I think that's a good idea.

I'll send it back to that.

We need to escape one in the way.

All right.

I'm not sure if we're expecting Michael to come or not.

Michael Aguilar.

Shall I wait for him?

Oh no.

Okay.

All right.

I think we should get started.

Yeah.

All right.

Good evening.

Um and thank you for joining our October twenty-first, twenty twenty-five joint planning commission and transportation advisory committee study session.

As a reminder, items will be taken in the order listed on the agenda.

Before we get started, I wanted to briefly go over public comment procedures for the meeting for those who are maybe joining us for the first time.

Public comments on items not on the agenda will be taken during item number two tonight.

Comments on other agenda items will be taken only with that particular item is called.

We're continuing to offer in-person and remote options for planning commission meetings, however, due to the continued recent disruptions during public comment at open meetings throughout the region and state.

We've modified our public common procedures.

One can public comment will be taken in person during the meeting or in advance.

We are emailed to PC at Rebood City dot org.

In-person speakers must turn in their speaker card to admin or staff liaison at the dais over there.

Um to be recognized to speak.

Comments that were emailed to PC at Webwood City by five PM today may be read into the public record by staff liaison.

I will now turn it over to staff to call the role.

Here.

Committee member Nogo present.

Committee member Schmid.

Here.

Vice Chair Aguilar Abson.

And Chair Chi.

Here.

Thank you.

For the purposes of this meeting, I will state that I'm Sue Xline, the assistant community development director and staff liaison to the Planning Commission.

Other city staff that are attending the meeting this evening.

Rick Jarvis, consultant city attorney, Malha Arang, Principal Planner, and Staff Liaison to the Transportation Advisory Committee.

John Francis, Principal Planner.

Apollo Rojas, Senior Planner.

And Jessica Goodall, Secretary and Meeting Host.

Thank you.

So moving on to item number two.

At this time, we will take public comments on the items that are not on the agenda for those of us joining in person only.

If you have joined us in person, please fill out a speaker's card and bring it to staff.

All right, so far I only have one.

Jessica is the only one.

No more.

No more.

Okay.

All right.

I will recognize um Glenn Babbitt.

Please come to the podium to speak.

I'm sorry, this is item 3A.

My bad.

There are no speakers for items not on the agenda.

We have do we have received any comments via email for items not on the agenda?

We have not.

Okay, great.

If there's no objection, I will now close the public comment.

All right, moving swiftly to item number three, which is our study session.

Tonight we have a joint study session for the planning commission and transportation advisory committee to review and feedback the Greater Downtown Area Plan Draft Vision Framework.

We have a staff presentation.

Yes, we do.

Thanks, Jess.

Good evening, committee members and commissioners.

My name is John Francis, and I am a principal planner with the planning division as well as a project manager for the Greater Downtown Area Plan process, otherwise known as the GDAP for short.

I'm excited to be here tonight to engage in a conversation around the emerging vision for the GDAP.

I'm also joined by a few members of our consultant team who will be presenting tonight.

That's uh Pune Narkar and Jim Stickley from WRT.

Um they're our prime consultant, and Brooke Dubos and Matthew Baum from Airup, who are with our transportation and sustainability team.

We have a lot of content to cover tonight, uh so we're gonna try and get do our best to get through it efficiently.

Um so we can open up the floor to you and to the public.

Uh I'll first give a project update on where we're at in the GDOT process, and then I'll hand it over to our consultant team to walk us through the draft vision framework.

So I want to just provide a little bit of context around the purpose behind the GDAP.

This process will revisit and refresh the vision that was adopted as part of the downtown precise plan effort back in 2011.

Um the goal is to build and expand upon what's been working in the plan area, and to address new opportunities and challenges that have emerged since 2011.

For example, we're looking at the economics of the post-pandemic world, which have really changed how people work and shop and where they work and shop, climate resilience for downtown and the adjacent neighborhoods, and we're looking at how to continue to improve mobility options for getting to and from downtown.

Just wanted to quickly highlight our multidisciplinary consultant team and note that um while the planning division is uh leading the process, we are working closely with our colleagues at other city departments to make sure our project goals and priorities and objectives are aligned.

I did want to note you do have slides uh in your packet too, the same slides are in there if it's easier than turning your chair.

So the planning process for GDAP is broken down into multiple phases.

Uh over the last 12 months, our focus has really been on evaluating existing conditions, meeting with the community and stakeholders to understand their concerns and aspirations, um, and developing a vision framework that will eventually be the form the foundation of our recommendations.

Tonight we're here to share that draft vision framework and to hear your input.

The framework purposely addresses concepts and themes at a relatively high level so that the project team can understand the ideas that really resonate with you all and the public and those that don't.

We want to do that before we really flesh out these ideas in further detail as we go along.

So the framework is intended as a starting point for the conversation among decision makers and the community.

So we'll be taking input we receive and using it to refine the ideas and begin drafting the plan.

And we'll be revisiting our boards, commissions, and committees, and city council and uh the and we'll have additional public engagement activities throughout that process to get a further input and guidance.

We anticipate having a draft plan for public review about a year from now, which will be the basis of our environmental review, and we're aiming for plan adoption in the second half of 2027.

Throughout 2025, the project team has been out in the community quite a lot, sharing information about the process and asking for people's input and ideas.

As just briefly noted on these slides, our engagement has been in various formats.

It has included project-specific events that we've hosted, such as community meetings, open houses.

And we've also gone out to meet people where they're at.

So that's included things like door-to-door neighborhood canvassing and pop-ups at existing events.

And most of our engagement activities have provided translation or interpretation for Spanish language speakers.

So these community commit community conversations have yielded a lot of information for the project team that has been really instrumental in shaping the draft vision framework.

Community priorities have emerged that address a range of topics.

For instance, the maintaining diverse land uses, bolstering civic and economic life downtown, strengthening connectivity between downtown and the neighborhoods, creating new and enhanced public spaces, making biking safer and transit more reliable, and using green infrastructure to improve climate resilience.

These priorities will continue to guide us as we develop the details of the GDAP in the months ahead.

One through line of the project team's work is the goal to weave equity into the process for drafting the GDAP by striving to reach communities that have traditionally had less access to the planning process.

We also, of course, want to weave equity into the plan itself by advancing strategies that broaden access to affordable housing and quality mobility and open spaces that support small businesses and economic mobility and that mitigate climate-related impacts for vulnerable communities.

