offered a persuasive adaptive reuse. i would agree with the department attempt to continue the discussion on some of the elements of the exterior design, including color. however, i am extremely supportive and laudatory of the situation, taking the building out of a limited rectangular geometry into something that creates a more exciting facade on the ground level. it is extremely important to not just make this building of like another office building, but make it a mixed use retail/residential building. the addition of residential at the lower part of market will transform the entire area, including van ness and market street. new buildings coming on line should help create a vocabulary of the new architecture which speaks to each other. i am concerned that the taller buildings we will be building

here are not all trying to attract attention on themselves, but create a harmonious setting which operates at the ground floor as well as the upper skyline they will create together. this building will be one of the first tall buildings at this intersection. i very much of forward to see the department worked with the architect and some of the other commissioners to continue the dialogue. commissioner sugaya: i have one question, i think, either for staff or the project sponsor, about the other building that has been mentioned. have we had any inquiries about that particular property? >> not that one.

my understanding, and others can correct me if i am wrong, is that the original facade was ripped off when the green glass was applied, unfortunately. the interior spaces are intact, but the exterior no longer exists that was originally on the building. commissioner sugaya: i support the project and would move to approve with conditions, and with the understanding that there will be additional work on the exterior surface. vice president wu: i agree with many of my fellow commissioners on the merits of the project, and would especially like to see that the structure is intact, and putting a new skin on it -- the notion of adaptive reuse is more green than brand new lead certified buildings. -- leed-certified buildings.

i also liked to see the mix of bedrooms. i do not like it when it is all studios. i appreciate seeing the mix, i think. i also appreciate the project sponsor's ability or agreement to keep meeting with community groups, even though the request came in quite late. commissioner moore: can i ask you a question? i think we talked about the adjoining building, and i am not trying to put you on the spot, but have there been any discussions between you and the adjoining owners about how to resolve these adjacencies? >> we have done virtually nothing on that. our focus was on the tower. as was noted earlier, they

jackhammer of all the exterior of the thing. they just hung those ugly panels on it. what i would like to do -- i do not know whether the owners would want to do it. we will see. we are certainly going to look at that. whatever happens here, it has to work with the tower. we will have to work on that. right now, it is totally up in the air. commissioner moore: we hope the taller buildings will fit into a context, and everybody else will participate in that discussion. i myself do not have any idea as to whether that facade could be reconstituted. i am not even sure that would be appropriate. >> we did have j. turnbull look at that. it does not work, unfortunately. it has been jackhammered. commissioner antonini: my

comments were mostly what commissioner moore brought up about taking into consideration. obviously, we need to make sure the design is independent, even though there still might be an ugly building next door for a while. in no way do we want to try to replicate anything that is close to that, i hope. there also was some talk about changing the parking entrance. it is going to come off of hayes street in the future, if i am not mistaken. that is a separate right of way. there is a third aaa building that is connected by an above- ground passageway across hayes. again, there is no connection to that in this purchase. hopefully, we can find everyone to work together, because there is that passageway, which

presumably will be eliminated. maybe not. whoever the buyer of that other building -- if there is a desire for that to take place, it might fit together with this building, if possible. i think 150 connect across to the other property. do you want to bring some light on to that? >> the other building was being used by the university for classes. i do not know what their long- term use would be, except as a classroom. commissioner sugaya: did we know that? commissioner miguel: yes. president fong: any additional comments? call the question. >> the motion on the floor is for approval.

condition that the project sponsor continue working with the stuff on design. commissioner antonini: aye. commissioner hillis: aye. commissioner moore: aye. commissioner sugaya: aye. vice president wu: aye. president fong: aye. >> thank you, commissioners. that motion passed unanimously on the variance. scott sanchez: i close the public hearing, noting it is an adaptive reuse of an existing non-complying structure. >> thank you. commissioners, you are now on item 9, 706 mission st., the mexican museum and residential tower project. this is a public hearing on the draft environmental impact report. >> good afternoon. i am debra dwyer, planning department's staff. this is the public hearing on the draft eir for case number

