range dripping in coastal flooding, which could create flooding risks in low-lying areas such as mission creek. we already see this today. if you think about how water drains, the strategy here is we will have to keep the water from the coast out while allowing the water from the land out. so the that presents a complex ethical challenge to think about as we design strategies for these areas. finally, we need to continue to understand the impacts of rising groundwater from sealevel rise. they also raise groundwater inland, and sometimes it can bubble up to the surface. particularly in areas, and this could have impacts relating to contamination and to liquefaction in earthquakes, and this is not fully known right now. this is an area of more study, but it is something we understand to be a risk,

particularly along the eastern neighborhood and waterfront neighborhoods. so those are the general key findings, and now i will just walk through the different areas of the city, and some of the findings of some of these neighborhoods. this is not all of them, these are just some of the key neighborhoods. we have detailed asset mapping that shows different areas of sealevel vulnerability for each of the ten scenarios. i am just showing one. this shows fishermen's worth. this is a 77-inch sealevel rise scenario. they are the tipping point at this point. where large areas of the shoreline or over topped, and there can be significant impacts on the neighborhood, particularly the business district. one thing i mentioned, this could happen either, you know, through sealevel rise over time or also through storms that happen with greater frequency over time. it is not necessarily all happening at once, but it is something that happens with

greater frequency as time goes on. in this area, you see a number of major port facilities, fishermen's wharf, open spaces along the embarcadero and also the munimobile kirkland yards which will all be affected. moving on to the financial district, and again we have stephen from the port here who can talk about the seawall program. there is a similar story where you start to see a tipping point in some of the midcentury scenarios where you have major impacts to some of the piers, the ferry terminal and ferry building, a loss of open spaces, and transportation facilities including the embarcadero, barton munimobile station where water gets in through some of the portals or the greats and the entrances, and as you go further down the line, you will see significant inundation of the financial district. moving further south, mission creek, mission bay are some of the lowest lying areas. they are built largely on silt. you would see substantial flooding due to the low-lying

shoreline. you can see in this area there is the railyard. there is the bridge over the creek, in certain scenarios could be inundated with traffic. there is also the public safety building emission they in this area as well. the mission rock development, which you have approved has built in sea level rise adaptation which was designed by raising the center of the site and having sloping up roads. it is important to note that you still have to be able to connect to the streets adjacent to it or you can't get anywhere. this is just indicating the need for district scale solution. there is also one of the lower lying areas in the city where you have a lot of inland flooding and coastal flooding. there's a concentration of cargo facilities and a number of transportation infrastructure and facility yards, public works yard, and as i will mention shortly, we actually have a

ground to start to study some adaptation strategies for the areas we are already working on and thinking about what is needed here. and then moving onto the west side of the city, sorry i can only fit if i turn it sideways. this is ocean beach. you see the water coming less far inland, but there are significant issues with beech and cliffside erosion and a need to protect critical infrastructure such as the oceanside treatment plant. this is also the subject of an ongoing planning and design implementation effort which i will talk about as well. even as we continue to increase our understanding of how sealevel rise is affecting the city, this project is, this report is informational, it is not policies or strategies or actions, but we are moving forward with that with both the building and district neighborhood scale. at the building scale, as i mentioned, the developments are building in sealevel rise strategy. the parkas an example of a park that builds in the ability of

the sea to rise in the bay to rise into the park. at the district scale, we have a number of projects going on. the ocean beach long-term improvements project is implementing portions of the ocean beach master plan and carrying on improvements to ocean beach and the great highway that will protect critical infrastructure and reduce erosion and add a multiuse trail. this is a project with a lot of agency partners. as i mentioned, we were successful in getting a grant to study near and long-term adaptation at the creek, with a focus on protecting critical transportation at the port facilities, and we are kicking that off now. i also mentioned we are working closely with our partners on the embarcadero seawall program, which will strengthening and adapt the seawall with seismic events and flood risk, and the port is also entering into agreement with the army corps of engineers to develop a flood study for the shoreline, which

