A proposal by Santa Clara County Supervisor Liz Kniss to use funds contributed to the county by Stanford University for a new bike bridge over Highway 101 in Palo Alto is facing resistance from the Stanford community, where residents and officials are urging the county to slow down and consider other alternatives for the funds.

The plan, which Kniss and Supervisor Dave Cortese unveiled Wednesday, May 16, calls for using $5 million in Stanford funds for the bike bridge at Adobe Creek and another $3 million to complete the Dumbarton link in the Bay Trail between Redwood City and Alviso. The money would come from a $10.34 fund that Stanford pledged to the county when it was applying for a General Use Permit (GUP) 11 years ago. The permit allowed Stanford to add up to 5 million square feet of construction to its campus. The $8 million recreation fund (which has since grown to $10.34 million because of interest) was intended to mitigate the loss of recreational opportunities that would result from the new construction.

But while Kniss maintained Wednesday that her proposals would boost recreational opportunities for Stanford students, residents and the wider community, members of the Stanford Campus Residential Leaseholders (SCRL) board of directors have other thoughts. The board, which is elected to represent the Stanford campus community, had its annual meeting last Wednesday night and Kniss' plan did not go down well with the board, said James Sweeney, the board's president.

Specifically, the board feels that the benefits of Kniss' proposed projects would provide little or no benefit to the campus residents, Sweeney said. Stanford had planned to use the funds to build a trail in San Mateo County but that plan fizzled in December, when the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to nix the idea.

The GUP specifies that if the trail proposal doesn't move forward, the funds would be used to reduce "the adverse effect on recreational opportunities for existing or new campus residents and facility users that will be caused by the housing and academic development approved by the GUP, which will reduce the availability of recreational facilities, while increasing the demand for such facilities."

Sweeney said he and the board believe that the projects proposed by Kniss fail to meet this criteria. Though they would provide benefits to the general population, they are too distant from Stanford's campus to get much use from the university community. Ideally, he said, the projects would benefit both Stanford and the public at large.

"We had a very strong negative reaction and we have not been able to identify anyone else who believes they'd have any benefit to them on the campus," Sweeney said, referring to the board's discussion of Kniss' proposals.

One proposal that the SCRL board supports is a plan to improve a trail along El Camino Real, between Stanford Shopping Center and Stanford Avenue and to enhance the existing trail along Stanford Avenue, which stops just short of the Stanford Dish. The proposal would stretch the trail to the Dish and to the newly completed S-1 trail on Page Mill Road.

University officials are also urging the Board of Supervisors to slow down. Though the board was scheduled to consider Kniss' proposals Tuesday morning, Stanford officials are calling for the board to continue the meeting to another date. Jean McCown, Stanford's vice president for communications, said Stanford has been waiting for the board to come up with a process for selecting a project that would be funded through Stanford's contributions.

NASA shocked local congress members in April by refusing to approve the offer from Google executives to pay to re-skin Hangar One because they no longer believe Moffett is useful or needed. They declared it surplus and proposed turning the future of Moffett Field over to the General Service Administration, which handles disposition of Federal property. 

This was totally unexpected.  In February a delegation from Sunnyvale spoke to the number two man at NASA and he gave no indication declaring Moffett surplus was being considered.  He spoke only of continuing review of the offer for Hangar One re-skinning.  Loss of Moffett will have a huge negative impact on this area, economically and from a safety and security standpoint.

Activities at Moffett refute the claim that it is un-needed and is surplus.  In 2003 NASA finalized a plan for future uses at Moffett and Ames including research and educational facilities which won the GSA award for Best Innovative Policy.

In 2006 NASA Headquarters approved a 20 year business plan and land use analysis for the site.  In 2010 NASA approved a 50-year lease with the California Air National Guard, and in 2011 NASA Headquarters reviewed and concurred with the Master Plan.

In December 2011 Congresswoman Eshoo and 20 other congress members urged NASA Headquarters to approve the Hangar One re-skinning plus long term lease with H221 LLC, the organization representing Google founders Page and Brin and chair Schmidt.

