Ravenswood Project Area
This Project Area was formed in 1990. It encompasses approximately 200 acres including both the Four Corners (Bay/University Avenue) and the Ravenswood Business District (RBD). The Four Corners area is primarily characterized by a mixture of retail and residential uses.
More recently, the Ravenswood/ 4 Corners Transit Oriented Development Specific Plan (the Plan), encompassing this project area, was completed. The Plan offers a great opportunity to create a community vision around land uses in the RBD and 4 Corners area and bring public transit alternatives to East Palo Alto to facilitate the smart growth of, and increased access to the Ravenswood Redevelopment Project area.
The assessed valuation of the Four Corners / Ravenswood project areas was $36.7 million in 1990 when the Redevelopment Area was formed. In 2009, the assessed valuation was $96.2 million
Nexus Study
Nexus Fee Study for RBD / Four Corners Transit-Oriented Development Specific Plan
The RBD / Four Corners Specific Plan calls for higher and better uses in the plan area. As a result, additional infrastructure capacity will be needed, including road improvements to Bay Road and its underlying backbone infrastructure, including water, stormwater, sewer, and underground utilities. The cost of the Infrastructure and parks, trails and community facilities included in the plan will cost an estimated $137 million.
In order to finance these improvements, the city is authorized to levy development impact fees on new development that will benefit from these new facilities and infrastructure, according to the provisions outlined in AB 1600. In sum, to levy the fee, the city needs to prove that the new development will create an impact, in other words, that there is a nexus between the development and the impact. In addition, the amount of impact fee charged needs to be roughly proportional to the amount of impact the development is creating.The Nexus study will establish the proportionate share of the infrastructure and community benefits cost of the RBD / Four Corners area. The impact fees can be converted into a land secure Community Facilities District (Mello Roos) or an Assessment District.
For more information, see the nexus fee study.
RBD / Four Corners
RBD Specific Plan Update
The City is currently undertaking a targeted update to the RBD Specific Plan (originally adopted by the City Council in 2013). This update aims to refresh the existing plan to address new and emerging challenges while also responding to exciting opportunities within the Ravenswood Business District / 4 Corners area (which is the City's Priority Development Area). For more information on the update, please see the RBD Update webpage.
