so that you can -- so it can the back up your development proposal is very strange to me. so i also think that building a 300-foot-tall tower is going to reduce the significance of the iconic 270-foot stack. i fully think that we should insist at this point that we retain the historic buildings. definitely station a. but the smaller buildings at this point, when you figure it into the whole development proposal, it's really not a big deal for them to restore it and incorporate it into the project. i think that the project is completely overdeveloped. i don't know where they're getting the idea that this is ok. i think it is throwing it out and thinking, well, if we put out 300 or couple of 300-foot towers, maybe we'll get one. maybe we'll get a couple, 150. meantime, pier 70 has worked with the 70-foot height and

that the community worked with. yeah. i have not been able to really get past, you know, step one with the developer as far as talking about the historic buildings. and that is where i am on that. i think somebody needs to see a pro forma and see how much money they plan on making on this project because i think they can make money on the project and still keep it within a reasonable height and density that will be more true to the historic district and that area of the city. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker, please. >> hi, i'm mark dwight. a resident and business owner in dog patch and founding board member of the dog patch business association. i think in any community, you are not going to find unanimous kind of thoughts about any big project like this and obviously we have a lot of sentimenttal

appreciation in dog patch for our historic buildings. that being said, you know, this is -- these are modern times and the economics of these kinds of projects are difficult. and i think that there will be some practical limitations to what can be preserved on this site. and i will say that i've actually been pretty impressed with the outreach efforts of the sponsor and there have been lots of meetings and lots of discussions and those are ongoing. and i'm confident that we will continue those discussions and try to reach something that at least meets general approval of a dominant portion of the community that is affected by it. as has been said today, many of these buildings are hidden from view. and so our sentimentality is really driven by going to see them now. we can't see them otherwise. we go on -- the site has never been accessible until recently. we all see the stack, which is iconic, as are the cranes in

dog patch. if two things define dog patch, it is the stack and the cranes and clearly unit three is also a dominant structure. if they can make something useful out of that, be at a hotel or something, i think it is fantastic. i've toured the facility and have been to the top and used the spectacular of the east bay and the south. i'm confident that we can move forward. i don't necessarily think practically speaking that total preservation of all those structures is going to be financially feasible for the sponsor and so maybe the proformas will bear that out. i'm supportive of their efforts so far and look forward to a positive outcome. >> thank you. any other member of the public wish to speak on this matter? please come forward. seeing and hearing none, we'll close public comment. commissioners, our role today is to review and comment on the e.i.r., toed a dress whether we felt it adequately recognized and addressed the historic resource on the site and to comment on whether the

alternatives are reasonable alternatives that address the different ways to preserve historic resources. a general kind of roll here today. any initial comments? >> i have one basic question, which i think will help. at least clarify what we're about here. with all deference to the very good comments from the public, we are here to comment on the draft e.i.r. and these presentational alternatives because these will be in the e.i.r. so i want to make sure everyone understands we're talking about preservation in various forms. so, or ideas. and concepts. but my question relates to our architectural review committee and i was there that day and i wonder if either the

representative from perkins will or ms. vanderslice could review what has been changed or what was done in the alternative -- >> to the alternative. >> since thele a tern tiffs because one of our big comments was please incorporate the total amount of architectural features and historic buildings into the alternatives and we were quite emphatic about that. as i recall. >> ms. vanderslice, is it possible you can walk us through the difference between -- >> i was looking for my copy of the [inaudible] right away. so, thank you. because i know you've done some work on this since the committee. yeah. >> so, we presented, i think, one full preservation alternative and then multiple partial preservation alternatives to the a.r.c. one of the main comments we got back, particularly from commissioner highland was that he wanted a full preservation

alternative that rehabilitated all of the resource on the site, but also was similar to the current proposed project in regard to development potential. and so the way that we did that is that the full preservation alternative c now preserves all of the buildings and also keeps the same amount of residential development the same amount of square footage and -- but also to do that, we had to add additional height. so that's mainly how we addressed that and i believe the other comment we got from a.r.c. had to do with just adding a little bit more detail about how the facade alternative would work. so, we did -- you wanted a little bit more detail on just what that would look like. so, some of that more information is in the draft e.i.r. and alternative section. >> not necessarily adding additional height. there's nothing taller than 300