Letters supporting continued use of Moffett Field and re-skinning Hangar One per the H221 LLC offer were sent to NASA by the cities of Mountain View and Sunnyvale, historic preservation organizations including the Advisory Council for Historic Preservation and National Trust for Historic Preservation, and the Secretary to the Air Force. 

Lockheed and Space Systems/Loral sent letters stating that Moffett Field is essential for their shipment of spacecraft and space-related hardware and that loss of the airfield would have significant national security impacts. The response on April 6 from Charles Bolden, head of NASA, was a letter saying Moffett is no longerneeded and is surplus.  Therefore no leases can be signed.

A revised plan to build a prominent "gateway" building at the downtown intersection of Alma Street and Lytton Avenue in Palo Alto will be the subject of a public hearing tonight.

The latest proposal is a scaled-down version of the original plan, which included a five-story building that exceeded the city's 50-foot height limit for new developments. If the City Council approves a "planned community" zone for the project at 355 Alma St. tonight, the new development would be four stories high and would consist mostly of office space, including an area for a nonprofit office that would be rented out at a subsidized rate.

The project, in its original five-story iteration, has already cleared the city's Architectural Review Board and its Planning and Transportation Commission. At its previous hearing on March 12, the City Council was generally sympathetic to the idea of allowing a large, dense office building to occupy a prominent spot near the downtown Caltrain station. But council members shared the concerns of residents from the adjacent Downtown North neighborhood who argued that the new development would exacerbate the area's parking problems.

In exchange for exceeding the city's zoning regulations, applicants Lund Smith, Boyd Smith, Scott Foster and Jim Baer are proposing an "in-lieu parking" fee of about $1.5 million and funding for a downtown parking study. The applicants' package of "public benefits" also includes $1.25 million for affordable housing; about 3,800 square feet of ground-floor retail; four electric-vehicle charging stations (two outside and two more in the underground garage); eight surface parking spaces available to the public and 16 more underground spaces that would be open to the public on nights and weekends; and various landscaping and road improvements.

Even as China emerges as a super power, many of those who have benefited most from the country's economic rise are heading for the exits. And many are relocating to the Bay Area, whose large Asian population, good schools and comfortable lifestyle are powerful draws for Chinese multimillionaires concerned about the future of their homeland and seeking the own American dream.

"The rich people are trying to get green cards," said Ta-lin Hsu, founder and chairman of Palo Alto-based venture capital firm H&Q Asia Pacific, who spends a lot of time in Asia. He is frequently asked by business associates about how to immigrate to the United States.

"The main reason is, they still worry about the future stability of China," Hsu said. "The U.S. is a democracy, there is freedom and it's a safer place."

The exit door for many of these wealthy Chinese is opened by the fast-track visas America offers for well-heeled immigrants. Known as the EB-5, the visa requires applicants to invest $500,000 in projects in economically struggling regions or $1 million in a commercial venture in other locations. The investments must create or preserve 10 jobs for two years. If successful, the applicants and their families -- spouses and children younger than 21 -- are awarded permanent residency.

The foreign money is a welcome source of funding for many projects. Oakland city officials, for example, have eyed the program to help pay for a project that includes hotels, a convention center, shops and new facilities for the Raiders and Warriors and possibly a new A's ballpark.

In recent years, as the number of China's millionaires has grown, interest in the program from across the Pacific has soared.

Between 1992 and 2011, the number of applications for investor visas jumped 700 percent, from 474 to 3,805, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. In the past two years alone, the number applicants has nearly quadrupled. More applications by far come from China than any other country. Last year, 77 percent of all of those who applied for these visas were Chinese.

"They are standing in line," said Scott Bachman, CEO of San Mateo-based eBee5. His company helps pair large development projects with wealthy Chinese looking to invest in the United States.