will identify alternatives for protecting the shoreline and the assets that our inboard of that from coastal flooding, that could enable future federal funding for shoreline protection we are working closely with the port as a scope out to study this. finally, we are looking at citywide efforts to coordinate this adaptation. these efforts are being largely read by the office of the zoning and capital planning. they have to meet the hazard and climate resiliency plan, which provides a five-year update to our mitigation plan and incorporates climate hazards and we are working with them to incorporate this into the general plan element. it is consistent with state law. and the finally, we are working with other agencies to develop

citywide climate resilience framework and program which would really take a comprehensive look at what the city is doing around mitigating climate emissions and adapting to climate change and how we can get a coordinated platform to prioritize what owl -- where to put our resources towards climate mitigation and adaptation over time. with that, that concludes my presentation. i and other members of the team are available for questions. thank you. >> thank you. do we have any public comment on this item? with that, public comment is closed. if you don't mind, i will start it off. thank you for this excellent piece of work. i have to say that language is really important and this to me

is bull should language -- this is bullshit language. i am scared that if we were making a movie with all the words we are presenting today, it would be a horror movie. the waves coming over all of bayview hunter's point and flooding our financial district, and wiping out the ferry building and all of our public infrastructure. to me, this language, sealevel rise vulnerability, consequences , is very neutral. i want to be talking about an emergency and a catastrophe, and really what we're talking about here is a wiping out of our public infrastructure. i would like this department to be a leader in terms of what we are saying to the p.u.c., to our family in this city about what really we are looking at here. so i think the best plan for

sealevel rise is for it not to happen. and what are we doing about that what are we doing with our housing and balance, and our transportation, and having the emissions of thousands of cars coming in over the bay bridge every day because people can't live here who work here? so to me, you know, this is good work. i know we have to prepare for it , but i want to see using appropriate language for the crisis that we are seeing coming we know it is coming. we know why it is coming, and i want us to be leaders in the field and how we express ourselves about it, and how we are working with others to make them understand what is going on thank you for allowing me my little throwback. this is just a long time coming. >> just to kind of back up your comment, one question for staff,

have we looked at certain cities that have a way more likelihood of these types of events, like miami, i know they are constantly on flood watch, and whenever there is rain or storm, they have to prepare specifically for those events, and that is not even the big elephant in the room, which is the sealevel rise in general. they are more vulnerable to the storms, but what have they done, or have we seen anything that they have done that we haven't thought of where we could do? not to say that we haven't seen those things every -- already, but is there something that we learned from them? >> thank you for the opportunity i will let adam and his team, especially if chris may is here, to speak to this as well. indifference to both of your questions, i respect your deep concern and clearly staff in our department and throughout the city share your concern. the urgency is there and we'll. we do need to both act to prepare because even if we stop

all of our emissions in san francisco, there is a global community, and we know emissions will be rising for a while. we also need to prepare for the resiliency fund, regardless of what we do here. the city is working on both fronts. that first vend diagram shows both what we can do to reduce our effect on the climate, and mitigate our climate impacts, as well as what we are presenting today, which is our resilience to the changes that we are already experiencing now. more in deference to your question. other cities are already more impacted now than san francisco is, but san francisco, as we have seen, is flooding and has more extreme weather and storms, and we are also experiencing our share right now, too, and to our interagency team, we are looking across the country and across the world that what we can do. it is definitely, it is

important to know the best practices, and we have assembled a great team. adam had a slide that showed the breath of different things that we have now specific to this issue, which is sealevel rise. we have multiple projects, the biggest one being the port's $3 million flood study, which includes flooding from storm events, and flooding from sealevel rise. i am proud of the response that the city has done and the coordinated interagency response , which is deep, but we definitely need leadership from this commission and leadership from our elected officials to make sure that funding is there to follow through on both the building adaptation as well as the mitigation side. >> commissioner fong? >> a question for staff. at one time when i was a little bit more coordinated with the engineers and their projections,

at that time, their projections are different than yours, from what you had in your briefing, and has that been coordinated so that we are all on the same page >> hi, are you asking on the difference on the sealevel rise productions -- projections that we are using? we started this work, we were using the latest science adapted by the state of california, which is from the national research council in 2012. that science is very similar to what the army corps is using in the state of california. the army corps has its own sealevel rise tool that allows you to adapt the signs to different regions of the united states, but as you likely know, climate science is a very continually evolving field, and we are getting more sophisticated computer simulations and more data, so

