BY EMILY MIBACH
Daily Post Staff Writer
Menlo Park is aiming to delay a proposed Stanford development that the Santa Clara County Planning Commission will consider Thursday (Oct. 26) over concerns that it will increase traffic on Sand Hill Road, Councilman Ray Mueller said yesterday (Oct. 23).
Mueller had requested a special council meeting be held either today or tomorrow after learning about the proposed four-story, 170,000-square-foot building that would provide offices for the Stanford Medical School’s faculty and staff. The proposal for the Center for Academic Medicine on Quarry Road, across the street from The Container Store and Stanford Barn, includes 830 parking spaces underground.
Instead of holding a special meeting to decide whether to send someone to the meeting on Thursday afternoon, City Manager Alex McIntyre’s office will send a request for a continuance to the commission.
City officials are seeking time to review the project and the environmental impact report for Stanford’s 2000 general use permit, which applies to this project.
This permit allows the university to develop a certain amount of square-footage, predominately on the east side of campus. But Stanford is
asking the Santa Clara County Planning Commission to re-allocate square from one part of campus to the medical center area, where the new
building would go up. Santa Clara County regulates, to some extent, Stanford’s building activities.
Mueller said the city is seeking the continuance because Stanford didn’t provide any notice to Menlo Park about the project. McIntyre also said he was unaware of the project, according to Mueller.
However, Stanford Communications Director Jean McCown said in an email that the school is “in touch” with Menlo Park.
Mueller said he is concerned about the added traffic on Sand Hill Road, part of which is in Menlo Park, that would come out of this development.
But McCown said the county determined “there are no significant, different impacts” if the project is built on Quarry Road instead of the other side of campus.
The Santa Clara County Planning Commission meets 1 p.m. Thursday at 70 West Hedding St. in San Jose.
