I am a huge proponent of building more housing in Mountain View, and voted the ticket in the City Council election. But I have to say, I am happy to see this plan go through.

First, rather than talking about the "jobs/housing imbalance" of the city, it is important to think district-wise. Downtown is a great place to work, both for that company and its employees and also the nearby restaurants and retail. My company has been lucky to work on Castro for the last two years. Most of our twelve employees go to lunch on Castro almost every day-- Le Boulange, Amarin Thai, Ava's, etc. Once a week we all go out to happy hour as well-- Buffalo, Tide House, Beirhaus / Stein's. We all love it. Three of us are lucky enough to get to walk / transit to work.

We have outgrown our space and have been looking for a new office. Unfortunately there is no availability on Castro. We would be willing to pay a premium (within reason) to be here, but it is not even an option.

I hope that as the plans go forward, somehow affordable office space comes into the picture. My company could not afford Class A space, and we do not need a 10,000 sq.ft office. But it is the startups who cannot afford perks like an in-office cafeteria who will contribute the most back to the local economy.

Lastly, the micro-location of this lot makes office particularly attractive compared to housing. Workers will fill the lots during the weekdays (and possibly will pay to do so), and the lot will be available for entertainment during the evenings and stadium transit access during the weekends. With housing, the lot would be filled up throughout the day with residents.

I know it was a hard decision but I personally am excited about these plans.

Problems:

1) Downtown traffic is already awful, and this is at an intersection that is already often gridlocked at peak PM hours.

2) There is no reason to believe that office workers or hotel residents will take public transit in significant numbers.

3) "Dozens" of new parking spaces - that is nothing, really. Once this project is in, the city will forever lose the possibility of putting any sort of parking structure here.

4) Giveaway of public land for private profit. Does the city honestly expect to make back $5 million+ per year in hotel tax, as the article suggests? If the city is really so strapped for funds, why could they not approve a hotel in a less congested location? How exactly did this deal come into being?

Won't most of those supposedly new parking spaces end up being used by all the new office people? We could end up with even fewer parking net available spaces than currently.

Placing of offices in Downtown Mountain View makes sense and getting rid of smaller outdated office building else where.

There is dozens of older single story office buildings in and around Downtown Mountain View on larger sites that would make fine housing opportunities.

Also I think office condo units for medical, non tech professionals and small businesses that want to invest in long term space is needed.

I high tech firms need space but your chiropractor needs space as well.