"When I go to China, I get a Chinese cellphone and I am constantly bombarded with EB-5 (advertising) text messages," said Kevin Wright, a consultant with offices in the United States and China.

A survey of 980 Chinese millionaires published last fall by the Bank of China and the Hurun Report, which tracks the country's wealthy, revealed that 46 percent of them were thinking about leaving China, while an additional 14 percent were filling out immigration paperwork or had already left the country.

"The Chinese government is definitely worried," said one successful EB-5 applicant, who relocated his family from Beijing to Los Altos Hills after initially moving to Texas, where he invested in a metal processing factory. The man, who asked that he only be identified as Mr. Zhang, did not want to reveal his full identity because he still does business in China and does not want to upset powerful government officials.

Indeed, most Chinese who come to the United States on these visas strive to remain under-the-radar, particularly those doing business in China, whose laws forbid transferring more than $50,000 a year out of the country.

Many Americans, bruised by the long recession and its painful aftermath, worry about the United States being eclipsed by China. But many successful Chinese complain about China's pervasive corruption, polluted air, contaminated food and educational system that stresses memorization over creative thinking.

"The United States looks like a pretty good option to them," said San Francisco immigration attorney Robert Gaffney, a specialist in EB-5 visas who is fluent in Mandarin. "It's a quality of life decision for them. They are voting with their pocketbook: They'd rather be here than in their own country."

The money of these deep-pocket immigrants is highly valued in this country at a time investment funds can still be tough to acquire for some development projects.

"Local financing is just not available, or it's very hard to come by, especially for construction," said Katie Yao with Sand Hill Property, a Redwood City developer that is planning to build a hotel across the street from the yet-to-be-built new Apple campus in Cupertino.

So far, the company has found one Chinese investor interested in backing the project with a $1 million stake, with the hope of getting an EB-5 visa.

"We are only trying to raise $20 million -- that means 20 (Chinese) families," she said. "We offer 6 percent returns and profit-sharing."

By China's boom-time standards -- which often reward investors with returns of 100 percent or more -- the Cupertino hotel project hardly seems worth their interest, she admitted. However, Yao added, "People want to find a shelter for their money, someplace safe."

The investor visa, which began in 1992, will expire in September unless Congress reauthorizes it, but experts expect that to happen.

"It has enjoyed bipartisan support," said Peter Joseph, executive director for the Association to Invest In the USA, a trade group that lobbies Congress. "It's about creating jobs without spending anything from the public purse."

Indeed, the risks are borne by the immigrant investors, San Jose immigration attorney Acton Yang said.

"The EB-5 requires a risky investment," he said. "It can't be investing in a security. You can't just buy a house. It has to be a risky investment that will generate employment in the United States."

And if investors put money in something that fails -- say, a shopping center in a troubled neighborhood -- they stand to lose more than their cash, noted consultant Bachman. "If the business is dead, they not only lose their money, they lose their visas," he said.

Still, many wealthy Chinese are willing to place such bets if they trust those they are doing business with, said Zhang, whose wife and two children live in their gated Los Altos Hills home while he splits his time between China and Silicon Valley.

The number of people in China who can make a $1 million investment "is huge," he said. "I am the captain of my golf team, 40 people. More than half of them can make a $1 million investment just like that.

"The Chinese have full confidence in the United States," he added. "It will come back. That's why, from an investment perspective, there are a lot of opportunities here. At least a dozen people around me want to come here. They have the economic power. They have the means."

The dilapidated shopping center at the entrance to town on Embarcadero Road will finally, after nearly ten years, be redeveloped into a multi-use planned community, thanks to a vote for approval by City Council Monday night.

The Eichler-built development has slowly fallen into disrepair since Lucky, then Albertson’s left the main grocery space, and today that building lays vacant alongside other empty storefronts.

When Sand Hill Homes finishes the 3.58-acre Edgewood Plaza, there will be ten two-story homes alongside a remodeled retail area and a public park, all of which were designed to complement the mid-century modern architectural theme developed by Eichler, who once headquartered his firm there.

