Dear City of Menlo Park Leadership,
After two years of constructive communication, planning and collaboration with the hotel developer Sagar Patel, we of the Park
Forest home community are now opposed to the revised plan (unveiled in May 2018) for redevelopment of the existing Red Cottage
Inn. I’m writing to reiterate my opposition to the current plan because it does not include underground parking, and instead
creates a hardship on our City, and on our Park Forest home community in particular, with increased noise, traffic congestion from
the proximity and size of the new structure.
The City leaders have granted a discretionary Public Benefit Bonus for this project without taking into consideration the serious
negative impacts of congestion, traffic, noise, lack of privacy and undesirable encroachment of this new, large commercial
building on our residential community. Without the underground parking as part of the plan, the new building will be nearly double
the size allowed for our low-density zoning. Further, this new hotel appears to violate Municipal Code Section 16.68.020 by
diminishing the character of our neighborhood and negatively impacting the desirability of our Park Forest neighborhood which is
directly adjacent.
We in the Park Forest community had supported the previous plan which was far more reasonable, and was designed to include
underground parking. Simply put, without underground parking, this large commercial building will no longer include the setbacks
from property lines that would make the new structure a favorable addition to the City that “fit” into our community.
We are asking the City leaders to consider the long-term impacts of their decisions so that we can preserve the character and
quality of our neighborhood. I’m asking the Commissioners again to please take a longer-term view of their decisions and find a
way to compel developer Sagar Patel to incorporate underground parking with reasonable setbacks and hotel size into his plans. I
attended the City Planning Commission meeting on October 8, and it struck me that the Commissioners were bending over backwards to
accommodate Mr. Patel’s increasing costs. But it’s not fair for the Commissioners to make the Park Forest residents bear those
costs in terms our diminished quality of life.
Respectfully,
Carol BroadbentBuckthorn WayMenlo Park