Before I hand things over to Poonum, I want to highlight again that we have numerous additional opportunities to engage in the conversation around the GDAP vision in the weeks ahead.

We just on October 11th had our second community open house, and we have additional BCC and City Council study sessions coming up.

And then launching this summer, we will have a digital community survey to provide another setting for input.

So without further ado, I will we will dive into the framework.

Oh, actually, one thing.

Sorry.

We also have a few questions that we would love to see you to keep in mind.

I won't read them out loud right now.

Keep in mind as you listen to the presentation.

These questions are in your slide packet, and then we also have a fuller set of questions in the staff report that was published that kind of dive into some other details.

So as you're listening to the presentation, keep those in mind.

Thank you, John.

Good evening, commissioners.

I'm Pune Mnarker with WRT, and I'm the project manager on this project.

Um, here I think.

Can you just tell me next slide and I'll do it for you?

Next slide.

Okay.

Oh, there's that.

This one.

Yeah.

This one right there.

Okay.

Thank you.

Do you have problems or something?

No.

Sure.

Thanks.

Okay, so as you saw, John quickly summarized, you know, the number of engagement activities that we have done, and we got a lot of really good feedback and information from the community.

And a consistent theme that really emerged from the community engagement was that Redwood City is a place that offers something for everyone.

And we heard that built on existing strengths and enhance what works well and address what could be better.

And so that really formed the foundation in for the development of the draft vision framework that we are going to be sharing today.

And it's important for us to recognize that the success of the greater downtown area depends on the integration of many elements, such as land use, economic development, mobility, public spaces, community identity, climate resilience, and all of these working together as a cohesive system, and that's what this diagram is kind of representing.

So in the next few slides, next, please.

Thank you.

So in the next few slides, I'm going to walk you all through the components of the vision framework.

And we're going to start with the concept of districts and neighborhoods within the plan area, which really are mixed-use areas, refining the mixed use, mix of uses that you already have in within the plan area, but they are defined by similar physical attributes, activity types, and urban form and character.

Each of these districts is envisioned to be a complete district in and of itself.

They're compact and walkable, they are served by essential amenities, public spaces, and multimodal choices.

And while each district is envisioned to have a distinct identity of its own and offering unique experiences, they're also supposed to be seamlessly interconnected.

Next.

Next.

Public spaces and recreational activities within the plan area.

And this framework really focuses on a network of existing and new public spaces connected by green streets that not only create a safe and welcoming walking environment but also support social interactions and provide relief from extreme heat conditions, you know, by way of landscaping and street greening.

And therefore, streets are going to play a very important role in the overall public space experience of the greater downtown area.

The key features of the public space framework really are streetscape enhancements, and and this is where I want to draw your attention to a priority on streetscape improvement improvements along Broadway and Main Street that support and advance the goals of promoting foot traffic and really supporting economic activity and social activity along these corridors.

Neighborhood greenways are equally going to be a focus to improve walkability within the neighborhoods, the two neighborhoods, as well as the connectivity of the two neighborhoods with the downtown core.

Redwood Creek is an asset, and there is potential for it to become a signature community space.

And then we also identify opportunities for new public spaces in the future through coordinated development activity and multi-benefit multi-benefit climate resilience infrastructure integrated within the public and private realms.

Next so as we are all grappling with climate change, it is imperative that we uh we make our future decisions around building and operating our cities, land use, economic activities through the lens of climate resilience.

This framework addresses a range of local hazards and vulnerabilities at different levels of risks.

And later in the presentation, Jim will be elaborating further on how that this framework will guide our responses.

Next.

Mobility and connectivity.

This plan envisions a high performing multimodal transportation network that builds on the vision of the walk bike thrive plan and focusing on improvements along key corridors.

And again, later in the presentation, very soon, we are going to have the benefit of Brooke providing more elaboration on the components of the mobility and connectivity.

Next.

So with this structural overview of the different components of the vision framework, we're now going to take a quick tour.

I'm going to invite all of you to transport yourself to a future condition and take a quick tour of the various districts to see how all of these different components actually come together on the ground and create the experience that we want we would like to have in the future.

Next.

So we're going to start in the downtown core.

This is your city's historic heart, it's a cultural hub, it's a destination that everyone wants to go to, wants to hang out with their friends and family.

Can we go to the next slide?

So for each of these districts, as we take a tour, we have just pulled together a few images that help us sort of maybe envision what that what that district might look like.

So this, you know, we envision this to be a place as a shopping destination where you would come and shop at the local boutiques, maybe some branded stores or enjoy a meal, go to the movies or an art show.

So lots of different things to come here to linger to really spend time in your downtown.

You may work here or enjoy downtown living in one of the new residential buildings.

And then really, this the downtown core is going to have a very unique character of its own as new buildings, you know, with high quality materials and are really good architecture, cohabit with the historic buildings and building on those assets.

Next, please.

From the downtown core, we're now going to walk to the transit district, the area around the existing and future Caltrain stations is what we are describing as the transit district.

This is a new gateway to your downtown, but it has a vibe of its own.

Next slide, please.

This is a vibrant urban district with high density development in taller buildings that include offices, housing, hotels, and other activities.

You would walk or bike through attractive, welcoming streets, energize with activity in the building ground floors.

You may come here to work during the week for entertainment, during the weekend for entertainment in the evenings or weekends, or you live here.

And so again, transit the transit district offers a pretty wide range of experiences, but in a different urban form and character.

Next, please.

From the transit district, we're now going to take a bus ride through the downtown core and reach the north of downtown, which is the area north of Veterans Boulevard.

This is the new district to live, work, gather, and play.

Its offerings include offices, RD type of facilities, maybe hotels, lifestyle shopping, and other services at the commercial areas along highway along 101.

And along with that, there will be new residential buildings, maybe with convenience retail on the ground floors.

There would be new parks, public spaces, enhanced creekway.

Something to note is that this district is also in one of the high inundation risk areas.

And you will see that as we share more about the resilience framework, and therefore the future development will need to integrate appropriate responses to that.

So that's next slide, please.

Oops, sorry.

Sorry, so just again a few images of you know how the integration of public spaces, multi-benefit public spaces would integrate with the various um various uses here.

