Sunnyvale city planners are requiring an environmental impact report for a large development project proposed for Butcher’s Corner that will likely take 12 months to complete.
City staff provided the applicant, De Anza Properties, with comments this month on the project’s preliminary review application.
Forty-one townhome units and 115 apartment units with surface and underground parking is proposed for the El Camino Real and Wolfe Road site. The proposed townhouse buildings are three stories, while the other two proposed buildings are seven stories.
City staff raised several design concerns, ranging from adequate parking to building setbacks.
“While the applicant has the choice of whether or not to address the design concerns of staff, they must submit any missing information before there is a complete application,” Sunnyvale communications officer Jennifer Garnett said.
Several items were listed as needing to be addressed, including a trash management plan, an accessibility plan, and a traffic impact analysis.
Staff also recommended the building height along El Camino and Wolfe should be reduced to about four stories.
The project would bring in just under $200,000 in transportation impact fees and $4.2 million in park in-lieu fees to the city.
The EIR and entitlement process have several required steps where the public can participate, Garnett said.
“The first would be about a month after the EIR consultant is given the notice to proceed,” Garnett said. “This is the notice of preparation and scoping meeting where other agencies and the general public are invited to comment on the issues to be covered in the EIR.”
A date has yet to be determined for that.
The next opportunity for public review is when the draft EIR is available for a 45-day comment period on the adequacy of the environmental review.
After that process would come the public hearings for consideration of the final EIR, which would include responses to any comments received during the review period and any corrections or modifications to the draft EIR, annexation to the city and rezoning.
Neighbors pleaded with the city council on Oct. 8 to delay annexation of the property out of fear that it would expedite the project that they said is too large and would bring more congestion to the area.
The annexation process began when the Santa Clara County Local Agency Formation Commission and the county’s planning division sent a letter to the Sunnyvale Community Development Department back in May 2011.
At the request of the landowner and at the recommendation of city staff, the Sunnyvale City Council postponed the annexation of Butcher’s Corner indefinitely while a consensus was reached on the project.
The property had previously belonged to the Butcher family for more than 100 years, until the principal owner died in December 2012. An operating orchard had been located on the property until its heirs sold it to John Vidovich, the De Anza Properties principal, who closed on the site in August 2013.
For more information on the project, contact associate planner Noren Caliva-Lepe at 408.730.7659 or ncaliva-lepe@sunnyvale.ca.gov.
