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HomeMy WebLinkAbout03-25-2014 th lopesKremke, Kate From: Mejia, Anthony Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2014 11:55 AM To: Kremke, Kate Subject: FW: Comments on Cal Poly Housing South Recirculated EIR Attachments: Letter-So Ho use Proj_DraftEIR_Lopes.pdf Agenda Correspondence for 03/25/14. Anthony J. Mejia I City Clerk MAR 2 7 2014 City of San Luis Obispo 5 t�l, E 990 Palm Street -C� -CTFY San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 tel 1 805.781.7102 AGENDA CORRESPONDENCE - - - -- Original Message---- - From: James Lopes [mailto:iameslopes @charter.net] Sent: Wednesday, March 26, 2014 4:13 PM To: Nicole Carter; Codron, Michael; Dietrick, Christine; Lichtig, Katie Cc: Carpenter, Dan; Christianson, Carlyn; Marx, Jan; Smith, Kathy; Ashbaugh, John; Mejia, Anthony; Johnson, Derek; Murry, Kim; 'Karen Adler' Subject: Comments on Cal Poly Housing South Recirculated EIR March 26, 2014 Nicole Carter, Senior Planner SWCA Environmental Consultants Hi Nicole, Attached and in the mail to you are my comments on the Housing South Recirculated EIR. Please contact me if you have any questions or concerns. Regards, Jamie Lopes James Lopes 1336 Sweet Bay Lane San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 Ph. 805 - 781 -8960 1336 Sweetbay Lane San Luis Obispo, California 93401 March 26, 2014 CSU Board of Trustees C/o Nicole Carter, Senior Planner SWCA Environmental Consultants 1422 Monterey Street, C200 San Luis Obispo, CA 93401 Subject: Student Housing South — Recirculated Draft Environmental Impact Report Dear Ms. Carter: Comments on the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo Student Housing South project are listed below for your review and responses. I appreciate the extension of time and the recirculation of the Draft Environmental Impact Report. Thank you for your consideration of my comments. Please contact me at 'amesio es charter.net or 805 - 602 -1365 if you have any questions. Sincerely, James Lopes James Lopes Letter Student Housing South Revised Draft EIR 4 -1 Aesthetic resources March 26, 2014 Impact Analysis: AES Impact 2 accurately identifies a potential impact from the visibility of structures as seen from the Slack Street neighborhood. Mitigation Measure Discussion: The Draft EIR states, "Allow complete removal of all vegetation, and plant replacement planting to screen at least 50 percent of the project." These measures would enable grading of a mature landscaped slope, with 60 -80 -foot tall pine trees and others at the top. Any replacement trees will take a generation - 15 to 25 years to replace the current ones. This is an unacceptable method and time frame for a mitigation measure, and appears to be part of the project description. The project site plan, Figure 2 -3, shows the five -story South Building near the top edge of the Slack Street embankment. This location will cause complete disruption of this bank in order for construction to occur on the south side of the building. The close location of the building to Slack Street will intrude on necessary slope for the final embankment, which will preclude any development of a sidewalk at the bottom of the bank, unless extensive retaining walls are built or the sidewalk replaces street parking. These walls would cause potential aesthetic impacts themselves to campus visitors, residents and students. The impact discussion should address the interaction of the close placement of the southern and western buildings with the embankments. Proposed Measures /Alternatives: I request that you consider a different set of mitigation measures: 1. Locate grading and development within the existing parking lot area, with at least a 120 -foot setback from Slack Street. 2. Retain the existing vegetation, especially healthy tall trees, and provide a wider landscaped setback than exists, with supplemental planting to screen 80 percent of development. 3. The south and southwest buildings shall be limited to three stories within a 35 -foot height limit, to reduce their scale to a more compatible and less visible height. This mitigation should be offset by replacement housing elsewhere on the project site or campus. 4. Revise the project site plan so that the parking structure building, wrapped by the proposed uses, is moved adjacent to or near the drive to the existing parking structure. a. This building should be designed to be compatible with the Performing Arts Center, with a plaza in front of it. Design the residential buildings so that the configuration is more urban in character (compact, linear, grid -like, oriented to focal points and open space), similar to Poly Canyon Village. b. Design the residential configuration so that the south end of the project site is in open fields for casual recreation. Impact Analysis: The EIR did not identify a potentially significant impact from the architecture of the Project. A visual assessment should address the congruity of the Project with existing conditions of the landscape. In this setting, the landscaping is introduced and mature, and it presents a highly vegetated edge to the site, with the Santa Lucia Hills as a natural backdrop above it. The view of these landscapes presents a very unified and harmonious setting, as shown in Photo 4.1 -21: 2 James Lopes Letter Student Housing South Revised Draft EIR March 26, 2014 The rectilinear architecture of the Project buildings will disrupt and degrade the visual character of the landscaped areas next to the existing parking lots and the open views of hillsides, by its height, starkness and long rooflines and wall planes. If developed in the City, the Project architecture would be inconsistent with the Community Design