there is a much more recent climate science that adam had mentioned that came out in 2017 and 2018, and that is there projections that we are trying to use, since those have been adopted by the state. one of the reasons why we adopted this sealevel rise scenario approach, which is really taking it in 12-inch increments all the way up to that 108 inches, we have a whole fleet of scenarios to have it covered. and not only to add to that, one of the things that i think is important in the planning community and the scientific communities to put the impetus on developing the response. while the projections have varied over time, we know enough about projections now, and we know enough about experience now that the difference between projections is something that matters much more in the long-term than it does in the immediate term.

we are trying to move toward solutions at this point. if we need to adapt our solutions because the projections are off later, we have time to do that. >> thank you. commissioner moore? >> i would like to address this that at a time when u.s. c.p.a. is not allowed to use the word climate change or objective data and frank discussions are. [indiscernible] they basically tried to pretend that climate change is not happening -- happening, or the reasons for it are garbage. that said, even our own awareness about rising sea level is very limited. in 2005, i sat from 2005 to 2,000 whatever, i sat on the treasure island citizen advisory , and at that time, for the first time, we had a maritime attorney who sat with me on the cab, who kept asking planning staff, not this

planning staff, people who were dealing with treasure island at that time, what is sealevel rise and one of the more distinguished maritime engineers at that time was standing in front of the cab saying, we don't think, with all the signs we have, and now you're talking about the premier maritime engineers, that sealevel rise will not go much further then the san francisco club. don't worry about treasure island. they will be no sealevel rise. this is 2005. that is 14 years ago. it was basically no understanding of the fact that sealevel rise, by that time, was already documented with maps which we brought forward and said, would you mind looking at this map, how does it relate to what you were doing? silence. fast forward, i think we are finding ourselves in a very unfortunate position or science is not driving the many things

that this city is boldly embracing and trying to address it. i have the good fortune, and i will give the address and contact person to the director to see if this person could perhaps talk to the entire planning commission or the city at large. i was invited to the -- embassy in san francisco, and there was somebody who gave a talk about sealevel rise, i will not spend time talking about the findings, which was so incredibly mind blowing. ahead of anything we are ever thinking of, but i will try to figure out if they could give this very same talk and fund this commission. it would completely change everything we think about in terms of how to look in the future, and i'm not just talking about the fact that holland, by itself, is far ahead of dealing with sealevel rise because that country is built on sealevel

rise coming and going every six hours, but this is not looking ahead into the global challenge of sea levels rising worldwide, and i want to offer that to you as a possibility, because i think it would be very, very educational, and encouraging for us to take a broader and bolder step, even beyond what you are currently doing. what you are doing is important to elevate awareness, and still -- instill fear and frustration, but we all can do better. >> thank you. >> interestingly enough, san francisco had an article in the chronicle this week about connect s.f. and the rise in emissions. i would love to get a presentation on that. it said our emissions will still keep rising because of services and population will be 1.2 million by 2050, which is the 1,000 a month from now until 2050 that we have been

experiencing. the thing that made me want to ask the question was, we will have enough room for 1.2 more million people, but will they be the people that are going to live and work in san francisco. what is a socioeconomic makeup of this 1.2 million? will we still have people commuting to do service level jobs, or lower than the six-figure high-tech jobs, and as well, the other thing is, the adoption rate of electric cars, construction cement is 7% of -- because a 7% of the global warming because of the heat, it requires in order to bake it. there are all these other things that could be done in addition to the traffic patterns and emissions. it is big, but there were other things that can be done. i think, maybe when we keep having this san francisco san francisco, perhaps we can look at it on a broader bay area

level or a state-level informational. what is california doing? i was disheartened to read that there was something recently called the plastics convention. not a convention of an industry, but 190 countries got together to reduce the amount of plastic that we use, from how do we reuse it, where do we make it, how -- two other materials make it biodegradable? only one nation didn't sign the treater -- treaty. we were the only ones one to didn't sign it. we are faced with -- we have already had one island off the gulf coast and louis it -- louisiana that had to be vacated because it was going underwater, probably two years ago. there's another island in the chesapeake bay that is going underwater, too. and the people on the island refused to admit that it is climate change. this is what we are dealing with in this country. it is flat earth, you know, 101.