From the north of downtown area, we are going to now walk over to across the creek to the innovation and incubation district.

And this is one of the districts that has going to focus on the commercial and employment areas.

This is the area that currently has light industrial uses, and it continues to remain important for the city to maintain the economic activity here as well as employment generation.

But we are envisioning this to be a mixed use employment district, and so therefore offering office spaces that would be very different than what you would find in your downtown core or the transit district.

So this is a place where there would be much more opportunity for startups, maybe innovation, research and development type of activities, creative businesses, some large format entertainment or nightlife, even.

And all of those, again, integrated with public spaces that are open to the community, that the community can come and hang out or have reasons to sort of spend time here.

From the innovation and incubation district, we are going to walk over to the Stambaugh Heller neighborhood.

It's envisioned to be a neighborhood that offers a wide range of housing options, from single-family homes, multiplexes to low rise residential development.

We recognize that there are some really nice historic buildings here in this neighborhood.

And the and the vision here is that there will be a mix of new development with existing buildings, while providing options for and housing choices for different household types, different income levels.

And then along Broadway, there is an opportunity to actually have some mixed-use mid-rise residential that also offers community neighborhood-serving amenities, neighborhoods serving retail and commercial that support support the support Stan Baheller.

There will be a particular focus on improving connectivity to Hoover Park, safe routes to school, expanding opportunities for neighborhood parks and greenways, and improved connectivity to downtown from this neighborhood.

And then lastly, we're going to now ride our bike from Stambaugh Heller through the downtown core and get to the centennial neighborhood.

As a transit adjacent neighborhood, it will have a mix of mid-rise, mid-high density development closer to the Caltrain station, while maintaining a missing middle scale of housing in other parts of the neighborhood.

And again, you know, there will be a focus on improved connectivity to downtown, better connectivity with the transit district, and access to neighborhood essential amenities and integrated public and improved public run facilities.

So I'm going to hand over, hand it over to Brooke.

So how does this work?

This site.

Fantastic.

Excellent.

Thank you so much.

Brooke DeBose.

Thank you for having us over here tonight.

I've dedicated my career to sustainable planning and design work really in support of vibrant and healthy communities, and it's been a great process to be a part of this project.

Want to make sure that everything that we're recommending for the mobility framework really meets those ambitions.

So I'm going to talk you through the mobility framework by mode.

So the hallmark of every great downtown is really about it being a vibrant and walkable neighborhood.

And so that's really the primary and focused mode for the greater downtown area.

And what we're showing up here on the map in the yellow area is what we're calling the priority pedestrian area.

Now we recommend that all of the greater downtown area is going to be a great place to walk, but in yellow is really where the focused investment will be for pedestrian amenities.

And that would feature things like wider sidewalks, street trees, and greening, activated ground floors, and really much better crossings.

And we're also recommending a suite of access and safety recommendations across the greater area that are really going to be focused on streets like Woodside and Brewster and the other larger streets that are are difficult to cross now.

Moving on to the bicycle network.

So the focus here is really on high-quality infrastructure, low stress facilities that support and are designed for everybody in Redwood City who's visiting or lives here.

There's also going to be a focus on safety and access improvements along major care along and across major corridors, ensuring a very seamless journey both within downtown and across to other neighborhoods and adjacent areas.

Did a phenomenal job of developing a vision for your bicycle network, and this work really builds on that.

So focused upgrades for the transit network are really going to be about strategic ongoing investments over a long period of time to boost transit speed and reliability and the overall passenger experience by people traveling by train or bus in and through downtown.

So the key initiatives are ones that you're well familiar with, the potential relocation of the Caltrain location station location and the adjacent future grade separation along the railroad tracks.

But we're also looking at for bus transit consolidation of specific routes.

Those are the ones that are shown as gray line, grade outlines there where there's current routes, we're recommending that they be consolidated onto other streets where there's existing transit service so that we can basically improve the the transit passenger experience on those consolidated streets.

Curbside management, loading, and parking are really important considerations for the downtown plan, and we've done a lot of thinking around optimizing those activities, knowing that it's a very dynamic environment and that there's going to be a lot of different needs along the curb in particular, whether you're a merchant or a visitor or making deliveries, right?

And so we really want to make sure that we're supporting local businesses and economic vitality through the strategies that we're recommending, and also making space for public space and use, like as we already are seeing in Redwood City with parklets and the like.

So two of the main strategies that we're thinking about here are one is a curbside management and commercial loading plan for the key commercial areas that we're showing here on the map.

That would be very much dynamic and using real-time data.

And the second piece is really understanding how people are driving into and and looking for parking in the downtown area as well.

So really focusing on managing demand, optimizing the existing on-street and on off-street parking supply, and coordinating with businesses to make sure that we're improving legibility for people who are walking and looking for driving and looking for parking.

And here's just an example on the on the screen.

This is a sort of a sample cross section.

I think we used Main Street as the example here, just to talk to illustrate how dynamic your curb uses are in Redwood City in some of these core commercial areas.

And there's going to be some really important trade-offs that need to be made in some of these streets.

Main Street is a really great example, right?

Where there's a high need for accessible loading and deliveries.

We also recognize that people are dropping off and picking up at the curb.

So how do we prioritize these different competing demands?

And how do we make sure that we're really optimizing best use of the curb?

These are are definitely meaty meaty questions that we want to unpack.

And then lastly, you know, the downtown, greater downtown study area is surrounded by four major corridors, and those are both really important to your transportation network, but they're also barriers in many ways, right?

And so a lot of good work has already been done to look at how to make these great places that support many different modes, both along their length and across them.

And the this this effort really is going to continue advancing that.

And so we're going, you know, this this effort is intending to address vehicle speeds along some of these streets, enhance safety and really implementing some important crossing opportunities to improve access across the neighborhoods at key key intersections.

I think Woodside is probably one of the most important ones that we're looking at.

How do you make it a more porous, more uh more connected neighborhood on either side of it?

So I'm gonna pass it over to Jim now, who's gonna talk about resilience and infrastructure.

Great, thank you, Brooke.

Members of the Commission and Transportation Advisory Group.

It's a pleasure to be here tonight.

I'm gonna wrap this up with a little uh discussion about our resilience framework.

And I'm gonna skip over this for a minute and just to say that we're looking at resilience to a number of factors.