PHOTOS: Architectural Renderings of Edgewood Plaza

City staff and members of the Architectural Review Board, Historic Resources Board, and Planning and Transportation Commission spoke strongly in favor of green-lighting the Final Environmental Impact Report as well as an amendment to the civil code and a tentative map of the home subdivision.

The amendment to the city’s municipal code approves a Planned Community Zone District allowing renovation of three retail buildings, relocation of a fourth, construction of ten single-family homes, and creation of a .2-acre park and associated site improvements.

The tentative map that was approved merges what were once three distinct parcels into one giant parcel that Sand Hill will re-subdivide into eleven parcels—one commercial and ten residential—plus off-site improvements, for the site at 2080 Channing Avenue.

 “We have finally gotten to a point where a majority of the community and the applicants are on the same page,” said Curtis Williams, Director of Planning and Community Environment.

Indeed, most of the twelve public speakers who addressed Council—all of whom lived in the immediate vicinity of Edgewood Shopping Center—spoke favorably of the plan, Sand Hill’s outreach efforts, and the work of city staff. Most exciting to locals, however, is the planned addition of a Fresh Market grocery store.

“Most people are very excited about having the Fresh Market come,” said Gail Olsen, who lives in a neighboring Eichler home. She said the Albertsons that occupied that space was “dirty, the product was poor quality, and it was expensive.”

Today, nearby residents have to drive or bike away from the neighborhood to get their groceries.

“We’re all excited about having a place where we can walk and bike to do our shopping and have coffee,” said Olsen.

Council members were also largely supportive of the plan, but many of them expressed great concern over traffic and parking issues.

Council Member Pat Burt said the plan did not properly account for the fast flow of exiting freeway traffic from Highway 101, which makes it difficult for drivers turning left onto St. Francis from Embarcadero. That intersection doesn’t have a green left-turn arrow, forcing drivers to wait for oncoming traffic to pass. Since traffic from the freeway is often going 55 miles per hour, and comes as a steady stream during rush hour, the drivers going the opposite direction have to wait a long time to make that turn.

“I think that’s a big part of what makes this real hazardous,” said Burt. “We need to figure out ways that we’re going to be able to address those issues.”

Chief Transportation Official Jaime Rodriguez said that a green left-turn arrow would certainly help mitigate that intersection, and adding a signal would cost somewhere in the ballpark of $120,000.

Burt later motioned that that upgrade be made a condition for approval of the project.

Parking was also a major concern, since the new plan reduces the number of parking spaces from the existing 250 to 156. Sand Hill hired a third party traffic analysis firm to assess parking needs, and they concluded that 156 spaces would be sufficient. City staff agreed with those findings and signed off on the result.

Council Member Karen Holman noted, however, that the existing office building being used by the Maharishi Enlightenment Center of Palo Alto will require more than 60 parking spaces if it is ever used as an office again. If that occurs, said Planning Director Curtis Williams, the applicant will have to find a way to deal with parking, which may be impossible since the parking lot will be at full capacity.

Council members also worried about the reduction of the number of driveways to and from the parking lots from six to two. But again, city staff agreed with the analysis done by traffic experts, who concluded that two access points would be enough.

Council Member Burt was the first to motion to approve the plan, along with two additional amendments—one for the left-turn arrow onto St. Francis, and another requiring the driveway in the rear of the Shell Gas Station to remain open.

“The community has been looking forward to this project for along while, and I think we have something that is a very good balance of a variety of competing interests,” said Burt. “No balancing act is ever perfect, but I think this is one that has worked very hard to come up with something that I think the community will be very pleased with once it is built.”

Council Member Greg Scharf seconded the motion and thanked developer Jim Baer for his commitment to working closely with neighbors, and for bringing in another place to buy food.

“I’d like to thank the applicant for bringing a grocery store,” he said.

