Photo by Monique Schoenfeld, Town Crier
Left to right, Dennis Young, John Berwald and Larry Chu are three prominent north Los Altos business owners who would like to see more improvements along El Camino Real. Young is managing director of American Express Tax and Business Services Inc., while Berwald and Chu own major destination restaurants, Armadillo Willy's and Chef Chu's, respectively.
Town Crier Staff Writer
Blight remains alongside the success stories at the northern edge of town
The Four Seasons Motel
Developers hope to level the current motel and build a 196-unit two- and three-story Marriott Courtyard on the site. The Four Seasons Associates, which includes Los Altos residents John Challas and Oliver Lin, have submitted plans to the city that will be reviewed May 19 by the city's architectural and site control committee.
Recently developers held a neighborhood meeting to explain their project. Not many came.
Afterward, "three people said the reason there were few people there is they all are glad to see the Four Seasons torn down," Challas said.
Challas and Lin, along with Los Altos resident Beverly Brockway, were the developers of the Tree Farm project also on El Camino Real, a few blocks south of the Four Seasons.
The Four Seasons is a place where low income people live week-to-week and month-to-month. The city counts the Four Seasons as part of its inventory of below-market-rate housing.
Police regularly answer calls for service at the motel. Typically they are for domestic violence, public intoxication, indecent exposure and drugs, Carlton said. On a call responding to a methamphetamine lab, officers spotted a pot farm on a neighboring balcony.
In 1998 a county-wide task force completed an "extensive" two-month undercover operation, "with a confidential informant in the motel," Carlton said. The state bureau of narcotics enforcement led the operation.
The end result: six arrests, including two suspects selling cocaine at the motel, a number of dealers - including a Los Altos resident - and a parolee selling drugs.
Plans for the new hotel, in addition to the 196 rooms, include underground parking, a two-story lobby, six suites and an on-site restaurant.
A big hitch: the project does not contain any affordable housing and the city's general plan calls for affordable housing in this location.
The developers are asking for a zoning change to commercial thoroughfare, what it was before it was rezoned in 1995, Kornfield said. The city made the change in 1995 in response to a lawsuit that claimed Los Altos was not meeting its share of affordable housing.
"The 1995 change was our way of telling the state that we're creating opportunities for affordable housing," Kornfield said.
When the developers first approached the city in January about a Marriott at the Four Season's site, the plans included six below-market-rate units for seniors.
The developers now are asking the city to change the zoning from residential to commercial, omitting the affordable housing; and to change the general plan. "Without these changes, the project can't happen," Kornfield said.
"How would the city justify changing this back to commercial?" neighbor Carol Malnick asked. She attended the meeting held recently by the developers. She pointed out the zoning was changed four years ago. "Why aren't we following through on that? If we change it, how are we to meet affordable housing goals in this plan?"
Malnick also raised concerns about the new motel with its entrance on Los Altos Avenue, fearing it would bring too much traffic onto the street.
"I'd love to get rid of that eyesore - the Four Seasons," Malnick said. "But what's the best use to maintain the integrity of the community - yet meet the needs of the community?"
Planning issues
That's one of the tough issues facing development along the Los Altos portion of El Camino Real. People point to the 10-story twin-tower upscale apartments that Mountain View approved for El Camino Real across from Los Altos at Jordan Avenue. Or they mention the seven-story Crown Plaza on the Palo Alto border.
Projects in Los Altos cannot exceed two or three stories along El Camino Real. Some wonder how Los Altos projects can compete commercially with the nearby high-rises that are going in.
"The issue for planning along El Camino Real is related to what backs up to El Camino Real," said Los Altos City Manager Phil Rose. "You don't want to put incompatible uses next to each other."
In the case of the two-tower apartments in Mountain View, "that whole area is multi-family, high density housing that backs up to that project," Rose said. "That's not true in Los Altos where single-family homes back up. You need a transition between uses."
So developers in Los Altos struggle to work with commercially feasible projects that respect the proximity of single-family homes.
Sherwood Gateway
Affluent and well-kept are not words that come to mind when entering Los Altos from Palo Alto along El Camino Real.
The eye is drawn to the Four Seasons Motel, the first big building and only lodging in town. A number is missing from the motel's sign. Weeds poke through sidewalk cracks. A few steps in the other direction, on the Palo Alto side of the town line, the newly remodeled and landscaped seven-story Crown Plaza Cabana Hotel looks down on its shabby two-story Los Altos neighbor.
