The Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) won two major takings law victories in late October. Clients championed by the property rights organization defeated a San Francisco law on compensation to tenants evicted under the Ellis Act, and managed to undo a coastal easement requirement that the court said was an unfair permit condition. San Francisco city attorney to appeal San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera announced he would appeal a ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Charles R. Breyer that struck down the city's new ordinance on compensation for tenants evicted under the Ellis Act. From its effective date in June until Breyer blocked it effective October 24, landlords who took an occupied unit off the rental market were required to pay their evicted tenants two years' worth of difference between the lost rent rate and the market-rate rent for a comparable unit in the city. The ruling in Levin v. City and County of San Francisco accepted arguments by the Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) that the ordinance violated constitutional property rights. The PLF victory press release said the lead plaintiffs in the matter would have had to pay $118,000 to the tenant of the duplex where they live in order to rent their extra unit to friends or family. The SF Chronicle 's Bob Egelko has details of the ruling . He quotes Breyer as calling the compensation amount "an enormous payout untethered in both nature and amount to the social harm actually caused by the property owner's action." A copy of the ruling is available on PLF's Web site . Coastal property owners vindicated On October 23, the Second Appellate District reversed itself on rehearing in Bowman v. California Coastal Commission . The court had agreed as of April 15 to depublish its initial ruling in March and rehear the matter. The new ruling is a victory for the PLF's clients, Sandra Bowman and her sisters, who inherited a large San Luis Obispo County property, partly along the coastline, from their father, Walton Emmick. The sisters have been disputing Coastal Commission efforts to enforce a public access easement as a condition for a coastal development permit (CDP) to improve the dilapidated house and barn on a part of the property a mile inland. As discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3452, the court's earlier ruling backed the Coastal Commission in finding that collateral estoppel barred the sisters from repudiating a public access easement that the county initially required of them as a condition for a CDP. The March decision gave a somewhat confused account of the facts, saying Emmick did renovation work in anticipation of that first CDP although it was issued after his death -- hence that he and his successors accepted the CDP's burdens along with its benefits. Accordingly the March court agreed with the Coastal Commission that the sisters could not take advantage of the county's decision to grant their application for a second CDP without the easement. The new opinion accepted the PLF's version of the facts: that Emmick did renovation work on the property only under county permits that were exempt from the CDP requirement because they did not "change the use or dimensions of the structure." It stated Emmick "did not make the repairs for which he sought authorization" under the initial CDP, hence that neither he nor his successors accepted any benefit under it. However, the court's new opinion was not based solely on this fresh understanding of the facts. It also said the easement exaction was unfair: "There is no rational nexus, no less rough proportionality, between the work on a private residence a mile from the coast and a lateral public access easement." The court found it immaterial whether the requirement was the Commission's or the county's fault. Regardless, the court said collateral estoppel doctrine calls for equitable results. Because of both the reinterpreted fact pattern and the lack of nexus between the renovations and the easement, the court found the equity requirement was not met. In a statement in April, the court had requested letter briefing on the standard of review. It said "the parties appear to agree" that the March ruling misapplied the substantial evidence rule to the administrative mandate question, in that it chose to consider only evidence supporting the prevailing party rather than "all relevant evidence even if it detracts from the administrative decision," as called for in La Costa Beach Homeowners' Assn. v. Cal. Coastal Comm. (2002) 101 Cal.App.4th 804. The court asked the parties whether the Commission should be treated as the sole authority to determine credibility of evidence, or, if not, how the La Costa case should apply. In the opinion that followed, the court looked to a phrase in La Costa saying "Courts may reverse an agency's decision only if, based on the evidence before the agency, a reasonable person could not reach the conclusion reached by the agency." It then based the decision on its own interpretation of the facts. The new, currently effective opinion is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B243015A.PDF.

News Item: the Los Angeles City Council has rescinded a long-standing ordinance requiring all high-rise buildings in the downtown area to have rooftop helipads . When the ordinance was in effect, all downtown buildings were flat-headed in design to accommodate the helipads. The result was a skyline of monotonous uniformity and "architectural mediocrity," according to the New York Times . There is only one way to provide an adequate commentary on this situation: A Greek tragedy. SCENE: LATE NIGHT IN DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES. A GREEK CHORUS, MADE UP ENTIRELY OF FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS, CHANTS IN UNISON. CHORUS OF FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: Oh, misfortune! Our reign has come to a sorry end. Gone is our skyline, unique in all the world, of uniform flatness. Gone, alas, are the days when ‘copters swarmed us The way butterflies swarm poppy fields. No more to hear The sweet sound of chop-chop-chop-chubba-chubba-chop-chop. Goodbye, copters! Goodbye cops! Farewell, first responders in MedEvacs! For the Chief Fireman has said, in his annoying nasal voice,    ‘Go not to rooftops any more, oh thou office workers of LA! People in emergencies should stay put, and wait for help.'  What kind of poppycock is that? Does this mean That choppers are never more to land on our flat, bald heads, Each with a target for helicopters marked "X" in the center,  Seen by none but birds, planes, God and Google Earth? No more will high-rise buildings look like us, the flat-headed tribe. The next generation won't have that special look -- that is to say, The look of a bunch of wooden boards at the hardware store, Standing upright, that nobody has bought. Enter THE TRANSAMERICA TOWER, a famous pointy-headed building from San Francisco. TRANSAMERICA TOWER: Oh, go ahead and moan, you inane band of overgrown cigar boxes. Snivel, if you want. You're through. The future belongs to sharper shapes. Just as skyscrapers with syringe-like tops were the toast of Manhattan In the Golden Age, so once again pin-head buildings will come to rule Your snoozefest of a skyline. FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: Insult added to injury! You pyramidal monstrosity, come to torment us Just when we're feeling totally like we can't deal. TRANSAMERICA TOWER (being really obnoxious) But deal you must. This is progress, enlightenment, artistic freedom! Face it, anvil-brains, you don't stack up when compared with Tokyo Or all those Chinese cities with their pointy tower things. Boring, boring! FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: You can laugh and scorn, you irresponsible pinhead! You, who never shouldered any social responsibility. Our very heads spoke of preparedness. TRANSAMERICA TOWER: Yes, and for that reason, you get no standout buildings by the Starchitects, Those favorites of Zeus and Hera, who got them jobs with the other gods. FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: What bosh! Know ye not that we are of the International Style? Just as the Seagram Building by Mies van der Rohe, and its wife, the green-skinned Lever House by Skidmore Owings Merrill, The legendary New York pair that gave birth to all the office buildings that came after them, were both flat of brow? What say you of that, you much-derided pinhead! TRANSAMERICA TOWER: Don't remind me of my poor reception when first built! Though I stand by the Bay, I was by designed by an Angeleno, The hard-partying Bill Pereira. Now I am a symbol of San Francisco! Take that, you derivative clump of banalities! ENTER the Heydar Aliyev Cultural Centre, a recent building in Baku, Azerbajian by Zaha Hadid. This exquisite building, widely portrayed in published photos during recent months, is elliptically curved in profile. HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURE CENTRE (with a slightly husky voice): Hey boys, stop fighting. You're not just wrong, you're stuck in the past. Look at my beauty and be struck speechless as Buster Keaton. Flat, pointed, who cares? It's irrelevant. FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: You look like a woman in a head-scarf Standing in a strong breeze. I think we are in love. TRANSAMERICA BUILDING (to HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER) You call us irrelevant? You're from Azerbajian, for crying out loud. The client is a dictator who builds what he wants, regardless of cost. Plus, you're a cultural center, not an office building, so you don't count. And you were designed by Zaha Hadid. Her office buildings On the whole, have flat tops! HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER: All true. I'm just making a point, you pecan-brained dinosaurs. The future can be flat, pointed or free-form like me. The point is that LA can enjoy some variety, and catch up With the skyline of a second-tier Chinese city, maybe, if it tries. As for Tokyo or Dubai, however … oh, just give up now.  CHORUS OF FLAT-TOP BUILDINGS (highly offended): You decadent hussy! Irrational product of extravagance and waste! HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER: Don't try to fluster me with your bluster, bub. Like the song says, you ain't so big, you're just tall, that's all.

