into the corner and creates a green buffer for the neighboring properties. it's a good deal more pleasant to look at than the existing station. we planted the roof with native grasses which you can see here, that will screen the corner and provide both a visual and inclusive buffer. what they look at right now is roofs. what they will look at in the future is native grasses. i'll briefly go over the site plan with you. you'll see that the station is located on the inside corner of the site with the car wash nestled behind it. we landscaped the southern portion of the site, a site that has no landscaping to speak of. it is sealed by concrete [speaker not understood] and taken additional measures -- we've taken additional measures like a screen wall and curtain to protect the environment while ambient noise is more than the car wash itself. we spent a fair amount of time in conversation with the

planning department, the merchant's association, neighborhood leaders and the district super advicers. i'd like to thank supervisor katy tang building bridges with the community. [speaker not understood]. finally, we've spoken with the station's customers and are proud at the overwhelming support for the proposed changes and upgrades. and i have here a series of signatures. during the course of the evolution of the project, we've added acoustical measures, we changed the vehicle circulation and done careful traffic pattern and acoustical analysis to show the station with the new car wash is quieter than the surrounding tractionv and the queuing would not spill over onto the street or cause congestion. ~ ultimately this project will provide an ancillary use -- will provide an ancillary use to the station on 19th avenue and lincoln boulevard that will provide customers with a service they're eager to see. as you know there is not ape

mechanical car wash in the south part of the city. [speaker not understood]. i'm available to answer any questions you may have. but in closing i wanted to draw your attention to a moment. gas stations that are closed and abandoned in san francisco. you can't really tell the difference between the colors, but there are over 60 stations here that have been closed either by discretionary action or have been simply abandoned. and i drive and i regrettably have to pump gas and would like to continue to do so wherever i need to. let me call up mr. sonny goyal and i'm available to answer any questions. [speaker not understood]. good afternoon, commissioners. my name is sonny goyal [speaker not understood]. i'll try to make this brief. our family has been in the gas business since about 1978, started by my father and his brothers.

today they're still actively involved in the business and our business is to own and operate gas stations. we do not lease them. we do not flip them. we do not buy them to just sell them. as you know, oil companies have sold all of their retail assets. so, back in 2010 we went and purchased this location from shell. the format of gas stations as you know, which ahmad just mentioned, has changed over the years. they're no longer possible with just gas and a mechanics bay. longer warranties for cars and modern technology has kind of destroyed the ability for traditional gas stations to kind of function. so, in order for our gas station to compete and keep our gas prices at a competitive level, we do look for ancillary businesses to kind of is up leapt and keep these stations running. we can't rely simply as

[speaker not understood] to keep the doors open. in talking to loyal customers who come by our state, they talk about the dilapidated state the facility is in and they would welcome a car wash site after we started talking to some of our customers who feel. the new facility would be state-of-the-art meet all the latest a-d-a standards as well as environmental health. it will have a green roof and car wash reclamation system to keep it as green as possible. i personally attended some of the community meetings and listened to concerns about the car wash and i wanted to stress the fact the car wash is an ancillary business. our primary business is to fuel the motoring public. the way we do that is -- or sorry, the price of our car wash is predicated on the gas purchases.

i wanted to kind of stress the fact that we do primary reason for being there is to sell gas. in our experience customers don't come just to our location for a car wash. they come from gas and we try to get them to get a car wash or [speaker not understood]. we really need this car wash to keep our site justifiably financially speaking. we don't want our location to be another one of those locations that gets sold for price or a developer to build a high-rise condo on t. we are gas station owners and operators and we believe in the location with would like to keep it as a gas station. [speaker not understood], i'm prepared to answer any questions. >> okay. thank you. opening up for public comment. >> there is an organized opposition to this. >> so, we'll call that organized group first and open

it up to individual public comment. and this organized group has 15 minutes. hello, my name is [speaker not understood], i'm the vice president of the mid sunset neighborhood association and i appreciate having a chance to speak today. i'd like to start off by saying as an organization, we have a large number of our members here today. we are not against new merchants. we are not against car washes. we are not against capitalism. what we are concerned about because we live and breathe and we have our children in this neighborhood, is our concerned about j., we're concerned about quality of life. and these are three issues, when you heard all of us, we

