Belmont planning commission backs zoning text amendments for El Camino corridor, adds protections for adjacent homes

The Belmont Planning Commission on Thursday voted 5-0 to recommend that the City Council adopt a broad package of zoning text amendments intended to implement the city’s housing element, consolidate parking regulations and update development standards for the Corridor Mixed Use (CMU) district along El Camino Real.

Deputy Community Development Director Laura Russell and senior planner Rob Gill presented the code amendments and modeling the city used to test outcomes under different height, floor-to-ceiling and floor area assumptions. Russell told the commission the package is intended to modernize the CMU rules, encourage ground-floor commercial space and implement items from the housing element. “Staff recommends that you adopt a resolution recommending city council approval,” she said.

The proposal includes several substantive changes: an increase in the CMU base height from 45 to 50 feet, raising the community-benefits ceiling from 55 to 60 feet, and a hotel-specific pathway that would make hotels a principally permitted use in the CMU with a targeted height of 65 feet and a 2.5 floor-area ratio (FAR). Hotels would no longer require a conditional use permit but would still be subject to design review and any other entitlements.

Russell said the city’s modeling assumed a 16-foot ground-floor commercial height to preserve viable storefront and amenity spaces, and noted that hotels and some commercial uses…