In brief California land use news this week: Curbed and the LA Times reported that the legendary La Mirada Avenue Neighborhood Association and attorney Robert Silverstein may have reversed the opening of a 22-story, 299-unit residential development in Hollywood. Because of the neighborhood challenge, developer CIM group may have to displace the first 40 tenants who have moved into its Sunset/Gordon tower. A judge found CIM's construction permits invalid after the association objected that demolition of the prior building on the site was improper. Potential applicants for HUD's $1 billion in resiliency money may be interested in a large, varied calendar of webinars discussing the program and its goals. For prior notes on the program see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3587. Environment California held an event in Santa Cruz to remind the public of the November 14 comment deadline on EPA's "Waters of the United States" proposed rule. The comment deadline on the proposed rule has already been extended twice . If approved, the EPA's proposal would extend the definition of waters that the Clean Water Act regulates to include smaller bodies of water and even wetlands. The EPA has given the proposed rule its own Web page at http://www2.epa.gov/uswaters. The Cupertino General Plan is nearing final approval. A recent Mercury News item lays out the remaining short timetable and (unsurprisingly) notes density levels in the housing element as an outstanding issue. Los Angeles County's running conflict over large solar arrays flared up in the San Fernando Valley. The LA Times reported a lawsuit was filed by PHL LLC and Foothill Solar, LLC  alleging the North Valley Area Planning Commission unfairly rejected a project application as incomplete. The San Luis Obispo Tribune reported a conflict over airport zoning "derailed" the city's General Plan update process this week. Two City Council members held up the plan by refusing to join a vote overriding the local Airport Land Use Commission's "safety zone" limits on development at the south end of the city. The General Plan itself can't pass until a deal is reached or the Council changes membership -- but that membership may change at the upcoming November election. The Tribune had editorialized that the airport body was inexplicably over-limiting construction in "the logical place for residential development to occur." The Tribune also reported that environmental advocates sued the Cambria Community Services District under CEQA, alleging the district tried to build "a permanent desalination plant intended for long-term operation under the guise of a temporary emergency facility." In another case of what seem to be frequent small-airport control issues lately, the city of Ontario was in litigation with the City of LA and its Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) entity. The Bakersfield Press-Enterprise reported Ontario alleged LAWA was neglecting the Ontario airport's marketing but also wouldn't cede control to local managers. The SF Business Times reported Mayor Ed Lee has a "housing working group" trying to negotiate incentives to get private developers to add affordable housing to the city. Also this week in San Francisco, the Chron reported the developer of "what will become the highest condo tower west of the Mississippi River" agreed to pay $1.26 million per unit rather than build 11 units of below-market-rate housing. Last summer in San Francisco the MonkeyParking app startup was cease-and-desisted , parodied , and finally left town . Now it's having a similar time in LA County. The League of California Cities spotted news that Santa Monica and Beverly Hills banned the app, which helps people to sell the news that they're about to leave a public parking space. West Hollywood was considering a ban , and the LA City Council's transportation committee has voted to draft an ordinance banning private sales of public parking. The LA Times quoted Councilmember Mike Bonin calling it "the stealing economy masquerading as the sharing economy." Large-scale San Francisco housing development has finally branched out into the low-rise residential Inner Sunset neighborhood. J.K. Dineen reports in the SF Chronicle that Westlake Urban of San Mateo has proposed to replace the 86-unit Kirkham Heights apartment complex with 460 units of housing likely to serve medical staff and students from nearby UCSF. Sacramento Bee water writer Matt Weiser visited the Carlsbad desalination plant for a news feature on the project as a test case. He writes that it's being widely watched to see if its physical, environmental and financial challenges can be met in ways that work for the rest of California. His article makes a helpful companion piece to an earlier, more legalistic Latham and Watkins review of the Carlsbad project as "a case study of permitting and approvals." The Metropolitan Water District raised incentives for SoCal water agencies to recycle, recover or desalinate water. It's now offering $340 per acre-foot . (Item via League of CA Cities.) The Santa Barbara Independent reports the Arroyo Toad may soon no longer be officially endangered. The San Diego U-T reported the city of Escondido rejected a shelter for immigrant children "for reasons including traffic, safety, parking and community character." The San Francisco Planning Commission is expected in November to continue review of a Reasonable Modification Ordinance for disability accommodations. The measure would create a process for an individual with a disability to request reasonable modification to a building to remove a barrier to fair housing access. The LA Daily News reported the City Council gave Anschutz Entertainment Group "an additional six months to find a football team to play in the developer's proposed downtown stadium." Per most recent glance at the CalEPA Environmental Justice page , there's still no word on the designations of "disadvantaged" census tracts that were due by the end of September. As we've noted before, it's a tough, highly political decision . Early this month the Santa Rosa Press Democrat published a thoughtful extended news feature on The Sea Ranch and its lasting effects on regulation of California coastal development.