Um this is a list of those factors: earthquake, liquefaction, extreme heat, coastal flooding, inland flooding, and groundwater.

And the latter three on the right hand side are really emerging as the bigger challenges of uh of what the responses are that we're developing.

And uh so I'm gonna spend a little bit more time talking about those this evening in our limited time.

But this historic map kind of sets that up as you can see the former marsh and the lower edge of that former marsh is approximately the location of Veterans Boulevard right now.

And I think that that says a lot in terms of what challenges we're we're already seeing today, let alone as we project forward with increased incidence of flooding, sea level rise, and and so forth.

So these maps go into a little bit more detail.

The one on the left and in the center are the hundred-year flooding maps.

Um the one on the left is current, the one in the middle is in 2100, and you can see that currently there's already uh flooding happening uh in the downtown area, and many of you have probably witnessed that flooding already during times of major storms and and high tide and so forth.

So those risks are what are driving a lot of the solutions that we're studying now to mitigate those risks.

Um there's also um other hazards which are shown on the right, and so we're trying to take a comprehensive view of all of these risks in in looking at the range of of uh of strategies.

And our approach is to come up with different kinds of tools, whether they be policy or operational measures or actual um physical measures, improvements that we might make to s to streets to parks and so forth.

And then we're applying those tools to the different systems within the city.

So we're applying them to utilities systems, where are the vulnerabilities, for example, in your pumping stations, uh undersized pipes and whatnot, we're applying them uh to buildings.

What are new building regulations that we can institute that set uh those buildings up to be less vulnerable?

And we're applying them to roads, we're applying them to public space.

So that's sort of the general approach.

And the map that Punham showed earlier is broken up into these zones that are very closely associated with the risk maps that I just showed a couple of slides ago.

So the very dark purple are the highest risks of flooding, and then the darker blue is the next highest risks of flooding, the lighter blue next level, and the very lightest blue is the least amount of risk.

And in each of those zones, we apply a different um intensity of these different measures in order to address those risks.

And these are some of the tools that we're starting to look at.

So, what are the strategies that we can actually embed within the street corridors?

And we're looking for things that give us multiple benefits.

So it's not just addressing one issue, but how do we address if you're gonna rebuild a street?

How do you address multiple issues?

How can you improve mobility measures that that Brooke was just talking about?

How can we apply uh better urban canopy to address heat island, uh, maybe integrate stormwater management?

So we're looking to do as many of those things as we can in one street project.

Uh in park space, we can do a lot, and this whole notion of a sponge city having uh green space that is more absorbent, that can be the um the receiver of excess water and then slowly release that water, and that can happen in a number of ways.

And so working with the AREP team, we're developing a whole sort of uh list of tools that can be, you know, subsurface measures, they can be uh surface floodable zones, zones that you can actually use and play on uh during times of of uh when it's dry, but those areas can actually flood during uh large storm events and then slowly release that water.

Um and then um there you've got several creek corridors that pass through the downtown and and some of those have daylit portions.

Uh they can also be a guide as to where uh future open space can occur.

You that may suggest uh additional daylighting and it may not, they may simply be part of a linear park system.

But even if you don't daylight a creek, that park system can still do a lot of work in terms of of uh stormwater management uh flood mitigation, as well as providing other benefits towards you know, recreation, uh urban heat island, et cetera.

And then the Redwood Creek itself is is sort of as as Poonum suggested is is sort of the real showpiece of your open space system, and it's already pretty terrific, but it's underdeveloped in terms of its pathways and its usable areas, launching points for kayaks, things like that.

So, you know, how can we formalize that as the city's central park, if you will?

Um, how can we gain a little bit more space?

You know, in terms of building setbacks and so forth that we can use again for multiple purposes, but but certainly to get more flood mitigation capacity uh built into that area.

And that concludes our presentation.

I'm gonna turn it back over to John.

Thank you so much for your attention.

Um, you know, I want I want to uh thank the consultant team for um coming out tonight and giving uh hopefully an informative um uh presentation, and we are available for questions.

Thanks.

Thank you, John.

Um are there any clarifying questions that the commission and the committee would like to ask the staff?

Now is a good time.

Commissioner Butt.

Yeah.

Um thank you for all your work on this, first of all.

This is a great plan.

Um just want to preface to that.

I was very impressed by this when I was reading to the packet.

Um, one of my clarifying questions was um around the selection of districts.

Um in a few regards, um, I see that Centennial District that we've marked out is right next to the almost touching the future Cal Train Station.

It's rather far from the main flooding area.

Um it seems right next to this budding transit district, which would be the heart of this downtown, or one of the hards, it seems like there's many of them.

Um what was the idea around not making that one of the pedestrianized um what was the actual term here?

The pedestrian network area.

Because it seems like we have a area right next to where people get off the Chicago train, which would not be included in this like ultra-pedestrian friendly zone.

Um I'll take a stab at responding to a question, and then um, you know, I can uh Brooke might be able to give us a little bit more.

So the the pedestrian core pedestrian network doesn't identifying that yellow zone doesn't mean that we are not paying attention to pedestrian movement and improving pedestrian conditions on other streets or other parts of the plant area.

But what that yellow area really indicates is where um, you know, just uh picking up on the point about prioritization or trade-offs on how we would use street right-of-ways, right?

And if we were to prioritize pedestrian movement and uh prioritize improvements for um enhanced pedestrian movements, that would be the focus uh because it is um, you know, around the downtown core, and improving pedestrian movement around the downtown core is also going to support um the economic activity within the downtown core.

There will be other um improvements and enhancements to pedestrian safety and pedestrian movement in other parts, but uh the core area is is where that focused or prioritization will be.

What did you want to add?

Yeah, and I can also share about how we define that area.

So first we really look at where are the key origins and destinations that we expect that people will want to walk to and from.

And that's where we start to draw in sort of the links of like where the walking trips are and also where we see where places where the it'll generate the most pedestrian demand or activity as well, because that's a great place to, you know, think about where to place your your highest investments.

So there's things like widened sidewalks, for example, that it's really great to accommodate larger groups or a busier, a busier block, um, also quite expensive from an infrastructure investment perspective, and so that's really how we started to characterize that area.

Does that answer your question?

Uh, potentially, I might have a some thoughts later, but it's all for clarifying questions.

Right.

Thank you, Commissioner Butt.

