Tiburon filters housing sites for more review

Vacant land at Reed Elementary School and commercial buildings downtown could help Tiburon meet a state mandate for new housing.

The Town Council gave its blessing to the potential sites at a housing workshop Wednesday. Council members had requested an accounting of possible sites and how many residences could be built.

The sites include the vacant land at the elementary school and areas along Tiburon Boulevard, Main Street and Beach Road.

The Cove Shopping Center at 1 Blackfield Drive was removed from consideration because of concerns about traffic, flooding and density.

“We will not have as much excess as a result of removing the Cove Center, but we will have some remaining cushion,” said Community Development Director Dina Tasini.

The shopping center would have added a potential 72 residences on a 3-acre portion of the 3.9-acre site. The town plans to increase the density for potential housing development at the Boardwalk Shopping Center at 1550 Tiburon Blvd. and at sites at 6 and 12 Beach Road to make up the difference.

Tasini said the Boardwalk Shopping Center would have a zoning of 40 to 45 residences per acre, resulting in up to 88 homes. The sites at 6 and 12 Beach Road would have a zoning of 40 to 55 homes an acre, resulting in 53.

Tiburon must plan for 639 new residences, said the town's housing consultant, Christina O'Rourke. This includes 193 very-low-income homes, 110 low-income, 93 moderate-income and 243 above-moderate-income.

The new homes are expected to be “small multifamily units” for people in smaller households, such as seniors and young adults, O'Rourke said. The potential heights of the developments were made with an assumed modeling of 900-square-foot residences.

The town would be required to modify zoning and density limits in the parcels to allow for additional housing to be built on the sites. Traffic impacts are expected on Tiburon Boulevard and will be explored in a planned environmental impact report.

The eastern Tiburon Boulevard parcels include the Bank of America site, the Chase Bank site and parking lots. All parcels are at least a half-acre. The planned buildings would be four to five story buildings with ground floor commercial use. The buildings would add an estimated 70 to 80 residences, plus restaurant and retail space.

“We would like to hold on to that important feature for downtown activation,” said Peter Winch of the San Francisco-based urban planning group WRT.

The western Tiburon Boulevard and Beach Road parcels contain offices and services, with three parcels at least a half-acre. They would include three-story buildings with groundfloor commercial use and add an estimated 27 to 36 residences.

“This was especially well-received,” Winch said.

Main Street would have residences added behind historical facades while maintaining ground-floor commercial use. The plan is expected to add 10 to 14 residences.

The Reed Elementary School site would provide for housing on a vacant 2.9-acre portion of a 7.5acre parcel. It is the only vacant site included in the town's list and already has an affordable housing zoning overlay. The site would provide for an estimated 66 new residences.

Approval of the housing sites allows the town to send them to an environmental review consultant to review their viability.

Town officials have repeatedly

criticized the housing mandate as inappropriate for Tiburon given its spatial constraints and topography. The town, like most other Marin municipalities, had its efforts to overturn the mandate rejected.

Mayor Jon Welner called the housing element the “biggest planning change in Tiburon in a generation.”

“I think we need to make a plan for really extraordinary outreach,” he said.

“There's no place to do it that won't increase the drain on the resources we don't have,” said Councilmember Alice Fredericks, on the topic of where to allow new housing.

Vice Mayor Jack Ryan said he would have supported keeping the Cove Shopping Center for further evaluation, saying it was an “opportunity” to solve an already pervasive flooding issue at the site. He said the new housing would likely be constructed on top of existing businesses and would not drive out essential services in the town.

“That's why I would say keep it in for now, but I hear the objections from the community for sure,” he said.