A new template for land use and preservation is forming across some 1,800 square miles of Los Angeles County's high, dry northeastern backlands. Its first increment could establish some key development permissions by mid-November, especially affecting the large Centennial new-town design, other construction plans, and solar energy arrays. The Antelope Valley (AV) Area Plan is tentatively scheduled for a vote by the LA County Supervisors on November 12. That approval, if granted, will be significant -- especially for the currently rural site along Highway 138 where the Tejon Ranch Co. has for years been laying regulatory groundwork to build a master-planned town it calls Centennial. There are also General Plan revisions afoot in two areas that affect the AV Plan area most: changes to boundaries and rules for Significant Ecological Areas (SEAs) and a renewable energy ordinance. (A plan to develop transit-oriented districts (TODs) is part of the same General Plan update process but affects more urban areas. The north edge of its "overview map" is in Pasadena.) The Antelope Valley plan area (see map ) covers rugged northeastern Los Angeles County, from the southeast-slanting San Andreas Fault to the Ventura, Kern and San Bernardino County lines, excluding incorporated areas around Lancaster and Palmdale, and applying as a limited overlay to federal property such as Edwards Air Force Base. It extends south of the fault to include the whole mass of the San Gabriel Mountains (including the new San Gabriel Mountains National Monument ), and the north half or so of the Angeles National Forest above Santa Clarita. The Centennial site is near the current northern limit of suburban development that looks toward Los Angeles. Above it are mountain ridges that, for the present, occupy a gap between the footprints of greater Los Angeles and greater Bakersfield. Mark Child, deputy director of advance planning with the L.A. County Department of Regional Planning, said the proposed SEA designation and governing ordinance changes would most affect the Antelope Valley area rather than other parts of L.A. County, especially now that sensitive habitats in the Santa Monica Mountains are being separately regulated by the new Santa Monica Mountains Local Coastal Plan and, farther inland, the Santa Monica Mountains North Area Plan. He said some SEAs are affected in the San Gabriel Valley and Puente Hills, but they are small in comparison to the Antelope Valley. Environmental and community activists' concerns have included keeping rural places rural, ensuring "heavy agriculture" upzoning doesn't allow solar arrays as of right (Child said it doesn't), and, especially, limiting density in three "Economic Opportunity Areas" (EOAs) that the AV Area Plan designates for concentrated development. They have also questioned whether enough big-picture environmental regulation is in place to avoid harmful cumulative effects. Major affected landscapes include the western tip of the Mojave Desert with its wild poppy fields and Joshua trees, and the knot of the Coast, Transverse and Sierra Nevada mountain ranges, including condor habitat, where I-5 climbs over Tejon Pass toward LA from the foot of the Central Valley. Landowners, from owners of single-house lots to managers of mining and ranching concerns, have been asking nervously how certain they can be of future requirements under tiered processes that the program-level rules are designed to set up but not resolve. In addition to Centennial and other housing developments, major affected industries and projects under the AV Area Plan and General Plan amendments include aggregate mines, cattle ranchlands, oil and gas wells, and solar energy businesses. For L.A. County's rural lands at present, it isn't easy to parse what will be decided where, how conclusively, and when. There are multiple rulemaking tracks; there are tiering provisions in the proposed rules that defer major decisions selectively, and there's uncertainty yet to resolve on how the new rules will take up the threads of older planning processes. The AV Area Plan and Centennial As previously reported at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3587, the Regional Planning Commission approved the AV Area Plan September 27. Its accompanying Draft EIR remained open for comment until October 6 -- viewed as procedurally possible because the Commission's action September 27 was only a recommendation to the Board of Supervisors; the Supervisors bear responsibility for definitely approving the plan and certifying its EIR. which will probably occur at the same time. (Sitting as the Airport Land Use Commission, the Regional Planning Commission approved the plan's compatibility with relevant airport plans.) The AV Area Plan, updating the existing 1986 General Plan component for the area, has been under review since 2008 in what has also been labeled the "Town and Country" planning process. However, new versions of the plan, and an extensive new Draft EIR, were published on a brisk schedule this summer, with the DEIR Notice of Preparation (NOP) posted June 12, revised planning documents posted July 23 and August 22, and the extensive DEIR documents posted August 22. (Comments on the AV Area Plan leading up to the September 27 hearing are labeled as "correspondence" and "supplemental package" documents as part of the meeting materials .) The new plan would encourage the proposed Centennial development by establishing policy statements in favor of upzoning at the intended town site. However, it would not allow building permits to be granted for the new densities as of right. Centennial's proponents would still have to bring a more detailed proposal through a full specific plan review process -- and it's not clear when they will decide the time is ripe for them to follow through. According to Child and Supervising Regional Planner Susan Tae, out of the three "Economic Opportunity Areas" (EOAs), only the west EOA, which includes the Centennial site, has a strict provision to ensure future review is coordinated. Any proposal to build more than five units of housing in the west EOA would trigger a requirement to begin a full specific plan coordinating infrastructure and environmental protections for the whole area. The county could also choose to begin a community plan there in the next five years. The published summary of September 27 changes to the AV Area Plan says affected properties in the west EOA are those of two particular owners: the Tejon Ranch Company and Bruce Burrows. In the west EOA, the AV Area Plan sets as general policy the possibility of zoning levels up to maximum caps described in the Plan's Map 2.1 . The green-veined yellow patches of H5 zoning (five housing units per acre) as shown in the map's upper left corner would be defined as generically appropriate for the east half of the proposed Centennial development site. Later on, the actual zoning changes would need to be adopted legislatively as part of a future specific or community plan, and their exact values would depend on the overall design of the project as then proposed. (In a choice that confused some activists, the DEIR's Figure 3.7, at Page 27 of Chapter 3 , sets out the lower A-2-10 "heavy agriculture" densities that would apply without a specific plan.) The Center for Biological Diversity has objected starting at the NOP stage to the use of any H5 zoning on the Centennial site. As of a Tejon Ranch Co. amended 10-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last March, the company was still discussing plans for 23,000 units of housing at Centennial. County planning staff say the maximum buildout under zoning envisoned by the AV Area Plan would be less -- more like 17,000 units -- but either would be a long way from the site's current population of zero. The Tejon Ranch Co. as of its March report held a 72.83% interest in the project's proponent entity, Centennial Founders, LLC, with minority partners Tri Pointe Homes (formerly Pardee Homes), Lewis Investment Company and Standard Pacific Corp. . (For prior discussion of Tejon Ranch real estate plans in the context of the Kern Water Bank EIR ruling see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3597.) SEA boundaries changing by stages Proposed new SEA boundaries are important for Centennial and for the AV area plan in general. Although the new SEAs are larger, it's disputed whether they actually increase environmental protection. Where former SEAs required buffer zones to surround them, the new approach is to expand the defined boundaries to include buffer zones within them. Similar changes were already adopted in 2011 for the Santa Clarita Valley area, which includes the Newhall Ranch planned-town site. (See http://planning.lacounty.gov/sea/proposed.) The Commission's September 27 action removed the SEA designation from a major area of the Centennial town site, between its east boundary at a farm road incongruously named "300th Street", and the west branch of the California Aqueduct, which forms a north-south divider across the site. (A separate SEA pullback limited barriers to development in the Central Economic Opportunity Area southwest of Edwards. For details see the September 27 summary document .) Child wrote that the west EOA changes "aim to strike a balance between habitat conservation and environmental protection, and economic development that is important to the Antelope Valley and Los Angeles County as a whole. As the most valuable habitat and habitat linkage within this landholding is on the western end