San Jose approves 737-unit housing development near major tech hub

While the city s overall housing production has lagged more projects are progressing in North San Jose with the latest promising to add more than homes near a major tech hub Related Articles Developer switches gears on -plus unit downtown San Jose housing project Bike pedestrian improvements celebrated at North Berkeley BART Station How California and New York are taking on the NIMBYs Lender seizes former San Jose store site housing project property Antioch council to discuss housing projects linked to controversial developer San Jose has approved a site advancement permit for Valley Oak Partners -unit multi-phase residential project between and River Oaks Parkway The project includes a seven-story -unit market-rate apartment building a five-story -unit affordable apartment building and for-sale townhouse units configured in three-story buildings This site s been vacant for plenty of years and when we were first introduced to this site about two and a half years ago it was in the time when builders remedy applications seeking to lower density were abundant disclosed Scott Connelly a representative of Valley Oaks Partners We took a different approach Our company is based in San Jose and we felt it was pivotal to design a project that fell within the vision and spirit of the underlying transit employment residential overlay in the San Jose Citywide Guidelines especially with respect to density per acre The -acre project site extends to Iron Point Drive to the West and Cisco Way to the east Major tech employers within the vicinity include Cisco Intel and Broadcom To make way for the advancement the developer will demolish the three existing buildings totaling approximately square feet The affordable housing building will offer a mix of units from studios to three-bedroom apartments at up to of the area median income AMI The AMI in Santa Clara County this year is for a household of four people The -unit market-rate building will include studios and one-bedroom units It also will house two-bedroom and three-bedroom apartments Although the state required San Jose to plan for new housing units by the city has struggled to get projects started over the past sparse years falling well behind the pace needed to meet that goal A fresh survey by HomeAbroad determined that San Jose saw the largest decline in home building permits among large cities When comparing and content San Jose s permitting activity has dropped Large-scale developments also have become increasingly challenging to build due to burdensome regulations and high construction and labor costs Last year San Jose saw zero new market-rate multi-family residential developments with more than units break ground The city has made specific inroads this year thanks in large part to a multi-family housing incentive operation that has shaved maturation fees and taxes making several projects feasible to build again Despite the city s struggles North San Jose has several large projects now underway which has helped alleviate the city s housing predicament Just last week the Facchino Family began demolishing structures at its -acre property at Berryessa Road before construction commences on a new mixed-income neighborhood near the BART Station Also in North San Jose the Hanover Co s Coyote Creek Village project broke ground in May and will eventually create nearly new homes near the intersection of Montague Expressway and Seely Avenue While the Valley Oak Partners project did not receive any pushback during Wednesday s planning director s meeting project manager Alec Atienza commented residents raised concerns during group meetings about affordability tree removal pedestrian safety traffic congestion and the need for more commercial space Connelly noted that the project includes several community street improvements including enhanced crosswalks widened sidewalks and monetary contributions toward bike lanes on Cisco Way He also added that the developers would save specific Redwood trees after receiving region input What we learned during our area outreach with the neighbors was we came to understand the importance of preserving those trees or trying to preserve as several as feasible Connelly disclosed While various of the trees have been deemed not suitable to remain because of their wellness or a meager with proximities closer to future buildings we have been able to preserve and keep