Marinwood Meeting of the Minds

Date May 17, 2006


Let’s start off with the assumption that everyone in Marinwood and perhaps the surrounding neighborhoods would love to have a nice local market in the Marinwood Plaza. We may disagree on the type of market, but no one would complain if there was one to replace the Bell Market that closed in January.

The meeting that was announced by Frank Nelson on his blog on the Marinwood Association’s own bulletin board almost didn’t happen. 7:30 PM came and went, and none of the Marinwood Association appeared. Apparently, it had been called off at the last minute without any notice to those who showed up that night. We would have probably left if it wasn’t for one of the seven people who showed up had Frank Nelson’s phone number.

Nelson pretty much presented the information that was on the posted announcement in his blog. The new plan would allow for 100 residential units (mixed condominiums/apartments) with a shell for a 20k square foot market, and 4k additional for retail. 8k additional would be added if there was enough demand. Owner also wants to be able to switch the remaining commercial to residential if the market and retail turns out not to be viable.

He did add that we should be getting drawings and the plan at the end of May and the building process needs to begin in July. So one assumes that the month of June will be alloted to sell to and get input from Marin residents via “workshops.”

A rather simple question was posed to him: will the new design be able to handle 100-200 residential cars and cars from consumers coming to the plaza?

If you have an addition 100-200 cars trying to get onto 101 each morning to work in San Francisco, how is that going to impact current residents of Marinwood, especially those from Casa Marin? How will the additional numbers work when the plan narrows Marinwood Avenue? 

Instead of explaining how the design itself will address the concerns, he urged us to not be so negative and see the big picture. He also suggested that we do our homework, before being so negative. The response was that all we have to go on is what the Marinwood Association and CSD provides and that is why we are at the meeting to get more information than has been forthcoming. In fact, to show how much research we have been doing, we will be publishing a multipart series on the whole project.

One of the women present questioned my genuine interest since she hadn’t seen me at the other monthly meetings. Judging from the turn out and organization of this meeting that was announced, why would I arrange childcare to go when there is a good chance no one would show up and there isn’t any indication of any developments with the project anywhere. It was only when Nelson had posted that there was a tentative agreement for 100 units, that there was anything to meet about.

I found that there were a lot of appeals to fear at this meeting. If we didn’t go along with this that would make Silveira Ranch open to development, but that seems to be a seperate fight that needs to be fought when it happens. There would be more through out the evening.

My husband came to the meeting as a long time resident who grew up in Marinwood since 1973. He remembers when there didn’t need to be so many stop signs in the neighborhood. We need more stop signs because there is more development and more cars. He worries about the type of Marinwood he is leaving our son. He asked how he would go about opposing the residential portion of the development.

My husbands concerns were trivialized by the notion that he was merely afraid of change and he had to be made to understand change is always good. At one point, they accused my husband of “bomb throwing.”

My husband wasn’t alone in the meeting. A couple closer to Terra Linda thought the increased traffic would impact them and an attendee who lived in Casa Marin, really didn’t want it. There were a couple of women who really wanted a market and were willing to accept the 100 residential units in order to get an upscale market.

The woman who questioned my interest, expressed her wish to be able to walk over to the plaza and sit drinking coffee with friend. I, too, would love something like that, but not at the price of the congestion.

It was related to us that accepting this deal was the only way to get a market. When I responded this sounds like we have to chose between congestion or blight. They backed down from that and clarified that it was the only way for us to get the full vision of an upscale market and community gathering area. They said that if this plan fails it will fall upon the county (who has an interest to build affordable housing) and would need an interested developer to present a plan for approval. In that case, it would take 10 years or more before anything happens.

Another attendee who was there to find out when the Marinwood Association was going to post the neighborhood CCRs they promised, talked about what happened in the Oakview development deal. The community hung tough and was able to drastically reduce the number of houses built in the project. It is possible to get the deal we want, rather than give away the store to a developer.

The meeting was a very frustrating because we are members of the association and residents, and we were made to feel that we were ruining their hard work by our questions and objections. There was definate pressure to just go along with them or destroy everyone’s hope for a nice market.

It will be interesting to see how the next meetings go. We will be posting a pre-presentation analysis of the project so far soon.

 

 

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Category Posted in Developments in Marin, Marin Politics, marinwood village