will address. in order for you to kind of have to listen to no repetition, each of us will discuss one particular issue. but i want to say before i start that we had looked forward to a partnership and we are concerned and would like modifications to this project. but there isn't much trust that we have with the organization that just presented. for instance, i just heard them say that they have two community meeting and nobody showed up. well, nobody showed up because we didn't know about it. in fact, you know that this was supposed to be brought up at this commission in may and doug vu requested that it be postponed because we found out about it five days before the commission meeting from a neighbor who knew one of the commissioners who said, do you know this is coming up? so, we're very concerned about the fact that we haven't been

notified and that's on purpose so that we don't have time to reflect and to prepare. and certainly appreciate that the initial meeting was postponed a month so we could prepare. so, now on to the topic. my topic is the foundation of this. the foundation of this proposal is based on a noise study and a traffic study which they were required to do and justifiably and they did do a noise study and they did do a traffic study which i'm sure you have and i have. my point is both of those studies are flawed. if that's the foundation, then the foundation for the proposal is cracked. let's start with the noise study because noise is something i know about. i am a professor at san francisco state. for the past 20 years i have taught students who have become pathologists and audiologists. sound levels and noise, what

happens to our ears is something i know about. the american speech and hearing thoughtv along with the american medical society, indicate the conversational level of speech which is what we should all be aiming for in terms of the hair cells within our inner ear, is 65 decibels. ~ the noise study indicated the conversational speech is 65 decibels. i really don't know where the got that from. and that the noise at 100 feet would not exceed 67.5 decibels. on the surface if you don't know about decibels, you say, what's 12 decibels, it's a logarithmic scale like the richter scale. conversational speech and [speaker not understood], is 12-1/2 times louder. that's loud. and it's not just loud from

9:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. when many people aren't in their homes because there are homes and apartments all around on two sides this proposed project, it would be loud 16 hours a day because it is 15 hours a day 7 days a week that the proposal for this car wash has been made. so, i am concerned about the effects of that on here. the second study was the traffic study study was done in september 2011 and november 2011. i'm not quite sure why one was done eight weeks after the other. but the november 2011 traffic study, now 19 old said the comparisons could only be 1150 [speaker not understood]. since school is out, i have

been to that street and done my own traffic study. i have been there 10 times. i have measured and counted and measured and counted and measured and counted. what i would like to do i think you have a letter from the association in your portfolio so you can just listen because it's all indicated there. i'd like to tell you the difference between mission and lincoln way because i don't think they're comparable at all. mission street, there are 40 feet between the convenience store and the pump. lincoln way, 11 feet between the proposed convenience store and the pump, all of which might be used for a queue for cars waiting for the car wash. mission street, 50 feet between the pumps and the parking spaces that they have for people who wish to park. lincoln way, 30 feet north and south of the pump. but these are where the entrances are ferment they're on 19th avenue and lincoln way. mission street, six parking

places plus one for the disabled. lincoln way proposal, one, just one for the disabled. mission street is on a diagonal san jose and mission on either side and they are relatively quiet at this point in the city, other other points they're congestioned. lincoln way, a state highway, and lincoln way a main artery. there were no pedestrians walking near the gas station the 10 times i was there. lincoln way, multiple pedestrians because there are sick bus stops, three on 19th, three on lincoln way. there is the golden gate park. there is a church across the street. there are major corridors of business. and there is jefferson elementary school with 475 children going to school every day from the middle of august to the end of may.

mission street, one bus line on mission and one tram on san jose, but no stops made after the actual gas station. lincoln way three buses on 19th, three buses on lincoln way. mission street, convenience store relatively small and this proposal would be to triple the size of the current convenience store from 8 hub to 2400 square feet. mission street, the proposal here, multiple apartment buildings and homes. at least 8 apartments overlook the gas station. it takes 6 minutes 42 seconds according to the traffic study. this is most disturbing because i asked for this information in writing and orally from the prospect sponsors and they have not [speaker not understood]. they have changed the car wash since the time of the traffic study from the original now there will be three

possibilities of car washes, one three minutes, one four minutes. that's just the time clamping the car in for the wash. it does not include getting into the clamp, getting out. plus there are three methods of payment which means there are nine new variables. none of which can be used on the traffic street. [speaker not understood]. anything more than that would spill over into the sidewalk on 19th avenue. well, 10 times i was there, the average, averaging them all together, we found that the number of cars waiting for car wash on mission street, and this is all in the last four weeks since school let out because i didn't have any time before that, were 9.5 cars at any one time. this traffic study but [speaker not understood].