Committee member Nova.

Yeah, um, just zooming way out here.

Can you remind me of the sort of timeline for all of this plan?

It's a lot of beautiful work, and it's not gonna happen overnight when this gets updated and approved in 2027.

Where like we see these beautiful pictures of what this might look like.

Is this 2100?

Is this 2055?

What is the timeline for this project?

That's a that's a great question.

Um I you know, in many ways, I wouldn't call it uh I wouldn't necessarily characterize it as one project because it's many aspects of um the development of our downtown and our greater downtown area.

Um, you know, and and there's a there's uh multiple answers to this because, for example, um we don't necessarily have control over private property, and the speed and and pace of which that happens is largely you know related to um uh market demand, uh market forces, also you know, individual property owners and what they what their goals are for the property, um, you know, and then um their street uh improvements, infrastructure improvements, uh park improvements, um, you know, certainly happen over a longer phase of time, you know, and that's based on availability of funds um to a large degree, and you know, just the city's capacity to design design various new infrastructure.

Um so I know that's not like the probably the most like fulfilling answer, but I would say, you know, I think that it it happens um over a long period of time.

It would one of the things that.

It's a long-term vision, and I think we hope it will look like this by X date.

Right.

And I it's I don't necessarily want to put a solid date on anything.

We we see a plan like this having a time horizon of about you know 25 years, and by that point we say, well, we should probably take another look to see how how far have we gotten, where have we gotten on these plans?

Do they all still seem relevant?

Um, and if not, how do we change direction?

Thank you.

Sure.

One other question at the time.

Um sure, go ahead.

Um, similar to um Shishir's question about the different districts.

This is another sort of big question that maybe is not fully addressed right now, but curious about the decision to um upzone and increase density and do a lot of investment in that like innovation district in that north of downtown district when it is so vulnerable to um all of these flooding concerns and and other environmental concerns when there is other real estate in the area that we're preserving for historic reasons or other reasons.

I'm gonna ask Jim to come up with and take out one.

So those areas can be developed in a way that um protects new development from flooding, uh, but they're gonna have to have um new regulations in terms of the of the performance that that they have to um that they have to achieve.

Uh part of that is gonna be the contribution of a certain amount of land area to stormwater facilities, and I think there's two categories of stormwater facilities.

There's some that can just be individual and then there the aggregate of all of those can start to build up capacity but then there are certain others that are a more uh concerted effort to to have an integrated facility and that's where we're showing maybe some additional setback on Redwood Creek and and a couple of the greenways that we're showing and those would be uh contributed to by the private landowners um the buildable portion of their site can be built in a way that offers protection from flood you're gonna do your ground floors in a different way you're not gonna put uh important utilities on the ground floor uh things like that um and in some way we will need to incentivize those developers um to contribute part of their sites for uh green infrastructure and and there can be a number of ways to do that and and we'll definitely be exploring those in more detail as we move forward.

Yep.

Thank you.

I do have a clarifying question about um neighborhood greenways I think it was referenced multiple times in the presentation I just want to be clear clear uh do they describe the green part of it or the waste part of it like whether it's alternative um bike ped type uh corridor that will be you know uh prioritized or is it a green way that you can get this green infrastructure whether it be bioswales uh medians street trees uh or is a greenway combination of both and that's the goal of having them both at the same time yes that is the goal and is to have we want to have our take and eat it and but it's gonna have to be tailored to each corridor in its its specific conditions because we've got all different right-of-way widths out there ideally we want to incorporate green infrastructure into any street project now the the lightness or heaviness of that green infrastructure project can vary depending on which risk zone that you're in some you know in low risk zone may be you know a very simple very shallow uh bioswale kind of system or or just a tree strip you know that allows more more permeability whereas in other higher risk zones we might go for you know deeper bioretention areas um you know in more ex more extensive green space at the same time we're trying to reconfigure those streets for balancing the mobility so again if we're gonna redo a street we want to capture as many benefits as we can and we're trying to do both in every street um but it's it's gonna very much depend on the individual conditions of for each corridor.

Sure I mean that actually is a very pertinent question because I think when I'm going to look at the slides and proposal for some of these um redoing of these streets you know i i imagine a very wide street something like in Chicago you have like a four six lanes and you can take some as a way to put green infrastructure bioswales you know protect the bike lanes and here even the the major corridors that we that we outlined in the plan are single two-lane you know one each direction so we're extremely limited in right away with so I'm curious in the context of Redwood City how do these solutions really come about thank you yeah yeah I just wanted to maybe add a little bit to what Jim was explaining maybe you know just touching upon your question about the neighborhood greenway and the green part and the way part is that the neighborhood greenways in addition to everything that Jim explained about you know identifying the multiple benefits through green infrastructure street green like tree canopies and landscaping the neighborhood greenways are also envisioned to be like yes they would be improving the walkability and bikeability so from a mobility perspective prioritizing walking biking along those greenways and creating safer environments for that movement is also envisioned and then coming to your uh the the question that you just asked about and how does that work uh in terms of the street right-of-way and I think that really goes back to you know what Brooke was uh pointing out when in using the example of Main Street is that it's true that a number of these streets have multiple demands on them uh the need to serve multiple functions and part of our process with all of you here is going to be how do we prioritize and what do we prioritize on these different corridors so that as you know we we get um as much benefit out of the corridors the street right of way is going to be limited we can't expand it so what can we do what do we want to prioritize and use that space for thank you so much um commissioner finch um yes thank you very much for the the presentation um it was great I just wanted to uh follow up on committee member Noga's question um do you think that the added cost of all of the flood mitigation measures and like the north of downtown and innovation districts do you think that might be prohibitive to um the kind of development that we are planning for there great question um I think we're looking uh at um we're looking at density we're looking at zoning as a part of this study I think there are there's a possibility that that we could increase you know allowable density in certain areas um but but not all areas you know some areas are are stable and and we we don't want to uh disrupt and so I think that's sort of the key how can we provide enough incentive in terms of of the of the allowable development you know to help offset some of the costs of of the green infrastructure oh I see so the in in this this district the the density would be the incentive and and kind of a uh we that's like a concession we make in return for the flood mitigation potentially I think that's that's one of the things that we're that we want to look at okay I see thank you.