where the SEA designation remains, the area removed seems not as critical to the overall viability of SEA protections in the area." But Greg Medeiros, vice president of the Centennial Founders LLC development entity, asked the Commission on October 8 to also remove SEA status from the area west of the Aqueduct, saying, "Both commercial and residential land use remain within the SEA overlay within the west EOA boundary. This commercial development is critical in developing a balanced community that can provide necessary services and jobs." He assured: "Removing the SEA designation does not mean that biological resources will be ignored. Project-level environmental review during site design within the EOAs will require avoidance and mitigation if necessary to comply with both CEQA and Fish and Wildlife permitting requirements." Countywide, the proposed SEA changes have been divided among three different regulatory calendars: Some SEA boundary revisions that form part of the AV Area Plan will be before the Supervisors for approval November 12. SEA boundary changes elsewhere in the county go to the Regional Planning Commission as part of a General Plan update item December 10. Revisions to the current Draft 6 of the SEA Ordinance, which calls for protective measures to be determined in part by environmental reviews of each building site, were taken off calendar as of the Commission's October 8 meeting to allow more discussion. The issues taken off calendar as "ordinance" matters include issues such as whether existing uses will be grandfathered. For example, at the October 8 hearing, Jeff Mace of ERA Energy asked if his company's 3000 acres of oil and gas wells and grazing land would be subject to new SEA requirements with effects such as new fencing requirements. Some landowners saw the proposed environmental review process as a source of uncertainty. At the hearing, land use consultant Peter Gonzalez said he couldn't clearly advise a landowner on building rights in an SEA zone if a county biologist's review still had to determine each parcel's level of sensitivity under the proposed SEA ordinance. Marta Golding Brown, representing the Building Industry Association for Los Angeles and Ventura Counties, told the Commission that the proposed mitigation ratios were excessive in requiring up to four acres open space for one acre of disturbed land, and the SEA boundaries themselves were oversized: "The SEA expansion virtually walls off all unbuilt or remaining lands in the jurisdiction. As a result, future population growth will need to be accommodated by dramatically increasing densities in the existing developed areas." She urged the Commission to combine SEA and CEQA mitigation processes in a single procedure and closed with the comment, "Please reduce the SEA overlays in the county to those areas having biota to protect." Environmental advocates weren't happy with the proposed SEA ordinance either: some said it had the unintended effect of elevating mitigation into a first choice for developers instead of encouraging them to avoid doing harm in the first place. Gary George of Audubon California told the Commission, "It's kind of a free pass straight to compensatory mitigation." Another environmental concern was whether single-family homes ought to be exempted from SEA requirements, or whether they, too, should be required to reduce their footprints. High SEAs A perennial concern in northwestern LA County has been whether the SEAs in the high desert and mountains provide sufficient "connectivity" or "linkages" for wildlife to travel among the several types of habitat that converge in the area, especially where I-5 traverses the Grapevine. (A slightly dated but informative "connectivity and construction" map from April gives a sense of the principles guiding SEA designations.) Child said a key purpose of updating the boundaries was to allow for linkages -- not necessarily to maintain land in "pristine" condition, but to allow for wildlife movement -- for example, by maintaining a corridor of grassland that might not itself be valuable habitat, but that would allow wildlife to move between developed areas. For the Centennial site an added uncertainty for activists is whether currently envisioned planning processes will make use of the work already done in an SEA-related environmental advisory process on a prior Centennial specific plan effort that was begun in 2008 but then deferred. As suggested by a 2008 Center for Biological Diversity press release , the SEATAC was sympathetic to critics who questioned not just how development might be made more eco-friendly at Centennial, but why any new project had to be built on the site.  The September 8, 2008, minutes of a SEATAC meeting on Centennial, still available on the county's site , shows a level of concerned review that gets literally into the weeds. The board discusses protection of grasslands, creekside habitat, watersheds and linkages, concerns about "leapfrog" developments surrounded by open space, the fortunes of species including badgers, lizards, owls, pumas, and the Tehachapi Pocket Mouse, a request to hear more about the futures of antelopes and raptors, and possible relocation of the Pacific Crest Trail onto the Tejon Ranch lands. Child wrote: "The future level and scope of environmental/biological review in this area would not be less careful than the review by SEATAC in 2008. The project is still subject to CEQA requirements and the County's consultation with responsible and trustee agencies would ensure that the project identifies and mitigates for any and all potential environmental impacts, including biota. Comments received from SEATAC regarding the project specifically, and the general region as important habitat land, would still be applied in the review of the project." Tae wrote that where SEATAC review is currently required for all SEA Conditional Use Permits (CUPs), the new ordinance would direct some projects to the county biologist, and others to SEATAC, with SEATAC "considered the higher review". Centennial's design was publicized more specifically before about 2008. The project stressed its environmental smart growth aspirations, discussing ways the project could be environmentally responsible and partly self-contained, even if residents commuted to jobs elsewhere. Now Centennial's main link from the Tejon Ranch Web site is a "Coming Soon" placeholder page. More detailed prior materials on the plan , including previews of the town's design , have been taken offline since last September . The Centennial Scout, a weblog formerly maintained for Centennial Founders, LLC by its community development manager, last posted in August 2011. It remains uncertain when the Centennial Founders management may decide the time is right to go ahead with their specific plan. So it's clearly enough in the project's interest to lock in as many permissions as possible for the 20-year duration of a General Plan update. In the meantime, the Ranch's interest sounds warmer with respect to its more recently proposed Grapevine development in Kern County. The Tejon Ranch Co.'s amended 10-K as filed in March 2014 stated, "California regulatory dynamics may impact the future ability to entitle new development so we began the land planning and entitlement process for Grapevine during 2013 to take advantage of the existing favorable pro-business and political climate in Kern County." The Tejon Ranch is the subject of a 2008 settlement in which five environmental groups, including the Sierra Club but not the Center for Biological Diversity, agreed not to oppose future development on the ranch in return for a conservation program affecting much of the Tejon Ranch land. Opposition to Centennial and other projects has been less widely expressed in the six years since then. The March amended 10-K stated, "The Conservation Agreement we entered into with five major environmental organizations in 2008 is designed to minimize the opposition from environmental groups to these projects and eliminate or reduce the time spent in litigation once governmental approvals are received. Litigation by environmental groups has been a primary cause of delay and loss of financial value for real estate development projects in California." Solar up next On a slower schedule, hearings are expected this winter on a renewable energy land use ordinance for projects such as solar arrays. Tae wrote that the draft EIR would likely appear in November, with the Regional Planning Commission to take it up in January. Tae and Child wrote that the ordinance has to reach the Supervisors by March to help the county qualify for a grant out of the Renewable Resource Trust Fund related to Assembly Bill X1-13. Child said there had been anxieties that a large-scale upzoning of about 190,000 acres to A-2, "heavy agriculture," in the Antelope Valley Area Plan would allow large solar arrays as of right. In fact he said that while A-2 zoning is a prerequisite for solar arrays, the ordinance would regulate such approvals and they would require conditional use permits to go through. The county's public tally of proposed utility-scale renewable energy projects to date shows most such projects are solar; there have been a few wind turbine schemes. The renewable energy ordinance review will need to interact with the California and federal EIR/EIS for the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan , which was posted for review September 26. Major solar energy developers are among the commenters on early stages of the energy ordinance.

