BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Palo Alto City Council voted tonight (April 14) to fit both a parking garage and affordable housing on the surface lot at the corner of Waverley Street and Hamilton Avenue.
Council was split 5-2, with Councilman Keith Reckdahl and Councilman Pat Burt wanting to build only a parking garage because it’s a cheaper option.
But the rest of council said 15 apartments along Waverley Street were worth the price.
“It’s in an ideal location in downtown, near additional services, public transportation, restaurants and other amenities,” Councilman Greer Stone said.
“To me it’s a little frustrating that we’re talking about only 15 (units) as opposed to trying to put some more in there,” Mayor Ed Lauing said.
Reckdahl and Burt said maximizing parking on the lot would allow the city to build more housing on other city-owned lots.
“By building parking with reckless abandon here, we can build housing with reckless abandon in the future,” Reckdahl said. “Money matters.”
The city has about $15 million set aside in a fund developers have paid into specifically for a parking garage, Assistant Public Works Director Holly Boyd told council.
Public Works Director Brad Eggleston and engineers with Watry Design estimated the garage would cost $23 million to build.
The garage would have 274 parking spaces in six stories, replacing 86 spaces there today.
“We would be ready to go with the garage pretty quickly,” City Manager Ed Shikada said.
The housing would likely get built after the garage because the city needs to figure out financing and find a nonprofit developer to work with, Shikada said.
The city would leave the space for housing as a landscaped area in the meantime, Shikada said.
Council is taking a fresh look at the parking lot after picking the nonprofit Alta Housing on Jan. 21 to build around 80 apartments in a seven-story building on a parking lot behind 7-Eleven, at the corner of Lytton Avenue and Kipling Street. The parking lot, “Lot T,” has 52 spaces.
Council is planning to develop more downtown parking lots in the future, and a new parking garage is intended to make up for the lost spaces.
“This location is part of a whole package of projects,” Councilwoman Julie Lythcott-Haims said. “I love the intentionality that we will go well beyond Lot T to additional lots.”
Menlo Park City Council has faced intense pushback from downtown business owners and residents over its plan to build apartments on three lots.
Flyers and banners against the plan are all over Santa Cruz Avenue, an online petition has 3,581 signatures against the proposal and business owners are fundraising to fight the development in court.
Palo Alto City Council had two public comments tonight, both who said the city should build only affordable housing and no parking.
” Councilwoman Julie Lythcott-Haims said. “I love the intentionality that we will go well beyond Lot T to additional lots.”
What she really loves is that she will get campaign contributions well beyond what she got as an inexperienced freshman candidate. Too bad that the rest of us will be inconvenienced, that PA sales tax revenues will further tank so we can get more double-digit utility rate hikes AGAIN to make up the difference.