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San Antonio Road area plan: city planners weigh 4,000–7,000 new housing units and trade-offs for neighborhood parks
Summary
Planning staff presented alternatives for the San Antonio Road area plan, which could accommodate an estimated 4,000–7,000 new housing units. Staff identified park-deficient zones and options ranging from one large neighborhood park to dispersed pocket parks, and outlined possible funding and coordination strategies with developers.
Planning staff presented the San Antonio Road Area Plan to the Parks & Recreation Commission on March 24, describing four redevelopment subareas along the two-mile corridor and a strategy to add public open space where the plan area is currently park deficient.
Robert Kaine, principal planner, said the plan area covers roughly 275 acres along San Antonio Road between Alma and the Baylands. Kaine told commissioners the plan considers a range of future housing outcomes and said, "the ranges that we're looking at would be anywhere between roughly 4,000 to 7,000 new residential units," a scale that would substantially increase local demand for parks and services.
Staff identified two promising locations to obtain new parkland if and when parcels redevelop: a roughly 25-acre property occupied by Maxar along Fabian Way and a consolidating set of parcels in the CTI (Commercial–Transport–Industrial) area that could provide space for plazas or pocket parks when redeveloped. The presentation outlined four design alternatives for open space: a highly visible plaza on Charleston Road; a smaller interior park with dispersed pocket parks; concentrating parks in a single interior green; or prioritizing pedestrian-oriented corridors (pedestrian-oriented open space, or POS) and expanded sidewalks over conventional parkland.
Kaine noted that most land in the plan area is privately owned, so the city will likely rely on developer-provided parks, land acquisition when opportunities arise, or in-lieu fees. He also emphasized the importance of multimodal access: improving pedestrian and bicycle connections to the Caltrain station, adding midblock walkways and safe crossings, and coordinating with regional transit and interchange planning. In some alternatives staff suggested replanting street trees and adding new canopy to compensate for any required curb changes.
Community feedback captured by staff so far shows preferences for neighborhood-scale parks (roughly one acre) and pocket parks, along with a desire for safer pedestrian and bicycle routes. Several public commenters urged that the San Antonio area plan more explicitly align with Cubberly as a community hub, requested clarity about timing and funding for new infrastructure (including the traffic study), and asked staff to avoid placing small parks adjacent to major roadways where noise and pollution would reduce usability.
Kaine said staff expect to return to the commission with policy recommendations later in 2026 and perform the environmental review in 2027, with a targeted City Council adoption in early 2028.
