Stanford seeks extension for development in Redwood City

Along with the specific plan, the council also adopted a 30-year development agreement laying out the types of community benefits the city would expect in exchange for the university developing its campus. Written into that agreement was a stipulation that it must be renewed every 10 years. 

“The primary focus of the development agreement was to memorialize Stanford’s commitment to provide community benefits (in the form of contributions and community programs) in exchange for preserving development rights to develop the campus for up to 30 years,” Stanford University spokesperson Joel Merman said in an email statement. 

Stanford owes the city more than $15 million in total under the development agreement. Those funds have and will continue to go toward various infrastructure improvements, neighborhood enhancements, educational programming and other city funds.  

To receive the first extension, Stanford is required to have obtained building permits for at least 350,000 square feet of net new development and have paid the full $450,000 toward bicycle improvements it promised and portions of its promised contribution to water tank improvements, community sustainability fund and neighborhood street enhancement program, according to the agreement. 

More than $5.3 million has been paid to the city since the agreement was adopted a decade ago, according to the summary letter Stanford submitted to Redwood City to extend the development agreement. Deputy City Manager Jennifer Yamaguma said the staff report for the Oct. 9 meeting when the agreement will be discussed will indicate that Stanford has met its obligations for the first extension. 

“These requirements were negotiated back in 2013 and provide objective criteria to determine whether an extension will be granted,” Yamaguma said in an email. “The extension, if granted, would apply to the entire project site covered by the [development agreement], including both developed and undeveloped portions of the overall site.”  

Phase 1 of the multi-phase project was completed in 2019. That initial portion brought in 570,000 square feet of office, a 1,057 space parking garage, a fitness center, child care facility and cafeteria.

Community benefits related to that first phase include 2.4 acres of publicly accessible open space and improvements to Broadway including new traffic signals, bike lanes, the creation of a center turn lane and maintenance of a loading zone on Broadway, according to the city’s development website for the Stanford in Redwood City project. 

The extension will allow for Stanford to move forward with two other separate but concurrent development applications. A third application for Block D, bound by Bay Road, Broadway and Douglas Avenue, has yet to be submitted for city review. 

The block bounded by Douglas Avenue, Broadway and Highway 101 — known as Block E — is being developed by Stanford Health Care and includes construction of a new medical office building adjacent to the existing Stanford Medicine Outpatient Center. It includes up to 228,000 square feet of new medical and clinical space, integrated parking within the building and a free-standing parking garage as well as open space with outdoor seating and wellness gardens for patients and staff.

An application for Block C, bounded by Broadway, Hurlingame Avenue, Bay Road and Warrington Avenue, calls for two five-story 125,000-square-foot office buildings with amenities and a separate 4,000-square-foot “amenities building” attached to a six-level parking structure that can accommodate 1,086 cars and 63 bikes.

Plans for both of those projects were submitted to the city in 2019 and are still under review.