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Published on 01/26/1998 All articles from this issue

Editorial

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Sunkist revisited: A better result?

Last October, the Town Crier sponsored a "mock council" meeting in which Los Altos City Council candidates discussed simulated issues typical of those they might face at a real meeting. One of the items was a neighborhood nightmare - a poorly designed house with clashing colors and yet met all city building codes.

Residents along Sunkist Lane in Los Altos must be wondering whether one of those nightmares has become a reality in their neighborhood. The unattractive back side of a second living unit - built to city code - is virtually right at the edge of the street on Sunkist Lane.

The unit is behind the new, attractive main house that faces Avalon Drive.

What's ironic is that Sunkist neighbors were in an uproar last year over the owner's proposed variance that would have had the front of the second unit facing Sunkist. The neighbors protested that an entrance facing Sunkist would make the house, in effect, a small cottage, out of character with the larger houses on the street.

The neighbors persuaded the city council to deny the variance and keep the back of the unit facing Sunkist. Some must be scratching their heads in the wake of the finished product, wondering whether the variance would have been better.

It would be unfair to employ hindsight and say the neighbors - and the city - should have known better. After all, the building designer's artistic rendering of the back of the unit looked very little like the nearly finished product. The crucial question is, what could have been done differently to avoid what some consider this eyesore?

Last week's Town Crier contained a computer-enhanced landscape design plan for the Community House, a 1920s-era bungalow that was relocated next to Hillview Community Center. The computer art showed exactly how the plan would look. Could the same "virtual reality" technology be used for this project and others like it so that all concerned could better visualize the outcomes?

And, if city codes are so unyielding that this eyesore is the result, then what about amending those codes to allow for "wiggle room" for unique situations? With the original variance denied, codes called for the original gabled roof to be leveled off, resembling what one councilman called a "construction shed." Shouldn't someone in the city be paying closer attention during the building process? After all, this particular project generated a lot of neighborhood concern.

In a community where so much focus is on attractive, compatible housing design, there may be a lesson or two learned from the variance-that-wasn't on Sunkist Lane.