In brief legal news this week: The State Supreme Court confirmed a victory for high-speed rail by declining to review the Third District's ruling in California High-Speed Rail Authority v. Superior Court (Tos) . The case upheld the High-Speed Rail Authority's authorization to issue bonds for the project. The Sacramento Bee had details on immediate reactions. For details of the ruling see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3546. Planetizen has more context at http://www.planetizen.com/articles/node-71723 . Prominent developer-side firms had asked the State Supreme Court to order publication of Save Our Heritage Organisation (SOHO) v. County of San Diego , but the high court refused . What remains on the record is only the Fourth Appellate District's unpublished ruling in favor of the EIR to replace a city-owned historic warehouse building with mixed-use development. The State Supreme Court denied requests for both review and depublication of the Fifth District's ruling in North Coast Rivers Alliance v. Westlands Water District . That ruling upheld the application of a grandfathering rule to exempt a two-year interim water contract from CEQA review because its predecessor contract was set up in 1963, before CEQA was invented. For details of the Fifth District decision see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3539. (And in separate news, the LA Times ' Bettina Boxall wrote a stemwinder of a water feature on a proposed deal to let the Westlands Water District off from a $360 million debt to the Bureau of Reclamation for its part in the extension of the Central Valley Project.) Judge Timothy Frawley confirmed his rejection of both of the CEQA lawsuits against the Sacramento Kings basketball arena project. For prior recent moves in the case see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3599. Local coverage in the Willits News celebrated the North Coast Rail Authority's CEQA exemption victory last month over two environmental groups who opposed increased use of an existing rail system. The paper reports the First District appellate decision (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3584) may allow lumber to be shipped from Willits by rail for the first time since the 1990s. Encinitas homeowners Thomas Frick and Barbara Lynch, whose effort to build a seawall has been blocked by the Coastal Commission and the Fourth District state appellate court, have now requested review from the California Supreme Court. The attorney filing their appeal was Paul J. Beard of the Pacific Legal Foundation. Beard told the San Diego Union-Tribune , "We are asking the California Supreme Court to hear this case so that these homeowners, and all property owners along the coast, can be protected from the Coastal Commission's obsessive crusade against seawalls." For detailed coverage of the Fourth District's decision, see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3572. The Fourth District's online docket shows it denied a request for rehearing in September. The landlord of the "Friendly Village" mobile home park in Milpitas has appealed the city's federal court victory (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3567), which blocked it from raising rents by 50 to 90 percent. The Mercury News reported the city has already approved $30,000 for attorneys' fees to fight the appeal before the Ninth Circuit. (Item via League of CA Cities.)

With the American Planning Association National Conference arriving in Los Angeles tomorrow, it's likely that more planners than usual will not just be attending lectures and idly networking but rather will be actively, and sometimes desperately, trying to remain in the profession.  Gov. Jerry Brown's decision to eliminate redevelopment agencies has not only sent cities into a frenzy and threatened thousands of projects, it also may be sending thousands of planners, and other land use professions, into a dismal job market. Although many planners are hanging on as staff for successor agencies, as 2012 progresses, many expect that competition for scarce planning jobs will grow ever more intense.  Just before redevelopment agencies had to shut down Feb. 1, the California Redevelopment Assoc. conducted a survey to roughly determine how many staff members of redevelopment agencies would be laid off.  "At the time, we estimated 2,500-3,000 employees of redevelopment agencies would be laid off as a result (of elimination)," said CRA interim executive director Jim Kennedy.  As recently as a year ago, redevelopment had appeared to be one of the most secure career paths for urban planners, even amid state- and city-level budget crises. The passage of Prop. 22 had ensured that agencies would be fully funded, until the governor and legislature eliminated them entirely. Many redevelopment planners are expected to seek refuge with municipal planning offices, but many of them have also downsized because of budget cuts.  "It's pretty financially constrained these days," said Kennedy. "We're not engaged in a high level of hiring activity.  I would suspect that it's a buyer's market." Ironically, the elimination of redevelopment could heighten the need for capable planners in cities across the state—if only cities had the money to hire them.  "Redevelopment helped fund many local services, including planning efforts for urban areas that were in the greatest need," said Kevin Keller, a planner with the Los Angeles Dept. of City Planning and president of the California Chapter of the American Planning Association. "The removal of this tool actually increases the need for planners to fill this void, but the public sector job market will likely remain flat for the immediate future."  In municipal planning departments, many planning functions that used to be conducted in-house are now being outsourced to private firms, meaning there are fewer permanent staff positions than ever.  "As governments have downsized, they're starting to look to more outside help for what they consider interim needs," said Phil Carter, president of PMC, a Rancho Cordova-based consulting and placement firm that specializes in public sector, land use-related careers.  Those jobs that are available may not be considered dream jobs. Many planning departments consider long-term planning and vision-setting positions to be the most expendable.  "We're seeing a continued slowdown in the demand by local government for certain types of planners, mostly those who are working on larger-scale design-type projects: urban landscapes or downtown plans," said Carter.  Meanwhile, Carter said that those jobs that are available tend to focus on relatively mundane administrative tasks, such as the processing of development applications.  The Los Angeles planning department is one of few agencies that intends to hire new employees in the foreseeable future. It may be an anomaly, however, because its funding is coming from grants rather than from sustained revenues or contributions from the city's general fund.  For planners on the job market, flexibility and geography may offer keys to success--as long as job-seekers are determined to remain in planning. Kenny Lousen, president of the Associated Students of Planning at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, said that some graduating students who have studied redevelopment have resigned themselves to exploring other lines of work.    "A lot of the students are focusing on whether they should go to grad school first or if they should start somewhere that's not their forte," said Lousen.  Eva Yuan-McDaniel, deputy director of planning at the Los Angeles planning department, said that lack of experience should not necessarily deter applicants. The department hires, in large part, according to an applicant's score on the city's civil service exam.  "You are not discriminated against just because you got out of school…or because you left school two decades ago," said Yuan-McDaniel.  In fact, graduating students may not, however, have the hardest time on the job market. Because applicants need to be flexible, Carter described something of a sweet spot for job seekers: a few years of experience, but not so much experience that they have committed to a particular function.  "Certainly someone with 3-5 years of a good urban planning background has a leg up on someone coming out of school," said Carter. "At the same time, we'll run into people who have been in the business for 10-15 years and they have locked themselves into a way of doing things that a younger person hasn't yet." Even though redevelopment agencies had been located in cities throughout the state, Carter recommended that job seekers be willing to relocate to increase their chances of landing jobs. He noted that development activity is likely to pick up in cities far more quickly than it will in rural  areas and in outlying areas that experienced housing booms in the early 2000s.  "There are huge geographic voids in the state," said Carter. "The more urban settings are more active." Contacts:  Phil Carter, PMC, 866.828.6PMC Kevin Keller, California Chapter, American Planning Association, www.calapa.org Eva Yuan-McDaniel, Los Angeles Dept. of City Planning, 213.978.1244