feet, but just additional -- >> there is additional buildings -- >> there's two 300-foot buildings and one that is 240 feet instead of 180 feet. >> right. yeah. nothing goes above 300 feet which we thought was important because we didn't want anything taller than the stacks. so we wanted to have that. and continue forward. >> and 125 is now 240. so, you sort of dense fied the other areas to take up the loss of the area that the historic resources are located in. >> exactly. yeah. we wanted to show basically if you were to preserve all the buildings what the changes would be if you wanded to keep the same development program and then the alternative programs address how we save portions of the buildings or individual resources and along with -- or rehabilitation of the stack and retain unit three and then show sort of what would be reduced. and so each one of those does reduce slightly the development program. >> great. thank you. does that answer your question? >> yeah. thank you. >> thank you very much. commissioner pearlman?

>> thank you very much. this is an awesome project in the true term of the word "awesome." the first thing you said was that you hadn't received any letters about historic resources. and we received two e-mails yesterday from mr. minot and ms. heath. >> i'm sorry. i may not have stated that clearly. i said you received two letters yesterday. >> i thought you -- >> and did not receive any addition until comments. >> ok. thank you. that's good. thank you. ok. yeah. i have a lot of concerns about this relative to the historic resources because i shared the concern that mr. bueller stated about a complete lack of consideration about the historic about this in the proposed scale of the project and the notion of trade-off since this

will be seeking to get some height relief to permit this seems like a reasonable exchange that, for preservation, that there is some relief from the height limit. and, again, we're not -- we can't talk about that, but the alternatives do talk about that. i found that i was appreciative of the alternative c because i remember talking about that and that one comes in at approximately 99% of what the proposed project is. and it is hard to imagine 300-foot towers there. but if you can imagine one, you can imagine two. so i don't know if that is the only alternative. as an architect and designer, i'm sure there are other ways to lay this out. but i think that is an

incredibly reasonable potential exchange. mr. epler talked about concerns only about the financial aspects of the project. but as we know, from the history of historic preservation, the financial issues are not necessarily in conflict with the retention of historic resource and you can see it quite clear at pier 70. it couldn't be financially successful, pier 70, those buildings which i've now had the opportunity to walk through, are remarkable. they're really fantastic buildings that have been saved. obviously those were not as deteriorated condition as the ones here. but in terms of -- someone just mentioned the percentage, the scale of the buildings, the historic buildings in particular the meter house and the compressor house, relative to 5.4 million square feet of development, it seems a drop in the bucket to ask that those be saved which would be alternative

s that would save at least those two buildings and the other piece i thought was that a marrying of alternative f.n.g. in relation to station a with building inside of it to preserve the facade and as a way to create -- i'm the one that mr. huey referred to. i used to live in the same building as he does on 23rd street in dog patch and used to look down the street and not only did i see the stack, but station a is incredibly big and important and i think iconic as well. certainly the facade of it -- i understand, i walked through the buildings and i know they're in horrendously bad condition. but the notion of alternative g where you build a building inside a building. so, somehow you are able to retain, you know, the form of the building and then the new

building is set back beyond that. so you still have the presence of that building, i think, is a very good idea. i think the problem with alternative g relative to the meter house and the compressor house is the small little chunk of office that they want to put on top of that would completely overwhelm those smaller buildings. in terms of preservation, i don't think that would meet the secretary's standards of approach. the idea of marrying f.n.g. so we retain portions of facades of station a and fully retain the meter house and compressor house would be a way to, you know, get this project to do both. and i think that is the bottom line. i think that is all anybody's asking for is that, you know, is there a way to retain some sense of -- i think by taking all of these buildings away,

you might as well not document it because there will be -- you know, no one will really understand it. i agree. someone talked about the mitigation measures seemed like a weak approach. a video of some old buildings is not something anyone is going to ever see. it will be in a presentation somewhere in the middle of a complex and virtually no one will see it. and that is a pretty small and just a kind of pathetic solution to mitigate some loss of some, you know, major part of this area, of the dog patch area. i think those are my comments. so i appreciate alternative c. i think it would be valuable to recommend at least in our letter that, you know, in our comments that some trade-off is

