WNAC Newsletter – 10/05/16


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Win6, WNAC, TriVillage, and engaged citizens:

The past two weeks have been incredible for our region. This message is longer than usual as I’ve consolidated to reduce the number of emails sent. Below are highlights of some great events that happened and will be happening over the next few weeks. I am also posting on Nextdoor and facebook.

Let me start with a general vision:

The focus on sustainable practices is a primary goal for our county and our State, creating great places (placemaking) and a high quality of life. As a community, we can take deliberate steps to start implementing ideas and techniques in our county to provide leadership for our region. You will see both local and national programs that are pieces of the solution. Our opportunity is to bring these various, seemingly daunting, items together in a cohesive vision for this area. We need you to be a part of this, whether a long time resident, a new neighbor, a developer, a business owner, a corporate hi-tech resource, a politician, etc. We are all in this together.

Some questions:

How is development putting these techniques into practice? How are our cities working together? How are we creating (demanding) great places in our community? What strategies are we using for placemaking?

SB-680 now law! – The most exciting thing that happened in the past ten days is Senator Wieckowski’s bill was signed into law by the governor Monday, September 26th. This allows the City of Santa Clara to invest the necessary time and energy to develop the best solution with The Core Companies and the community on what the agrihood site will become. This site will be an inspiration for our area. Details…

Autonomous Uber – Last week the first driverless cars were deployed in the United States on the streets of Pittsburgh, PA. Why wasn’t Silicon Valley the testing site? Details…

Governor Brown signs Autonomous car law – The Governor just signed a bill that allows autonomous vehicles on public roads with no driver, no steering wheel, and no usable brake by a human. Details…

Ford purchases Chariot – The SF based shuttle service Chariot is part of Ford’s strategy for the future. Earlier this year Ford announced their plans for a Level 4 (fully autonomous vehicle – no steering wheel) by 2021. This is another clear signal that transportation as we know it is changing rapidly. How are we embracing it? What are we doing differently to accommodate it? Details…

Feds Release Housing Toolkit (parking impact)– The White House released a manual which talks about a number of things, but the most exciting thing is their comment about “eliminating the minimum off-street parking requirements.” Parking is expensive and raises the cost of housing, but it also continues to perpetuate the reliance of personal car ownership. Reducing parking for housing developments may seem like a bad idea initially, but it is how the future will look (and aren’t we talking about building for the future)? Details…

National Heritage Area (NHA) – The Task Force created an umbrella theme for the feasibility study underway: The Valley of Vision. Wow, that really says it all. Expect a lot of amazing content over the next 6-12 months, and there will be plenty of public engagement in the process. The NHA will be capturing our past and present, while helping to identify how to create a future that we all want to be a part of. The monthly meetings can be found on the County’s website and a project website will be released shortly. Come join in and see the progress. Details… (select Nation Heritage Area Task Force)

TriVillage growth/expansion – There is a lot happening in the TriVillage area (centered around Valley Fair/Santana Row) with roughly nine (yes nine!) projects happening or identified. We have captured a relatively complete list below, but here is a newer, less familiar, item:

On Monday, Oct 3, we learned more details of a 200,000 sqft 11-story hotel on a half-acre lot on Stevens Creek, to the east of Santana Row (where the gas station is).

Upcoming public meetings focused on this area:

Thurs, Oct 13 – 6:30pm, Cypress Senior Center – A joint meeting of WAG/SCAG (the Tri-Village groups) will be having its first collaborative meeting to discuss how our Urban Villages come together, the benefits/challenges of the current Urban Village Advisory Group teams, and how we can work together going forward.

Wed, Oct 19 – 6:00pm, Bascom Community Center – the revised Volar project will hold a public meeting (now 18 stories) on a .9 acre lot. While not part of Santana Row, it looks like it is. Will this become “normal” in Tri-Village area over the next 5-10 years? Should it?

Wed, Oct 19 – 7:30pm, Bascom Community Center – This WNAC meeting will follow the Volar meeting at 6:15pm and roll into a discussion on Business Improvement District (BID), with Scott Knies leading the discussion.

Ongoing groups/meetings:

Winchester Advisory Group (WAG): meets the 2nd Monday of the month at 6:30pm at the Cypress Senior Center. Next meeting is Oct 17th due to Columbus Day. Details…

Stevens Creek Advisory Group (SCAG): meets the 4th Thursday of the month at 6:00pm at the Cypress Senior Center. Next meeting is Oct 27th.

Details…

TriVillage details:

Santana West (Century Theater site) General info for Santana Row, but Santana West has been modified

– 970,000 sqft of Class-A office

– 29,000 sqft of retail space (probably a supermarket)

– re-use of the Century 21 Theater building

500 Santana Row

– 230,000 sqft of Class–A office

– Almost complete (Splunk building) – fully leased

700 Santana Row and 900 Santana Row (the surface parking lot where CineArts is)

– 510,000 sqft of Class-A office (this may turn into a combination of office and residential)

– 56,000 sqft of retail (at the end of the Row)

Apartment building of Hatton (also known as lot 12)

– 5-story, 258 unit multi-family attached residential building

Valley Fair expansion

– 650,000 sqft of new retail, including a 3-story flagship Bloomingdales

– demolition of both banks (and rebuilding them)

– addition of a 10-screen movie theater, allowing for drinks and dinner

– approximately 10,000 parking spaces

– new restaurants and walkable plazas

– construction has begun and will continue for 24-30 months

BAREC/Win6 site (on Winchester across from Valley Fair)

– 6 acres of open land

– Proposed agrihood with housing, urban farm and mixed use potential

– Opportunity to include Veteran Services in design

– Opportunity to include Speno Center in design

– Potential for a 7.25 acre placemaking experience

Thanks for getting this far!

Kirk Vartan

President, Winchester NAC

Co-Chair Stevens Creek Advisory Group

Small business owner

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