February 23, 2022
Diana Pancho
li
Senior Planner
City of Mountain View
500 Castro Street
Mountain View, CA 94039‐7540
Re: Propos
ed 555 West Middlefield Drive Project (PL-2017-004) - Tree Preservation / Parking Reduction Alternative Study
At the City
Council hearing for the proposed development project at 555 West Middlefield Drive on February 8th, 2022, Council directed the applicant to study whether additional heritage trees onsite could be preserved if fewer parking spaces were required to be built in the project. The subjects of this discussion were three redwood trees (numbered 178, 179, and 180) in the Block A area that were proposed to be removed in the proposed redevelopment of the site because they are situated within an area where an underground parking garage would be built. In response to this study direction from Council, AvalonBay has developed an alternative development proposal that is described below, and in an exhibit package submitted separately to the City.
This alte
rnative development proposal would reduce the southeastern portion of the Block A garage footprint in order to leave this stand of redwood trees (numbered 178, 179, and 180) intact. Four other smaller trees, including two heritage redwoods (181 and 182) and two olives (183, a heritage tree, and 184) would also be preserved in this alternative. The changes in tree counts are summarized in the table below.
REMOVED TREES
Alternative Previous Variance
Total Tree Quantities 122 129 ‐7
Heritage Trees 51 57 ‐6
Non‐Heritage Trees 71 72 ‐1
PRESERVED TREES
Alternative Previous Variance
Total Tree Quantities 235 228 7
Heritage Trees 151 145 6
Non‐Heritage Trees 84 83 1
In this alte
rnative design at Block A on the ground level, the parking ramp would shift westwards from the eastern edge of the block by approximately 62 feet in order to avoid conflicting with the tree Planning
Division
Received on
March 9, 2022
Attachment 8
preservation area. The surface parking area would shift to the eastern edge of the block to accommodate the new ramp location. A picnic seating area from the original design would conflict with the location of the preserved redwood trees, and therefore would be eliminated. The original design for this garage features two elevators, but one of those elevators would be eliminated in this alternative. The second garage staircase, which was previously located in the southeastern corner of the garage, would be shifted to the opposite northwestern corner.
Underground, the reduction in the footprint of the Block A garage would result in a reduction of 67 parking spaces from that garage. Some of this parking reduction could be offset by reconfiguring the layout of the Block C garage. There is space within the existing Block C garage footprint to add another 23 parking spaces. The combination of these two changes makes the net total impact of this alternative a loss of 44 spaces. These parking space changes are summarized in the table below.
Parking Alternative Summary
Block A SPACES
Level Alternative Previous Variance
B3 94 115 ‐21
B2 94 113 ‐19
B1 88 113 ‐25
Floor 01/Surface 20 22 ‐2
Total 296 363 -67
Block C SPACES
Level Alternative Previous Variance
B2 234 211 +23
B1 201 201 0
Total 435 412 +23
Total Change -44
This alternative would not require the use of any new or different construction equipment than was assumed in the previously proposed project. Similarly, this alternative would include work that is fully within the footprint of the previously proposed project. This means that no new areas would need to be excavated or disturbed beyond those already studied under the proposed alternative, and all work would be either the same distance from, or farther away from, all existing buildings.