lincoln and 19th is a very unique, very busy major artery. and what we're saying is the study is irrelevant. it's invalid, and, therefore, the project which is based on it is invalid. thank you. good afternoon, planning commission. my name is angela tipper. i'm a small business owner and president of the outer sunset merchant and professional association representing over 120 businesses between 19th and 27th avenues along irving street one block away from the proposed site. i know that you have to consider the facts versus feelings in this proposed intensification of use. and i hope you will consider the following as i ask you for an intensification reduction and deny additional permitting [speaker not understood]. the vast majority of businesses in our corridor are family owned and operated.

these people work 60 to 80 hours a week trying to get back. ~ get by. residents cannot afford to be here. there are convenience stores and delis [speaker not understood]. a sizeable 2369 square-foot competitor which literally dwarfs the small businesses in our neighborhood. struggling small businesses goal will be heavily impacted by the addition of the convenience store. long-standing mom and pop shop and other customers by name [speaker not understood]. the car wash optimistically maybe shifts their revenue up in the low double digit somewhere between 10 and if that's the car wash where are the millions of dollars being spent on the high powered

consultants [speaker not understood]? why is this money being invested, a relatively small amount of money? answer being, it isn't. it is therefore going to have to come from the convenience store. so, despite the assurances to the merchant association, the small businesses will not be heavily impacted. that's not the case if you do some very simple p-r somewhere between 06 and 100 gas stations depending on the source you use and they get paid to operate over 100 more stations furl. [speaker not understood] or oslo i in their forecasting or operation. they aren't going to invest in $2,000,000 without an expectation something behind a 10% bump in revenue. this is important because it means that revenue has to come from the convenience store which means it will pull it

away from the local small merchants. au energies is a very large company. they may be family owned, about 65000 known and operated is nowhere near small. levi straus's family, it's a multinational multi-billion dollar operation. they are neither forthcoming about their business side nor providing information study and project status they agreed to when they first met with us in 2007 this did you not a warm feeling. at least they did assure us property owners who do business into traffic lands, [speaker not understood], commuters will have to suffer the situation and bear the onus of pushing through the remedy process. a remedy process which was used at the gas station on bell and

divisadero with pretty dismal results. parking places eliminated and still the lines for that gas station leak into the heavily traffic lane of [speaker not understood] street every day. while the vending is 17 59 lincoln it is moderate density. boardering truth is high density. [speaker not understood]. 19th avenue is a highway, a major thoroughfare. it is much more congested during those numerous weekends per year that other parkses are closed because of walk a toctionvs, marathons and concepts. this is not included in your track study. 4 to 6 bus lines lie between the gas station. the sfm will try to ease congestion and increase safety.

i have given you that information in a letter in your packet. the design of this project is in direct constudy. virtually ensuring parking issues [speaker not understood], and cars lined up waiting for the car washes. it is a perfect storm of road rage to come, honking horns to create issues with local residents. traffic city notes it's [speaker not understood] and fails to mention they have two additional longer car wash options as well. the city legislation that was passed to allow a project such as this serve the gas owners have to make [speaker not understood]. interesting the staff would recommend approving this because it would be a hardship for the neighborhood.

[speaker not understood] and four gas stationses within four blocks. not having a car within 2-1/2 miles hardly constitutes a hardship. my question is do they have the right to increase their revenue, our quality of life for all the local residents, small businesses and computers. good afternoon, commissioners. my name is doreen silk and i'm a member of the [speaker not understood] neighborhood association. i want to show you at the conclusion of the traffic queuing studies -- >> i'm sorry, the organized opposition time has expired. oh, no more can be read? can i leave this with you, then? >> you can leave that with us. okay. >> the rule is --

[multiple voices] yes, i'm one of them. >> so, just to clarify, and jonas correct me if i'm wrong. if there is a neighborhood organization of some sort, collectively you can request a block of 15 minutes, which you did and that was granted. thereby, anyone who is a member of that organized group association neighborhood group whatever is not allowed to speak at public comment. someone outside of the group can. is that correct? >> not exactly, commissioner fong. the rule specifies the organized opposition has to have a minimum of three speakers, okay, during that 15 period of time. it doesn't actually preclude members of the organization to

speak. my understanding is that these two people are part of that organized opposition presentation, okay. they provide at the merchant's association some of their time because they expect it had to go over. that 15 minute block of time is now expired. that's right, right. >> okay. so, the ladies who have been standing over on the side can have three minutes at the regular public comment period. there would be nothing to prohibit them from doing that. but when she introduced herself as part of the mid sunset neighborhood organization, that's what prompted me they were part of that organized opposition that requested the 15 minutes. >> okay. so, i do have some speaker cards and i'll call them. angela tickler. sam debit.