Um and um there will there we are as you know the project team will be exploring various tools um that will enable this and so the density as Jim said is one of the possible tools but there are other tools out there that our economic consultants will be exploring looking at you know sometimes there are things like community infrastructure districts or other um you know mechanisms by which one can uh like that that cities are able to uh fund some of these infrastructure upgrades and so we will be looking at a suite of tools that would make sense here oh great thank you thank you um commissioner Robinson oh yeah sorry commissioner cornejo please go ahead thank you um this project looks great i i saw that there was a lot of community engagement and involvement which um is awesome there is like over 400 sticky notes so I can only imagine hopefully they were all colorful and in everything um so I have two questions one of them is um in regards to like the business involvement if there's a um more detail to that can be shared on how exactly the downtown um local businesses have been involved in in this in this project.

Thanks for that question um so far you know we're our our community engagement is going to be a rolling process um so we've done we over the last few months we as you've as you noted um we've done quite a bit we've talked to a lot of folks um and our first kind of um series of conversations with small business owners were in the form of a um a focus group that was hosted by the downtown business group um and we kind of um went to one of their regular membership meetings um and we had about um I think we had about 20 folks from a from 15 different small businesses in the downtown uh we had a really great discussion with them um and we actually we took notes and we posted a summary of those notes on our website um so I invite you to check that out um and you know, they they they covered a lot of different topics related to just the walkability of town, of downtown safety, just wanting to make sure, you know, there's certain like folks on Main Street, for example, who are like, you know, we really want people to turn make that turn from Broadway onto Main Street.

How do we get that type of activity happening on broad on Main Street?

That's that's already happening on Broadway, just a block away.

So things, you know, a lot a lot of like really interesting conversations about that.

Um, you know, one thing, you know, that came up was about parking and the fact that um, you know, while there's a lot of parking actually availability downtown, there's not great um wayfinding for folks to find that parking, um, because it's you know, some of it's embedded in private development and the signage is inconsistent, I'll say.

Um and so, you know, there was just questions about like making sure people have the resources that they need to access all the great amenities that are downtown.

So lots of great conversation.

Um, and we we will definitely be going back to our small businesses.

Um, and we've also been, you know, we've been um in touch with or we've actually presented a couple times to the uh Redwood City Improvement Association who represent you know property owners in the downtown.

Um we're talking to a lot of different stakeholders that are institutions and uh property owners downtown as well, um, such as the Kaiser Hospital.

Um we've chatted with the county, of course, um just a lot of folks who you know have a vested interest in the planning area.

Great, thank you.

Um and my next question is on transit.

So um it's not a secret that there's an increase of homelessness in the transit space, and it's kind of a they'll clean it up and then they'll come back, and it just adds a lot of um unsafety issues.

So I'm just wondering how this project or this these plans are gonna touch on that.

Yeah, it's it's it's definitely a challenge that Red Ridge City has, um, as well as many other communities up and down um the peninsula and and in the Bay Area.

So, you know, I I think that we're gonna be coordinating um, you know, we're we with our other departments um related to you know making sure that the that we can in any way we can incorporate some of the ideas um related to physical space um into the into the project uh to make sure that you know we are producing you know our transit area to be as safe and friendly as possible.

Um, you know, there's some of the things are a little bit out of our control in terms of physical space and how we program it, and you know, there's definitely other factors and other um kind of specialties that we'll need to be continuing as a community to coordinate with such as the police department, um, you know, our our the county uh services related to homelessness and um so you know I think it's gonna be an ongoing diligence, um, and you know, we're definitely considering that as as part of our work.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Cornyhoe.

Uh Commissioner Koch.

Thank you, Mr.

Francis.

Thank you.

This was a great presentation.

This is a Herculean task.

I hope I'm alive to see part of it at least.

Um I'm looking at the questions on the back.

I know we're not going to do those just yet, but um.

I love that so many of the BCCs are working on this individually, and then we get to meet together because I think that's incredible feedback for all of us.

Um thank you for doing as many of the public outreach sessions as you have.

I know that three of our neighborhood associations were supposed to have shown up at the library.

I honestly don't know how well downtown did because Dylan and I aren't allowed to go to those because we're here as well.

Um, I'm hopeful that we had some people from downtown.

If you do another one, please let us know because I'll do everything I can to encourage our members to turn out and sort of guide them to the website so they can see it is important that you be there.

Um, honestly, I think that's great.

I love the feedback that's in here.

I think it's I feel like it's going really well so far from everything that I've seen that has been done thus far.

Um your department, if you had a ground zero to start, like this is the neighborhood, this is the spot that we want to start in if we had our choice, and then the REPL effect out from there.

What would be the number one?

That's that's a very difficult question.

Because this isn't just, I mean, this isn't core downtown anymore, right?

So it's now it's going out everywhere.

Yeah, I mean, I I don't I don't think that there's a uh ground center ground zero of uh where we expect everything to radiate radiate out from.

There's already today a lot of um you know development activity and interest in all corners of the planning area.

Um so you know, I I think that there will be um parallel tracks on all of you know, and I hope so because you know, you know, it it takes such a long time for all of these systems to work together that they all have to move kind of parallel um uh in a time in a time set.

So yeah, um, it would be nice to have multiple things going on at the same time for sure.

That would be wonderful.

Okay, we'll keep an eye on it.

Thank you so much.

All right, thank you.

Uh community member Chi.

Please go ahead.

Hi, um, my c my question's much simpler.

Um, so I I love utilizing that creek as an urban space.

Um, and I just wanted to ask, um, it looks like somewhere near El Camino, there's also a little public park space, and there's some dotted line about a potential bike route.

I was curious why that um if it was planned that there would is if it's thought that there would be biking along that creek, and since it seems to connect through the downtown so nicely, uh why that what's your thought about like making that part of the uh bike, a bike um a bike path.

Like you've highlighted.

Is this the diagram you're looking at?

No, I think it's the one before.

Am I is it the bike one?

Yeah, okay.

So you have this dotted line where the creek, this park and along El Camino, and then there's a little park around El Camino.

I think I believe you're referring to uh Little River Open Space.

Is that right?

Yes.

Okay.

So and the question, sorry, I was a little distracted on the location.

Is there an opportunity there to make that a full bike path?

Like you've highlighted the other other routes in the in the uh um I I believe that the the creek area is um is not big enough to accommodate a bike facility on it.