, you know, seems like a reasonable thing for the planning commission to consider between square footage and the reception of historic fabric in this area. thank you. >> thank you. just one quick question for staff. in the proposed project in this diagram, it sayses that the unit three is retained but i thought in the description there was some discussion about whether it may or may not be retained. it was sort of very ambiguous. i mean, are we getting this? or are we maybe not getting that? >> the proposed spronlts that unit three may or may not be retained. when we did the impact , we assume it would not be. there is effort to do that, but for the e.i.r. and for the historic resource impact, we assumed no. so, the only building that is

being kept is the stack. >> ok. thank you. commissioner black. >> i agree it is an awesome project in terms of its scope and scale. it is an awesome opportunity site. the views, etc., are going to be amazing. one of the things that makes it so frustrating is our limited abilities to comment. i want to jump in as a planner and talk about a whole bunch of competing objectives anja really because -- >> you can make public comment at the planning commission hearings. [laughter] >> exactly. exactly. one of the things that really struck me is a number of people have commented on visibility of things at this site. and the stack and unit a are

visible from dog patch and other neighborhoods beyond. at the end of the day, when this development is under way and completed, it is not going to be what's viz frbl afar. it is going to be at the street level. so, my concern from a historical standpoint, given that's what we get to comment on is that there needs to be something at the street level that defines what used to be here. not just the stack. there's more to the site than just stall structures. i really get it that there is a tug and a pull here. there are some huge costs of preserving and reusing some of these structures. many are really not in good shape and i understand that there is economic issues looking at the phasing of the promise. even though we don't have a pro forma, the housing comes at the

end. so clearly there is a thrust for the functions of use that are going to pay off early enough to support the costs of building the other stuff. so i do think that it could be complicated from a financial standpoint. i also agree with the comment that alternative c is intriguing. i see a number of the alternatives, though, as working well. i just wanted more than anything to make the comment about how the site will be looked frat a historical stand point. it will be looked at from the street and not from afar. >> i'm going to just jump in one second since you stated that so elegantly. i think that comment is a really important one because i look at the two diagrams of the

proposed projects and alternative c and i think about what that experience is going to be like walk along this humboldt street and you have basically mission bay -- with all due respect to ms. hall and her design presentation, but the scale of thee buildings are going to be like mission bay in that each block is occupied by a giant building. it's not the grain of san francisco. it is mission bay. you've got sort of six blocks, three, four, five, six. and then finally you arrive at this repurposed unit three which we may or may not get. we have the character of mission bay when i look at that. and then if i look at this alternative c, you come in and then you've got a few new buildings and you have this great sort of historic character of the older buildings and then you have a series of new buildings and then the station house at the end. unit three at the end. excuse me. so it seems like there is a big difference in the character from the street of what the experience is and that is what

the experience will be, because as commissioner black stated, this isn't going to be fight and feud from afar anymore, you will be in it. you will be in the minute of it. commissioner johns? >> thank you. just a couple of things. number one, several people have commented that some of these buildings aren't visible, haven't been visible. but, of course, if they're preserved, they will be visible. i think that -- i kind of got the impression that the thrust of some of those comments wass that if they had not been visible in the past or the public hadn't been able to go there, they were of very much less importance if, indeed, they were important at all. and i don't think that because a building historically was not open to the public or couldn't be seen by the public, it is

not a matter of historical interest. is fallacious. so i would just like to -- want to make that comment. further, i do think that the comments that have been made by the last three commissioners to speak really encompassed everything that i wanted to say and did it somewhat better. i do think that alternative c makes a lot of sense. but fundamentally, i think going back to what you said, mr. president, at the beginning, i think that the -- this proposed e.i.r. meets all those criteria and has focused our attention on the issues and it presents a number of, i think, reasonable -- although debatable -- solutions for these issues. so i would be in favor of

making those comments to the board of supervisors and the decision is theirs. >> thank you. commissioner? >> i wanted to add a couple more comments after we clarified that c brings up most of what we -- we're talking about at a.r.c. and i think f&g, too. you made some good comments about that, commissioner pearlman. i think what is even more significant for me as a cultural landscapist is the fact that this is an area of san francisco that is really unknown to the public. and, yes, i agree with the previous comments that the public will be inside it now for the first time ever. and to -- so i think we should do our darndest to bring up as

