We just moved to the area, so I don't know the answer to this question:

Are the people currently on City Council the same people that were on the council when the Mariposa Park and Del Medio Park projects were approved? The addition of those parks have been invaluable. Mariposa is a favorite gathering place of the moms group I'm a part of, and another mini park where one is lacking would be a good thing.

It would be terrible to see this parcel sold to a private developer who would only be interested in building apartments that they would then rent out at obscene prices.

This is not the place for a 1.2 acre park and spending the money to develop it would be wasteful. I would only support this if the city intended to re-sell the majority of the land to a developer that would build medium density condos, not apartments, and use the balance of land for a mini-park. This seems more reasonable.

Yes I agree more parks are needed in this area, also pretty nice that people who work in the area will have a place to relax in the sun. The site comes with trees, if the question of the street comes to play. Build a fence with to opening to keep a stray ball from entering the street

Two of the seven people on the council were newly elected in November. Five of the seven were there when those new parks were opened, though those properties were bought years before when only a couple of current councilmembers were there.

Please build some un-affordable high density apartments. Please.

@ Greg David

Why is this not the place for a 1.2 acre park? Your comment makes no sense. There are many, many high density apartments already in this area (and they are already building more) and they have very little park space. I think this is the PERFECT place for a park that is much needed in this area of Mountain View.

I completely disagree with your comment. I guess since your neighborhood (Old Mountain View) already has nice park space it's easy for you to not concern yourself with how others in your town live.

Perhaps Council would like to buy the empty houses across the street!

This falls in the Rengstorff planning area. According to city planning records, the 2010 Census counted 6577 people in this planning area.
The target for the city is # acres per thousand people, meaning this planning area should have had 19.73 acres in 2010.
It currently has .8 acres or short 18.93 acres.

This is second worst in the city, right behind San Antonio being 23.19 acres short, and just ahead of Central which is 10.94 acres short.

Keep in mind this is 2010 Numbers. Recent development makes it far worse.

Most of Council is not up for re-election.
Council might use park fees to buy the land, but I will bet, this is going to be high density, low income, subsidized housing, with insufficient parking designed to attract people with multiple cheap unreliable cars creating parking conflict in the area.

At least we don't have a City Council openly taking payoffs from developers like Sunnyvale.
Don't believe me? Watch a Sunnyvale Council meeting!
I much prefer to keep it hidden!

A park is the best idea and money well spent. Its a huge quality of life issue. We don't have a decent size park anywhere in the neighborhood. Folks who work in the neighborhood would have a nice place to hang out and it could easily be arranged so that a children's play area is the farthest from the street. Saving all those trees is just an added bonus.

I think this property would make a fine park and would hate to see it used for high-density, high-priced housing. Senior housing, another choice offered by the owner/seller, would be acceptable, but definitely second place to a park, in my opinion.

Is a park this size (especially with all those great trees) worth $3+ million? I think so and I think the City should do it.

If Mr. Steiper is being paid $3+ million, why does the city need to pay $25,000 to relocate him? A park would be nice but senior housing would be a good use of the property as well.

Could someone explain what "$207,000 in administrative costs" entails?

It costs $150,000 to tear down an old 960 square foot house?

I drive by this location almost daily. I have always wondered what was behind that little house.

Little did I know there was over an acre of property behind it.

I'd love to see a park go in here. Enough with the housing.. even "low density" is still high density compared to a regular street of houses (which no one builds anymore).

This is a good spot for a park which I hope will open in time. You can walk over from the burrito shop and sit down under a tree. Have a open lawn area so you can sit out in the sun.

Have a really nice playground, basketball court. Open space is also needed in businesses areas, they do need a place to relax among the trees.

$3.4 Million dollars
The resident gets to still live there
The City has to spend $40K to clean it up
The City cannot prosecute if we are lied to about the quality or history of the land
The City has to maintain her gardens for her.

I thought we were broke last year? And the year before?

Part of the housing crisis here is BECAUSE we do not build housing.... we have jobs, but not housing for the people that work. Over $2000 for an apartment is obscene. Parks are nice & important, but we need a mix of housing and open space, or the homelessness will get even worse. Look at this video: Web Link

It seems to me the folks who don't live in our neighborhood where this land is located want more housing. We have many businesses, condos and apartments but NOT the mix with OPEN SPACE. The City has already proposed low income housing for the corner of Rengstorff and Old Middlefield Way. There is not any more land available in this neighborhood; we need a park!

The city is allowing gross overdevelopment in the San Antonio Center Area. We need a park at this end of town NOW. We will need yet another park soon. But Coucnil is oblivious to that as they are oblivious to any impact at this end of town. They just don't want to know.

There are obvious and significant ERRORS in the Phase I EIR descriptions of existing conditions of nearby arterials. They are paying lip service to bike connections to all projects in this area. For example, they (as controlling agency of the Mayfield site) have not supported an important, low-cost connection from the Mayfield Mall project across San Antonio at Nita even though Palo Alto has already built a connection on their side of San Antonio. We need MV City Council to get serious about bicycling if they are going to push for this kind of high density. Staff's work on all of these projects has been sloppy, and NO ONE on the dais is asking hard questions.

I hope they will approve this open space, but by itself it won't be adequate to serve the needs of the good folks at this end of town. MV City Council is not serving residents in the north well at all.

My feeling is that the council is pandering to nearby neighbor Don Letcher. Why are they are afraid of this man?