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A four-story condo development in Mountain View largely sailed through a City Council meeting Tuesday evening despite some opposition from residents who said the project was not a good fit for the neighborhood and did not provide enough parking.
In a 6-1 vote, the City Council approved a 47-unit condo development at 266 and 272 Tyrella Ave., just down the road from a controversial seven-story builder’s remedy project. Council member John McAlister cast the dissenting vote at the Sept. 23 meeting.
Council members praised the project for providing ownership condos, including five condos set aside for very low-income households, a rarity in Mountain View.
“I’m really pleased to see this particular project because we’ve had experience with this builder, and we know that they do really good quality work,” said Council member Pat Showalter, adding that the developer had modified parts of the project in response to community input.
But council members also expressed concerns about the cumulative impact of adding more housing in a low-density neighborhood, given the project’s proximity to a recently approved 80-unit condo development at 294 and 296 Tyrella Ave.
Combined, the two projects will add 137 housing units to a street that currently consists of single-family homes and two-story apartments.
“The quality of life or the impact on existing neighborhoods always has to be reviewed and looked at, and unfortunately we got two projects,” McAlister said, expressing particular concerns about parking, traffic and walkability issues.
The developer is proposing 47 parking spots for the project, one space per condo, in a one-level underground parking garage. Under state law, the project is not required to have any parking, as it is located within a half mile of major public transit stops, the Whisman Light Rail Station and Mountain View Transit Center, according to the council report.
The prospect of adding a lot more vehicles on the street, in addition to concerns about the building’s height and density, prompted several Tyrella residents to speak out against the project at the council meeting.
“There have been a lot of apartment buildings that’s been built on Shoreline, on West Middlefield, on Moffett and Castro, just around the area,” Tyrella resident Lan Pham said. “These are four, six, seven stories high. But the difference is that the streets are much bigger.”
Pham added that many apartment buildings in the city also have vacancy signs out in front, which she said indicated they are not affordable for most people.
While in support of the project, Council member Emily Ann Ramos raised concerns about the displacement of existing tenants. A single-family home and two duplexes currently sit on the properties. Tenants living in the duplexes earn below 30% of the area median income, the council report said.
Under state law, the developer is required to replace the duplexes with housing units of equivalent bedroom count and affordability. The law also stipulates relocation benefits for low-income tenants and gives them the opportunity to return to redeveloped properties at an affordable rent or sale price.
Ramos expressed concerns that the residents living in the duplexes were not fully informed of their tenancy rights, including access to relocation assistance.
“One of the things that we need to make sure is the actual implementation is done correctly, that they aren’t falling through the cracks,” Ramos said. “I really hope that as we look at this project, this is an opportunity for us to move forward on our goals to prevent displacement while providing the housing that we need.”
Vacant Mountain View building condemned after 3 people, small fire found insideJanuary 16, 2026 5:15 pm
A street designed for forty residences will now have 160 residents. (120 without parking plus the existing forty residences.
Absolutely nothing to see here folks. But they want to build build build on top of people who bought their homes on a quiet street with parking.
Come gather ’round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the special interests
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be overburdened to the bone
If your time to you is worth savin’
M.V. you better start leavin”
For integrity is sinkin’ like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’
The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The sneakiest one now
Will later be a fat cat
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is rapidly fadin’
And what is valued first now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’
I would hope that the Builder’s Remedy project will never get built. This one is a lot more reasonable considering there are apartment buildings already on the street.
do we have any idea of what this is going to cost per unit and what the rents will be? It’s very concerning that new units are going un-rented or unsold as that speaks to affordability.
What new units are going unrented? No builder expects to get to 90% occupancy before twelve months.
I should make a bingo card for these comments. The myth of the street perfectly designed for the number of houses on it (as opposed to cookie-cutter planning code), the myth of high vacancy rates, etc.
The drawing looks pretty nice, actually. Since this is a buolders’ remedy project, the developer could have gone taller, but I think this area should just be zoned for four stories.