much emphasis and strength on helping the citizens and the region and anyone that comes on to the site to know really what -- how the city evolved here. and so i want to even emphasize more strongly. i think c is ok. i mean, it -- you know, it does a pretty good job. i think the -- i'd like the know more about how the design controls fit into this. we did talk about what's the hub at one point and i went out on the site and talked about what the hub might look niek. as far as the site character and what could be done with portions of some of the buildings there. i mean, that would also be

interesting. but i really want to see more, if we could somehow make some general comments about the e.i.r. that the proposed project, as it stands, without one of these alternatives does not go. does not work. period. and how we can further and focus on c as being what we would like the see happen. and i'm interested as well in having us see the linkage between the third street historical district and the union iron works. and that is really amazing and would like to see more about the -- what are the links. what are the connections. what are the aspects of the landscape and the architectural ideas and saving some of these buildings relate to the union iron works. so, i think the linkage and the

connection there, i don't know whether i'm making myself too clear. i think that is important. >> i would like to commend the staff and sponsor and everybody who worked on this e.i.r. for presenting this material kevin o'learily. personally the alternative dos a good job of addressing a complex problem, complex project with a lot of different factors. and we have more preservation alternatives that than we ever had in a project. and there are a lot of things you're thinking about so i just want to thank everybody who worked on it for the clarity. [please stand by]

>> any other comments from staff we ? do we need a motion on that? >> we are just review and comment. >> anything i missed that we should put in our letter? >> know , you did a good job.

>> thank you. >> we can move to the next item. >> very good. replacement of public toilet and kiosk. certificate of appropriateness and permit to authorize. >> good afternoon. i am with department staff. project before you is a request or certificates of appropriateness and permit to alter for the proposed replacement of the existing non historic public toilets and kiosk located within the boundaries of article ten and 11 landmarks and districts as outlining your packets. the proposal is reviewed by this commission at a joint hearing with the civic design review committee of the arts commission in july of this year. the sponsor has revised proposal to address the recommendations provided at this hearing which include a more rounded version of kiosks and more pronounced curbs -- curves in the toilets.

treatment of the roof, more interactive components and programming in the structures and materials that would be scratch resistant and would reduce glare. a copy of the meeting notes is included in your packet. most recently the project was reviewed by the civic design review committee in september. the committee approved phase one and two of the project contingent upon aligning the small kiosk designed to be in the same design family as the other kiosk and providing alternative stainless steel patterns for the preferred option if it is not a viable option. the design presented today by the sponsor is modified and the version included in your packet as a response to the approval by the civic design review committee. following the publication of packets capped the department has been made aware of opposition from the working group and dwellers for the proposed replacement of public toilets at the location.

if the commission would like to facilitate continued discussion between the sponsor and the north beach neighborhood groups, than the commission may approve the other locations and continue the project at the location to a future hearing date. a copy of the public comment and review committee meeting notes and environmental analysis is provided for you today. the department believes the design addresses the recommendations provided by the h.p.c. and the civic design review committee of the arts commission and meets the secretary standards. the department staff recommends approval with conditions. including a request for the project sponsor to submit a materials board to staff to verify the final material choice and finish and they should provide final mockup and shot findings to staff for review prior to commencement of construction. the project sponsor team has prepared a more detailed presentation.

i would like to introduce lisa from public works. i'm available for any questions and this concludes my presentation. >> thank you. >> good afternoon, commissioners my name is lisa. i'm the project manager. i'm happy to be here today with the team provide an update of the project to you. since a joint meeting between h.p.c. and the arts commission in july, we had collected valuable comments from all of the commissioners and from there the project proceeded to review and we received phase i and phase ii approval in september with a conditional approval addressing the form of a small kiosk which we will cover shortly during the presentation. public outreach for the project is a high priority for public works. the project manager at the time conducted mass efforts involving the public and engage the community his from the beginning

and throughout the life of the project and we are happy that the project we see has wide support from the majority of the public. i will be happy to offer more information if you have any other questions. if not, i would like to introduce françois and an architect from smith group to proceed with the presentation with the updated design. >> good afternoon, commissioners we have been working diligently since we met in july and we have revised the design of the public toilet and the kiosk based on your appointments. we are presenting some of your documents and we have some latest information available to you. we are going to do a quick presentation and then we will be happy to answer any questions that you may have. >> thank you.

