01 ATTACHMENT 4 - Laserfiche WebLink

ATTACHMENT 4 Stoneridge Mall Framework Public Comments Provided for the City Council meeting on January 26, 2023 Page 28 From: john h Date: January 16, 2023 at 6:15:59 PM PST To: Deborah Wallace, Pattie Hall, Sachiko Riddle, Shweta Bonn, Melinda Denis, Ellen Clark, Gerry Beaudin, Jack Balch, kbrown@cityofpleasanton.gov Cc: Mayor and City Council Subject: Re: Planning Meeting for Stoneridge Mall Framework Some people who received this message don't often get email from email@hotmail.com. Learn why this is important I have some concerns regarding the Stoneridge Mall Framework that I think are not being adequately addressed. I am concerned about the traffic congestion. There were no strong objections to the idea of adding housing to the Stoneridge Mall area at first…until we started finding out about how much density there would be. We started talking about 5 stories of housing, but when concerns about parking were raised, the answer was basically that the housing units would have their own parking and would not impact the mall parking. Turns out that this seems to mean that there likely will be parking stalls under the housing units, thus making the buildings even taller! A formal Engineering Traffic Impact Study was conducted to determine the impact of the proposed higher density housing. It was determined that there is ALREADY congestion impact, but with mitigations, we could absorb up to 50 units per acre. Above that, the models begin to “fall apart”. The proposal being considered, however, suggests 50-65 units per acre! When asked about how we could possibly consider going 30% higher in density to 65 units, the answer was that “I feel that there is some slop in those numbers, and we could do more”!! This was a paid Expert Engineering study (not a lot of slop in engineering) that someone simply “FEELS” that there is some slop. I kinda doubt that there is even a 10% slop that would raise the maximum possible to 55 units, but 30% slop up to 65 units is pretty unbelievable! The Traffic Engineer stood by his assessment of 50 maximum in the last Planning Commission meeting. To make matters even worse, as has been stated in both the City Council and Planning Commission meetings, we are rushing through this process in hopes of possibly getting a “Density Bonus”. The Density Bonus allows more lax building rules, such as even FEWER parking spots per housing unit than is standard. Even more concerning, however, is that this would mean even MORE density, possibly up to 85-90 units per acre!! This density is almost DOUBLE the 50 units above which the Traffic Study says congestion models “falls apart”!! Why should new Lower Income residents and the community be given impossible congestion and parking standards?