Last night the Council approved a reduced scale Transit Village on a 4 to 1 vote. I was the dissenter, primarily because I believe the Council should have honored the recent election and made its decision after Cameron Johnson is seated in December. The Transit Village and its associated impacts, after all, was a huge […]
Transit Village Reflections Read More »
The ultimate size of projects like the Transit Village always end up reflecting a balance between economic pressures striving to make them bigger and community pressures trying to keep a lid on them. Given that, it’s important to understand a project’s economics. Unfortunately, that’s not as simple as one might like. Of necessity you end
How Big Is Big Enough? Read More »
This was published as an op ed in the San Mateo Daily Journal on October 17, 2013. You can find it on their site here. San Carlos residents could be forgiven for thinking all the issues surrounding the proposed Transit Village are resolved or being successfully managed based on the staff-produced newsletter they just received.
At the last Council meeting I cited well-validated rumors Legacy Partners was vetting a new and different plan for the San Carlos Transit Village with some City Council and Planning Commission members. I brought this up out of concern that if the project was ultimately approved it could appear the outcome was preordained. To be
This posting originally appeared as an op-ed piece in the San Mateo Daily Journal on August 11, 2012. You can see the published version here. The “final” environmental impact report for the proposed Transit Village in San Carlos is under review by the Planning Commission. It’s a step along the way to whatever the ultimate
More Dialog, Less Tension Read More »
Last night we had our second budget discussion, part of the process which will ultimately lead to an adopted budget for the 2012/2013 and 2013/2014 fiscal years (the City’s fiscal year runs from July 1st to June 30th). If you’re ever interested in getting a quick overview of what every part of the City staff
The parking study proposal for San Carlos caused a number of people to comment about parking meters. Specifically, about how undesirable or stupid it would be to replace the current free parking with pay parking. That may or may not be correct (and it isn’t clear to me we even have a parking problem). But
Bar Food and Free Parking Read More »
You may have wondered why I haven’t written about the Council’s upcoming review of the Carlos Club expansion application. There’s a simple reason: I haven’t made up my mind. And it’s important that I not make up my mind before the public hearing, because the Council acts in a quasi-judicial role on these kinds of
Land Use and Business Expansion Read More »
At last night’s City Council meeting we unanimously, but quite reluctantly, approved a revised cellphone tower proposal from AT&T as part of settling a lawsuit they had brought against the City. Much of the meeting was spent discussing the proposed settlement, and taking AT&T to task for continuing to underperform in the design and community
Towering Incompetence Read More »
At last night’s City Council meeting we gave new guidance to staff as to how the Council views high speed rail as it relates to San Carlos. The short version of where we ended up is simple: the Council doesn’t support putting more tracks through San Carlos. This is a pretty significant change from where