but that i think needs to be discussed among the commissioners. with respect to the issues that mr. hillis and commissioner antonini were talking about, it seems as though the developer's quite willing to work with the theatre in terms of the specific issues that were just discussed. i think that related to drainage, ventilation, light, realizing that some of that is due to property line issues and i heard him say he's willing to put in a skylight or some kind of ventilation. anyway, that might be part of any motion that we make. with respect to noise transmission, i think there are two issues for me anyway, one is noise that emanates from the completed building, whatever form that building takes, it's going to be residential with ground floor retail. i would not think that the operation or the use of that

building for those purposes will generate any kind of overt noise problems. the issue of the rear yard which is a deck on the second level or above the first level anyway, you know, we're not going to get rid of the open space, so i'm not sure exactly how to address that, that will have to be partially, there might be some sound attenuation along the property line wall, that can be part of a motion and any kind of -- something that tells the tenants or the owners that there is this issue and that there is a theatre next door i think would be good on the part of the landlord or the home owners association or whatever, as far as noise during construction, that's a different issue, it's going to be temporary but it will affect the theatre if it's overtly

noisy. even though we were told that the theaters are inside, there are standard hours, i don't know, staff, can we impose any further conditions on construction hours, or is that out of our jurisdiction? >> i believe you can but currently the construction hours are restricted between 8 and 7. >> well, we can discuss that. >> i'm going to chime in for a second and agree with -- i'm sympathetic to the marsh but i think there's clearly a communication breakdown between the two here and for some of the items like commissioner sugaya laid out, i guess maybe we can go through one by one and call them out, but they seem solvable and to do some soundproofing and some noise abatement, the skylight offer seems to be genuine, hours of

construction, to the project sponsor, this is maybe a 12 month, 14 month project? and i have no idea what the marsh's schedule is, although we have a brochure here, if there's a seasonality to it, they can perform some of the work when you're dark, i don't know, but i imagine the conversation could go a little bit further and figure out bh the best time to do work close to the marsh would be. is there any pile driving to this project? and there's two bmr units on site? >> yes. >> and you have one space for one casing -- car, whether it's it's for one tenant in the building or car share. is there any bike space parking?

>> there's bike space parking for both the retail and the residents, there's a gear dump area with lockers, and there's also a workbench so people can wrench on their bikes. >> so, from a security point, i would be okay with asking for some kind of bike parking requirement. >> they have bike parking. >> they do, okay. >> 28 spaces. >> 28 spaces, thank you. let's see what other commissioners feel, commissioner wu? >> i'm happy to hear all of the support for the marsh, i add myself to that list of commissioners, i happen to live in this neighborhood, i live about five blocks away, i take transit everywhere, i take transit to the commission with my board packet every week so i think it's workable to have a building with no parking. another issue i heard a lot about is affordable housing.

i wish today we had 100% affordable housing but we don't, i think the best they can do is put their bmr's on site to encourage the diversity within one building. i also want to point out that there's no displacement of tenants and that's important, it is an opportunity to build residential without having to move anyone off-site. i am open to some ideas about physical changes but i'm not sure from -- well, on the affordable housing issues and the noise issues, the physical issues don't change that, the site is not in or don't alleviate those concerns, the site is not in the actual liberty hill historical district, so i'm sort of somewhere in the misleading -- middle around whether we should take dr to make design changes?

>> commissioner moore? >> this project's a challenge to me because of what i believe in the intent of the eastern neighborhoods, there is a rigor in the way this building presents a response which i am concerned about. it has been my concern all along that bh the rubber hit it is road and you come to physical design, rather than to zoning, that there is a trailing legislation that does not require the sensitive transition from old to new, so [inaudible] kind of structure which does not on the transitional corners respect what is there. my request for an architect would be to do something where you transition from a five storey to the adjoining

buildings, particularly as this building now tries to address hill street, i think his response to hill street has to be really more reflecting of the general character of that street. that doesn't mean it has to mimic the adjoining height or it needs to make a gesture. i would like to remind this commission on the discussion and the long battle we had when we discussed the change from pottery barn at the corner of poke and pacific and while we acknowledged the inherent height and zoning on the corner, we did require that it meet and make down to the adjoining properties and that didn't mean it had to exactly mimic the hiekt but it had to make a gesture and i think that is one of the biggest challenges that we do as massive an overlay of rezoning in the eastern neighborhoods as we do here where we have large prevailing strong neighborhoods