One by one, the rest of the council members offered enthusiastic—if measured—support for the project, with the exception of Karen Holman, who, although generally supportive, wasn’t satisfied that the EIR was complete and therefore could not support approval.

After more than three hours of debate, City Council voted to green-light Edgewood Plaza on a 8-1 vote with Holman voting against.

via paloalto.patch.com

An ambitious proposal to construct a high-profile "gateway" building at a prominent corner of downtown Palo Alto is facing resistance from residents worried about the new building's parking impacts and concerns from city officials about its size and benefits.

The issues over parking and "benefits" bubbled up at Monday night's public hearing for the "Lytton Gateway" project, a marathon discussion that featured testimony from about 20 residents, a series of split votes and a wide-ranging debate by the City Council about what they want to see in the new building. Faced with competing priorities, council members ultimately decided to defer a final decision on the project. Instead, the council voted 6-3 -- with Councilwomen Karen Holman, Nancy Shepherd and Gail Price dissenting -- to direct the applicants to further revise the application and to consider reducing the number of stories in the project.

The development under discussion -- a five-story building featuring three stories of office space, ground-floor retail, 14 apartments and an underground garage -- would stand at Alma Street and Lytton Avenue, near the downtown Caltrain station. The applicants -- Lund Smith, Boyd Smith, Scott Foster and Jim Baer -- characterized the project as the perfect example of a transit-oriented development -- a dense, mixed-use building next to a major transit site. Various downtown property owners have come out in favor of the project, as has the Sierra Club, which wrote a letter supporting the dense development because of its proximity to Caltrain. The Palo Alto Housing Corporation, a local nonprofit that manages the city's affordable-housing stock, also endorsed the project, which includes seven below-market-rate units.

The project has also received the blessings of the city's Architectural Review Board and, more recently, its Planning and Transportation Commission, which voted to approve the project last month after four lengthy meetings. While few residents attended the previous public hearings on 101 Lytton Ave., more than two dozen showed up to the Monday night, March 12, council hearing.

Council members agreed that the site, which was previously occupied by a Shell gas station, is ideally suited for a large new development. Vice Mayor Greg Scharff called it "probably the best site in the city" for an office building and Councilman Sid Espinosa said it was "the right kind of a development, from my perspective, for the right site." But members had different ideas when it came to the the details -- namely, just how big should the building be and which "public benefits" the applicants should be forced to provide in exchange for dramatically exceeding the city's zoning regulations.

Concerns over the new building's parking impacts also loomed large during Monday's discussion. Residents and property owners from Downtown North and other nearby neighborhoods attended the meetings, with many arguing that the project is far too large and that it would burden the neighborhood with more cars than it can accommodate.

The project, as proposed, would include 130 parking spaces, including eight outdoor spaces that would be open to the public and 14 underground spots that would be available to the public on nights and weekends. The development will also include a valet-parking system that would allow the building to accommodate 164 cars and a transportation-demand management plan geared toward getting people out of their vehicles and into other modes of transportation. This includes buying Caltrain Go Passes for the building's occupants.

Boyd Smith of the applicant team told the council that his group has been meeting with neighborhood residents and striving to meet their concerns about parking. Unlike most of downtown, the residential Downtown North currently doesn't have any parking restrictions, a situation that prompts many office workers to leave their cars in the neighborhood, various residents told the council Monday. Many have called for a parking-permit program that would limit the amount of time nonresidents can park in the neighborhood. Smith said the applicants are willing to pay the city $250,000 for a study to evaluate possible parking solutions for the neighborhood.

"We have done everything we can to be thoughtful and responsive to those concerns," Boyd Smith said, referring to complaints about insufficient parking.

Many remained skeptical. Sally-Ann Rudd, who lives in Downtown North, said her neighborhood had become the "overflow parking lot" of downtown and encouraged the council to institute a permit program. Another resident, Tina Peak, went a step further and said the project is far too big for the neighborhood. She asked the council to demand that the applicants reduce the building's size.

