Community Outreach Summary 1/24
City of Palo Alto
San Antonio Road
Corridor Plan
Introduction
Activity 1: Mad-Libs Visioning
Activity 2: Lego Mapping
Key Findings
Appendix
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4 17
Table of Contents
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Introduction
Students from the Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo’s City and Regional Planning Department are working in collaboration with the City of Palo Alto to develop a concept report for the San Antonio Road corridor, from the Baylands to Alma Street. The goal of the report is to detail how the area can accommodate 1,185 new homes to help the City achieve its housing goals. As a part of this effort, Cal Poly students will be hosting community outreach events. These events serve as opportunities for the community to provide feedback about the project.
On the evening of January 24th, 2024, Cal
Poly students led a community workshop
at the Mitchell Park Community Center.
The purpose of the workshop was to
engage the community in a shared
visioning process for the corridor and
understand community attitudes toward
growth and development in the area.
This report serves as both a summary of
community engagement and a catalog of
all recorded input provided by participants.
This report serves as a concise overview
of our second outreach initiative held in
January 2024. It encapsulates the engaging
activities, such as Mad-Libs Visioning and
Lego Scenarios, carried out during our
community workshop in Palo Alto and the
San Antonio Road Corridor.
Figure 1: Community members and Cal Poly students
listening to the workshop presentation
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Activity #1: Mad-Libs Activity #1: Mad-Libs
Visioning Visioning
The Mad-Libs Visioning activity challenged participants to create a vision statement for WKHIXWXUHRIWKH6DQ$QWRQLR5RDG&RUULGRU0DG/LEVDUHˋOOLQWKHEODQNZRUGJDPH where players are prompted to provide a list of words to substitute for blanks in a story before reading aloud.
)RUPLQXWHVSDUWLFLSDQWVDWHDFKRIWKHQLQHWDEOHVFROODERUDWHGWRˋOOLQWKHHPSW\ VSDFHVZLWKZRUGVDQGSKUDVHVWKDWˋWWKHLUYLVLRQXVLQJDWHPSODWHFUHDWHGE\&DO3RO\ students (see Figure 2). Once complete, each table shared their vision statement with the other participants. Each table’s vision statement helped guide their decisions in the Lego Scenarios activity.
The subsequent pages show the results of the Mad Libs Visioning activity. Each page corresponds to a separate sentence and blank within the Vision Statement. Responses were collected and arranged with the most commonly repeated words or phrases at the top.
Figure 2: Mad libs vision statement template
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Activity #2: Lego
Scenarios
The Lego Scenarios activity tasked participants with
placing at least 1,200 homes on the project area base map.
Participants could add other uses such as commercial, light industrial, greenspace, and “Y our Big Idea” . Participants could place bricks anywhere on the map, regardless of
existing buildings, land use, or zoning and could stack bricks to indicate increased density. Participants could also create mixed-use stacks by placing different color land use bricks on top of each other.
Each yellow brick represented ten homes per acre of
residential. Each red brick represented one acre of
commercial space. Each gray brick represented one acre of light industrial space. Each green brick represented one acre of parks/open space. Each blue brick represented “Y our Big Idea” , which could be anything from a new school, more restaurants, a stadium, etc.
The following maps were created as a complication of all 9 group’s results. The maps were separated by the the land use designation options (housing, commercial, open space, industrial). The numbers on the map correspond to the
average amount of lego blocks placed in each area. The
average densities provide insight on the uses and densities comunity members would like to see. See Appendix for the lego maps created by each group during the workshop.
Figure 4: Instructions for the lego mapping
activity handed out to each group.
Figure 3: Aerial view of
group 3 lego scenario
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The community placed a high concentration of lego blocks designated for housing between East Charleston Road and Highway 101; a medium amount north of highway 101 and at the east of the corridor between 0LGGOHˋHOGDQG(DVW&KDUOHVWRQ5RDG
DQGDORZDPRXQWEHWZHHQ$OPD6WUHHWDQG0LGGOHˋHOG5RDGDQG ZHVWRIWKHFRUULGRUEHWZHHQ0LGGOHˋHOG5RDGDQG(DVW&KDUOHVWRQ5RDG 12 Community Outreach Summary
The community placed a high concentration of lego blocks designated for commercial / mixed - use space between East Charleston Road and Highway 101; the remainder of the site alternates between low and medium concentrations with the low concentrations residing at the west of the corridor between Alma Street and East Charleston Road, and at the east of the corridor between Gideon +DXVQHU-HZLVK'D\6FKRRODQG0LGGOHˋHOG5RDG
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The community placed a high concentration of lego blocks designated for industrial use at the east of the corridor between East Charleston Road and Highway 101 and north of Highway 101. Very few locations were designated elsewhere throughout the site with a low concentration of blocks placed at WKHZHVWRIWKHFRUULGRUEHWZHHQ$OPD6WUHHWDQG0LGGOHˋHOG5RDGDQGZHVWRIWKHFRUULGRUEHWZHHQ East Charleston Road and Highway 101. There were no designations for industrial use at the remainder of the site.
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The community placed a high concentration of lego blocks designated for big idea recommendations at the north half of the project site, north of East Charleston Road. Below East Charleston Road, very few big ideas were generated with a low concentration of blocks placed on the southern half of the site. 15 Community Outreach Summary
The community placed a high concentration of lego blocks designated for green space between East Charleston Road and Highway 101; a medium amount at the west of the corridor between Alma Street DQG0LGGOHˋHOG5RDGDQGQRUWKRIKLJKZD\
DQGDORZDPRXQWDWWKHHDVWRIWKHFRUULGRUEHWZHHQ
$OPD6WUHHWDQG(DVW&KDUOHVWRQ5RDGDQGZHVWRIWKHFRUULGRUEHWZHHQ0LGGOHˋHOG5RDGDQG(DVW Charleston Road.
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Key Findings
• Community members generally supported an increase in housing, favoring mixed- use developments integrating residential and commercial spaces. • There was an emphasis on improved connectivity and accessibility, especially for the San Antonio Road Corridor to connect with other parts of Palo Alto. • Concerns were expressed about walking and biking and public transit, with a focus on safe and accessible routes that serve the San Antonio Corridor. • There was a desire for more green spaces, trees, and parks. This included a variety of parks, green roofs, and tree-lined streets.
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Appendix
Lego Mapping
Table 1 Lego Mapping
Table 2 Lego Mapping
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Table 3 Lego Mapping
Table 4 Lego Mapping
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Table 5 Lego Mapping
Table 6 Lego Mapping
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Table 7 Lego Mapping
Table 8 Lego Mapping
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Table 9 Lego Mapping
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Appendix
Mad Libs
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