When the Menlo Park City Council recently approved the Derry project, consisting of 135 condominiums and more than 22,500 square feet of commercial space near El Camino Real, it also set the gears in motion for an equally dense development right next door — as well as for a possible challenge on procedural and legal grounds by a group of unhappy residents.
At the same time the council green-lighted the Derry project, it also rezoned the adjacent 3.45-acre site at 1300 El Camino Real, the former site of a Cadillac dealership. The move, which caught some members of the public by surprise, means that a high-density project proposed for that site has already cleared a key hurdle.
Yet, legally required public notices for public hearings on the Derry project didn’t mention consideration of rezoning the former Cadillac site; nor did City Council agenda items pertaining to the Derry rezoning and required general plan amendments include rezoning and general plan amendments for the adjacent site.
Members of Menlo Park Tomorrow, the resident group leading a referendum campaign against the Derry project, are looking carefully at the rezoning of the former Cadillac site.
“There are severe procedural and legal questions about how this has developed,” said Jack Morris, a former Menlo Park mayor and councilman and a member of the group.
San Mateo-based Sand Hill Property Co. is proposing 134 apartments and about 80,000 square feet of commercial space for the former Cadillac site. The proposal calls for about 39 residential units per acre, and buildings between 50 feet and 60 feet tall.
The old zoning limited development projects to 18 residences per acre and structures no taller than 30 feet.
Although rezoning 1300 El Camino Real doesn’t guarantee that the proposed project will be approved, questions arise over why the city opted to move forward with one project while approving another — as well as over the adequacy of the city’s legally required public notification of the rezoning.
Acting City Attorney Dan Siegel said public notices issued by the city were sufficient. The notices said that parcels “in close proximity to the Caltrain station” could be rezoned in the approval of the Derry project. That site is near the intersection of El Camino and Glenwood Avenue.
Community Development Director Arlinda Heineck noted that the rezoning wasn’t specific to the 1300 El Camino Real site — all land bounded by El Camino Real and the train tracks and between Oak Grove Avenue and Glenwood Avenue was rezoned through the council’s approval of the Derry project.
She said a wider tract of land was rezoned because the city “had the opportunity to look a little bit more broadly” at the general plan, and focus on building “transit oriented development” near the train tracks.
The council voted 4-1 on August 29 to approve the Derry project, with Councilman Andy Cohen opposed.
The agenda item for that meeting, as well as the notice of public hearing published as a paid advertisement in the Almanac before the meeting, specifically identified the parcels at 550-580 Oak Grove Ave. and 540-570 Derry Lane as the property being considered for rezoning and other changes. The 1300 El Camino Real site was not mentioned in those notices.