Gov. Jerry Brown's successful effort to shut down the state's now defunct redevelopment agencies has taken another casualty: the California Redevelopment Association.  In a statement released today ( pdf ), CRA officials and board members announced that the organization, absent its raison d'etre, would soon begin the process of shutting down, pending a vote of its membership. The venerable organization had led the fight to preserve redevelopment. Along with the League of California Cities, CRA drafted and promoted Prop. 22, the 2010 ballot measure that was designed to protect local funds, such as redevelopment monies. It then took on Gov. Brown and ultimately filed suit to overturn the legislation that forced agencies to shut down if they refused to make payments to the state. That legal effort turned disastrous for CRA, as the state Supreme Court rendered a ruling that eliminated the payment scheme and condemned all the state's RDA's.  Since the court rendered its decision in December, CRA has been helping agencies navigate the dissolution process.  In a letter from CRA President and Alhambra City Manager Julio Fuentes, and CRA Interim Executive Director Jim Kennedy reads, in part: "(W)e are confronted with the unfortunate reality that the years of incredible success with redevelopment – building affordable housing, creating jobs, cleaning up and reusing contaminated sites, and revitalizing communities – have now come to an end due to a policy choice of the State of California to address its fiscal imbalance in part by dissolving redevelopment agencies. As a result, cities and counties in California will, at least for a time, have to address community revitalization needs without this incredibly powerful tool. "With the dissolution of local redevelopment agencies as of February 1, it has become clear to the board and executive staff that the business plan for CRA is no longer sustainable.  (T)he CRA Board of Directors has now concluded with great reluctance that it has no other prudent choice but to initiate the dissolution of the association." Fuentes and Kennedy explain that the League of California Cities has already taken a leadership role in discussing the future of any "next generation" local community revitalization tool:  "The League of California Cities has already convened a Next Generation Task Force to assist in these discussions. The imperative for California's communities to continue addressing their infrastructure, affordable housing, jobs/economic development, brownfield reuse, and military base reuse challenges remains." CP&DR will provide updates as they become available.

Nearly two years ago I wrote an article  that pondered the effects of legalized marijuana on California's cities. The options, for those cities that didn't forbid cannabis entirely, seemed to range from stoner wastelands to magical communities of mellowness.  Back then, the state was on the verge of transcending the medical marijuana movement and in fact legalizing recreational use for all adults. Oakland's Oaksterdam "University"--which teaches about the cultivation and sale of cannabis--and its proprietor Richard Lee were at the center of this movement, claiming that legalized marijuana would be good for everyone: good for patients who needed relief, good for adults who needed the occasional mental vacation, and--not insignificantly--good for taxing entities that could finally cash in on an enormous, but previously untaxed, portion of California's economy.  My article traced, in part, the potential effect that legalization would have on the urban environment. If you've been to the real Amsterdam, you know that coffee shops figure prominently in the streetscapes of some neighborhoods, to the delight of tourists. Though I am personally ambivalent about marijuana, I figured that enterprising cities might attempt to replicate Amsterdam's success (minus the canals and Rembrants), and Oakland seemed like the leading contender (with Eureka not far behind). This week, the federal government--with apparently no backing or cooperation from local officials--lodged its objection to this notion.  Agents of the DEA, IRS, and federal marshalls raided Richard Lee's home Monday, with the intent of shutting down his legally operating business. Reports indicate that "dozens" of agents took part in the raid and used such devices as battering rams and power tools to breach Lee's defenses. Lee is a wheelchair-bound paraplegic; he uses marijuana to control his pain. Now his institution seems all but  defunct . At nearly the same moment that the feds were busying themselves with weed -- and a 10-minute drive away -- seven people at another institution of learning, Oikos University, lost their lives  at the hands of a disturbed, but apparently stone-cold sober, criminal.  When I wrote on the legalization two years ago, I spoke with Rebecca Kaplan, the Oakland City Council member who has long championed the legalization, regulation, and taxation of marijuana. She spoke of the value of legal cannabis in no uncertain terms. Oakland has already cashed in, levying a significant city tax on what has been, in large part, a peaceful economic activity. And, by some accounts, the city has benefited. Oaksterdam has already become something of a neighborhood hub, in an area between downtown Oakland and Lake Merritt. I'm not going to posit whether or not this is a good thing--that should be up to the people of Oakland--but I will point out that the forces of urban development often work in strange, unpredictable, and fascinating ways. Great cities are great in part because they house diverse peoples. They allow like-minded groups to congregate and create communities, often for everyone's benefit. So far, I haven't heard any reports indicating that Oakland is any worse off.  The forces that bring people together and subsequently shape neighborhoods are economic, cultural, and ethnic. But they can also be legal. Certain laws, some with no particular mind to land use, have profound impacts on the urban environment. In California's case, the legalization of cannabis allows cannabis enthusiasts to congregate. They can share ideas and gain a sense of dignity that many of them--especially those for whom marijuana is truly  medically necessary --may not have experienced heretofore. If this openness gives rise to coffee shops, cafes, and even "universities" where well meaning patients and users can cease to be marginalized, so be it.   In a city that has suffered riots, racial strife, chronic unemployment, and all manner of derision (cf. Gertrude Stein), it's hard to say that Lee, Kaplan, and law-abiding cannabis enthusiasts don't know what they're doing.  We can be fairly certain that Oikos shooter One L. Goh was not in his right mind. Whether the DEA was, and whether Oakland will be better for it... that's probably an open question.

