Urban Planning Area Strategies CHAPTER 5_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ CHAPTER 5 Urban Planning Area Strategies This chapter describes the Planning Areas within the Service Level Objectives Urban Service Area and their future need for The City’s General Plan service level objective is neighborhood/community serving parkland, to provide 3.5 acres per 1,000 population of community centers, community gardens, dog parks, neighborhood/community serving parkland within skate parks, aquatic facilities, sports fields, trails, a reasonable walking distance. Of the 3.5 acres, a and improvements to regional parks. There are 15 minimum of 1.5 acres is to be City-owned Planning Areas as defined in the City’s General parkland and/or trails while public schools can Plan: Almaden, Alum Rock, Alviso, Berryessa, provide up to 2 acres of recreation school grounds, Calero, Cambrian/Pioneer, Central/Downtown, all of which are within a reasonable walking Coyote, Edenvale, Evergreen, North San José, San distance. Physical barriers, such as major arterials, Felipe, South San José, West Valley, and Willow creeks, rivers and architectural barriers, are seen as Glen. Calero, Coyote and San Felipe Planning impediments to this walking distance strategy, and Areas are outside of the Urban Service Area and, the plan attempts to mitigate such conditions. therefore, are not discussed in this report. In the Neighborhood parks, community parks, trails and Coyote Planning Area, only the northern industrial recreation school grounds are counted toward this portion has been approved by the City. No urban service level (excluding high schools without joint residential development will occur in the North and use agreements). Acreage within citywide/ Mid-Coyote Valley until the City Council has regional and County parks used for neighborhood/ adopted a specific plan. community serving elements, such as picnic areas, play areas and/or sports fields, is also included. This chapter also defines projects for Citywide facilities under the control of the City, addresses Goals how access to neighborhood/community serving In accordance with the Urban Environmental parkland might be improved in San José's Accords, which the City of San José signed in underserved neighborhoods and includes the Capital November 2005, the City has a goal to provide Action Plan which identifies projects that may be “... an accessible public park or recreational open delivered in the next five years (2009-2014), as well space within half-a-kilometer (approximately 1/3 as projects that are unfunded. of a mile) of every city resident by 2015.” The City currently has 51 underserved areas using this new goal of 1/3 of a mile radius compared to 27 underserved areas in 2000 when the goal was 3/4 CITY OF SAN JOSE GREENPRINT 64 Draft Strategic Plan Update Urban Planning Area Strategies CHAPTER 5 of a mile. When the 2000 Greenprint was The underserved areas in each Urban Planning developed, the 3/4 of a mile radius was used to Area are identified, along with strategies to gain evaluate the underserved areas. All of the 27 access to neighborhood/community serving underserved areas identified in 2000 are now parkland. (The underserved areas are identified on served or will be served either by a park, school, the maps with a circle representing the general trail or open space except one. The one area that area that is underserved along with the number of remains to be served is included in the current 51 households that would be served). To address the underserved areas. underserved areas, a recommended strategy is wherever possible enhancing and expanding San José’s population as of April 30, 2007 was connections to existing parks and/or construct 973,302 (latest year information was available) additional amenities within them to allow more and it is projected to reach 1,148,000 by the year users. This strategy is preferred to acquiring 2020. To meet the service level objective in 2020 separate smaller parcels to construct pocket parks of providing 3.5 acres per 1,000 population of which will only serve a limited number of neighborhood/community serving parkland, an residents. additional 1,124.6 acres will be needed. The City should provide a multi-functional Given the high cost of property acquisition and community center, also known as the multi-service limited amount of undeveloped land within the hub community center, within three (3) miles of City, the City of San José will be unable to acquire each resident, an increase from two (2) miles in the the total additional acreage needed to achieve the 2000 Greenprint. This new radius is supported by service level objective of providing 3.5 acres per data from the telephone survey which indicated 1,000 population by 2020. Underserved areas are over 70 percent of residents are willing to travel up defined as neighborhoods within the City that have to 10 minutes to reach a recreation facility by car. no access to current or future proposed parkland, The 10 minutes equates to approximately three trails or school recreation parkland within a 1/3 of miles. It is anticipated that people will drive or a mile radius of residences without encountering a take mass transit to such facilities. major barrier. 