november 2020 elections, they are pivotal. we need to -- if we keep done on this puffer former years or six more years, i think we will be toast. this is a huge issue for us. i would love to see a larger presentation on the state, and also what the city will look like in 2050. that being said, the joint project to the right thing. they elevated their project. we had all of these other projects underwater, but there is no nexus study that we are titling these projects to say, you will be underwater, c. have to pay for part of the seawall. i don't think that is fair. the giants have the right idea by fortifying their projects with other projects. can you comment on that? >> two things.

the major development projects along the waterfront have funding mechanisms built in that will give off money to the shoreline. there is also funding to the central soma plan. >> great. >> it will kick on later on spee mac that's great. >> they were designed and approved before -- those projects don't, as far as i know >> they are fortifying their thing and being charged this infrastructure finance stuff. >> i'm not familiar with that. >> i believe that is at the d.a. , but they went above and beyond and they should be commended. >> i just wanted to address one other thing. you were requesting, you know, a counting of the city's overall omissions and what we can do at the local level, and one thing

that the city is working on and the department of environment is working on is a climate action strategy. and the first piece of that will be the halfway to 2030 report which was requested in the climate emergency resolution that was sponsored by supervisor madeleine and that will detail the sector that the city would need to take to meet the emission reductions. >> there was an article that the chronicle had on the first page was to be carbon neutral by 2030 >> the goal of the department of the environment is to have zero waste, 80% transportation mode, and 100% climate neutral in terms of emissions. there is a whole series of actions that we have been putting in place. the city has exceeded its goals. >> that is correct. it is 30 7% or something like that, and the goal is 25%.

>> i think the point needs to be taken, i know it was mentioned earlier, to remind us that we could meet all those goals in and the sealevel will still rise we could do everything we can possibly do as a city, and the sealevel will still rise. i think that we need to do both, clearly, because it is a longer-term issue, but we have to assume that we will still deal with this. >> sure. my point was, we are putting together this document, and putting it out into the world. nobody in our city is using words, or we are trying not to, words like climate change. we are really talking about a climate catastrophe and climate emergency. my point was only that we should use the appropriate language, because we believe this, we know it is happening, you know, because some of this is in draft form, i beg of you, to use the right language. thank you. okay, did you want to say something further?

okay, commissioner richards? >> one comment. i read somewhere about the way people perceive risk in terms of time, temporal, meaning distance the further it is out, the less risk they think there is, so we're talking about these things in 2050, and people just don't feel connected to the level of risk, and they want to make sure that whatever language we do use , we are able to incite them psychologically to get their mind wrapped around that they do have a part and it is coming. >> thank you. >> very good, commissioners. that will place us on item 12. eighty-eight block some street. this is an informational presentation.

>> small planning department staff. and a preface to this, i want to return to commission to give some context on the location of the site and some of the context around open space and the neighborhood, following up on the urban design conversation of may ninth. so looking in at the area of central soma, there are four distinct zones within that we are being -- we are going to expect to see projects. the eastern corners mostly historic, some infill projects potentially there. the western corner very similarly. the projects that we will be seeing including 88 bluxome, are in the southern quadrant, which is indicated in the yellow. there are a number of key sites located that are adjacent to one another. in the northern portion, which is the blue zone, there were other key sites that are more transitional into downtown. this simple a show some of the open space, public benefits that are going to be part of the

neighborhood. some of them are existing ones and have had recent investment, additional money will be going to others, and then we have a series that will be part of the project. eighty-eight bluxome will describe their own adjacent components that are part of the open space. i just want to zoom in on the projects. one of which you saw previously earlier this month. the two that are going to be coming today, and then there is one that will be following and these are the first key sites that are coming through planning commission. just to zoom in for a minute to see how these projects are related to each other, have the experience of the neighborhood works, there is a park along bluxome, but also a series of alleys, partially connected to the development site. there is a rec center, there's also connections to the fifth and some of the improvements that will be going on from sfmta , including protected