LOS ANGELES - Hasan Ikhrata, executive director of the Southern California Association of Governments, began this afternoon's general assembly session by saying that the organization's 2012 - 2035 Regional Transportation Plan and Sustainable Communities Strategy "isn't perfect, but it's good." In some circles, that sort of candid modesty would probably get Ikhrata fired, or at least booed off the stage. Instead, he got applause from general assembly members, and none of roughly 20 speakers who offer public comments offered lodged any major objections.  In a room full of public policy wonks and elected officials representing six counties and nearly 200 cities, "good" is good enough.  "It is going to change the way we do business an the way we think about the urban form," said Ikhrata. "It's going to provide choices for people to move around." Shortly after Ikharta's introduction, the general assembly adopted the RTP/SCS on a unanimous vote of its 83 members. The age of climate-friendly, smart-growth regionalism has official begun in Southern California.  "Today's approval of the 2012 – 2035 RTP/SCS was a historic decision made by Southern California elected officials on SCAG's Regional Council.  This action establishes a roadmap to welcome four million new residents and 1.7 million new jobs into our region by 2035," commented Pam O'Connor, SCAG President.  SCAG's is the second RTP/SCS to be adopted under California's 2008 landmark climate change and smart growth law, Senate Bill 375. The San Diego Association of Governments adopted its plan in November, but that plan is facing legal challenges under the California Environmental Quality Act. So far, no one has raised legal objections. The Sacramento Area Council of Governments is soon expected to adopt its SCS and Metropolitan Transportation Plan update.  As CP&DR reported in December, the RTP/SCS is based on a decidedly "bottom-up" approach. The plan does not ask jurisdictions to swallow growth or transportation strategies that they are not already willing to take. And, notably, the plan allows for some subregions to create their own alternative SCS's so that they can meet the greenhouse gas targets of SB 375 as they see fit.  Implementation of the RPT/SCS is now a looming challenge. It is expected to cost $524 billion over 25 years. The plan dedicates 54 percent of funding to transit and non-highway options, more than triples the funding for bike and pedestrian projects, and reduces traffic congestion overall and per-capita delay by 24%--despite the addition of 4 million residents in the 6-county region by 2035. It would locate 87 percent of all jobs and 82 percent of all housing within a half mile of rail stations and bus stops. Apartments and condominiums would account for 68 percent of all development, up from 39 percent in the previous plan. Some environmental highlights of the plan include the following (noted by NRDC's Amanda Eaken on her blog ):  Increases funding for biking and walking by over 350% from $1.8 to $6.7 billion; Spends $246 billion—nearly half the plan's total revenue-- on public transportation; Reduces congestion 24% per capita despite adding 4 million residents; Brings 12 key transit expansion projects to Los Angeles in the next 10 years under Mayor Villaraigosa's 30-10 plan; Creates 60% more housing near transit than is currently available; Creates 4.2 million jobs in the region, 87% of all jobs will be ½ mile from transit; Achieves a 24 % reduction in pollution-caused respiratory problems, resulting in $1.5 billion per year in health care savings' and; Saves over 400 square miles of open space--more than a third the size of Yosemite--from development by shifting to a more walkable land use pattern for the region. Supporters contend that this investment could yield savings of $3,000 per resident because of savings in fuel, electricity, and water. These savings are based on the premise that more compact development patterns will eliminate expenditures on laws, cars, and heating and cooling.   "We can expect a reduction in per capita emissions, supporting the construction of new homes and businesses but with a plan to connect the dwellings with multiple transportation options, preserving the natural beauty of the California landscape for today's recreation and our future generations enjoyment, and ensuring that businesses remain in the Golden State and prosper," said Ikhrata in a statement.

According to Randall Arendt, a renowned planner and fellow of the Royal Institute of Town Planners, the effective planner must have four basic skills: observing, recording, communicating, and self-educating. Given the essential nature of urban planning, it's assumed that most of these skills play out in the real world: streets, buildings, parks, and the like. Unfortunately, many planning jobs keep planners cooped up in offices staring at desktop monitors. Smartphones, however, can reverse this trend, allowing planners to do much of the work they do on computer – researching, analyzing data, and even sketching – in the field, where, ideally, they ought to be. While even planners can get distracted by Angry Birds and Pandora, we can now choose from a host of mainstream and industry-specific apps that can help uphold Arendt's time-honored principles. For example, on the job with Los Angeles County Parks & Recreation, I can use mapping and data analysis apps to evaluate and determine the suitability of potential new sites for parks while out in the field.  Smartphones and apps also come in handy in meetings when I need to quickly research and answer questions about our parks, such as how many residents are within a half-mile of a certain park or which schools are within walking distance of the park.    For planners who haven't yet spent much time in the App Store, here are a few of the most useful apps, many of which are smartphone versions of software and websites with which many planners are already familiar. ArcGIS ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/arcgis/id379687930?mt=8 ) While it is not possible to do full blown GIS work on a smartphone, this app allows you to: find and share maps from ArcGIS Online (ESRI's online GIS); use tools to search, identify, measure, and query; and collect, edit, and update GIS features and attributes. Business Analyst Online (BAO) ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bao/id380484178?mt=8 ) BAO allows you to get key demographic and market data about any location in the U.S.  It is a great tool for planners who need to evaluate an area on-site. Users can get up-to-date facts about the people at a location, e.g. age, income, education, home ownership, lifestyle, spending habits; compare one address against another or against the county, state or U.S.; and share facts about a location with others.  Additional features are available for subscribers. Cyurbia ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cyburbia/id446645799?mt=8 ) Cyburbia is the internet's oldest social networking site for urban planners and others interested in shaping the built environment.  The Cyburbia Forums message board allows you to discuss and possibly find solutions to the issues facing your communities, share your knowledge, and enjoy conversation and camaraderie with other planners, architects, students, and other like-minded people. Google Earth ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/google-earth/id293622097?mt=8 ) Everyone should be familiar with Google Earth by now. This app offers the same global satellite and aerial imagery available on the desktop version of Google Earth, including high-resolution imagery for over half of the world's population and a third of the world's land mass. Planetizen  ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/planetizen/id328082077?mt=8 ) Planetizen is intended to be a one-stop source for urban planning news, commentary, interviews, event coverage, book reviews, announcements, jobs, consultant listings, and training.  This free app allows you to browse Planetizen's daily news summaries, job listings, feature stories, and blog. (Disclosure: Planetizen's parent company manages CP&DR's website.) Planetizen Courses ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/planetizen-courses/id483028462?mt=8 ) Planetizen Courses provide online video courses related to the field of urban planning.  With this app, you can learn tools like mapping, Photoshop, and SketchUp, and about topics like pedestrian planning and planning ethics.  This app enables you to view sample chapters (usually the introduction) of urban planning courses available.  Full courses can be viewed in the app when you subscribe on the Planetizen Courses website. SimCity Deluxe ( http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/simcity-deluxe/id380017992?mt=8 ) The idea of building a city from scratch is exciting, especially when compared to the incremental, piecemeal approach to planning most of us have grown accustomed to.  With this app, you can build your dream city, test your ability to handle multifaceted scenarios, and guide your city through seasonal catastrophes. It just may sustain your passion in planning and may even help you gain some useful insights for real life city planning.    All of these apps are available on Apple's App Store and most can be found on Google's Android Market.  Unfortunately, there are no CEQA or post-redevelopment apps yet.  But one can always check out CP&DR's website on a smartphone for the latest news coverage on both topics.