It's a very short um section of Daylight Creek, and there's already a I don't know if you you're probably familiar, there's already an area where there's a daylight creek there, and that is actually being as part of the 901 El Camino development.

Um that daylight portion of the creek is actually being relocated slightly to the north and east, I believe.

Um, and so there'll still be a daylight portion, but it's just gonna be a slightly different location, and it's a pretty small small area.

Now that um, and I'm I'm gonna actually ask Brooke to come up because I think that one of the dotted lines is on James Street.

That is showing.

John, that is James Cycle Track.

James Cycle Track.

And the idea is even in the Vogue Bike Drive Plan that goes like a bike pit under crossing under the Caltrain tracks and comps out on Vinslow.

It would be a cycling drive.

Yes.

Yeah, the idea is a 901 El Camino is building something, and then it's beyond that is a long term horizon.

Malha, could you remind us?

Is that part of the walk bike thrive plan today?

It is, but um, yes, it is.

Thank you.

Does that answer your question?

So it sounds we we have a we already have a in our existing bike plan a uh a proposal for that um to enhance that bike connection.

So that is where, you know uh part of this is laying our existing bike framework, some of which is built out, some of which is not yet built out, with additional improvements that our team is has identified.

So that is one of the pre-existing but not yet built um policy proposals that is in our planning documents.

So that would maybe could extend into you're saying the the park that's closer to the creek side, like the to the bay side, um, would does not have enough room for bike route through that open public space.

That's small, I that's my understanding.

That's that's a very small um daylight portion of the creek from El Camino along um just across from James Street.

Um I don't think it's sorry, I'm not talking about that section.

I'm talking about the section closer to the bay where you're envisioning the parkway.

No, okay.

So along Redwood Creek.

Yes.

Okay.

Sorry.

Um, that that definitely that already today has a pretty wide path that is accessible for both bike and pedestrians.

Of course, it's an incomplete path.

So there's um, you know, there's different um there's varying ownerships of the land that uh butts the creek today, and so in some areas um where redevelopment has happened um the the property or the the developers have set back from the creek to allow for a public access um walk and bikeway, but in but at some areas no development has happened yet, and so there's no new develop no access.

So unfortunately today it's incomplete.

Our vision is for that to be a completely connected um bicycle and pedestrian pathway along the creek.

That would be great, or the nice feature of Riverwood City.

Thank you.

Commissioner Robinson, yes.

Uh thank you.

I I really was impressed with the presentation that it first recognizes uh the um uh residential character and historic assets of Centennial and Stan Ball Heller neighborhoods because they're not really downtown, they're adjacent, but very much impacted by this uh plan.

But my clarifying question is back on the bike network slide.

Um from this, it doesn't say if any uh two-lane two-way bikeways are contemplated in the plan, and and I'm not sure if at this stage that would be even expected, and then just another side question is I like how it extends the entire length of Broadway, but I thought we're closing a portion of it, and I could see there being competing um needs for space on Broadway as we widen sidewalks, that type of thing.

So thank you.

Yeah, those are two great questions.

So the first one around two-way facilities.

So you were talking about like a path or protected bike lane.

Correct.

Yeah.

So just in terms of the context for where we would apply those, that the two-way bike facilities are really fantastic in certain contexts, um, but not so much in others because they introduce additional conflicts that need to be designed around.

So at this point in our planning process, we haven't identified any particular places where we would apply those, but for example, along um, you know, a creek or another like linear um space, that would be a great opportunity for a two-way facility.

Um the other thing I want to mention here is that we're really taking the guidance of you know what's really just been adopted at the the national level around how we pick facilities, right?

It used to be that we would pick facilities based bike facilities based on what was left over after the parking and the cars and the deliveries and all of those things, right?

And now we understand that very few people like to bike in that kind of environment.

So what we're we're proposing here, and I think really strengthens on the work of the walk work, the walk bike thrive plan is not compromising on the facility type if you want an all ages and an all abilities network in your downtown.

Um so that means that there will be more trade-offs to come, right?

Um, because there is more right-away that is needed there.

Um, so I just wanted to mention that.

The other piece around the sort of your question around the the two-way facilities, is that that also requires a certain amount of um connected width, you know, to be provided for.

But if there's certain locations that you think would be great candidates, we'd love to hear that, and we can take a look and study that and integrate it.

Um and then for Broadway, I think you know, your question there, right, as we really want to make sure that there's certain spaces in the downtown where everyone is at you know, at a pedestrian speed, right?

And that we're not um competing for space, particularly as electric scooters or e-bikes or whatever might come through with these speed differentials that can feel really uncomfortable, especially for people with disabilities or whatever it might be.

And so I think that that's gonna be an important policy piece that's supported by the design of the street, so that if we're inviting people to bike or scooter through a pedestrianized area, that there's really um support and signals in place for people to be slowing there.

Um, so one example of of how we can do that is you can have sort of um uh uh geofence catchment areas for e-skirters to reduce their speed through those areas um automatically.

Does that answer your question?

Um about Broadway where we have a block closure contemplated.

Is that still on the table?

Well, it is closed today.

The pedestrian model is closed today.

Okay, so um, I can just think because we have we're showing uh you know a full bike lane.

If I'm looking at the slide correctly and understanding it, I'm seeing a full bike lane the length of Broadway, which is interrupted at the same time.

So, so the the the and and brooke, you can clarify me if I miss saying anything.

So the the network that you're seeing on the screen is not necessarily indicative that there's going to be um a specific bike or a bike lane facility on every single street.

There may be different types of facilities, they could be, for example, a bike boulevard, which is a somewhat less protected um uh uh piece of infrastructure that is suitable for streets that have less car traffic.

They don't have protected lanes.

Whereas, you know, on Veterans Boulevard, for example, um, which is much higher traffic, more speeds, um, you're gonna want a safe, a more protected um type of bike facility.

So this network diagram that you're seeing kind of just shows like where we're showing any type of bike facility, um, and we're not necessarily um at the level of detail yet where we're um designing the exact type yet, but we will be getting there uh kind of in our next phase of work.

So, in terms of the bike, the bike uh excuse me for Broadway on our pedestrian mall that we have today just a block away from here.

Um, to Brooke's point, there's there's different uh physical strategies that you can signal to cyclists, scooter users that this is a place where you need to slow down.

Um those could be physical things.