bicycle lanes. and also along brandon street which has mda investment, in the subway which becomes aboveground at this portion in the neighborhood. we have 88 bluxome, also known as the tennis club. we have the creamery, which would be following fourth street , those are the two that will be here today. you have always seen five -- you have already seen 598 brandon. and then additionally, the flower market. these are in it together. there are a lot of different ways you can move between and through these sites that are completely new, or connections that are being made as part of these sights to facilitate a much more connected and interconnected neighborhood. with that, i will hand it over to linda who is the planner. >> good afternoon, members of the commission. i'm here to introduce two informational items to you for projects located within the

central soma special use district. the first is for 88 bluxome street, known as the tennis club site. is one of the eight key sites identified in the central soma plan, and is scheduled for review by the commission on july 11th, 2019. the project requests a large project authorization and office allocation for the demolition of the existing bay club tends building and the construction of three new buildings which will be comprised of a west office tower, east office tower, community center, and affordable housing building, with a total of 839, 860 square feet of how office, 24,140 square feet of retail, and 4,400 square feet of childcare. it would also be up to 170 street parking spaces -- offstreet park -- parking spaces 381 bicycle spaces as well.

the project will include a dedication to the mayor's office of housing and community development for the housing site , as well as there will be -- they will be developing a new linear park which is known as bluxome linear park, and that will measure approximately 11,896 square feet. the project also includes additional on-site mac open space including privately owned public open spaces, the project is in the central soma mixed-use office district, and is within the 130 districts. to begin the sponsor's presentation, i would now like to introduce someone from alexandria real estate equities. >> thank you. commissioners, director, i'm the senior vice president at alexandria real estate equity. i'm here with our development partner and our architect.

we will speak quickly, as i have been given five minutes. i will move through these slides fairly fast. the site conditions, it is the tennis club site. i thank you have heard, it is a very large building. it has 475-foot length along bluxome and brandon that has no windows. is a facility that has been there since the seventies in operation. our principles for design have been to look at the central soma district and to look at the typology of buildings, both the punched window typology and the more industrial window façades. the things that guided our principles to develop the site were number 1, we had to maintain 12 indoor tennis courts

on the site, number 2, we wanted to not create a project that looked like a single building. we were looking to break it up into components that are more articulated, but essentially it is a single project. and the third, as we wanted to create physical connectivity through the site to create more porosity since it is such a large sight. we think we have accomplished that through creation of a pedestrian pathway shown here in green, as well as a through lobby through the office component of the building, that is accessible to the public. we believe that we have also succeeded in making a single project look like multiple buildings, and so, matt? >> thank you. good afternoon, commissioners.

we also wanted to make sure our plan tied into the central soma plan. when we reviewed the goals from the plan, we saw it break up into two categories. more districtwide goals, and goals we could apply at our project, which i will take you through here. first, his recreational. it has great history of recreation with the tennis club, and we will look at ways we can expand that. we are building the gene friend aquatic center which will be donated to parks and recreation upon completion of the project. it also includes ground-floor recreation space that is designated for afterschool use, community use, and other recreation. there you would step into the new midblock alley. from there, down to the bluxome layer park that will be creating as part of the project, this runs all the way from fourth to fifth, not just in front of our frontage. we have been working with planning, public public works, the fire department, and the p.u.c. to design this facility,

which has lots of different programming and amenities. here are some images of different components of it. play and exercise, more gathering space, and it also includes a critically needed dog run. here is the circulation diagram showing how it fits into the broader context around it, up to the central soma park. it is across the street, and through the network of new bike and pedestrian ways. the next thing we looked at was maintaining the diversity of residents. the project will donate a site for affordable -- 100% affordable housing, we will also construct the foundation for that building and provide all the utility infrastructure as part of our donation to the city we have been working with mo on this. it has more than 25% three bedrooms, designed to be intergenerational or family housing, and we have fully approved floorplans. we are also looking at preserving and celebrating the cultural heritage of the neighborhood. we have a broad arts plan here,

