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Mountain View has settled on a plan to turn two vacant Google-owned properties into a public park with pickleball courts, after a yearslong struggle to find a suitable site for the popular sport.
The City Council is scheduled to vote on the terms of a seven-year lease agreement with Google at its Tuesday meeting. The lease is included as a consent item on the council agenda, which are typically non-controversial matters expected to pass in a single vote.
If council members give the green light, city officials would be authorized to sign a lease for 485 and 495 Clyde Ave. Sitting in the northeastern corner of Mountain View near Middlefield Road and State Route 237, the pair of properties are directly adjacent to the Sunnyvale Municipal Golf Course and cover a combined 3.72 acres, according to a city staff report.
Unlike previous city proposals, which faced substantial community opposition, adding the new pickleball courts would not require paving over existing parks or open spaces. The site is also not next to homes. But that could change soon, as the area is slated for major housing growth, including plans for a mixed-use development at 675 and 685 E. Middlefield Road and an eight-story apartment complex at 490 E. Middlefield Road.
The city’s lease comes after Google’s announcement last year that it was exploring the sale of Middlefield Park, a 40-acre site that includes 485 and 495 Clyde Ave. At one time, Google had proposed to build more than a million square feet of office space and nearly 2,000 new homes at the Middlefield Park site.
Currently, 485 and 495 Clyde Ave. each have one vacant building. In their place, the city is planning to build a new public park with up to a dozen pickleball courts. The facility also would include parking and restrooms, the staff report said.
The city will pay Google only $1 per year, plus property taxes and property management costs. That’s expected to total approximately $131,000 for the first year of the lease, according to the staff report.
The agreement would also include a provision allowing Google to give the land to the city in exchange for park and open space “credits” equivalent to 3.72 acres. Google could then use the credits to meet park and open space requirements for other developments it pursues, according to the lease terms. Google also could sell the credits to other developers.
The lease will begin once Google demolishes the existing buildings, which is expected to occur before the end of the year. The city would then be responsible for all property repairs and maintenance work, as well as the development of the park and pickleball courts. The design and construction of the courts would occur once the lease is signed, and is expected to take about 18 months to complete, according to the staff report.
“These lease terms present the most feasible path for providing new pickleball courts within the next two years,” the report said.
The lease also includes an off-ramp for the city if it can’t develop the park and pickleball courts because of land use restrictions. The property is partially within the “Moffett Federal Airfield Turning Safety Zone,” which requires separate approval from the Santa Clara County Airport Land Use Commission.
I’m certain that in the next decade, the City Manager and staff will allocate $1 million dollars to yet another ill-conceived project for the Cuesta Annex. As my neighbors in Cuesta Park have explained to me, every 10-15 years, the city seems to believe that the last remaining open space for miles should be transformed into a some pet project of the City Council.