Brooke was mentioning more high-tech technological things related to um rentable e-scooters that they would automatically um reduce their speed.

Um so there's a few different measures you can do, and that part of the solution might also be that um that's not necessarily the best place for bikes to continue, and there's maybe a a detour.

We haven't you haven't decided that yet or determined what the best approach would be yet, but um we're not taking anything off the table quite yet.

Thank you.

Thank you for the question.

Commissioner Hunter, right?

Thank you, John.

Uh we have a few questions here, so somewhat specific questions uh based on your staff report and presentation.

Um a few places in the presentation of the staff report, you talked about improving connectivity to Hoover Park, which is a great idea.

Um, and in one one or two of the slides, it shows um three blue circles on Woodside Road, uh like between middle field and and spring.

Um what do you have in mind for that?

Because I mean, under, I mean, and over pedestrian overpass, like there's a near middle field or underpass or something else.

That is a great question.

Uh, you know, you you've you hit the nail on the head.

You know, Woodside Road is is such a barrier, and we have neighborhoods on both sides.

And um folks who live on the south side.

Um we we hear that, you know, gosh, it would really be great if we could have better access to our downtown um through other means other than than car that feels safe.

Um and on the ver on the contrary on the other side, you know, getting across Woodside from the north to the south to Hoover Park and Hoover Elementary School, which is where a lot of um the folks who live in Standby Heller, you know, send their kids to school would be a great thing.

So today we have a pedestrian bridge across Woodside at the end of Stambaugh Street.

Um, you know, I think that it is a really important piece of infrastructure.

Um it's also not necessarily, I think for some folks that we've heard that doesn't always feel like the safest place to be, particularly at night.

Um, you know, there's not great lighting, um, there's um, you know, just some just some safety issues there.

So, you know, we're really interested in hearing from you all and from the community.

What are the best strategies to get across Woodside Road?

Is it a new pedestrian bridge?

Is it a um and you know the existing bridge maybe with some improvements?

Would would our are at grade crossings um more suitable and more comfortable and safer?

Um, so you know, we're we're looking at various locations where new crossings could happen and studying those, but we're really interested in hearing um some input um from the community on what feels the best for um their safety and connectivity.

Great, thanks.

Yeah, yeah.

Um John throughout this process has really encouraged the consultant team to think about big moves um for this this project, and I think that Woodside Road is one of those places where really thinking forward to what it what it could be, right?

And a lot of our work in the mobility world right now is repairing the urban fabric where these big roads have been cut through.

And so uh it's easy to think about bridges through there because that's what is there today, but would love sort of reactions to you know, what if we were to really repair those connections through proper at grade um crossings, particularly for people to walk and bike to the school and the park and all of those places.

Um and when we really think about sort of it from a network density perspective, that's where those circles are placed and places that are really gonna support the walking or bicycling journey.

Um so we're really excited to explore that.

Now those crossings could be for all modes, including drivers.

They could also just be activated for people to walk and bike, you know, and be a crossing for that that does not disrupt the the through traffic um along Woodside.

So there's a lot of different tools that we have.

The bridges are the most expensive ones, um, but they may also be the ones that the community feels most comfortable with.

So I think that we're we're really interested in hearing feedback on what that vision could be.

Thank you.

Um some of the same maps, I mean I think there's a particular uh Stan Ball Heller map.

Um, and and um I as I'm saying my comments later, I think uh Stanbaugh Heller definitely needs more parks.

Um and so you have two like green stars somewhere in there, um which say public open space opportunity on public land.

Um and I couldn't figure out what that was, and I actually drove walked by there all around there today, and I I didn't see any public land.

So could you talk about that?

Yeah, thanks for that question.

That we have a couple different ideas that we're actually really interested in in hearing feedback on.

And I'm actually gonna let um Putum or Jim speak to those a little bit more.

So um those the icon that's closer to that's close to Broadway Street.

So it's actually placed where Beach Street meets Broadway.

And as we were taking a closer look at um, you know, the conditions there in terms of you know what the parcels and what's what what the what's happening um on either side of Beat Street, um it stood out to us as a possible opportunity to um you know create something like a ped wall uh without actually create uh without I'm sorry, I I didn't get a pedestrian similar to like the current existing uh sorry uh my bad, but it's like the current Broadway pedestrian mall where uh vehicular access is um is stopped, right?

So it's mostly all pedestrian, but that can turn into a pedestrian plaza because the parcels on either side do have an alternative access, so those could be accessed either from Broadway Street or from uh there is an alleyway.

And the reason why we are looking at some of these opportunities is as we can, as we all know, the neighborhood is is it's built out.

And so to look for opportunities to create you know new public spaces, we started to look at within the public right-of-way, where can there be uh, you know, where do those opportunities exist and can we think creatively about um you know introducing some of these um or exploring some of these opportunities uh within the public right-of-way.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Um, yeah, I I love uh you know, in in both of these first two questions, the uh you're looking for creative you're looking for creative answers that don't exist yet, but I I really like that.

Um another question is um on the mobility and connectivity slide, uh, and this is gonna be about Caltrain grade separations.

Um I think there's five places where it shows possible grade separations, and three of them on the southern part are um pretty close to each other.

Is it and I I don't remember from maybe studying this in the past.

Is the plan or the thought to have that whole section be elevated?

I mean, I I know whatever is gonna be done there is gonna be in normal, so it's expensive.

Um because you all one of the um slides that you showed earlier also had a uh artist rendering of the new um proposed Caltrain station, and that's also elevated.

Yeah, so and Malha might ask you to jump in here too.

Um, but um so staff has regular um meetings with Caltrain um to talk about you know the the uh grade separation project, which you know is a little bit um, you know, the timing is uncertain of when that's gonna happen.

Um, but you're correct in that um the the um grade separation is proposed um across all three of those southern um crossings um as well as um up to Whipple as well.

So it would they would all be separate uh grade separated um now you know there's uh there's still quite a lot of uncertainty in the exact design of what that looks like.

Um so we're we're learning along as we go um with you all.

Um and you know, I I don't know, Malahat, if there's any um kind of forums coming up where um additional information from Caltrain will be made available to the public.

Probably in the next few months.

So we did um from 2019 to 2023, we did a feasibility of study with Caltrain to look at um separating there at great crossings for safety on traffic operation.