2008.1084e, the mexican museum and residential tower project. i am joined by the preservation technical staff and the senior environmental planner. in addition, the successor agency to the redevelopment agency is here. briefly, the project would include the rehabilitation and restoration of the building at third and mission streets, conveyance of the parcel to the project sponsor, and the new construction of a 47 story, 550 foot tall tower connected to the building. space would be provided for the mexican museum within the lower floors of both structures. restaurants, retail, or

commercial use is proposed for the ground floor of the other building. up to 215 residential units would be provided. flex options for the upper floors to remain office use or be converted to residential use have been analyzed. in addition, seven circulation and access to areas have been analyzed. these consider how people will enter and exit the project site. the draft eir found that implementation of the proposed project would result in a considerable contribution to a significant and unavoidable cumulative shadow impact. in addition, circulation and access variance would result in significant and unavoidable traffic impacts. other potentially significant impact with regard to archeological resources, noise and vibration, air quality, and hazardous materials would be

reduced to less than significant with the implementation of mitigation measures. a hearing to receive historic preservation commission commons was held on july 18. i actually have the comments in a letter for you. staff is not here to answer comments today, but comments will be transcribed by the court reporter impact transferred to the comments and responses document. this will respond to all comments received, and make changes to the draft eir as appropriate. this is not a hearing to consider approval or disapproval of the project. that will follow the final eir certification. commons today should be directed

to the adequacy and accuracy of the environmental analysis contained in the draft eir. i would remind, enters to speak slowly and clearly so the court reporter can produce an accurate transcript. also,, andrews should state their name and address so they can be properly identified and so that we may send them a copy of the comments and responses when completed. we will also take any comments on the draft eir by the planning commission. the public comment began on june 28, and continues to fight -- through 5:00 p.m. on august 13. the comments not made orally today should be submitted in writing to the planning department. this concludes the presentation on this matter. unless commission members have questions, i would respectfully suggest the public hearing be opened.

president fong: your right side of the room, and try not to block the moderator. that would be great. joe fang, brian cenoba, paul sedway, margaret lynn, jack plumack, and edward collins. >> good afternoon, commissioners. i am the president of the homeowners' association at the four seasons, which is on the same block as the proposed project.

on behalf of the homeowners, i am here to express our grave concern over the eir report. the project has a number of very significant issues which are not properly addressed are mitigated in the draft eir. i will only mention a few of them. for example, the draft eir addresses only the pm traffic in this area, the afternoon traffic. as we all know -- will you show this, miss? >> their it is. -- there it is. >> as we all know, this is third street. the traffic is worst in the a.m. hours, when all the office commuters are trying to get to the financial district.

the shoppers are trying to get into union square. all the housewives are trying to do their shopping in chinatown. it is not unusual to take 10 or 20 minutes to go the two blocks between howard and market street. for some curious reason, this eir does not address the a.m. traffic at all. the eir also contemplates the traffic created by the new 706 mission street. the first five conditions contemplate using this small half block 1-way, dead-and the street -- deadd end street for moving traffic into their garage. between the four seasons residences and the car park,

there are over 1000 car parked there. this is the only way in, and most days, the only way out. it is not unusual to see trucks parked there for loading and unloading. it becomes a one lane road. the people trying to get into the car park in the four seasons -- it is not unusual for them to take 10 or 20 minutes to get out. the owners are not here to stop the project, but we want this to be a good neighbor project which will encompass long-term solutions to traffic, which is environmentally friendly and as not create a major bottleneck and traffic nightmare, such as those we see so often in hong kong and other major cities.

>> good afternoon. my name is bryan can't. we were hired by the 765 market street residential owners association to look at the transportation aspects of the draft eir. we prepared a memo analyzing the impact, so i will focus on three of our findings that we made. this is one of the figures from the draft eir. one of the problems we found was that in the eir there was an improper analysis of what we will call intersection critical movements. those are vehicle movements that take the most time going through an intersection, taking up more green light time. according to the analysis -- it is difficult to see from this point of view. the eastbound through movement

has been labeled as critical movement. that is movement going toward the ferry building. in the absence of west turn movement, the traffic flows easily. the real critical movement is from market street, turning right onto fourth street. that is due to the high volume of pedestrians crossing the street there. if you were to take that into consideration, the proposed project would result in a significant impact. the 6 and 7 would result in less than significant impacts. that is the relationship of the vehicle impact. the second aspect is that the analysis is not consistent with the circulation patterns for current and future users. we have prepared another diagram. this is not from the draft eir, but our own. essentially, the distribution of

trips predicted in the draft eir is not realistic. in those variance, crisps are predicted to circle around and go up market street in order to access destinations east. this is not realistic because of the congestion on market street, the lack of available left turns on market street, and the fact that markets street has a dead end. there are other routes which are much quicker. once you take into account those aspects, it turns out to be less than significant impact. lastly, i would reiterate the previous comment about a.m. traffic levels. due to the high in bound volumes in the morning, there could be significant impacts to the project at third and stevenson as well as third and market