The 47 unit project is not a builder’s remedy instance. This is a very nice project being that it is ownership housing. Condos like this are less expensive than the townhouse Condominiums. These new condos could go for under $1 million dollars per unit for the non-subsidized units. There will be HOA fees every month. It seems like the market for such condo units has a very low Supply compared to Apartments. Apartments Construction
That is construction age up to 8 years currently have a 12% vacancy rate in Mountain View and that could rise given the economy and the cutbacks and layoffs. It seems pretty wise for this developer to use condo Style ownership for such a project at this time because that market could hold up being that it’s at the extreme low end of the ownership housing. The unappealing units in the Builder’s remedy project are likely to have a very high vacancy rate. Having a dedicated provided parking space is a big draw.
Note that in this four-story condo development, 42 units (89%) will be expensive, market rate units. Only 5 units (10.6% ) will be slated for VERY LOW income families. And this is spun as a GOOD thing: “Council members praised the project for providing ownership condos, including five condos set aside for very low-income households, a rarity in Mountain View.”
The data shows that in 2023 and 2024 (the first 2 years of the Housing Element Planning period (2023-2031)), 89% of new housing units are only “affordable” to the highest wage earners in the land (those earning over $217,000 a year in Santa Clara County). 89%, that’s interesting, that is the same amount of market rate units as in THIS project. Hmmm ….
Time and time again, the MV CC approves projects such as this one, projects that contain only trivial amounts of affordable housing … the final result is predictable. It’s a MATH thing. If almost every project approved by the CC contains 90% market rate units, the cumulative tally at the end of the RHNA cycle will also show that 90% of new housing built in MV was 90% market rate units.
MV is on track to FAIL meet our RHNA (Regional Housing Needs Allocation) subtargets for affordable housing. MV is on track to be hit with SB 35 sanctions.
This is also how gentrification happens, my friends: very slowly, one project at a time, by a CC that approves projects without any concern for the RHNA requirements imposed on MV by the State.
Car prices have increased dramatically in recent years. We have to mandate car manufacturers to sell half of their cars at affordable rates! (Said no one, ever. Everyone knows that people who can’t afford new cars but used cars. But it somehow eludes them that the same logic applies to apartments.)
@ivg: State law requires that all cities produce a “Housing Element” every eight years. The general idea is that the State is putting legal pressure on local governments to increase the supply of housing in CA. The State has crafted RHNA targets for each city.
What are RHNA targets? Page 241 of MV’s Housing Element provides more info:
“A key component of any Housing Element Update is identifying adequate sites to address the jurisdiction’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA). The California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) determines state-wide projected housing needs and allocates new housing unit target numbers to regional councils of government (COGs). State law (California Government Code Section 65584) provides for COGs to then prepare and adopt plans that assign a “fair share” of the region’s housing construction need to each city and county. The Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) is the COG that determines fair-share portions of state allocations for the City of Mountain View.
“For the 2023-2031 Housing Element planning period, the City of Mountain View is required to plan to accommodate the development of at least 11,135 housing units. This includes
2,773 units for very low-income households,
1,597 units for low-income households,
1,885 units for moderate-income households, and
4,880 units for above moderate-income households.”
Note these words above: “the City of Mountain View is required”. The “push for affordable housing” is a LEGAL REQUIREMENT, handed down by State politicians, that Mountain View “have a plan” to construct the number of units that they “require”. Our Housing Element is the official documentation for our “plan”. If we don’t have such a plan by the deadline, then we are subject to sanctions from the State in the form of “Builder’s Remedy”.
We have had our plan approved, hooray. However, if we don’t actually build the REQUIRED amount of units for families with VERY LOW, LOW, and MODERATE incomes, a different set of laws kicks in: SB 35.
The sanctions under SB 35 are very similar to Builder’s Remedy. As long as for-profit developers meet certain conditions, they get streamlined approval for projects, even if the majority of residents object to it. Google “sb 35 vallco” to see how residents in Cupertino have been negatively impacted by SB 35.
The odd thing is, it’s not the RESIDENTS in MV who object to affordable housing. It is our City Council, who approves project after project jam-packed with market rate units, without concern for the RHNA target for affordable housing. This lack of concern puts us on track for sanctions under SB 35.