>> good afternoon, commissioners i am with smith group. the designer. really quickly, we will go through the toilets first and then we will look at the kiosks. this is a representation of the entire family that we are presenting today, from the left of the right is the single toilet and then the double toilet. the interactive kiosk like an a.t.m. machine. the market street kiosk and then a smaller kiosk. it is a new item that you did not see in july that we have realized that existing ones are larger than the ones that are in other parts of the city. we have had to come up with some different sized kiosks. you will see that they are of the same family and they look almost identical but there are variations that allow one to be about 9 inches smaller than the other. the one on the far right is a multifunction retail vending kiosk.

the listing at the bottom are locations of where each one of those exists within the city, within the article ten and 11 districts. the interactive kiosks and the smaller kiosks might be interchanged as they move forward on which one is more appropriate for which location. there are six toilets that are currently under article ten and article 11, as you see on the diagram on the left. they are all currently single toilets. currently the plan is possibly three of those would go in as a double toilet, mainly due to capacity issues with the usage. this is the location of the six toilets. the dark stars. and then there are, i look at my notes, 34 kiosks that are in article ten and 11. they are currently a variety of

the market street kiosks which you see at the top right with the large onion dome at the top or the middle one which is the smaller one that currently exists, not on market street. those are a variety of three sided advertising kiosks and interactive kiosks and retail kiosks. these are the locations of all of those. scattered all over the place. and then some examples of the street furnishings around the world. boston, germany, canada, paris, new york, et cetera. there is a large variety of different types of fixtures all over the world and the one that we are doing is uniquely san francisco. quickly, into the public toilet itself, this is our current design on the left of a single toilets.

the material from the bottom up is a durable concrete base for the first 12-15 inches, mainly that is because that's where gets most of the abuse. kicking, et cetera. everything beats it up right there so it will be concrete. and a finished durable base to keep that clean. above that is a stainless steel panel. i have two samples that we can pass around. the corners of these are a little sharp. don't cut yourself, please. they make up the rest of the product. these are comments that we received it from you in september. one about graffiti resistance. you notice these have a very irregular texture on them that we believe will prevents graffiti notice ability. the biggest graffiti on these items, according to 20 years of maintaining his stickers. so creating a project that is not super flat and so stickers

can be easily peeled off and cleaned. it is also not very shiny, which is another comment we heard from you last time about shininess. theriot -- they are a match color so they will not reflect images. the only reflect light. the third item that is on the screen is the perforations. at the bottom of the door we need to let a little fresh air in because there is exhausting of these toilets and we have determined that the exact same material can get perforated. it will not be a different finish or a different product, it is just the same pattern with holes in it. the shape and size are similar. he will see in the bottom left existing toilet is a dashed line and the new one is just slightly larger. and then here is a drawing of the double which does get larger but it is accommodating a single toilet and then a nona.d.a. pair to it on the opposite side. this is also a good diagram to

show. another, he made last time was about a location for literature in the article ten and 11 districts and we determined that the location of the operating panel could be replicated on the opposite side of the toilet in the exact same panel so there is a doughnut-shaped panel which has -- here is how you use a toilet and here is how to open the door. on the other side there could be the exact same panel which has literature within it that could have anything programmed by your commission to put in their of historical reference on the neighborhood, et cetera that could go into that same panel and to be maintained that way. this is another map of where the toilets are located, specifically of the six toilets.

here again -- here is where you see the panel that is the operating panel. you can imagine not being on the back side with exact same opening in the metallic finish that would have historical reference. interestingly enough, most of these toilets in those areas, the door actually faces the street side so that panel would be facing the sidewalk side. it would be accessible by the public. this is a reference to the double. there was a comment from this commission during the joint hearing and also during our phase one and two review of civic design that the metal portion of the top of this is a little flat and it wasn't as rounded as the rest of the family. we have made that adjustment although it is not reflected in this rendering. you will see it here. the top middle is a little more hourglass shaped and a little

bit more pinched so it is more voluptuous. you will also see another comment that you made in september was what does this look like from the top? we spent some time thinking about this. i know we had plants up there many moons ago. this is at the top. it incorporates bridging that matches the cladding on the exterior. the bubbles you see up there are skylight domes. we have daylight down into the toilet. it is never dark in there during the day which is a comment about -- of reasons why people don't use these. they are afraid of the lights going out. you will see on the right there is to. that is a double toilet with one on each side. and then we will go through a series of these six locations. this is the toilets that is currently in civic centre plaza.