and i'm looking for referencing -- i'm talking about the existing basic structure of the area and we don't have any rules which require an adjustment. i find at this moment the bay window response, one way of creating scale as to whether or not it's fully worked out, i would say no. and i'm referring to this particular drawing i'm not going to sit here and redesign it, but the response, this is a horizontal page, i think there needs to be more work done on the building. i'm very comfortable with the developer trying to be more responsive and open to discussing with the marsh, some of the real big survival issues, but i do believe there has to be more work on the architecture including on the

transitioning to both streets in order to make this building more contextual i would say, although i hate that word. >> if i may, and i don't know if we want to redesign at this point, but if you look at one of the pages, it's labeled 25 and it looks down hill street and i'm picking up on commissioner moore's comments because you look at the red building where valencia and hill come together, and there's a clear step down, right. commissioner antonini. >> thank you, we're putting some renderings up there, it's hard to see on the screen, the ones on the right are the earlier ones and i think they were a little bit more sensitive than the newer one which has the rounded larger

bay, and also if you can't tell now but the older version had more [inaudible] in the window and is the newer version just had two, when you see it on the screen, you can't see it well when you're looking at it on the page, i would encourage to work with staff to see if we can make the building as less imposing as possible because although you like a strong corner, that really large bay element there really emphasizes the height a little bit more of the building whereas the more discrete units that we had and the one on the right seems to make it as more individual units. the other thing i wanted to point out, commissioner moore was talking about stepping out to hill street, it looks like we have an element that's over of what appears to be the only

garage, that is a good transition there, there isn't any transition between the marsh building but that is on a bigger street. it's valencia has higher buildings. so, i'm generally happy with approving it, but i would like to see what the other commissioners have to say, but i would like to approve it but with the conditions regarding changes made to the marsh for sound, attenuation and for sky light tos allow them to have light into where they lose their property line windows. >> commissioners, a couple of things, i wanted to make sure because i heard a couple of different things, the issue with the corner, there is a technical problem in the code in terms of how the bay is done in the corner and i agree with the architect, this code language goes back a long ways, it's clunky and does contribute to this but there is

a technical problem, but the question i think on the transition to hill street is a somewhat different question, what i heard you all say is that you wanted some more transition on the hill street side or i heard some of you saying that, i think it's important that we get that clear. i think if you're talking about stepping the building down further, that's a different issue than what happens at the corner, and i think it would be helpful if the commission could be clear on that. if i may, just the other issue is because the marsh is a separate property you cannot make it a condition of approval that they make the improvements on the marsh, you could encourage them to do so, you could ask the project sponsor to put it on the record that they will do so but you cannot make it a condition of approval. >> okay. >> commissioner borden. >> yeah, i do want to join -- first, the commissioners supporting the marsh theatre, i'm glad to have your schedule,

i always walk by and wonder if you're having a show. i think you've heard here that we want to do something to make sure that this theatre is not impacted, i live across the street from a construction site and i know sometimes there's noise and in my case, very early morning. in terms of the building, i think they're doing a lot of positive things with the on-site bmr's t no parking and it's true we spend a lot of hours, commissioner moore and i because many of our other commissioners couldn't be participate ining that process for other reasons but recused by law, we think about shrieks -- heights, this is transit rich, you're close to the bart, you have the jay church, other

muni lines, we spend a lot of time figuring out what that is, we had all these different conversations and i wish some of you had been part of these discussions because this is where we are today, that's still separate and apart from the design of this building and whether the building is responsive but to the extent that the building is 55 feet, that is the case, and i understand why there might be some sort of tension with the project sponsor not understanding what's being requested by the community and likewised, i can understand why they feel the project sponsor should be doing something different. i would hope that in the faou -- future that we can all come together because everybody has to be neighbors and co-exist in the city and we live closely to each other and we often have to

