Planners reach consensus on new home-size policies in San Carlos

Of particular focus for commissioners Monday was identifying maximum floor area ratio, or the ratio of a building’s total floor area to its lot size, for lots of different sizes. Though commissioners agreed to keep the 50 percent lot coverage maximum, they agreed after a lengthy discussion to recommend setting the maximum floor area ratio, or FAR, to 1,000 square feet plus 35 percent of one’s lot size, with a minimum FAR of 0.50.

Noting a staff recommendation to set a flat 0.59 FAR is expected to reduce the maximum area in which homes can be built by 37 percent, Commissioner John Dugan said in a phone call after the meeting the FAR formula commissioners are recommending to the City Council is comparatively more restrictive. It is aimed at allowing those contemplating home projects to meet the needs of their families without negatively affecting their neighbors, he added. The City Council is expected to review their recommendations at its Oct. 8 meeting, according to city planner Lisa Porras.

“This is a new restriction on development and it is a big step that’s been taken after a long time,” he said, acknowledging some residents have advocated for even more restrictive standards than those the commission recommended. “This gives us a good start and we can certainly adjust from here.”

Dugan looked to other changes commissioners are recommending, such as an exemption from a home’s lot coverage of up to 200 square feet of space dedicated to front porches as well as another exemption from a home’s FAR calculation basements that are no more than 3 feet above grade and completely under a home’s footprint, among others, to similarly afford homeowners with small lots room to design homes that make sense for their families while also encouraging first-floor projects that don’t cast shadows on their neighbors. But for San Carlos resident Christian Vescia, the commission’s recommendations didn’t go far enough to ensure the size and scale of new home projects don’t impose on the way their neighbors feel in their homes or how pedestrians feel walking through a neighborhood. A member of a volunteer group Good Growth San Carlos, Vescia advocated for a maximum FAR closer to 0.53, the median FAR the group calculated for peer cities nearby.

Because the commission’s recommendations kept the lot coverage the same at 50 percent but allowed for an FAR reaching 0.60 for smaller lots, Vescia wasn’t convinced they would address the concerns residents originally aired about the impact of oversized projects on those living next to them as well as the surrounding neighborhood.

“It’s clear to me that that’s going to be a problem for anyone who lives next to a small lot where a neighbor or a speculator knocks a house down and then builds it up,” he said in a phone call after the meeting.

Commissioners grappled with how a sliding scale could be shaped that would allow smaller lots to have slightly higher ratios so homeowners would have more flexibility to build and prevent larger lots from having oversized homes on them.

Acknowledging the majority of the city’s nearly 8,000 single-family-zoned parcels are under 6,000 square feet in size, Commissioner Jim Iacoponi voiced concerns about the limited space in which homeowners with smaller lots can make changes, noting the experiences of two architects and a homeowner who faced challenges in planning designs for smaller lots.

“I’m just mindful of what can be built on those smaller lots and don’t want to disadvantage people in that space where it’s really important,” he said, according to a video of the meeting.

Among other adjustments to the city’s existing zoning standards, commissioners also recommended changes easing a city requirement to build a two-car garage and instead allowing homeowners to build one-car garages as long as they include a driveway that can accommodate two parked cars. They recommended the changes go into effect 90 days after City Council approval, and expanded the required radius for noticing home projects with neighbors from 150 feet to 300 feet and added a requirement to put signs about the projects in the front yard of a property.

Having engaged with the issue for more than two years, Vescia said he and several others have repeatedly asked for more restrictive standards and are getting frustrated they are only starting to see the recommendations shift away from form-based standards and not promising the change residents are hoping they will have. He also voiced concern about whether officials adequately assessed the impact of the set of changes they recommended Monday.

“The residents are very clearly saying with a united voice over the years what they want and the city appears not to be listening,” he said. “People are so frustrated and so tired of going to meeting after meeting.”

anna@smdailyjournal.com

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