City Seeks Public Input on 15-Acre Parcel at City Hall Meeting Thursday

Small Town Girl September 20, 2012 at 01:02 pm

The City has asked for public input many times on this parcel of land, and hasn't listened to its residents yet!! An overwhelming majority of residents, when surveyed, said they wanted that land to be used for a school site. The second highest vote went to a retail center (which was still less than 20% of the vote, because the school was so overwhelmingly high). But what happened? They went with senior housing - because it's what the council at the time (all Senior age or very close to) wanted. They didn't care then what the residents thought, will they care now? Perhaps one or two, if we're lucky.
Foster City didn't need more housing, but that's what we got - at Pilgrim Triton (look at that monstrosity) and now on the 15 acres. But no account goes in to add schools to make all this extra housing feasible. This "town" is turning into a huge city nightmare - high density neighborhoods, overcrowded schools, and a traffic nightmare. Way to go Foster City!

Nancy Harmon September 20, 2012 at 01:53 pm

Oops - Server Error 404 (File not Found) when I click through to review the updated plans.
I'm still trying to figure out how we will have a vibrant night-time "scene" of cafes and the like without the ambient noise disturbing the seniors who live upstairs, whether they are in the regular units or those for assisted living. I'm hoping a view of the revised plans will answer that. I've heard a number of people waxing poetic about this being a smaller version of Santana Row - which sounds fantastic to me. I just worry that it won't be an easy marriage - enough liveliness for those of us who want to eat, drink, laugh and enjoy ourselves later into the evening and enough quiet for the seniors who live there. And, if the restaurants have to wrap everything up early to accommodate the residents, the restaurant owners are not going to make the level of income required to want to stay. Anyone else concerned with this?

Jennifer van der Kleut September 20, 2012 at 02:42 pm

Nancy - thanks for letting us know the link is not working. I think it's because the PDF it links to is so large (15 MB or so). I have edited the text with a link to the page the PDF is on instead, that should help readers find the plans better.

Small Town Girl September 21, 2012 at 08:35 pm

Nancy, I completely agree with you. I'd love for it to be a vibrant area, a place to "hang out" in town. But with seniors there, not sure it'll end up getting that vibe. Hopefully the businesses that do go in won't end up flopping due to the senior living.

Nancy Harmon September 21, 2012 at 09:45 pm

Small Town Girl- I attended part of the session last night and watched the rest at 1pm today. While there are some things that need to be improved, this is a FAR better approach overall than the last one I saw. Noemi and others hit the nail on the head that the Shell Blvd. side of the plan has to be upgraded and should have retail on that side also. Having grown up in the restaurant business myself, I have a few thoughts I plan to share next time I get the chance. We must come up with a way for at least a couple of the restaurants to have a hook to market to the hoards that pass by every morning and afternoon on Hwy 92 - I'm working on one idea, the retail experts can probably come up with many others.

Nancy Harmon September 21, 2012 at 09:45 pm

PART TWO:
Since the population here is relatively small, we will have revolving door restaurants (in the worst sense) unless they can count on folks swinging through FC to pick up dinner for their family on the way home. These resstaurants will not be able to pay the rent and make a sustainable profit if they're only full for 1 or 2 meals a day. While I am totally against their being restaurants along the "street" cutting through from shell to FCB, I agree with Herb and others that this promenade cannot feel only like walking through a neighborhood of houses/apartments or people will not traverse on a daily basis unless they're walking their dog. Some were concerned that the conceptual plan views were too "boxy". I clearly heard that this is only the beginning and the "architecture" in in a future phase. As long as nothing looks like the high concept but horribly ugly and cheap looking library building, I will be happy.