both international artists, local artists, and even very local artists with the soma being involved as well. we also -- it was critical to us that the new buildings enhance the character of the neighborhood and of the city. we think this is an extremely critical goal. we have a broad array of recreation, art, and supportive housing. we have a design that is a modern interpretation of the neighborhood industrial character, and we are incorporating a tennis club. as you can imagine, the 35-foot height and the 60-foot span of putting that club presents an amazing engineering challenge. we are incredibly proud to be able to deliver project that provides key element of the central soma plan an elegant design solutions. i will let lisa, our architect, take you through some of the design elements. thank you. >> thank you. >> you can take two minutes. >> you will be under two minutes

>> as mentioned, we work to articulate this large single building to have the appearance of separate pieces to create a more dynamic cityscape reflect a different character of -- of the central soma. first, the different massing strategies for the buildings, it takes the building envelope and modulates within to become large blocks on the west, and shifted horizontal volumes on the east with a transparent connector between. second, as mentioned previously, a developing -- by the -- by developing two façade strategy -- strategies, it brings it into the 21st century. we developed the façade into a gradient of window sidings that allows each building to read holistically, and respond to the different orientations. this includes elevations. it becomes wider towards the top and northeast, and we reiterate this shifted volumes on the east materially, the two sides of the building or complement rebut different. both façades focus on creating

lights and shadow through depth. the façades are made of panels and a copper bond aluminum. there are deep window apertures and allow the building to flicker. the daylight façade is composed of metal panels and glazed terra-cotta, arranged so they create a three-dimensional façade with varied reflections and shadows. this describes the sides together, and there is a grassy connector which becomes a natural entry to this building. lastly, a few images of the potential future interior and what it might look like with views of downtown. we welcome your comments. >> thank you. is there any public comment on this item? please come on up. if -- i'm sorry? okay. i have betty and others. anyone else who wants to speak, please line up on the left side and come on up. >> hello. i'm anthony.

i'm a member of the board of an organization called the san franciscans for sports and recreation. that is an organization that had its origin in a group of people who saw the tennis club disappearing, and they had a good run, and it was always the unrealistic down there, but in the concern that came out of that, we formed this organization because we became to realize there was a larger problem in san francisco of lack of sports facilities and recreation facilities generally. we formed this larger group, and we have been working with alexandria, initially in 2016 when we worked with them to persuade them to put the tennis courts into the basement, which, by the way, is not only an engineering marvel, the next ordinary thing in the city to have a facility like that so close to downtown. who knows what that could be used for. alexandria has been really good

partners for us. i'm sure it is not the most efficient use of this the space from their perspective, but they have really worked with us to support not only doing this, but other things that we will talk about, and for us, of course, the facility is the tennis courts in the swimming pools. they are key elements of this project, so we support it wholeheartedly with those elements, and betty will tell you a little bit more about the issues and talk about what they have been doing. >> as a commercial landlord, i knew that we would have to come to this point with the tennis club at some point in time. in 2006, we dodged the bullet when they wanted to buy the tennis club, and they were

stopped in their tracks. but come 2016, i think the offered dangles in front of the bay club which was a little bit too much to resist, and therefore we had no place to go, really. we knew that our days were going to be numbered, at that point, we started conversations with alexandria and as a result of that, we have our club that is now going to be rebuilt in this same space, along with the public recreational funds that have been given to us to help the city and with all its sports and recreation. this area, the central soma area , really has the least amount of recreational space per capita in the city right now. with this project, we have found that alexandria has been more than generous in terms of allowing us to increase the

different types of recreation that we will have. we will have the resurfacing of all the public courts, 24 public courts in san francisco, we have been able to give wheelchairs to disabled basketball players, and we have given significant amount of money to the golden gate -- park project right now. the tennis club is being rebuilt as we speak. i just want to let you know that we are in support of this project. i play tennis on saturday and sunday morning, and right after i play, the children come running in for their lessons. their parents are not necessarily members of our club, but as -- of the broader community. we do serve the public. we have high school groups coming in, the san francisco

