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Faced with little room for enrollment growth, Mountain View-Los Altos High School District officials say a vacant city-owned parcel north of Mountain View High could be just the release valve they need to house hundreds of new students.
Last week, Mountain View City Council members began closed-session negotiations with the school district over a potential long-term lease for of vacant land just north of Alta Vista High School. If the city agrees to lease out the 1.3-acre lot, the district would build classrooms possibly two or even three-stories high to house as many students as possible, according to Superintendent Jeff Harding.
The eagerness to expand comes from recent demographic studies, commissioned by the district, that projects enrollment at Mountain View and Los Altos high schools will increase by a combined 600 students over the next five years. The two schools currently have a combined enrollment of about 4,000 students.
Harding told council members that the fast housing growth in Mountain View is welcomed by both the school board and district administrators, but the surge of new students is going to have to be accommodated somewhere.
Without question, adding hundreds more students would put both school campuses over capacity, but the district is already facing space problems. Last year, school board members mulled the possibility of putting portable classrooms on blacktops, field space and in parking lots at Los Altos High School to accommodate 70 additional students for the upcoming school year, and later decided to convert the school’s weight room into two classrooms.
Just before the closed-session discussion at the June 20 meeting, Harding told council members that the vacant land could be the new home for Freestyle Academy, the district’s technology and media-centric alternative program. Freestyle currently operates in an area behind the district office on the Mountain View High School campus in portable, 1970s-era classrooms that are in in serious disrepair. Freestyle seems like the obvious candidate for the new classrooms, and removing the old classrooms creates more room for Mountain View High to expand.
“This piece of property doesn’t solve the problem, but it certainly relieves some pressure,” Harding said.
The school district has been eying the property for some time, according to Associate Superintendent Mike Mathiesen. When the city agreed to lease land to the district for the new Alta Vista campus in 2002, district officials tried unsuccessfully to get a lease for the land directly north of it as well. The reason at the time, according to Mathiesen, was that the city might need a portion of the land for a future pedestrian footbridge across Highway 85, and that the landing ramp of the bridge would likely extended into the property.
Harding assured council members that the district would be amenable to working with city staff to make sure any new classroom construction would not hinder the city’s ability to build the footbridge or the final extension of Stevens Creek Trail down to Mountain View High School. The likely solution would be to have parking or some sort of blacktop area where the footbridge would eventually go, so the district can avoid tearing down new classrooms to make way for a bridge.
“In the event that the council at some later date was interested in building the footbridge across Highway 85, there would be property to do that,” Harding said. “I think we can co-exist, the property is large enough that we can put a good number of classrooms on that property.”
Although Freestyle is certainly the front-runner, it’s undecided what exactly the district would do with the land. The district is commissioning an architectural firm to create a facilities master plan for the district — which is due for completion in the fall — and the vacant city-owned land hasn’t been “called into play” quite yet, Harding said. And while the intent is to build up in order to maximize the valuable real estate, Mathiesen said two-story construction is probably the way to go, considering the low-density residential neighborhood to the north.
The enrollment increase of 600 students over the next five years is based on current and near-term development in Mountain View, and does not include the more distant prospect of residential growth in North Bayshore and East Whisman. Plans by Mountain View City Council members to allow up to 9,850 homes in North Bayshore are projected to increase high school enrollment by an additional 1,108 students, prompting the need for another high school on a new campus.
400-660 more cars in the neighborhood? This is ludicrous to think the neighborhood can support this traffic when we already are trapped in our homes for 1/4 of the day. When are the brilliant minds supporting explosive growth without consequences gonna expand roads and infrastructure to keep from wasting hours trapped in traffic? A overpass will give little relief but as I said little when you are adding so much to an existing problem. The tide will turn soon as I see more and more homeowners fixing and renting their houses for 7-8k and moving elsewhere.
I think this is an excellent use for community owned property – that is currently vacant and thus giving us No Return On Assets! In the world of commerce, zero ROI is not good. In the world of community investment zero ROA is also not good.
Freestyle Academy program would be an excellent fit. The facilities there are old – portables – and at the-end-of-life. MVLA facilities people have been very well treating their building assets (even the older portables forming the language area near MVHS tennis court) and this would be a great time on replacing the old portables.
I look forward to the City administration and my Council in facilitating this ‘best use’ of a community land resource.
(ab normal – I live next to an elementary – have for decades, I expect traffic, always have! it is No Surprise! When kids sports leagues rent the fields for their kids – I also expect LOTS of families to bring their kids by My Driveway and parking next to My House. All weekend! Yippie! good clean fun for all)
@ Steve Nelson
I believe you missed the point. Expansion of El Camino hospital and cars cutting through the neighborhood when 85 is stopped has made grant road a mess. What was 3-5 minutes to main road access and freeway is now 15,20 -30 minutes for 2 miles(Yippee! dirty exhaust fun for all!). I heeded my fathers advice Not to buy the houses next to a school. The noise and band doesn’t bother me. My point is that the reaction of this will make an existing mess much worse. Maybe you and your school buddies could make Fremont a 3 lane rd. to alleviate some; 2 lanes in might encourage more reroutes from 85 and gridlock grant road. It is more fun when you are trapped and can’t get your kids to soccer practice or piano lessons on time sitting in gross polluting traffic, but we all will be driving electric cars soon enough….yippee
Some of you wanted to add more corporations and workers and now you are starting to pay with. overcrowding. $2.5 million for a good house – for what? Maybe it will continue to increase in price so you can bail out of the area with spending money. Great plan.
“Some of you wanted to add more corporations…”
Specifically who???? No really, who on this page are you speaking to: Steve, Waldo or ab normal?
OR… did you make up an imaginary person who said imaginary things so that you could then say “See what you get?” to those figments of your imagination. Good plan but you might want to seek help.
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I totally agree with ab normal, and would like to add more. MVHS is already a massive organization, truly industrial in scale, sitting in the middle of an (expensive) housing area. To add to its already considerable size is a big mistake. In fact, considering its growth over the past couple decades, actions should be taken to reduce its now imposing impact on the neighborhood. For example, cut back on intentionally noisy activities, such as Marching Band, Winter Percussion, etc. Note that sporting activities are not intentionally noisy, and are not intrinsically a noise problem. As for traffic, MVHS has done a commendable job in getting students to take alternative transportation, most notably bicycles. Nevertheless, the automobile traffic at certain times of the day is horrendous, and there is no easy fix. Simply putting a traffic light at Truman and Fremont is not going to fix it, but that could make the situation a little less ridiculous. I strongly urge the City of Mountain View to reject any MVHS plans for growth. Find another location for a campus serving students closer to downtown. It was a mistake to close the old MVHS on Castro. Now that poor choice is coming back to haunt us.