street. thank you. >> my name is paul said way. -- sedway. i am a resident of the neighboring area to the project. i want to commend the planning department, which is famous for its transparency. on the cover of the eir, you will note that the power behind the building has been made totally transparent, and the mexican museum has been made invisible. so much for covers. i would like to point out that under the eir, the project should not be approved. there is significant shuttling of union square, adding 20% net new shadow, which is considered

a significant cumulative impact. the shuttle analysis suggests that the project will be made except a ball under this constraint by lowering the building to 351 feet as a reduced shuttle alternative, or 195 feet under the existing zoning regulation. to our mind, even this is not acceptable, because of the impact on jesse square. it is a very important open space in the city. it has been largely ignored. the proposed building would impact jesse square in the morning hours. therefore, we have to consider that affect. yet another alternative exists which is not addressed in the eir.

that is the very creative proposal designed in 2007. the eir says this option was rejected by the planning department because it was disfavored by the planning staff based on impact aho on the air and sun -- on the ehrenson building and the acceptability of an elliptical tower. however, the power was shifted to the west to avoid shadowing under proposition k. we believe this was the case. we urge the commission to study this superior alternative, which was not addressed, to make modifications, and to accept the finding that the existing zoning alternatives at 400 feet

and a 6.1 floor will be made compatible. thank you. >> my name is jack. my wife and i are full-time residence at the four seasons residences. when we purchased our home, we were concerned about the difficulty of access, both as regards entering the four seasons as well as exiting and entering on two or crossing northbound third street. unfortunately, our concerns have become unpleasant and unsafe realities. it seems unthinkable to not only contemplate the traffic burden of the cars from the hundreds of

additional residential units proposed in the tower project on stevenson valley and third street, but also the traffic bottleneck that will be created from the loss of one or more lanes of traffic during the construction. in addition to this already difficult dangerous and situation, there will be additional traffic load created by the tower. the fact that they are proposing to have a one-to-one parking ratio, when what was previously considered was 0.27 -- for these reasons, considering the additional burdens of further decreased orderly traffic flow, emergency vehicle access, and shadowing, we feel the project in its present proposed

footprint, with its height density, parking in excess of code, the associated problems creating another curb cut and access driveway entry, it is ill-conceived, and would create multiple additional problems in an already gridlocked downtown area. we urge you to consider our many concerns when making your final determination regarding this project. thank you for your consideration. president fong: i will call a couple of mornings. -- couple more names. [names are called]

>> members of the commission, my name is lynn sedway. i am a neighbor as well as an urban and real estate economist. you have heard a lot about traffic. i hope you will hear about the issues involving pedestrians in the area. i would like to focus on the fact that many cumulative impact were not adequately addressed. i will mention a couple. traffic and parking of the renovated facility, which will include target. we all love target, but many people drive to use target. also, the impact on union square. third street is the main route for many coming from the east bay and the peninsula. union square is a valuable

resource for us, both from a city standpoint and a fiscal standpoint. to make third street more of an obstacle will have a significant impact on the union square merchants and open space. the shadow impact on union square is significant. we understood that shadow impact on the transit center. it seemed a worthwhile trade-off with the increase transit service. that did not mean to open the door to this and other projects , which is caused by the height of the tower. i asked you to please send the environmental impact bat for further study. thank you. president fong: sir, did you

have -- >> good afternoon. my name is howard wechsler. i and the council for the residential owners association. i believe you should have all received the comment letter and traffic report that we submitted on friday. i would just like to briefly highlight what i think are the critical items, because you have the full report to read and i only have three minutes. first, i think if you go through and staff goes through and consultants go through what we have produced, you will find that even using only the pm peak figures that variance 6 and 7

will turn out to be superior traffic areas. when one does what i believe has to be done, a.m. peak traffic for a one-way street like third street, it will be quite clear that the project variance -- variants will likely have significant impact, particularly between mission and market. there will be no traffic or additional curb cuts that pedestrians will get involved with. in terms of shadows, the eir correctly points out that both alternatives b and e are far superior, because any project below 351 feet will cause no net new show, on union square. this project, which is proposed

to be higher than the existing building, would generate 22% increase new show on union square and the beyond the power of this commission and rec and park to grant, because it would generate 337,000 square feet of net new show, and the current allocation is only 322,000 feet. you'd have to increase the amount of show on union square that can be allowed, and then grant it all to this project blocks away, preventing any other project near union square from adding any net new show. -- new shadow. finally, in regard to jesse square, there hasn't not been an attempt to look at an alternative. -- there has not been an attempt to look