65 CITY OF SAN JOSE GREENPRINT Draft Strategic Plan Update CHAPTER 5 Urban Planning Area Strategies The Ideal Planning Area funding sources have restrictions on how or where In order to have a balanced and equitable park and the funds may be used. As noted above staff has recreation system, while continuing to meet also identified the underserved areas based on the specific area needs, staff developed the Ideal new goal of a 1/3 mile radius. These will be Planning Area Model. It calls for parks, trails, a addressed by acquisitions and development in each dog park, a skate park and a community garden in of the Urban Planning Areas as needed. each Urban Planning Area, along with two “High Use” sports fields and access to a community Urban Planning Area Strategies center with a gym and an aquatic facility. The descriptions of each Urban Planning Area that follow have several purposes. First they list any The Greenprint Update has given the Department underserved areas as indicated in the 2000 an opportunity to evaluate its priorities on how to Greenprint, followed by any new underserved provide residents with a balanced and equitable areas resulting the from the Urban Environmental park system in the face of shrinking resources. Accords’ goal of providing a recreation open Community input played a significant role in this space within a half-kilometer (approximately 1/3 process. The community indicated that mile). See Table 5-1 on the next page for the “Maintaining the City’s existing parks and prioritized list of the Urban Planning Areas based recreation facilities” was a top priority followed by on need. Major improvements as needed in 2000 “Providing adequate funding for parks and are noted along with a list of accomplishments recreation opportunities throughout the City.” since 2000. Maps of each of the 12 Urban Planning Areas show the current and potential The Department realizes the need to channel future park and recreation facility sites. Finally, significant resources toward addressing the the Capital Action Plan provides a list of infrastructure backlog while maintaining existing improvement projects that could be delivered and facilities. The Department is cognizant of the fact it categorizes the unfunded projects into a Priority that it will need additional funds to provide a 1 or Priority 2 for future funding consideration. balanced and equitable park system to meet the (See tables beginning on page 70). The unfunded growing needs of the community. Therefore, project priority list may change based on a number revenue generating strategies have been developed of factors including funding or community desires. as outlined in Chapter 3 in best efforts to bridge the gap. It is important to bear in mind that most CITY OF SAN JOSE GREENPRINT 66 Draft Strategic Plan Update Urban Planning Area Strategies CHAPTER 5 Table 5-1 lists the Urban Planning Areas in priority order of need for new park acreage. Points were assigned for the ratio of acres per 1,000 for developed parkland, the number of underserved Table 5-1 Planning Area Ranking households based on the 1/3 of a mile radius and for population density. Based on the number of Ratio (3.5 # of Population points, they were categorized into the level of park Level of Planning Area Acres/1,000) Households Density Total need, “High”, “Medium” or “Low.” The four Park Points to be Served Points Points highest need Urban Planning Areas are West Need Points Valley, Willow Glen, Central/Downtown and West Valley 2 5 5 12 Edenvale. High Willow Glen 3 4 4 11 See Appendix B for a more detailed analysis of the Central/Downtown 4 1 5 10 underserved areas, including a breakdown of how the points were assigned. Edenvale 1 4 4 9 Alum Rock 1 2 5 8 Medium Cambrian/Pioneer 2 2 4 8 South San José 2 0 5 7 North San José 4 0 2 6 Berryessa 0 1 4 5 Low Evergreen 0 1 4 5 Almaden 0 1 2 3 Alviso 0 0 0 0 67 CITY OF SAN JOSE GREENPRINT Draft Strategic Plan Update CHAPTER 5 Urban Planning Area Strategies Table 5-2 summarizes the data for each of the Urban Planning Areas. It summarizes the area in square miles, population, population density, developed City parkland and school parkland. Table 5-2 Urban Planning Area Statistics Urban Population Developed