Guidelines. Proposed Measure /Alternative: Revise the proposed architecture from a modernist theme to a more residential one, with sloped roofs, eave overhangs; wall patterns such as pediments, pilasters and cornices; obvious changes in planes; all engaged in softening and "breaking up" the unrelieved wall planes and roof lines. My proposed mitigation measures will potentially block views of the Morros. To avoid or mitigate for the loss of these views, strategic view openings should be part of the project. Revise the site plan to orient buildings to provide two or three angled views west through the site to the Morros, in particular from an angle such as seen in Photo 4.1 -17: 4.4.5.4 Nuisance Noise Impact Analysis Discussion: Impacts from pedestrians and their bad behaviors should be addressed as an increase above existing levels, rather than being dismissed by the assessment that, the "project will not alter existing enforcement methods, and will not alter campus enrollment." The essential point about the project is that it will locate an additional 1,400 approximate students at the edge of a single - family residential area. These students will join an existing student sub - culture of walking through the neighborhood looking for parties and friends to join. The neighborhood has become a recreational zone for existing students who pass on this sub - culture to new ones. Although noise and bad behaviors from some students might be occasional, they are individually often significant. The impact assessment should consider the number of nuisance/ noise complaints that have been filed with the City, and also consider the "impact' nature of these noises. Impacts from mechanical equipment are not adequately addressed in terms of standard practice, partly since Cal Poly construction is not subject to City standards. Mitigation Measure Discussion: Nuisance impacts should be reduced by structural means, by locating walkways within the campus as much as feasible to channel circulation to California and Foothill Streets through campus from the site. Where a walkway must be placed near or at the edge of campus, a sound wall should be constructed to define the edge of the walkway and campus, and to block sound from the walkway. A wall at the edge of campus and outside a walkway is an ordinary way to define the boundary of student activity. See the following section on Pedestrian and Cyclists Off- Campus Impacts for related discussion. Nuisance noise should be addressed and mitigated by programmatic means as part of the project. An ongoing, permanent "good neighbor" program should be developed by Cal Poly and the City, to James Lopes Letter Student Housing South Revised Draft EIR March 26, 2014 educate and warn students about the situation and how to reduce neighborhood impacts and respect the existing community. To ensure that the project will adequately control mechanical equipment noise, standards similar to the City code should be included as mitigation measures, to require solid screening which will effectively reduce the noise of mechanical equipment from rooftops or other locations. 4.6.4.2 Pedestrian and Bicycle Facilities Mitigation Measure Discussion: Table TC Impact 2: Mitigation Measure TC /mm -1.a suggests a partial mitigation measure for the lack of sidewalks. It speaks to "including Pacheco Way and along the north side of Slack Street." Taken a limited way, it would require the development of sidewalks only on the frontage of the project site. However, there is no existing sidewalk west of Pacheco Way until Longview Street. This measure could leave pedestrians on the street surface at Pacheco Way and Slack Street, unless the following changes are made: 1. Clarify that pedestrian circulation shall be developed between the project site and the existing sidewalk at Longview Street. However, this mitigation is difficult to meet at the street edge: a. There is no space at the south edge of the project site or west of Pacheco Way for a sidewalk, since the existing embankment goes directly up from the curb of Slack Street at the project site, and directly down along the curb of Slack Street west of Pacheco Way. It would have to be graded back the necessary distance from the existing curb and fill brought in at these locations. b. Or, the existing 8 -foot parking aisle would have to be used for a sidewalk, which would not be an adequate width. Using the parking aisle would be ineffective and counter- productive, because it would require a mid -block crosswalk at Pacheco Way and direct students to the neighborhood sidewalk on the south side of Slack Street, causing the identified potential impact. It is not acceptable to provide just a sidewalk along the length of Slack Street to Longview Street. This is a route selection that will invite if not direct pedestrians into the neighborhood, albeit more safely. This mitigation measure should be replaced with the following concepts: Proposed Measure /Alternative: To reduce traffic into the neighborhood, an on- campus route through the recreation area around the track should be developed. The mitigation measure should be revised to state that a management plan shall: 1. Locate and design walkways that avoid increased pedestrian traffic and noise into the Alta Vista neighborhood. 