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Building booms in north city
By Sam Scott
It's all boom in north Sunnyvale.
A month after approving plans for Yahoo! Inc.'s corporate headquarters in north Sunnyvale, the city's Planning Commission on Feb. 14 gave the nod to another large development in the booming Moffett Park area.
Jay Paul & Associates, a San Francisco developer, received the commission's approval on a proposed five building, 2,000 parking space campus near the intersections of Highways 237 and 101. Ariba, Inc., a growing e-commerce firm, has tentatively agreed to be the campus's tenant. The company currently is headquartered in Mountain View.
Eager to get the plans passed, developers agreed to build a light rail station near the campus to mitigate the impact on traffic--a step unprecedented by developers. The plans await City Council approval on Feb. 29.
Unlike the Yahoo review, the Jay Paul proposal faced commissioner opposition. Commissioners Michelle Hornberger and Megan Satterlee, voting against the plan, voiced concerns about putting such a dense development so near the overwhelmed Highway 237/Mathilda Avenue intersection.
Ray Williamson, the city's traffic officer, said that area is one of the most complex intersections in the county, with four traffic signals and difficult lane changes crammed within 800 feet. The development will further increase the demand on the area, he said.
The prospect of worsening an already unpleasant traffic situation troubled the dissenting commissioners.
"I just can't, in good conscience, support this plan," Hornberger said. "The plan was not complete enough for me to vote for." The developer's plans to divert 15 percent of the campus' employees into alternative transportation do not seem solid, she said.
Jay Paul, president of Jay Paul & Associates, said his company would offer on-site showers, a fitness center and restaurant to lessen employees' needs to leave the campus during the day. He also offered to build a $2.5 million light rail station in front of the campus. He was, however, vague on details on some other plans like a guaranteed ride home program.
The privately-funded station would be the first of its kind, said Valley Transportation Authority spokeswoman Jennifer Hong. Other commissioners appeared to be swayed in favor of the project by the proposed light rail station and the inevitability of worsening traffic.
"The light rail station is a very compelling argument," Commissioner Otto Lee said. "It [the proposed site] is one of the few places in Sunnyvale where you will have a light rail station literally adjacent to a site."
Commission Chairman John Howe said the light rail station would not affect traffic much. Without the commission's approval, he said, Jay Paul likely would build a smaller project absent a traffic plan.
Howe said 35 percent of the property's total area already is zoned for building. Developers would not need city approval to build to that limit, he said. Jay Paul's plans call for developing 56 percent of the area, hence the need for city approval. "It is better to have [this project] than to have 35 percent of the area developed with no light rail and no diversion rate," Howe said.
Michael Hrastinski, Ariba's vice president, said the company would be a good corporate neighbor, donating time to civic involvement. But, as the company has yet to turn a profit, it may be less generous with money for a while, he said.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