A few blocks further into Los Altos, graffiti graces the white stucco wall bordering three sides of the cleared land at the Tree Farm site. Lawsuits and bankruptcy have stopped this mixed-use project of motel rooms, office space and affordable housing. The land sits vacant, in legal limbo.
At the intersection of El Camino Real and San Antonio Road, what many call the north gateway to town, ropes and clamps hold together the granite Los Altos entry sign.
Just beyond the cracking granite block, dozens of day workers hang out on corners, beginning at Sherwood Lane and El Camino Real, waiting for work.
At one time it was ladies of the night who sold their services in Los Altos along the King's Highway. Polaroids of prostitutes filled a bulletin board in the Los Altos Police Station, helping officers on patrol to spot the women.
In contrast, some of the most successful businesses in Los Altos also line El Camino Real: Chef Chu's Mandarin Kitchen; Armadillo Willy's BBQ; Carl's Jr.; Hunan Homes Restaurant; Los Altos Supply & Garden Center. All these businesses are on the city's list of "top 25 producers" of tax revenue for the town.
Many other popular businesses, like the Bank of Los Altos in the Village Court Shopping Center, See's Candies, Round Table Pizza and Calico Corners also sport an El Camino Real address.
The Los Altos portion of El Camino Real is only 1.3 miles long, shorter than San Antonio Road, half the length of El Monte Avenue. But with its sales tax revenue and its window on Silicon Valley, it is a key part of the city.
New banners that invite people to discover Los Altos line the street.
"A revitalization is taking place," said Los Altos Police Chief Lucy Carlton. El Camino Real is "our welcome carpet to Los Altos," Carlton said. "If it looks real good, it's going to prosper."
People in town agree. But deciding how to help it prosper is the question.
"It's an unusual area, and it needs some attention," said David Kornfield, a planner with the city of Los Altos. "Sometimes people forget we have a piece of El Camino Real. It's nice to pay attention to it with new projects. They will certainly change the character of it."
"It's long overdue to redevelop this area," said Larry Chu, owner of Chef Chu's restaurant at the intersection of El Camino Real and San Antonio Road, the mid-point of El Camino Real in Los Altos.
His first concerns are traffic patterns, safety and beautification. "I've been here 29 years, and it's never been addressed," he said.
In 1998 a 15-member task force, of which Chu was a member, worked with a consultant and considered traffic conditions, redevelopment and beautification for what's called the Sherwood triangle. The area, bordered by San Antonio Road, El Camino Real and Sherwood Lane, is home to Armadillo Willy's and Chef Chu's.
Instead of economic revitalization, the task force became embroiled in concerns about housing density in the nearby property of the Los Altos Garden Center, which is not for sale. The city council agreed to change the density on the city's general plan from 38-units per acre to 16-units per acre.
The merchants in the area asked the city to re-focus on traffic and beautification. At a March study session, city council members voted for a traffic study for the Sherwood area.
City council members all agreed there are traffic safety issues in the Sherwood area. But at its April 27 meeting, council members put their support for a $20,000 to $35,000 traffic study on hold and instead referred "the whole matter to the neighborhood traffic advisory committee," said City Clerk Carol Scharz. The council wants the Sherwood traffic issues looked at in the context of the traffic goals and needs of the city.
Councilman Francis La Poll said he wanted the Sherwood traffic study to be put into the city's budget process. "Spending money up front is not good if you're not going to do something about it," he said.
As for beautification of the Sherwood area, some talk about continuing the village look from downtown.
Chu disagrees. "You can't have a village look. Time has changed. The young generation has a new look," he said.
Having a village look along El Camino Real "is not reasonable," said accountant Dennis Young, chairman of the task force for a Sherwood plan, whose office is at 5150 El Camino Real. "The area needs a regional voice. The village atmosphere won't play," he said.
"If you took the downtown and put it here, it would not be compatible," said John Berwald, owner of Armadillo Willy's.
Looking ahead, Chu, Berwald and Young all see a bright future for the Los Altos stretch of El Camino Real - with plans for a Marriott's and new office space.
"It's a community where a lot of people want to have their business," Young said.
But the three also talk about the need for a regional view. On the El Camino corridor, "You can stand in one place and be within 40 feet of three cities. There's no coordinated effort," Young said.
"Look at El Camino as part of the Bay Area," Chu said. "Look at the whole picture, of what Mountain View and Palo Alto are doing and look at what Los Altos can do to compete with them.
"In Los Altos, there's too much worrying about the back yard and not looking at the front yard," Chu said. "In the business world we're competing" with other parts of El Camino Real.
"The challenge, then," Kornfield said, "is identity, something that respects the village character yet honors El Camino Real that is so different."