police department is there, tennis is played there, we are very much a public community oriented center as well as a private club. what fun it is for the children to see serena williams come on the court and take pictures with them. she would not take pictures with me. >> thank you. next speaker, please. >> hello, commissioners. my name is seth and i am the cofounder and executive director of san francisco sports and recreation. i just want to talk a little bit about the public benefits that have already come out of this project through our partnership with alexandria and the project sponsors. to date, san franciscans for sports and recreation has donated over -- exactly $1,864,000 to public recreation in san francisco. while this is not an exhaustive list, i do want to call out some

of the ways we have already been contributing to the city of san francisco, and my colleagues and i, whom you just heard speak, are quite proud of these accomplishments. $864,000 has been donated to the san francisco recreation and parks department towards resurfacing public tennis courts fifteen public tennis courts and six different locations throughout the city that have already been resurfaced. those include courts at golden gate heights, west portal, the recreation center in the marina, mclaren park, one avista park and mountain lake park. four public tennis courts have been resurfaced earlier this year. we have done 400,000 -- donated $400,000 to the learning centre and the rec room and the new tenant center that has broken ground in golden gate park. $95,000 to the restoration of the correct playground in golden gate park that was damaged in a tragic incident of arson in 2017 we were the leading project sponsor of that restoration.

we have given $300,000 to the let's play initiative towards retrofitting the 13 playgrounds in most need of repair to the project being led by the parks alliance in partnership with san francisco recreation and parks department. almost exactly one month ago, we broke ground on five of these playgrounds at panhandle playground, outer mission, mclaren playground, said heights playground and sergeant mccauley playground. in february, we celebrated our donation of $105,000 to the gene friend recreation center, which is only a few blocks away from 88 bluxome that we are discussing now, and that was a first of its kind program where ten sport wheelchairs were donated to that center, and are allowing for pick up pickup and organized wheelchair basketball games that have never been possible in san francisco without this equipment. again, i want to emphasize that this project has already changed san francisco, and in particular

, recreation in san francisco for the better. because of that and the support for preserving the indoor tennis that this has historically been at this site, we are in support of this project. thank you for your attention. >> hello, i am a manager. we are the in-house managers of bluxome centre and alexandria's event space and. we have been working with alexandria for over a year. the space because community groups in. for the past year, our focus has been on engaging and outreaching to nonprofits, as well as surette -- select arts organizations. we go to nearly 30 events will nonprofits. and all of their events were hoping -- hosted in the space free of charge.

we produce a free community event on bluxome street last october called bluxome state for -- street fair which alexandria sponsored. included kids activities, local and free vendors, and live music we partnered directly with bluxome businesses, as well as the fire department and residents on block some street. it was really well received and enjoyed by tens of families, youth, and community members. alexandria is sponsoring the event again this august. the nonprofits we have hosted have been thrilled to have the free event space and have been extremely appreciative of alexandria's hospitality and support. we're looking forward to continuing our work with alexandria this year to bring you more nonprofits, and reach even more community members. thank you for listening. >> thank you. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon, commissioners

i am here with my partner. we are the art consultant firm working on the very exciting art program for 88 bluxome. our lead creator is joseph becker. he is the official creator -- curator at s.f. moments. i have been in the art world for ten years in san francisco, curating exhibits. opening my own art gallery. the reason i work in the arts is because i'm very passionate about our local architect artist community, as well as educating youth. we started a local arts nonprofit. we have partnered with local nonprofits such as united players, larkin street youth and san francisco beautiful. the public are planned for 88 bluxome creates a landmark destination in the heart of soma , with an immersive art program bringing together local, and international artists.

eighty-eight bluxome becomes a diverse location. sculptures and marrows -- murals intended to inspire the public. we will be -- they will be walking through an outdoor museum. we are an extremely accomplished international artists city. our next step is working towards our local artist selection, particularly artists of significance in the filipino, cultural art district in soma. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker, please.