2. Give priority to locating walkways entirely on- campus instead of at the edge of Slack Street, to connect to the sidewalk at Longview Street. Highest priority is to utilize the existing driveway onto Pacheco Way, and westerly around the track to Longview Street sidewalk, or a different extended walkway to connect to Foothill Boulevard. If this measure is not accepted, then another measure should be written to address Slack Street: Develop a new sidewalk on the north side of Slack Street, with at least an 8 -foot width, inside a 5 -foot landscaped parkway, to extend past the project site to the existing sidewalk at Longview Street. This measure will require extensive cut on Slack Street at the project site, and a retaining wall may be necessary, and it will require fill placement west of Pacheco Way. To 4 James Lopes Letter Student Housing South Revised Draft EIR March 26, 2014 accomplish this, Cal Poly should not grade the embankment on the south project site edge, but instead replace the existing street parking with this walkway. P. 4.6 -24: Pedestrian and Bicyclist Off - Campus Impacts: Impact Analysis: This section does not examine the existing and potential increase in pedestrian trips through the local streets in the Alta Vista neighborhood; yet the bad behavior of some people who are walking in the neighborhood can be attributed to Cal Poly students, as evidenced by City records of nuisance /noise complaints. The first paragraph states, "Off- campus pedestrian and bicycle trips associated with the project would be concentrated along Grand Avenue and, via internal campus roads, California Boulevard, and Foothill Boulevard, as those streets are equipped with pedestrian and bicycle facilities and provide more convenient connections." This assessment says nothing about the neighborhood. Actually, trips through the neighborhood go to student houses throughout it, and funnel to Longview, Orange and Hathway Streets to connect to fraternities, sororities and student housing near or on these streets. This section should be revised and upgraded to account for actual travel routes and behavior and an anticipated increase in trips and nuisance complaints. The combination of noise and other bad behavior will accompany the project's addition of over 1,400 students in the vicinity. This fact is not accounted for or examined. It is an existing significant impact that will be worsened with the project. The section does point out that trips to downtown, parks and surrounding roadways will increase. However, the measures in TC /mm -1 are inadequate as described above. Proposed Measure /Alternative: Please refer to the proposed mitigation measures above for internal, on- campus pathways, and walls where necessary to control and limit neighborhood access. 4.6.6 Cumulative Impacts — Intersection Impacts. Impact Analysis: This section discusses the California/Taft Streets intersection and states that the project would add to significant impacts here, but curiously it concludes quickly that no mitigation measures are feasible. Proposed Mitigation Measure: Standard measures should be written that require "fair share" contribution to intersection improvements, including signalization. To say that there is not enough evidence that such an approach will reduce potential impacts is questionable and debatable, and TC Impact 4 should be revised to include standard mitigation measures. Cumulative Pedestrian, Bicycle and Transit Impacts. Impact Analysis: This section does not recognize that Teach School will add these kinds of trips, in terms of teacher and student walking and bike trips. These additional trips should be addressed in the cumulative analysis. James Lopes Letter Student Housing South Revised Draft EIR 5 Alternatives Analysis March 26, 2014 New Alternative Proposal: Move Parking Garage North — Create an Urban Village This alternative is discussed above as a mitigation measure to aesthetics, noise and traffic impacts, but it could be extensive enough to be evaluated as a project alternative. It would shift the project site away from Slack Street to avoid or reduce aesthetic, noise and traffic impacts. 1. The parking garage could be moved closer to the entrance drive to the Performing Arts Center (PAC), with a fagade of the desired offices and visitors center facing the PAC. The building could be designed to complement the PAC but not replicate its sweeping lines. It could have a small plaza in front, but not a huge area. The garage would include the spaces lost from the proposed project's parking lots. 2. The residential buildings would also be moved north, and they would be sited in an urban village similar in compactness to the configuration of Poly Canyon Village. 3. The height of the buildings would be lower at the west and south ends of the project. 4. Student shops and services would be located on the ground floor similar to a pedestrian mall. 5. A large play field / park would be located at the south end (not as big as shown in the Master Plan). This design would relocate the entire project closer to the Performing Arts Center and make the building distribution more compact. However, pedestrian circulation and on -site noise could still create noise and traffic impacts due to the project's close location to the neighborhood. 5.5.3 Location Alternative — H -12 and H -16 Parking Lots I support the alternative of locating the project to the H -12 and H -16 Parking Lots and their vicinity. A parking structure and a dining commons should also be located with this alternative. The design and features of the buildings should include these features: 1. The residential buildings in an urban village similar in compactness to the configuration of Poly Canyon Village. 2. The height of the buildings should be lower at the edges of the project. 3. Student shops and services should be located on the ground floor similar to a pedestrian mall. 4. A large play field / park should be located adjacent to the project. 5. The buildings should be residential in character, rather than modernist, to create a comfortable and familiar living environment, distinct from the utilitarian learning environment on campus. rel