deal with things we don't want to have to deal with, but it's worth the sacrifice because we live in a vibrant city that has a lot of great amenities, in terms of a building design, i feel that the earlier rendering is better, more respectful, i believe that the vertical articulation makes the building look taller, i think that the step-down on hill street is really clunky, it's tall and then a tiny, for me, it seems really dramatic, i think a better stepping would be more respectful because it doesn't even -- you could even do something a little smaller, the building next door is not even that short, you have this massive building and then something really low entrance, to me, it seems clunky in that regard. in terms of the valencia street side, i understand this property is zoned as part of the mcd, it's not zoned as a

residential property i know just a #lock down that the building that was built not long ago, maybe it has not opened it, it's also a tall building, but i think if we can look at this articulation, in this rendering, the colors more closely mimic the marsh, it looks in that -- with that and with the windows being very similar to the windows in the marsh building, it better translates the two properties together, so i know staff had made changes for -- because of other technical reasons, but if there's any way that we can kind of bring that back because this building from that rendering looks a lot less imposing than the new version of what we're talking about today and the other thing is i would work on the transition on the hill street side because i think it doesn't do anything to

soften the larger rest of the building in my personal view. >> commissioner sugaya? >> yeah, i would agree with that. i think all of the commissioners have voiced that same opinion, one consideration might be to add a floor to the garage part and drop the fifth floor a bit or drop off the fifth floor on the hill street side and exchange units that way or something like that. it might introduce other neighborhood concerns if the backyard so-called goes up a storey, they miekt think, i'm not really a sound person, but you could conceive that a second floor open space, i'm not sure that's code compliant, but might have some sound transmission issues, the staff is shaking their head that that doesn't work. change the code. >> yeah, the rear yard needs to

provide at their lowest residential level per code. that would be the only consideration within that scheme. >> what if we decide that we want it to be above that? >> the project sponsor could seek a variance from the planning code for that aspect of the project. which apparently was originally part of the proposal. >> okay, anyway, i'm not saying that's a solution but there may be a consideration to what i just said, putting another storey on top of the garage and dropping down the fifth floor, that's closest to hill street in some fashion, you know. it's just an idea, it doesn't have to be the solution. and i think with respect to the 55 feet and what's zoned as 55 feet, i mean, the eastern neighborhoods plan that we looked through, i know we looked at it property by

property but we didn't get down to this particular location, what the context was and what the other considerations might be with respect to the building or with respect to a proposed building that might go on that site, so i think that this is an opportunity to take a closer look at it even though it says 55 feet, i think i'm quite comfortable with, you know, discussing something that isn't 55 feet uniformly all over the property and i think that's what commissioner moore and others have been voicing here too. i'm not sure how to craft a motion, i'm not sure if commissioner antonini has something in mind, apart from the marsh's concerns, i don't know if we do that, i don't know if it comes back here or not. >> i'm going to ask the project

architect maybe to come up, i see you probably scratching your head here, you can see the direction that we want to try to go. before we go and redesign the building that you have spent a lot of time on, i'll give you an opportunity, do you have something in mind that might be able to reach -- >> one idea that i have thought of that could address the marsh's concerns and the neighbor's concerns is to enclose it like a green house, i don't know if that requires a variance or if that could somehow be construed in an allowable open space. >> it's a code issue. >> yes, that would still require a variance because you're enclosing the open space. >> the one problem with -- this is not a single family house we're chopping something off the back, it makes the room smaller, it would impact a small unit and possibly lose one and honestly the project sponsor with all the opposition was teetering on this whole new

ledge slaix reducing down to 9 units, this is very close right now, so i am sensitive to your concerns, i'm afraid to show the drawing i broukt of the original proposal which went -- addressed the idea -- not the idea, the seating, this does not have a rear yard, i'm creating a dark pit of a deck here for open space, and i started out seeking a rear yard modification variance that stepped the building down and filled that space in and left it as a side yard but that would involve a whole variance, the neighbors could appeal it, we already went down that route and that's something that changed the plans in response to the neighbors. and it was sort of a preventive attempt to address that concern. so, i don't know. i do have a screen at the

street that was also in response o -- to the noise from the deck, it's 8 feet high, maybe that becomes more semi-solid, which from the street at least would create that stepping. the other thing is, the photos, if you look at the other corner lots that do not step -- there's that 7 storey building at lexington that shoots out, it's a historic -- >> maybe commissioner antonini has an idea. >> well, thank you, i don't know, i'm very sensitive to what project sponsor's gone through and as was mentioned frequently, we have almost no buildings that were built between 5 and 9 units in the last five years and this is a 12 unit but it's getting close to where it isn't going to make any pencil out if we're going to have to take units, it