"Currently this city is not even close to being sustainable on its own and adding more and more development will get us no closer to this goal," Peak said. "Please send this project back to the drawing board or, better yet, to the chopping block to bring it down to size."

Some on the council shared her view that the project, as proposed, is too big. The building would be 64-feet tall and would feature as its centerpiece a tower that rises higher than 80 feet. It would thus exceed the city's 50-foot height limit for new developments.

"There's a 50-foot height limit that's been a long-standing city standard and one that has broad community interest," Holman said.

Councilman Larry Klein proposed reducing the building from five to four stories. His proposal ultimately received enough votes, with only Holman, Price and Shepherd voting against it. The council also voted 5-4, with Espinosa, Holman, Klein and Greg Schmid dissenting, to have staff and the applicant explore bringing a nonprofit organization to the new building at a subsidized rate. The nonprofit organization would replace the retail component under an idea proposed by Councilman Pat Burt.

Burt acknowledged that the parking problem in downtown Palo Alto is real. But he also said that the building's location and its potential benefits could justify its large size and density. The site, under existing zoning, could accommodate a two-story office building. To build the larger building, the applicants are requesting a "planned community" zone, which allows them to exceed regulations in exchange for "public benefits" to be negotiated.

"I know this still remains a large building and a tall building but I think in the end it is a gateway building," Burt said. "It does have the opportunity to have an outstanding design.

"I'd be able to trade off some of the concerns over its height and mass for other values that we're seeking in the community."

Burt also directed staff to compile the various available studies evaluating the impact of transportation-demand-management programs. These studies, he said, should be publicized so that members of the community can consider if the strategies proposed by the applicants are sufficient to accommodate the area's parking problems.

An ambitious plan to redevelop Alma Plaza in south Palo Alto took another leap forward Tuesday, Feb. 28, when builder D.R. Horton signed an agreement with the plaza's developer to construct the first 19 houses at the plaza.

John McNellis, the developer behind the project, told the Weekly that D.R. Horton had agreed to build the first phase of homes on the 4.2-acre plaza, which is located in the 3400 block of Alma Street. The company had also built the houses at Arbor Real, the residential complex at the site of the former Rickey's Hyatt.

McNellis' agreement with the builder is the latest milestone for a high-profile project that was the subject of 15 public hearings spanning two years. The City Council approved the zone change to enable the plaza's redevelopment in January 2009.

While the anchor of the new plaza will be a grocery store, the project also includes 37 homes, 15 below-market-rate apartments, a small park and a community room. The city's approval allows the construction of half of the homes once the lease with the supermarket is signed. The other half can be constructed once the store is occupied.

While the Tuesday agreement pertains exclusively to 19 homes, the same builder could return later in the process to build the remainder of the homes, McNellis said.

"We both anticipate and hope that it will be D.R. Horton building the second half," McNellis said.

McNellis said he expects construction of the homes to begin March 5 and to be completed in August. Meanwhile, construction is in progress on the retail portion of the plaza, which includes the grocery store and the public park. The plan is to finish construction on the retail and the homes at about the same time, McNellis said.

The new grocery store will be occupied by Miki's Farm Fresh Market and would be modeled after the popular Berkeley Bowl supermarket. Michael "Miki" Werness, who worked as manager of Berkeley Bowl and Monterey Market (both in Berkeley), announced in July his plan to open the store at Alma Plaza.

Miki's Farm Fresh Market is scheduled to open this summer.

An ambitious proposal to build a five-story building featuring a glassy tower, offices, apartments and a coffee shop at one of downtown Palo Alto's most prominent corners took a major stride toward winning the city's approval Wednesday night, Feb. 22, when the Planning and Transportation Commission agreed to rezone the site to make the project possible.

It took four public hearings and a long debate over "public benefits" before the project at 355 Alma St. could gain the endorsement of the commission, which voted 5-2, with Susan Fineberg and Greg Tanaka dissenting to rezone the site. Because the project's density far exceeds the site's zoning, the applicants requested a change to a "planned community" zone -- a designation that allows developers to build beyond the city's restrictions in exchange for public benefits.

