference room A at Burlingame City Hall. If you re concerned as I am, you will attend.

Comments

[Joanne]

Another generic cookie cutter montrousity!
Listen to the rhetoric of council members and vote out the "puppets".

[JF]

This looks like the Titanic docked in Stow Lake! And the dark shadows it will create will be awful. Burlingame will survive just fine without it.

[Joe]

Here is the DJ piece on the project meeting this week:

http://www.smdailyjournal.com/articles/lnews/2017-06-07/burlingame-affordable-housing-and-parking-projects-take-shape/1776425181439.html

[Bruce Dickinson]

Well folks, Bruce Dickinson must laugh at the asinine logic of "hurrying up to build something" that is both not aesthetically pleasing and given market forces, cannot be viable on its own without special financing and city funds.

Sounds like we need a classic bubble-bursting to get everyone on a rational plane again and flush out the nonsense!

[Sir Paul]

Sadly thru the introduction of autocad software have these monstrous buildings been created.A little different to the days where an architect would sit down with a drafting board an actually put some thought into what their trying to create.visonry,creative orther wise.Sorry folks we are seeing a trend of non sustainable architectural missteps that will leak,cause homeowners financial hardship for years to come.

[resident]

Is it really better?

http://www.smdailyjournal.com/news/local/burlingame-apartments-review-tepid/article_aade7b2a-c9c8-11e7-b528-fba1582870c9.html

[Laura]

It was, compared to what was proposed. Saved seven heritage trees. Broken into three buildings, versus one. Setbacks greater than what was required which means more landscaping between sidewalk and building, roof top gathering spot reduced and brought towards Mrytle, ten less units and more parking spaces.

With that said, it's still massive and would rather not have it in my neighborhood. The developer at least reached out to neighbors and tried to make it fit somewhat in the neighborhood. The next developer won't have to as they will be able to build lot line to lot line, thanks to Governor Brown and we will not have a say. Would love for it to just go away, but it won't. This I'd the second developer to try and it won't be the last. At least with this one, he tried to work with people to make it somewhat better.

[Bruce Dickinson]

Bruce Dickinson is glad, yes, heartened that the Planning Commission members really care about the quality of architecture in Burlingame and how aggressive infill development causes other significant externalities that reduce quality of life. While the new proposal is better, agree that more can be done.

It is interesting how developers automatically propose large, cheaply designed modern buildings and only seem to engage community members afterwards and come up with better architectural design and smaller footprints when forced to. Does this mean that they automatically expect rubber stamps from our approving officials? What leads them to believe it's so easy to get things done in Burlingame?

Bruce Dickinson thinks the several of the City Council could learn a lot more from the Planning Commission in how to properly represent and defend the community!

[Jennifer]

Agree. Resident is asking the wrong question, which should be: Does it fit the downtown plan. This version- yes (much better). The first one, --not at all. There was even one three or so years ago, that Laura mentioned, and it looked like a Holiday Express.They didn't want to spend time working on their plan.

IMO The downtown plan should have contained density limits, at the very least whenever multi unit parcel projects come up upon single family residential neighborhoods such as a situation like this, but those were not included, and probably not even considered necessary at that time, with no construction happening.

So this developer is doing what he can to get a decent ROI while trying to "fit" via guidelines (not standards) given. They have provided more open space, left more trees and setbacks than in the Downtown plan would have required (another loophole that needs to be fixed) and more parking, while keeping the 13 "affordable" units-- they aren't affordable, but that is the game the state is playing- another topic.

The problem is the given size. Bump it down by half as dense, and then we're talking about lots of great architectural possibilities. This one started out dense because that is what is allowed, and used for calculating the purchase price of the 7 parcels involved. It is way, way too big, nobody is going to argue about that.

Can it be improved architecturally? Of course, but the problem begins at the beginning, with way too much "stuff" crowded into one area, and disappearing side setbacks.

That is why all these Dwell - Mission Bay type boxes are springing up all over-- the boxy style, is the cheapest way to cram more into less, and hope the resin and metal panels of the day are seductive enough to pass through the Planning Processes, under the description of "modern" architecture.

In most cities, and increasingly in ours, they do. I'll bet there are good, very, very dense projects somewhere in this state that are well designed, but given this task, in a transitional area adjacent low scale housing, I'm betting they are few and far between.