a before and after of this. it looks larger because this is one of the locations where we will be going into a double. this is the existing fixture. this is renderings of the new fixture. this would maintain a single. so it is just slightly larger from a footprint perspective. powell and market. this is adjacent to the cable car turnaround. again, this is a double. that is why it is a little bit larger in the proposed rendering the u.n. plaza. this is just along market street at about seventh. another location for a double. it looks much wider. washington square.

in the final one at union square is in the ramp going down into the garage. on the geary street side. and then the second part here is kiosks. the family of kiosks is for kiosks. there is a small version, a regular sized version going from left to right. retail and then the interactive kiosk. c. material palette as the toilets. it is all a family. again, all a family. the dolls -- stores all open like a clamshell so they can get rendered at the advertising -- advertising on the inside but it looks seamless from the outside. we are smaller than the units that are existing on market street. we are shorter and slightly wider. and then there's a bunch of maps of where these exist.

and then a bunch of photographs of where they all exist. a little find waldo. at the end here we have an example of the market street kiosk on the left, the existing one and our proposed replacement on the right. this is the same design you saw in september this is an example of the retail kiosk and then this is an example of the interactive kiosk. the comments we got from cdr is busy interactive kiosk in the small version was to retweet flat so we rounded the edges to make them look like they are in the same family. that was comments we literally made in the last week that we revised that small version. thank you, very much the neck i have a quick question since you have that slight there. looks like in the -- and san francisco government if you can go to the monitor? in the existing kiosk, there is signage or advertising panel above.

is that not true? it seems like there is a missed opportunity there. >> we revised that this morning. there is a public service announcement advertising on that side of the interactive. on the regular advertising kiosk it is two sides in a public service on the sidewalk facing side. and we missed that that happens above the canopy. >> if you go back one slide. i think, also, there, as well. it would look better i think to have. >> it is a little bulky right now. a late realization. >> ok. thank you for your presentation. commissioners, any questions before we go to public comment? at this time we will take public comment on this matter. does any member of the public wish to speak? please come forward. >> good afternoon. my name is richard. you know me as a legacy business program manager with the office

of business that i want to make it very clear that i am speaking to you today is a san francisco resident and an urban geographer not as a city employee. i'm here today because i want to challenge your philosophy with regard to copying historic architectural styles, which is generally not allowed by planners and historians. on page 10 of the addendum to the negative declaration is a statement that says existing structures falsely evoke a historic aesthetic. they do not falsely evoke anything. the wording on page 9 is better. the existing public toilets and kiosks were designed in the turn-of-the-century -- turn of the 20th century style. there is a huge difference and i want to take this opportunity to explain the difference and why it is important. coaching quoting alan davies in a 2012 article, there is something about tradition that people like. it is not just history.

they are drawn to qualities like complexity intimate scale, detail, richness, elaboration and nonabstract meaning. why can't new buildings and streetscapes be in historic styles can't even sluggishly historic ones? most people really, really, like them. san francisco city hall is a perfect example. this gorgeous building that we are sitting in which opened in 1915 was designed in a neoclassical style. neoclassical architecture is an architectural style that began in the mid-18th century and is derived from the architectural -- architecture of classical antiquity. in other words, it is a copy of an older style. the dome was city hall is in the same style of a church and from paris. with san francisco she was san francisco city hall falsely evoking a historic static? should be destroyed the building and replace it with something modern? absolutely not. yet if someone tried to build city hall today, planners and historians but absolutely not

allow it. if someone was to build something in the turn of the 20 th century style, he would call it a false revocation of an historic static and say no. that to me is a travesty. as long as a structure we are building is constructed well with top quality materials and craftsmanship, we should embrace it even if it is a copy of an older style. if you like to replace existing public toilets and kiosks with different design, that is fine. but if you want to replace public toilets and kiosks with a different design using argument that the structure is falsely evoking a historic aesthetic and are therefore not worthy of preservation, that is not ok. besides, how our structure supposed to become historic if we keep destroying them and replacing them with things that are more current. if in the 1950s we destroyed all the art deco buildings from the 1930s because they were only 20 years old at the time, we would have no art deco buildings today. thank you for me allowing to challenge your philosophy about designing structures in older styles. >> thank you. >> does any other member of the