The planning commission had previously endorsed the appearance and the concept of the new building, which the city's Architectural Review Board had also approved. But at the Jan. 22 hearing, commissioners argued that the applicants have to provide more benefits to justify the increased intensity. The applicants returned this week with an expanded proposal, one that would provide more public parking, more units of affordable housing and a pledge to help the city fund a downtown parking study and a landscape improvements. The proposal includes 14 units of housing, seven of which would be below market rate, ground-floor retail and offices on the floors one through four.

The "Lytton Gateway" project, proposed by Lund Smith, Boyd Smith, Jim Baer and Scott Foster, represents in many ways the city's drive to encourage dense developments near major transit centers -- a key tenet of New Urbanism. The proposed building would stand at the intersection of Alma and Lytton Avenue, right across the street from the downtown Caltrain station. Without the zoning change, the development would have been limited to a two-story office building.

At a previous hearing, commissioners said they were concerned about the insufficient number of parking spaces proposed by the applicants. Several residents from the Downtown North neighborhood near the site urged the commission Wednesday not to green-light the project unless it provides more parking spaces. Among them was Sally-Ann Rudd, president of the Downtown North Residents Association. Rudd said she was concerned about the prospect of Lytton Gateway employees taking over the parking spaces in her residential neighborhood.

"We're already parked up during the day from a mixture of Caltrain commuters and downtown employees," Rudd said. "This has been a subject of some irritation from the residents."

To address the community's and the commission's concerns, the applicants agreed to provide eight surface parking spots and 14 underground-parking spots to the public in addition to the 123 spots they had previously said the project would include. The applicants also agreed to pay $60,000 to help the city fund a downtown parking study and to launch a full-service attendant-parking program that would add another 34 spots to the building.

"We truly believe this is the wave of the future for downtown parking," Lund Smith told the commission, referring to the attendant-parking program.

A revised proposal to redevelop the Edgewood Plaza Shopping Center and to build 10 homes at the Eichler-style plaza took a major step forward when Palo Alto's Architectural Review Board voted to approve the project Thursday morning, Feb. 2.

Though the ambitious project still has to get approved by the Planning and Transportation Commission and City Council, the board's endorsement presents a major victory for the Sand Hill Property Company, the Redwood City-based developer behind the project.

The board voted 4-0, with newly appointed member Lee Lippert abstaining, to approve Sand Hill's plan, with several board members praising the evolution of the project's design. The most recent changes include lowering building heights, larger yard spaces for the residences and relocation of entry doors at some of the residences to face Channing Avenue. Board Chair Heather Young was one of several members who lauded the changes as an improvement to the project.

Young also praised the developers for getting the surrounding community's support for the revitalization of the worn-down shopping center.

Located at 2080 Channing Ave., Edgewood Plaza was built by developer Joseph Eichler and architect A. Quincy Jones of the firm Jones and Emmons between 1956 and 1958. The proposal includes major renovations to three retail buildings, a relocation of one retail building and construction of 10 homes.

The renovated plaza will also feature a new grocery store. John Tze of the Sand Hill Property Company wrote in a letter to the board that the company has already signed a long-term lease with a grocer "who is highly desired by our neighbors."

"Edgewood will be their first Bay Area location before expanding throughout California," he wrote.

The grocer anticipates opening by Thanksgiving, Tze wrote.

The board also added a list of conditions to its approval, including more details about residential street furniture and garage-door panels, fencing and soundwalls. Members also expressed some concern about noise from the delivery trucks that would be entering and exiting the grocery store.

The board also questioned the proposed light fixtures, which Vice Chair Judith Wasserman said look Victorian and out of place in the Eichler community.

"It doesn't even pretend to be modern and Eichlerish, so try again," Wasserman said.

The planning commission is scheduled to review the project later this month while the council is tentatively scheduled to hold a hearing on it in March.