>> two things. one is this case and the other three projects from the central soma give the planning commission the opportunity to help with staff. put in your staff report. a bit on how this project and how this development relates to global sea rise. they are all in the area of south of market that will have issues around sealevel rise. planning commissions have not done that when they have done area plans, and somehow you can go back when you are doing project allocations like this one, and really have it spilled out, and i think this is one that needs that. 4,554th street and the two

projects need it as well. they are all in the plane. i have been dealing with thinking about earthquake impacts before this year, ten years ago, because as we are adding houses on floodplains, which is south of market, housing on floodplains and high-rises, when there is an earthquake, they have a problem of not being able to get back in their house. but that is one of the problems, the other problem is sealevel rise. i spent ten years of my life dealing with washington, which was the twin of this tennis club it was a recreation center that was built for middle income people. that is what golden gateway was traditionally. it was built intentionally as.

they were going to lose their recreation facility for upper income housing, and it was fought and won on the ballot. but south of market has no real open space. there was a battle on this commission on december 20th on folsom street, and the decision by this commission was reversed by the board of supervisors. in part because people who live there, which were low income filipino communities, really came out. and you have to understand the traditional people who have lived in the south of market and have not in yuppies. they don't have $200,000 here for their income. they are low income, a lot of filipinos and black community and because it was cheap housing

that is why they don't have open space. you have the ability to correct that. thank you very much. >> thank you. any other public comment on this item? public comment is now closed. commissioner phone? >> question for the project sponsor. is this project going to be phased? >> thank you for the question, commissioner. as i stated, this is a single building project, really, however, we have been asked by the mayor's mayor's office and the planning department to consider the fact that you are under some stress with prop m. -- >> i think the developer is under some stress. >> and to take a look at how we could potentially phase this. quite honestly, as i said, it is

one building. it looks like three but it is one building. i would like to say, if everything is possible, usually it just takes time and money. we are looking to see how much time and money we need to figure out how to phase it. >> so your proposal will be for the full allocation that you are requesting? >> that is the project. the commission is being advised to grant us a smaller amounts, and we will accept that. >> okay. >> if there is nothing further, commissioners, we can move on to item 13. 655 fourth street, also an informational presentation. >> good afternoon, again. planning staff. i am here to introduce a second

project that you will be hearing about tonight. this one is a 655 fourth street, also known as the creamery site. it is scheduled to go before the commission on june 20th, 2019. the project is requesting a large project authorization and a conditional use authorization to demolish the three existing buildings and associated parking lots, and construct two new buildings with 960 residential dwelling units, a 38 room hotel, 21,840 square feet of office, approximately 18,454 square feet of ground-floor retail, 2,484 square feet of retail and indoor publicly owned private open space, and the project includes additional private open space and public open space. this is a key sight in the

central soma plan, and to kick off the sponsor's presentation, i would now like to introduce carl shannon.

lawsuit and economic pressures have put us in the position where we are quite frankly that does not make sense. we are putting this project forward as a fee project but should something change and should that window open again, there is nothing i would like to do more than see us bring the housing forward. in terms of context for the site, this is important. this is next to the new central

subway, across the street from the major supermarket. walking distance to the school and library. it is between south park and the new park that we are going to build in the park block. this is really, i think, the ground floor, the intersection of fourth and townsend at peak hours during the day has 3,000 people cross the street per hour. a subway on one and muni lines on the other. it is a dense urban location. we wanted a project that had open space where the publico get away from that and have an inward looking project where there is a lot of permme

ability. a central courtyard. the lobbies face into the courtyard, not out in the street. this is a project people can walk through to find some refuge from the dense urban transit rich environment in which this project sets. 20,000 square feet every tail, 38 room hotel. space for small businesses, a very family with high percentage of two and three bedrooms. family oriented amenities within the project. this is from fourth street. we wanted something that really invited people into the project. to do that we wanted to bring a

great ark thin team to the pool. he will walk you through the project in detail. >> thanks for hosting us today. i am thomas. i am from the offices in new york and copenhagen. we have been working on this project for about six years. when we first came to the site we were intrigued by the creamery and the activities that happened on the site, and we felt that the best amenity for the residents would be a public amenity to really ground it in the neighborhood. here you can see it on the greater map. weav