public wish to comment on this item? seeing none and hearing no other public comment, i will close public comment. >> thank you. i really appreciate what you are saying. i have made that argument about postmodern architecture which is only 20 or 30 years old. we are destroying it all. i think your argument is well taken. i did have a question for the architect about when we last talked about these, one of your expressed design desires was about the panels being reversible so therefore you would eliminate lots of inventory for panels. now what you are suggesting is that the upper panels are more curved than the lower panels. so therefore that doesn't quite work anymore. my understanding that correctly? >> partially.

it is just the middle of the sides that will have a different wall on the top and bottom of the ends of the units will still be reversible. one of the reasons i asked the question is because i thought your photographs and your renderings were very good. because i saw this one and i was shocked at how tall and how big the new one is relative to the old one. and wondering why it has to be so tall. i remember last time we had the conversation because while we are making these panels that can flip up and down and therefore we are creating this good thing for efficiency. by a design stroke, we have eliminated that and i mean, i am shocked because you have the same people standing there. it really shows how much bigger they are. the other question related to this one, in particular, because these are the double ones, is

there really a necessity for the double ones create the double ones are so substantially bigger than the single ones. when you show the pictures like at union square or at washington square, and those are the single ones that are getting replaced, they are not nearly as impactful as these. and then i really question at the civic centre all of a sudden , you are getting a huge blockage of the building behind and to the new café that is there that will be blocked by it i understand it on the civic centre because there are a lot of people there. but somehow, i don't know. i just know you probably have done studies and their reasons why that there's more people therefore you have doubles, i mean, it seems enormous to me. in terms of its historic placement in historic locations, it is substantially -- substantially impactful.

i am wondering if there's any way to make it shorter. obviously the height of people haven't changed and the height of the bathroom is the same. so there's a lot of dead space up there. it is very tall. and number 2, i love the design overall. i think all of that is great. i love the materials you have suggested and the concrete base with a stainless steel. it is great. and all of those things, providing a place for some historic dialogue poster or something is also really incredible. >> they are only 13 feet tall if i am reading this right not 13 feet outside on the street is not tall. >> they are actually only 12 and a half. >> thirteen includes a foundation. >> you are right. they are 12 feet space which i think about outside is something that is 12 and six is not -- i know you're looking at the renderings, with something that is 12 and six is not --

>> in these renderings, it would save the existing ones are eight and a half or 9 feet tall. >> then your renderings are nowhere near accurate. >> quite possibly. >> at least in this united nations plaza rendering, it looks substantially bigger. if that is the case, if you're only going up 3 feet, it looks like 60% or 70% bigger. >> it might be a rendering scale issue. >> it is important to get approval because it shows up on all of the pictures. it seems substantially bigger. >> thank you. >> i had exactly the same reaction. somehow i felt like i had just awakened to the size of this. especially the double units. i like this material. i wonder, has this been used for any length of time in another

similar application? >> , yes. we have used multiple designs of that manufacturing company. >> is that particular sample the same? >> yes. working with very similar materials and we have to generate how it will work exactly with venting. but for maintenance purposes, we like it a lot based on experience. this is a really good project. is more expensive to invest but on the long term it is a good investment. >> ok. that is one of my concerns. may be -- when we have the joint meeting, the prime material looked like it could be as easily scratched as my macbook. thank you.

something else i was struck by is these renderings show -- i don't have concern at all about the kiosks. the renderings show the toilets, especially the double toilets, they are shown here being sort of darker and i thought that was somehow a material that we were going to end up it with. and of course, you brought the sample today. i would be interested to hear the other commissioner his comments on preference in terms of that sample versus this elevation and this rendering that shows what appears to be darker units. i think part of the reason that some of us are struck by how much bigger these look from the existing structures is the existing structures are darker and because those are bigger and

bulkier, i think they will be really highly visible and i be interested to hear what comments about using the same material but just in a darker finish. >> that material will reflect the light around it. it is not reflective but it is reflective of light. it will dematerialize it a little bit in the sense that it will reflect the sky and provided light. >> you seem to be as concerned as i am. fair enough. >> that is just my two cents. >> could i address really quickly pick what we found is the renderings, it is a little bit of what the background has, which changes your perception of the color on it. in the computer, it is the exact same material that is getting rendered. depending on the brightness of the background montage photograph, it changes our perception and makes it darker or lighter.

