Amending and extending

The 1548 Maple St. project aims to construct 131 for-sale townhouses on a roughly 8-acre site along the southern bank of Redwood Creek just east of Highway 101. The project also includes both the reconstruction of a portion of Maple Street and the extension of Blomquist Street so that it connects up with the newly reconstructed Maple Street. Finally, it includes the dedication of a piece of land along the southern property line for a future extension of Blomquist Street out to Redwood Creek (where, someday, the city could bridge the creek and connect Blomquist to East Bayshore Road), and the creation of a new segment of the Bay Trail along Redwood Creek.

The project was approved in mid-2018. Starting in early 2019 the site was raised to help protect against sea-level rise, various utilities were undergrounded in preparation for the project, and both the reconstruction of Maple Street and the initial extension of Blomquist Street were completed. Since then, although the site has remained essentially untouched, behind the scenes some rather important changes occurred. Most importantly, in 2021, the property owner, the city and the county performed a land swap that gave the county the land needed for its new Navigation Center (completed in 2023), gave the city the parcel at 1580 Maple St. through which the final segment of the Blomquist Street extension needs to run, and left the developer with the land it needs for its townhouse project.

Negotiating the land swap took a lot of time. That, plus the fact that COVID hit right about when townhouse construction might otherwise have gotten underway, led the developer in mid-2023 to request, and the city to readily agree on, a three-year extension to the original five-year agreement. That original agreement had given the developer until May of 2023 to complete the project. The additional three-year extension thus pushed the completion date of the project out to May of 2026. Given that work on the townhomes themselves has yet to begin, that deadline clearly is clearly going to be missed. Further complicating things in late 2023, the county proposed construction of a 110-unit affordable apartment project on the portion of 1580 Maple St. not needed for the Blomquist Street extension, a project that just may occur before the townhouse project gets underway. Finally, the final segment of the Blomquist Street extension, which is planned to be built by the townhouse developer, must be completed before the city will grant occupancy certificates for the 131 townhouses.

Given all this, the developer’s request for another extension to the project’s completion date makes perfect sense. The city really wants these 131 new townhomes, and seems confident that the project developer (The Carlyle Group) fully intends to complete the project. As for the fee reversion, the current high costs of both materials and labor, plus the high cost to borrow money (a lot of which is needed for a project of this magnitude) have apparently changed the project economics to where the fee increases that have occurred since 2018 — right around $2 million — have made the project economically infeasible. Thus, the request to revert to the original agreed upon amounts.

When completed, this project will provide a significant number of new for-sale housing units in an underutilized part of the city, and will generate a significant amount property tax revenue (about 25% of which goes to the city). Plus, the final segment of Blomquist Street would get built, and we’d all get to enjoy a new section of the Bay Trail running along Redwood Creek. That seems like wins all around: for those looking for more affordable homes to purchase, for the city, for the county, for the general public and, yes, for the developer. It seems well worth the wait, not to mention the forgoing of $2 million in fees.