tess barberin. judy tomsik. [speaker not understood]. if you're ready, come on up. now you know my name. i just wanted to show you at the conclusion of the traffic study significantly [speaker not understood] the proposed project. i quote from page 3 of paragraph 4 of the aforementioned study. due to the congestion of 19th avenue and weekend peak hours, the approach is highly suggested. on the signal address, dee spied these cues what typically free of [speaker not understood]. the entire basis for the project is to increase visits to the site which is primarily a last resort before crossing

the golden gate on 19th avenue, a california state highway. enhancing the current station's attractiveness here with a car rush on a busy route and adding a [speaker not understood] hence, more vehicles with intensification of usage. the narrow right hand last are extremely [speaker not understood] vehicles attempting to pull around the obstruction of pedestrians walking between queued vehicles. the adverse consequences of congestion impaired maneuver ability on the drawing cannot be ignored. according to admin 64 inches wide and 15 feet 9 in length. moving a consumer vehicle prior to obtaining car wash would be to back up and merge into the southern wash queue or attempt to make a u-turn in the pump

aisle area [speaker not understood] bordering the convenience store that could easily be parked by store customers and unable to find available parking and bunn handicap space. it may necessitate the q-1 parking. [speaker not understood]. it seems that most feasible methods for obtaining a car wash or gassing up would be a station on the northern driveway on lincoln, go around the block pass the library school on irving and making a right turn on northbound 19th to rea preach the queuing lane for the car wash. a bus from one to three lines are not blocking the lanes. thank you. my name is denise daly and

i live in the area. my concern is with the scope of this project and the effect it will have on drivers and pedestrians. this busy intersection will become more congested and dangerous. this site has unique problems. 19th avenue is one of the busiest streets in san francisco. lincoln way is also a busy street running parallel to the golden gate park. on a good day buses drop off passengers in front of the station driveway and back up the curve. when there was an event in the park, a problem occurred to me. with the size of the proposed convenient store, look of space for cars to maneuver around the site. they stated people will only use it [speaker not understood]. please give drivers more room so they won't get caught in the queue unable to move. this will create irritated and

frustrated drivers. i don't live next to the station, but i do live nearby on 26th avenue. 19th avenue is already difficult for pedestrians and lincoln way is also a problem. i am very sensitive to this because my husband was killed by a hit and run driver when crossing the street on lincoln way a few blocks from the proposed site. i don't want anyone else to suffer this tragedy. our city is one of the most dangerous in the city for pedestrians. we need to anticipate problems and ensure our streets are made as safe as possible. it has been stated in the paper numerous times that this city is looking for ways to improve [speaker not understood]. i'm asking that the project be scaled down. this could be one step in that direction. this would still benefit the owners as well as our community. thank you.

hi, my name is [speaker not understood]. i used to own a business on 19th avenue for 27 years. i know 19th avenue like i know my name. i used to have [speaker not understood] on the corner of 19th and [speaker not understood] which has a green zone and yellow zone on the side. even that was not enough parking for my customers, for my vendors for delivery. even the size on [speaker not understood] avenue square foot, new operation it's going to be 2,100 square feet. one is not enough, therefore, the customers -- i think you must choose the size of mini

market [speaker not understood]. if you notice 19th are avenue are double fines for moving violation, it's because everybody speed on 19th avenue. i see so many accidents in my life on 19th avenue. i've seen so many people get hit by a car. we'd like to see the situation on 19ing avenue and lincoln if we have a back up [speaker not understood] people get upset and get angry and speed through that area. i think that's it. thank you. >> thank you. let me call a few more names f. your name has already been called, please approach the podium. ~ christin flokin. [speaker not understood] yip. hugo cerna. hello, my name is [speaker not understood] and i'm a fifth generation san franciscan which i believe at this point makes me entitled and selfish. and, so, i am going to s