we have struggled with trying to get it to render correctly. and then the material that we passed around here is not finished. it is just stainless steel and flat. we went through, do you coat it or do you do all this other stuff and then it defeats -- defeats it being graffiti resistant if it can just be refinished. >> you can consider the way it is picking up the wedge right now. it looks almost like would. it is kind of interesting. >> i can see that. thank you. >> thank you. here i am concurring in part and dissenting in part. and the concurrence first is you said commissioner, pullman -- commissioner commissioner pullman, you had comments about prior comments concerning historic styles that you made. i agree with what you said and i agree with what you said. i am never open-ended by the

reworking of historic styles. so that is the concurrence. as to the dissent, if i understood your comments correctly, you wondered why there had to be so many toilets were so many double toilets. >> i have observed that in san francisco currently. there are a great many full bladders. [laughter] and that, to me is complete justification. i'm sure there's lots of ideas on that. >> i think it was more of -- [laughter] >> remember, we are here to determine whether we feel these are compatible with the location they are in in the historic district. i would like to make one comment for the record relative to the opposition we received from the telethon hill dwellers about the

structure in front of cory tower i was just walking by corey tower recently and i looked up and i thought well, it is a sleek and modern looking tower in which one of these toilets will be completely compatible with the streamlined designs of the corey tower. so i do not have a concern. if there is any location where these toilets are appropriate, it is probably that one, more than any because of the character of corey tower being so streamlined and simple and modern. so i think i would like to entertain a motion. do we have a motion? >> i will move the staff recommendation to approve the use with the modified texture. >> i believe the texture is in the staff report. >> it was the map that texture is already in the report. >> i would move the staff recommendation to approve it. >> i second that. >> thank you. >> if there is nothing further commissioner his, there is a motion to approve or certificate

of appropriateness and permit to author with conditions. on that motion? [roll call] so moved. that motion passes unanimously. commissioners, that places us on item eight, for landmark designation on union street. >> good afternoon, commissioners shannon ferguson from planning staff. i'm here to present our recommendation regarding landmark designation of the

former paper doll bar located at 524 union street in north beach. the department received a community sponsored landmark designation from the property owner. the final draft of the designation report was submitted by the property owner to the department department in august, 2018. commissioners conducted a site might visit on september 5th at the hbc initiated designation the same day. the paper doll bar is significant as one of the earliest gay bars. it has helped contribute to the development of lgbtq communities in san francisco. it is also significant for its association with an individual. as the owner paper doll, he became one of the person just one of the people on the front lines for the fight for lgbtq civil rights in san francisco in the 1950s. i wanted to note that the period of significance has been updated following receipt of new information. it is now 1947 to 1961 and this reflects the date that mona sargent took over management of

the paper doll and turned it into a gay bar and ends with the date that dante sold the paper doll. i also want to mention a property owner has an easement on the adjacent alley. alumni designation does include just the building. it would not include the alley and we have updated the ordinance to reflect, to clarify this. i have updated copies here. there are also character defining interior spaces and features. these include the front dining room and l-shaped rear dining room. the long bar and back bar. the fireplace and heavy timber support posts. these spaces are eligible for designation because they were historically publicly accessible designation of the paper doll also meets the three historic preservation commission pack three of the four priorities for designation, including designation of underrepresented landmark property types as are

only three other landmarks associated with lgbtq heritage. designations of buildings and underrepresented areas. there are only three other landmark buildings in the nearby vicinity. and designation of properties with strong cultural associations. the property has significant cultural associations with lgbtq heritage. the property owner is very supportive of landmark designation. there is no known public opposition to designation of this location on and the department received several letters in support of designation including a couple of new letters that were included in your pocket. the department believes the building meets established eligibility requirements and landmark staff is warranted. the department recommends the hbc recommend landmark designation to the board of supervisors if recommended today that the department will forward the designation onto the board of supervisors. this concludes my presentation i am happy to answer any questions