sounds easy enough to add a floor off on the unit level and take a floor off, i'm not sure if it works out to have the 8 -- 2 bedroom unit and is the 4-1 bedroom units ts, i believe that's what we're looking at, we start losing one of our two bedroom units or something, i would be hesitant to do that even though it seems to make sense. i would probably make a motion just to approve the project with -- as designed right now with working with staff to try to incorporate some of the things that the commission has talked about with the treatment of the bay issue in the front and also with -- the project sponsor would have to agree to -- it's not a condition, to work with the marsh to try to remedy sound issues and provide some sort of relief from the loss of property line windows. that would be my motion, although that does -- other parts are not conditions.

>> just a question, can we add as a condition that they work with the marsh and come up with a construction plan that, you know, at the least limits construction times to, you know, earlier than 3:30 and no construction on weekends? >> if you want, you could put conditions on the construction hours and/or encourage the sponsor to work with -- there's continuation measures, you can require it on the project sponsor's building but you can encourage to work with the skylight or more soundproofing on the marsh building but only as an encouragement. >> i would like to limit construction times beyond what's in the code to what's being suggested by the marsh because i think that could be a big impact. >> what hours? >> construction goes on for a

long time i think if you start to chop off too many hours. >> and you have labor hours by which a construction worker needs to work an extra amount of hours, i think it's very hard to control that. >> i'm sensitive to their performances in the evenings. >> right. >> i don't know, 5:30? 3:30 is a pretty early performance. >> there's youth classes. >> summertime only. >> commissioner moore? >> [inaudible]. >> i say until 5:30, no construction on weekend. >> i think that standard hours of construction would be 7 days a week or five days a week.

>> 7. >> okay, well, project sponsor, is that going to work if you cut off weekends, it's going to be really hard? >> i have no problem at all, nobody's going to be working until 8:00 at niekt, 5:00, and mostly everybody's going to be out of there by 4, and on the weekends, no work on sunday, and saturday, i mean, once again, we explained them, you come over, you have some special thing going on, come and tell us and give us a little bit of advance notice and no problem, so i mean, 5:00, 4:30 is fine with us for a cut off. >> i accept the friendly amendment, you can start as early as you want in the morning, probably 7 o'clock in the morning is earliest you can do, 7:00 to 5:00 is realistic six day as week, that would be fine.

six days that don't include sunday. >> i think the marsh does do saturday shows that begin at 2:00, saturday and sunday, the marsh does 600 performances a year at that site, so we have two to three shows a day there because we have an upstairs space and a downstairs space so having any construction on saturday afternoon honestly would be a very significant financial hit. i think one thing, speaking for the marsh is that we want to be assured of a liaison, someone we know we can always talk to that will always give us a schedule for the week that we have a regular check-in, i think our fears are they can say what they want at this moment but if we don't have an

assigned liaison and that's a requirement of the project, and after the project is built, we'll need to continue to work as a liaison, there has to be a concrete liaison setup, not just call us whenever we want, we need to know who and we would like to have a weekly meeting during construction. >> one of the conditions, there would be a liaison that would be provided. >> that's important to us. >> and with the permission of the other commissioners, if we go 7 to 6 during the week and 7 to 1 on saturdays,. >> that would probably work for us except for special events. >> our call time is 5:30 during the week for 7:00 performances and then for regularly, it's 3:30 on saturdays. >> i think take what you got.

you want to restate the motion >> okay, the motion is to approve the project working with staff for design, concerns particularly in regards to the bay and the front of the building at the corner of valencia and hill, and secondly, continue, the project sponsor will work with the marsh in terms of providing a liaison for communication purposes. >> j*u one point of information, this is a dr so you should take dr and do these thing and is the community liaison thing is not in here because it's not a conditional use, it's a dr, so anything like that has to be in the language of our dr. >> we are taking dr to do this, that's true, and also to address sound attenuation and possible sky lights to mitigate for -- these are not conditions. >> encourage