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For years, Charleston Plaza in Mountain View has struggled with high vacancy rates as its flagship stores – REI, Bed Bath & Beyond and Best Buy – have either relocated or closed down entirely.
Now a real estate developer is proposing to transform the big-box shopping center just off Highway 101 into a mixed-use community of offices, housing, retail and open space.
In June, Presidio Bay Ventures submitted a “gatekeeper” application for 2400-2470 E. Charleston Road, requesting changes to the city’s land use and zoning regulations.
Currently, the nearly 11-acre site is zoned for industrial and commercial uses. It has four major warehouses, three of which are vacant, a multi-tenant retail building and a 300,000 square feet surface parking lot.
In its place, Presidio Bay Ventures wants to build a residential neighborhood with some retail, along with a big office footprint – a whopping 450,000 square feet that will support emergent technologies like life sciences, advanced robotics, artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles and climate green industries, according to the company.
“Charleston Plaza will deliver significant and much needed housing, while also offering flexible commercial space for the next generation of tech firms – businesses that are essential to Mountain View’s continued growth,” said John Meany, an associate of Presidio Bay Ventures’ acquisitions and development team, in an emailed statement.
Despite a challenging market, there still is demand for office space, according to Meany, who said that companies are seeking office environments in well-designed, mixed-use communities that also offer a lot of amenities.
There also is demand for retail, just not the big-box experience of the past, which Presidio Bay Ventures described as outdated and underutilized. “We believe that active retail within a walkable mixed-use community is slated to be more successful as it allows for spontaneous encounters rather than planned shopping expeditions,” Meany said.
At its core, Charleston Plaza will be built out as a cluster of buildings that includes four seven-story residences, two eight-story offices and a seven-story parking garage – a significant increase from the three-story height limit currently allowed for the site.
It also will include retail and other public amenities, like a plaza and central park, to encourage an inclusive and welcoming community so that residents can enjoy the shared space, Meany said. Similar to Springline in Menlo Park, another Presidio Bay Ventures development, Charleston Plaza will not feel like a corporate campus or traditional office park, he added.
In respect to housing, Presidio Bay Ventures is proposing to build 450 homes, with 350 slated as apartments and 100 as for-sale stacked flat condos. Of these, 68 apartments have been designated as affordable units for low and moderate-income households. It also has set aside 10 condos for moderate-income households.
As part of its housing requirement, Presidio Bay Ventures said it would contribute $1,785,000 in lieu fees to support other affordable housing projects in Mountain View. The funds would subsidize 12 to 14 new homes, it said.
To sweeten the deal, Presidio Bay Ventures has proposed a number of community benefits, starting with the condos. These were included to offer opportunities for entry-level home ownership, according to the company, noting that there was a shortage of options for first-time buyers in Mountain View.
Other benefits include 7,500 square feet of dedicated community space for facilities like a childcare center, an incubator space for small businesses and a shared kitchen that could be used for food startups. The proposal also includes transportation and pedestrian improvements to E. Charleston Road, and opportunities for public art and year-round community events.
With the parking, Presidio Bay Ventures has proposed two levels for each residential and office building, as well as a separate seven-story parking garage, primarily for commercial tenants, retail uses and visitors. It plans on implementing a shared parking strategy to allow for a reduced overall parking count.
“Since the commercial, residential, retail, and open space uses each have different peak hours throughout the week, we can offer a lower parking ratio while ensuring that our available parking meets the needs of our tenants and visitors,” Meany said.
The gatekeeper hearing for Charleston Plaza is scheduled for the next City Council meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 10.
I would love to see this space used; but the first thing I think of is the traffic it would cause. Along U.S. 101, Mountain View has traffic all day long, in both directions. It appears that the off-ramps/on-ramps and arterial roads need to be looked at.
Did “its flagship stores – REI, Bed Bath & Beyond and Best Buy” choose to leave? A message on the balancedmv list back on April 7, 2022 says “I was told by the manager at REI that they were leaving because their lease was not being renewed,” which I take to mean the property owner didn’t offer renewal.
It may not true that the plaza has “struggled” with vacancy but rather that the property owner has been working toward this redevelopment for a couple years.
Yes. From what I heard from the employees of the stores that left, leases were not renewed. It’s shameful. We have no stores of this type in Mountain View to shop. IMHO the city has always struggled with retail until this helped a bit….and now it’s gone, as are all our dollars. Now Sunnyvale gets the benefit of the tax revenue not Mountain View.
This is a good project, and it would be even better with more housing!
I like it!
To clarify what I said before, what we really need is HOMES. But it’s not a great idea to put housing right next to a freeway, so the office buildings are important to buffer the freeway noise and pollution. (Their heavy windows and industrial HVAC can handle it.) That said, it’s possible to add more housing by making the residential buildings taller, which I think the city should recommend the developer to do.
Ditto to what Scott said. This was a manufactured crisis.
After many years of living in Mountain View, I left. the Mountain View city council, and all of Mountain View leadership has shown no real regard or vision for the community that Mountain View once was. They have allowed for the destruction of retail, out of control rents on old, dumpy apartments (finally finally capped by rent control), and they have kissed the backside of Google to a ruinous degree. And… they had allowed for RVs to live on Mountain View streets, polluting communities with garbage and other nasty stuff for way too long.
With this kind of leadership, Mountain View will never, ever be great. The city will always pail in comparison to its better neighbors.