Loath as I am to make grand pronouncements, I think Bay Meadows, the 83-acre project in San Mateo, is possibly the best plan I've seen for a transit oriented development. This mixed-use proposal brings an unaccustomed level of clarity and order to the design of mixed use-neighborhoods near transit stations.  Bay Meadows, in fact, makes most other TODs look almost slipshod and disorganized by comparison. The desire to achieve density, rather than instill a sense of order, often prevails at TODs. The much praised Contra Costa Centre, for example, appears casually planned and suburban compared to Bay Meadows, while others look like dense business parks. But is high-density urban design really incompatible with pedestrian activity? Bay Meadows' site plan, however, is as easy to understand as a diagram. Yet, the irregular and flexible parts of the plan may be equally responsible for its success. Planned for the former site of the Bay Meadows horse racing track just south of the San Mateo County fairgrounds, Bay Meadows is entitled to build up to 1.25 million square feet of office space, 90,000 square feet of retail space and 1,170 apartments and condos.  (The same developer, Wilson Meany Sullivan, was earlier responsible for conversion of the Ferry Building in San Francisco into office space and retail.) As in most other TODs, the biggest buildings are closest to the transit station, in this case a future Caltrain stop (which will replace the current Hillsdale station). Also familiar is the strategy of scaling down development the further one gets from the station. Rather than invention, it's the straightforwardness of the design, prepared by Cooper Robertson of New York, is what makes Bay Meadows a model for other TODs. If I were an academic, I might say that Bay Meadows has lifted the klutzy phenomenon of transit-oriented development to a recognizable building type. (Architects, who seem to love opacity in language, might call it a "typology.") Let's start with the obvious features of the design. Rather than blurring the difference between residential, retail and office buildings, the designers here have made each building type as distinct as possible. Each of the building types–office buildings, retail boxes, apartment clusters—has its own identifiable size, shape and location on the map. Here, the notion of mixed use is more horizontal than vertical, with different kinds of buildings sitting side by side, rather than stacking housing atop storefronts atop one another. Equally important, each building type is arranged in long rows that run down the width of the plan, with the regularity of rows of beads in an abacus. Nearest to the station is a set of five office buildings, known collectively as "The Station." This is Bay Meadows' gesture toward the noble if elusive goal of jobs-housing balance. Immediately east of the big-footed office buildings is a neighborhood-serving shopping street, which appears relatively narrow and pedestrian friendly plan. This is the place for residents to pick up the dry cleaning and a quart of milk, and it provides some eating places for office workers. Large-scale, multifamily housing starts on the eastern edge of the shopping street. Moving further east, the housing is interrupted by a linear park that parallels the almost rigid arrangement of buildings. The park is formal and French-looking, like a silk tie on a white shirt. The park looks small, active and inviting for dog walking and bicycling. One sign of refinement of the Bay Meadows plan is that the landscaping tends to be active, as is only secondarily used as a buffer or negative space.  The major recreational site is a 12-acre park on the north edge of the plan, which looks like a scoop of ice cream atop a piece of apple pie. The park also provides a buffer (see above) to the immense parking lot for the fairgrounds on the immediate north. Flexibility is important to Bay Meadows. Although the plan is set up on a grid, the pie-shaped site does not allow the designers to use a strict, unvarying grid. Instead, the grid is soft-edged, allowing lot lines tend to stretch, contract and sometimes take on irregular contours. Slight irregularities in the shape of individual blocks grow more pronounced as we head east, toward the shift to the diagonal streets. The flexibility, whether "suburban" or not, also makes it possible for the developer to develop the land efficiently, with a minimum of awkward, triangle-shaped spaces left over in the transition from the square grid to the diagonal street. Also, the soft-edge nature of the plan allows the designers to provide a pleasant concave edge to the southern boundary of the big park, rather than an ugly, arbitrary straight line. Nothing in life or urban design is perfect. The designers of Bay Meadows cannot entirely avoid the awkwardness of the site, with the parking lot to the north and a large industrial parcel to the east. In this setting, Bay Meadows may look like a stand-alone suburban island of medium-density development amid big empty spaces. The next place to plan is that parking lot, where hopefully some future developer can extend the orderly urban fabric created at Bay Meadows. Bay Meadows site plan.  An earlier version of this article listed Bay Meadows in Santa Clara County, not San Mateo County. It has been corrected accordingly.

CP&DR is pleased to co-host a launch party for Next American City's new online magazine, Forefront. This event will take place in conjunction with the American Planning Association's Annual Conference in Los Angeles.  What: Next American City's Forefront launch party When: 5pm - 7pm, Sunday, April 15 Where: Wuho Gallery, Hollywood RSVP: RSVP@americancity.org We hope to see you there!  For more information, please see flyer: