(OPTIONAL): Please add any comments you have about Scenario 2:
#	Response Date	Comment
1.	Mon, 8/13/07 10:39 PM	Again you are making assusmptions that may not be valid. What "funding innovations" could you be referring to? "More taxes" are something that Palo Altans will not be willing to pay.
2.	Wed, 8/15/07 8:28 PM	Pie in the sky. You are more delusional than the Bush administration
3.	Wed, 8/15/07 10:31 PM	Proper placement of housing can only do so much. From what I have seen of local and area politics, it's all a moot question until you secure funding to support the demands of this growth. The Stanford model cannot apply, since they can manage housing, employment and services within their circumscribed area under their own umbrella. Stanford's decision making process regarding housing, services and funding is likely much, much more efficient than that of Palo Alto and the surrounding cities. Therefore, rating the Scenario requires too many 'ifs'.
4.	Wed, 8/15/07 11:51 PM	Again, stupid scenario. Plao Alto does not care about driving habits. Palo Alto worked hard to get rid of our two local grocery stors forcing every one who likes food in our area to drive a minimum of five miles to the closest market.
5.	Thu, 8/16/07 3:03 AM	Scenario 2 may occur to some extant. I don't think policies will get many people out of their cars. Much higher gasoline prices will. Housing for "deserving" local workers is a loaded phrase. All citizens are deserving. I can't rate something phrased like scenario 2.
6.	Thu, 8/16/07 4:44 AM	It would be very good if it were do-able and workable. But it is a pipe dream. There is no requirement that people who buy homes in Palo Alto or rent in Palo Alto WORK in Palo Alto. Sounds good but I doubt if it will every happen.
7.	Thu, 8/16/07 4:48 AM	We want to be a leader but, moderately.
8.	Thu, 8/16/07 5:21 AM	This is all pie-in-the-sky, all fairy tale. Schools are already suffering. Simply look at the portables. NO to high density; NO to further traffic congestion
9.	Thu, 8/16/07 8:02 AM	this isn't a realistic scenario... Its carefully constructed to make the only "correct" answer seem "very good". i.e. scenario 2. I'm allowed to travel back in time and join Google as employee #3, who wouldn't say that is "very good". As long as mass transit is so much less convenient and more expensive than private cars, increasing housing density will increase local traffic and probably lead to increased greenhouse gas emissions. The only point at which mass transit and "traffic reduction" measures can make any difference is if the density becomes extremely high such that everything you need is within short walking distance (i.e. Palo Alto becomes Manhatten .. but then even in Manhatten I seem to recall that they are looking at congestion traffic pricing as a solution to reduce traffic problems). We have to remember that peoples' decision to live in outlying areas is usually driven by economics. Houses in Gilroy, Tracy, etc are much more affordable than in Palo Alto, even considering the costs of commuting. This practially means that if you are really serious about getting more people to live closer to work, you have to supply enough housing to be a significant drag on real estate prices so that more people who live on salaries can afford to live locally. In scenario 2 as stated "Because of Palo Alto's inspired model, cities such as Menlo Park, Atherton, ... follow Palo Alto's lead". More likely what will happen is that exclusive cities like Atherton that resist high density housing will become more desirable relative to Palo Alto, and lucky homeowners there will see their property values rise while Palo Alto struggles to deal with budget issues inherent in high density housing where the number of people requiring city services outpaces the property tax revenue generated by high density housing.
10.	Thu, 8/16/07 5:48 PM	What recent suburban funding innovations are you referring to? I am an active advocate for transit in CPA and I see nothing but cuts in our future. If you know about a pot of money that I don't, please fill me in. What I get from this is that ABAG thinks Palo Alto should be punished for their previous excellent leadership and cooperation by imposition of completely unrealistic and dangerously high quotas. As a person who has publicly supported some high density smart growth housing projects in CPA this seems to me a disincentive for future cooperation. Please note that I have not responded to your completely biased and misinformed question deliberately. I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that this survey is garbage.
11.	Thu, 8/16/07 6:49 PM	This is not a valid scenario. I would like to see exactly how this result could be achieved by adding new homes.
12.	Thu, 8/16/07 8:59 PM	This is of course the desirable scenario, but it also shows a bias in this survey. Where will the next question lead?
13.	Fri, 8/17/07 3:54 AM	What about new schools, parks, pools, playing fields, and green spaces? Where do these get built, and who pays for them? But that's a rhetorical question. Is the cost to infrastructure and the increased overcrowding of all educational and recreational facilities outweighed by the hypothetical (but, practially speaking, impossible) reduction in GHG? In my opinion, no. Solve the transit problem first, make the solution crystal clear, and that in turn may render "innovative growth" something more than the nebulous euphemism it now is.
14.	Fri, 8/17/07 5:29 AM	It's time that we worked to redress the need for socioeconomic diversity in Palo Alto. Many, many high contributors to society do not make high wages. We're currently losing the opportunity to share the significant intellectual capital and community contributions that lower-paid workers (professional, and non-professional) living closer to their work can make to our community.
15.	Fri, 8/17/07 12:37 PM	This scenario is also not very likely, because city planners have shown that their actions, finally, are guided by money and fads, rather than legitimate concerns such as increasing auto traffic.
16.	Sat, 8/18/07 1:31 AM	That's just too much new housing. Again, more creative thinking about transportation is necessary. Start taxing people who drive on El Camino, for example. What happened to the really creative thinking about city planning that Palo Alto used to have?
17.	Sat, 8/18/07 2:51 AM	What do you mean by "PA imposes similar traffic-reducing policies on new housing"? And "PA also implements further traffic reducing policies for PA workers, etc."? Details, pls? Then there is the issue of schools and public facilities. Who pays for THAT expansion? Are the "rich retirees" of Palo Alto supposed to finance this workers paradise of affordable housing for Stanford's staff growth? What kind of cigarettes are being smoked here?
18.	Sat, 8/18/07 4:36 AM	Same as comment on scenario 1. Your survey is highly questionable, with a clear agenda behind it.
19.	Sun, 8/19/07 4:21 AM	Enlightened state tax policies could encourage just this kind of scenario in many cities.
20.	Sun, 8/19/07 7:50 PM	Again the question is skewed to illicit the response you want...enjoy the attitude of those here already have the right to drive as much as we want, yet new residents should be restricted.
21.	Mon, 8/20/07 1:50 AM	Nice scenario, but not credible. I doubt Menlo Park or Atherton will do their share. Meanwhile, if future projects resemble the horrific Sand Hill Project which isolates residents, thus requiring each car, pedestrian or cyclist to stop traffic in order to go anywhere. 50 or more cars come to a complete stop, idling for a minute or more hundreds of times a day - an environmental disaster.
22.	Thu, 8/23/07 11:22 PM	Lets give builders and buyers a choice of where and how to live.
23.	Fri, 8/24/07 7:13 AM	This is truly inspirational and is the fitting scenario for the home of innovation. Palo Alto should be leading the way, not lagging like it currently is. Palo Alto should form alliances with other like-minded cities and share best practices and help the state start moving in the right direction.
24.	Fri, 8/24/07 8:25 PM	Scenario 2 would be nice. But it won't ever happen like this in reality.
25.	Fri, 8/24/07 8:31 PM	Again, faulty scenario. Stanford's going to add thousands of jobs & bigger hospitals. More trips by outside residents to use these services means traffic & auto trips still go up. Your scenarios both seem very unlikely IMHO. People just don't all live in the cities they work in. I don't, & most residents I know here don't. And more businesses means more people driving in & out for the services. And more dense housing means more people driving out of the city to their jobs & you're going to have gridlock at more & more intersections.
26.	Fri, 8/24/07 9:16 PM	Give me a break. The GUP is an unmitigated pain in the neck for Stanford and requires that the university spend money on housing instead of academic programs. Stanford provides the Margarite shuttles, paying for it with annually increasing parking fees, in a desperate attempt to delay reaching the trips to campus limit. Administrative staff are being moved off campus. The city's shuttle service is far less extensive. The probable elimination of the Route 88 bus route in North Palo Alto already has the city saying that it cannot extend its route to compensate for the loss of mass transit.
27.	Fri, 8/24/07 10:22 PM	Sorry, this is too hard to believe.
28.	Fri, 8/24/07 11:58 PM	What funding innovations ensure these items are fully funded??
29.	Sat, 8/25/07 12:10 AM	Cannot really expect residents to cut down on driving unless, along with the new homes, there are also enough jobs and retail and service businesses built within walking/biking/mass transit distance to those homes. It will be necessary, therefore, to include mixed-use development as part of this plan.
30.	Sat, 8/25/07 12:43 AM	Sounds good to me! Bring on the higher density residential but make sure it is in a smart location.
31.	Sat, 8/25/07 4:14 AM	Who will pay for the new schools that have to be build, and wherre will they be?
32.	Sat, 8/25/07 4:17 AM	Best approach is to do everything possible to discourage more population growth by not building more housing here.
33.	Sat, 8/25/07 6:00 AM	Again, the less than neutral response reflects the quality of the question. The scenario is desirable but utterly lacks credibility. The desirable outcomes described will require levying huge fees on developers, which will drive the new housing prices sky high. This would actually be good and appropriate, with the price representing the true cost to the community of the new developments. Developments to date, and those in the pipeline, such as 800 High (hideously ugly, by the way, an aesthetic blight) and Alma Plaza, have not covered such costs, have (in some cases) replaced local shops while adding job capacity and generating more out-of-city trips. Scenario 2 is not even remotely feasible under the current political system, with likely more of the same: Dense developments that produce profits for developers and have only negative impacts.
34.	Sat, 8/25/07 7:40 AM	Sounds great, but, unfortunately, also sounds like fantasy. What are the funding innovations? How do we make sure that adequate new housing is created for "deserving local workers" (and who decides who is and who is not "deserving")?
35.	Sat, 8/25/07 2:46 PM	Higher density is necessary to protect open space and agriculture on the periphery. With Palo Alto having so many more jobs than homes, it is imperative to add housing here to reduce trip lengths.
36.	Sat, 8/25/07 6:38 PM	This a better scenario,except that the housing level is still too high. Then there is getting the Palo Alto City Council to take such visionary and optimistic positions. I've lived here for 45 years and see very little of this taking place. Why the city hasn't even maintained the infrstructire it alresdy has, i.e. roads, parks, library and so on. Yes, this is what PA should do. Will it? I don't expect to see such visionary behavior in my life time,and I have worked at getting the city to see some of these things you describe.
37.	Sat, 8/25/07 7:41 PM	this again is biased
38.	Sat, 8/25/07 8:31 PM	i would love to be in touch with the person who is interested in these sorts of scenario exercises also, please consider baylands and bay-side issues associated with sea level change. i've been told palo alto has not yet started to consider infrastructure protection for the wastewater treatment plant. i suppose the airport can be changed to accomodate seaplanes.
39.	Sun, 8/26/07 12:53 AM	I am a staunch environmentalist and actively work to reduce my family's carbon footprint every day. Nonetheless, this scenario strikes me as simplistic and conclusory. I would love to bring down GHG levels, reduce driving, and preserve the foothills. But to suggest that putting thousands of new homes here would do that? I think that assumes too much. Stanford West is a very, very, special situation because the residents work or study at Stanford. Most of the new housing couldn't go there. The levels of affordable housing that I understand would be built are rather low, and are still not affordable for many "deserving" local workers. There are real limits to what you can accomplish with traffic reduction. GHG levels back to 1990 just because of this? I find that difficult to believe. Far more would be accomplished through better emissions standards, choices of more fuel efficient vehicles, cap and trade, conservation, greater use of renewables, etc. etc. Again, all of these scenarios rest on the questionable assumption that people who will move here will be driving less because they live and work here. And the part about balancing the city's budget? What kind of innovations could be adopted that would not only fill the gaps we have now but also provide schools and services to thousands of additional people?
40.	Sun, 8/26/07 12:54 AM	This scenario is also baloney. The additional local traffic from all this new housing will make driving far worse than it is today. There would be an additional 1 million or so people in the Bay Area by 2020, in this scenario. This would greatly increase the stress on all our services -- in particular, education and medical. As the Bay Area degenerates into an LA-type disaster, people and businesses will move to less crowded suburban locations, such as in the northwest. A few developers will rake in the big bucks, but the rest of us will pay for it many times over in reduced quality of life.
41.	Sun, 8/26/07 1:27 AM	Ridiculous assumptions.
42.	Sun, 8/26/07 5:30 AM	Pipedream
43.	Sun, 8/26/07 6:18 AM	Once again, where do these GHG numbers come from? Ridiculous to include something like this in a survey. These biased questions are clearly intended to evoke particular answers. Fortunately, they are constructed in such an obviously amatuerish way that only a moron could take them seriously. You ought to be ashamed of yourselves for putting out this kind of tripe.
44.	Mon, 8/27/07 5:00 AM	Due to the changing demographics, Palo Alto politics change and "big box" retailers become welcome in the City. Increased sales tax revenues lead to a balanced budget and a surplus.... Indeed, Palo Alto takes a development lesson from East Palo Alto.
45.	Mon, 8/27/07 8:00 PM	The community will be "green" & mean. Merely cutting "GHG" to 1990 levels will only slow global warming. It won't turn it around. You need to do better. I also question the accuracy of your figures. Is your GHG figure gross, or does it consider the carbon sequestered by the City's truly green organisms, not just the reductions achieved by the nominally "greeen" structures?
46.	Tue, 8/28/07 2:23 PM	Palo Alto should simplify and normalize the permit issuance process, and allow economic forces - not bureacrats - to specify how our citi=y should be developed.
47.	Tue, 8/28/07 6:30 PM	This scenario is all about greedy developers. Schools weren't even mentioned in this scenario. WHY??? The prices of condos that the developers hope to sell are closely related to the quality of the local school district. Developers would rather take their money from higher sales prices than to actually help out the school districts. For every 500 homes, the developers should have to purchase a new school site and help the local district set up the new school. They should have to pay money toward expanding the local library and other city resources. It's unfair that they can build new homes, crowd these cities with more people and cars and then just cash their big profits.
48.	Wed, 8/29/07 12:15 AM	Note that the planning for approximately 3,000 new workers MUST include planning for at least 300,000 square feet of new office/light-industrial workspace where they can be employed. If that space is not also in, or very near, Palo Alto, all the greenhouse savings go out the window.
49.	Wed, 8/29/07 6:19 PM	This scenario is desirable, but is pie in the sky because I'm unsure residents would support full housing build-out in Palo Alto.
50.	Wed, 8/29/07 7:55 PM	A lovely description :-)
51.	Wed, 8/29/07 8:36 PM	To reduce GHG in Palo Alto, we should come up with programs that help existing Palo Altans to reduce their emissions NOW, not build new houses that are more green. Just encourage current residents to go green. Give them incentives to do so.
52.	Wed, 8/29/07 9:19 PM	Please keep in mind that "inspired" really means inspiring my pocketbook to grow larger.
53.	Wed, 8/29/07 9:31 PM	Less impactful growth is better than unconstrained growth, but growth still negatively impacts the environment. I don't know what "funding innovations" you refer to, but more taxes is not the answer.
54.	Wed, 8/29/07 10:09 PM	Thanks, no thanks, we do not need more people on the penisula.
55.	Thu, 8/30/07 12:19 AM	This is a trick scenario. Why not insist that the downtown merchants and businesses provide housing for their employees. HP? The California Ave businesses? Why not suggest that more Palo Alto residents should move closer to where they work - such as Cupertino, Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, etc? This survey seems to be setting up Stanford as the culprit and savior for this housing problem.
56.	Thu, 8/30/07 12:37 AM	I am skeptical about this! What traffic reducing policies do you have in mind? How healthy will San Francisquito creek be under this scenario? Could you put in some sentences here about how the average Palo Altan's lifestyle has changed to accommodate this (fewer purchases and vacations?)
57.	Thu, 8/30/07 1:22 PM	Not sure that housing can be restricted to local workers, but would like the idea if it could.
58.	Thu, 8/30/07 2:03 PM	cost of housing increases, lack of afforadable units
59.	Thu, 8/30/07 2:18 PM	Any city worker in PAlo Alto should be considered a deserving local worker..a teacher .....polce officier fire fighter... Stanford must be required to build affordbale housing for hospital workers, mall workers and pay a fee for each stanford worker that lives out of the city and does not use mass transit, carpool or drive a hybrid or elctric vehicle. Palo Alto needs to require real community wide befits from developers before any new housing development occurs...eg require that new development be walkable location for schools. Stop big high density single family housing projects now... require any new or remodels involving adding or affecting more than 600 square feet of exsiting homes to include a solar installation. Encourage lot combination...2 lots for one family..discourage small lots, do not allow any more single family houses unless lot is greater than 5000. Allow repair but no expansion of homes on lots smaller than 5000. enforce spedd limits and add traffic slwoing on all aterials,,, University, Middelfield, el camino and embarcadero. Force all city senior employees..eg city manager to live in the city. Rember we are a city not a suburb
60.	Thu, 8/30/07 4:00 PM	We are already losing too much green space and character to the mega projects.
61.	Thu, 8/30/07 4:05 PM	unlikely to happen
62.	Thu, 8/30/07 4:17 PM	Not sure what funding innovations are - more detail there would be helpful to see if those are real and feasible.
63.	Thu, 8/30/07 4:54 PM	I like pie in the sky too!
64.	Thu, 8/30/07 5:58 PM	While at face value the scenario appears to be good, this part is a significant assumption that is unlikely to become a reality: In order to balance the city's budget, Palo Alto copies recent suburban Bay Area funding innovations to ensure that city services, parks, infrastructure, and high quality education are fully funded.
65.	Thu, 8/30/07 7:15 PM	If the city is going to own the properties and only rent to workers within the city this might work. Although I would imagine that asking people to leave if they got a job outside the city would be interesting at best. Best to define the new innovative funding of city services, parks, infrastructure and schools....we could use that anyway.
66.	Thu, 8/30/07 8:30 PM	Sounds like a very unrealistic plan to me
67.	Thu, 8/30/07 9:17 PM	Again, I will not answer this because it is clear that the desired outcome is sstill 3,505 new homes - how insulting!
68.	Thu, 8/30/07 9:38 PM	unrealistically optimistic (what PR firm wrote this?)
69.	Thu, 8/30/07 9:41 PM	leading quesiton again.
70.	Thu, 8/30/07 10:46 PM	in the spirit of scenario dreaming... 1) all sorts of demand would be eased and solutions arrived at, if the Redwood City School District was dramatically improved. The city has remarkable amounts of infrastructure and re-building potential BUT the school test scores are so poor many, many, many buyers or family renters will absolutely not live there. Its a sad state. For many reasons - it a perfectly nice town, (i mean it made the gov't test for the best weather!) and large tracts in the town have homes of the same architectural quality and period found in some of Palo ALto's most sought after neighborhoods, the lots sizes are equivalent, the tree canopy are lush, but they sell with fewer buyers attracted to them because of the schools. 2) Why single out Atherton - they can't build any more units then they have. (period) Pretty much Menlo Park for that matter as well. BUT, can they contribute to a pool with other cities including Palo Alto (who also has little land) to buy what available parcels there could be assembled, develop and then lease the land to the homeowner - similar to Stanford's lease land holdings in West Menlo Park. There could be long-range revenue deposited back into the pool, to create future housing developments. Similar to how the City of Palo Alto Utilities and the Bay Lands were developed. 3)Dream vision for Menlo Park: demo Santa Cruz Avenue (!) please - it is so depressing! and re-build into a charming, multi-story, mixed-use vibrant downtown. Result: same number of family run shops, with easy to sell, or rent "urban-ish" dwellings on top. 4) Dream vision for Palo Alto - there are many great things about Palo Alto, one of the most important of which is the existance of a Commercial Arhcitectural Review Board. If 3,500 units are to be built, please keep this Board , hold them to an even higher accountability and control. (that said, how unbelievably disappointing it is to see El Camino junked-up with the condo complex at the old Ricky's site) Also, especially since 3,500 units will likely come in the form of building complexes, there should be a heighten emphasis put on making sure the dollar reserves for each complex is substantial and spent on a regular basis. There is much excitement these days about high-density living with very little in the way of practice/experience or history of American's living in a communal situation. Reviewing the physical sturctures, financial statements and management of Palo Alto condominium complexes as young as 20 years of age shows that well-maintained "group living" is extremely difficult and rarely achieved. Lastly, but also adding to the pressure on communal living is... 5) all new commercial buildings should include a roof top garden - checkout what they are doing in Chicago ! Its amazing! Plus, private roof top gardens for the sole use of the residents of the complex would be a feature that would help out in the trade-off of not having their own plot of land.
71.	Thu, 8/30/07 10:46 PM	What are the funding innovations you refer to? I think we need to abolish (at least fundamentally change) prop 13. Now that would be a funding innovation!
72.	Thu, 8/30/07 11:48 PM	So the housing will be restricted to folks working at SUH and Packard? Who else constitutes "deserving local workers," and who decides? What are these "traffic reducing policies?" These "deserving local workers" might be using public transportation to work, but what about their leisure and shopping use of a car? These folks will still be clogging our streets with their cars at one point or another.
73.	Fri, 8/31/07 12:47 AM	Unlikely
74.	Fri, 8/31/07 5:54 AM	Don't believe the assumption is correct- can't add all those people without impairing traffic, GHG and life styles.
75.	Fri, 8/31/07 7:28 PM	Unrealistic scenario
76.	Fri, 8/31/07 9:20 PM	As presented, I don't see the downside.
77.	Sat, 9/1/07 8:53 AM	This one sounds much too rosey to be believed. What about the tremendous increase in size of Stanford Hospital that is proposed? Are you talking about housing the worthy nurses we have now or also all those to be added? Where does it stop, when we are all living with several families to a house?
78.	Sat, 9/1/07 8:19 PM	I think this scenario is overly optimistic about insuring that new housing is occupied only and -forever- by persons/families whose working adults are employed at adjacent businesses/institutions and whose children attend the adjacent schools.
79.	Sat, 9/1/07 11:49 PM	THINK ANEW!!!!! These are NOT the only alternatives. There are opportunities here to save the planet and make it a pleasant and productive place to live!
80.	Sun, 9/2/07 12:11 AM	This scenario doesn't look at all the crowding in schools and parks. It doesn't consider whether we can still obtain enough water, gas and electricity for this growth. It also doesn't consider who pays for the new schools and parks.
81.	Tue, 9/4/07 3:26 AM	Sounds wonderful, but Palo Alto's record doesn't bear out that it'll happen.
82.	Tue, 9/4/07 6:11 PM	Sounds like a utopia that is difficult to achieve, but perhaps worth striving for.
83.	Tue, 9/4/07 6:23 PM	This seems quite unrealistic though!
84.	Tue, 9/4/07 8:37 PM	In assessing this scenario, it would be helpful to know more details of the recent funding innovations. These innovations might be very desirable or very undesirable -- in the absence of further detail, I cannot meaningfully rate implementing these innovations or a scenario that includes doing so.
85.	Tue, 9/4/07 9:11 PM	I don't believe that this scenario is realistic. GHG levels will go up.
86.	Wed, 9/5/07 4:57 AM	It would depend on what the traffic reducing policies are. Were they something that made sense for students but would not make sense for, say, soccer moms transporting their kids everywhere? The traffic reducing policies have to be reasonable. I can't quite picture them so can't quite "believe" this scenario, though I want to.
87.	Wed, 9/5/07 3:42 PM	Very careful attention needs to be paid to funding city services and education. Already there are too many battles over education resources. Innovative funding and housing solutions will also require innovative education solutions - charter schools, schools housed in nontraditional locations, magnet schools
88.	Wed, 9/5/07 4:39 PM	It is not clear what some of these magic phrases mean (e.g., "funding innovations", "further traffic reducing policies", etc.) or what their implications are (e.g., "the foothills remain preserved" tells me the flatlands are much worse off than currently). Quality of life and services is important, especially to an aging population and to new families.
89.	Wed, 9/5/07 5:06 PM	What a great vision! Will really take a lot of commitment for those who believe in it to make it happen, but if we really care we need to be willing to work for it.
90.	Wed, 9/5/07 6:59 PM	this is an aside -- stanford is experiencing issues with people parking where they shouldn't be. stanford makes employees pay for parking. other companies reward employees for carpooling, taking public transportation. what can't stanford do that as well? why can't i park on stanford land to run the dish, but THEY can park anywhere they damn feel like it. (Can we have signs that say 'parking for non-stanford permit holders only'?).
91.	Wed, 9/5/07 7:24 PM	These two options are written in a way so as to make the survey invalid. It shouldn't be obvious in reading a survey what the authors' agenda might be. I am extremely jaded about the part about "deserving local workers." The condos which are going in behind us right now have a section specially reserved for "low income" families - they'll be starting at 800k. I don't know any nurses who can afford that. How will these homes be priced correctly? How will homes be awarded - lotteries? Will the new owners then be allowed to sell their houses to others outside the pool of "special" workers? Who decided who these special people are? How will all the new students be accommodated? Education isn't fully-funded right now - what magical event will change that in the future? I think that lowering GHG levels is very important, but not so much that you can overlook all the other impacts of the growth. Perhaps a new school could be built near the housing? Space for businesses so that there will be sales tax revenue coming to the city to help support the new residents?
92.	Wed, 9/5/07 10:46 PM	No matter how you cut it, "Large population growth" = "very bad". "Deserving local workers"? What kind of Orwellian concept is that? Where is the additional water coming from? Where is the sewage going? How far can we expect this exponential population increase to continue?
93.	Thu, 9/6/07 5:36 AM	If we add housing in Palo Alto, I agree that driving great distances to and from work will lessen, however, just because folks live in Palo Alto does not mean that they will work in Palo Alto. The analogy with Stanford is weak in this regard. Stanford housing is for Stanford employees. I don't think we can mandate that Palo Alto residents work only in Palo Alto.
94.	Thu, 9/6/07 11:25 PM	see above
95.	Fri, 9/7/07 12:56 AM	This Scenerio would never happen in Palo Alto! Be Realistic! By 2014! "The Palo Alto Process" ties up all balanced growth.
96.	Fri, 9/7/07 2:17 AM	Good scenario but pretty fanciful. The likelihood of local governments being good enough to pull this off is extremely low.
97.	Fri, 9/7/07 2:58 AM	When the city figures out the innovative funding options then we can discuss this proposal. There inovative funding options are to charge or charge more for city services.
98.	Fri, 9/7/07 4:15 AM	The state continues to underfund public education. Due to population growth, but no resources to build additional schools, all of the Palo Alto elementary schools overflow and there is a crisis in the school district. I'm sorry, but Palo Alto by itself cannot solve the public education funding crisis - it is a state problem. I also have a problem with designating housing for 'deserving local workers' in the way you imply. Create the low-cost housing so it is convenient for Stanford Nurses, but make the qualification criteria objective, such as based on income, commute distance, and so forth. How do you know who will be most deserving in ten years time? By the way, this scenario sounds so rosy and optimistic that it makes me laugh.
99.	Fri, 9/7/07 5:28 AM	Scenario 2 would be a good result if it could be acheived without, in particular, overcrowding our schools. The fact that Stanford is able to achieve positive results in GHG production does not mean that it would translate throughout the City. I assume that residents of the Stanford West Apartments tend to work at Stanford. Hence fewer miles traveled. How can Palo Alto require residents of these new homes to work close to their homes (and how can Palo Alto require their employers to retain these people)? More perplexing is the fact that residents of Palo Alto generate substanitally more GHGs than Stanford West residents. If people who already live in Palo Alto ("where all the jobs are") are doing a lot of driving, how can we be sure that the residents of the new homes will not?
100.	Fri, 9/7/07 1:55 PM	I would argue that it is impossible to add 3,500 new homes and not add any total auto trips. this seems completely and totally unrealistic. no credibility whatsoever to this utupoian scenario.
101.	Fri, 9/7/07 3:21 PM	Bit of a fantasy here.BTW best scenario to reduce commuting is to concentrate office buildings in a city center - perhaps San Jose - as a transit hub.
102.	Fri, 9/7/07 3:24 PM	I don't think this is truly possible.
103.	Fri, 9/7/07 3:46 PM	I'm not sure I buy the "deserving workers" part. Someone else can always be identified as deserving, and it is going to build some resentment. If we think nurses are particularly deserving, provide them a tax break or provide some incentive to the local hospitals to pay them more. It is all still a tax on the other local people -- why not actually tie it to what is being proposed (low salaries for certain workers). A little vague about the "fully funded" bit. Basically the people making $$ from what I assume will be large developments should pay for a large portion of the additional city services. And maybe, just maybe, Palo Alto city could work on a bit of efficiency.
104.	Fri, 9/7/07 4:04 PM	To me this is the answer. Look at cities like Austin TX that have a real vision and see themselves as leaders in this area. Palo Alto should be right up there as a model for all communities nationwide. This is a huge opportunity for us given the resources and brainpower that we have in this community.
105.	Fri, 9/7/07 4:08 PM	I would like to see a better use of resources in this country and more sustainable building practices. However I don't think that government should madate so much. We should be using market forces to incent better resource usage. Palo Alto is a wonderful place to live for many reasons that go beyond the town itself. Proximity to High Tech, San Francisco, Stanford, airports and great weather also contribute. As a result, the cost of housing will continue to be lower in communitites farther from the bay area and that will draw many people to those bedroom communities.
106.	Fri, 9/7/07 5:00 PM	I am not certain what "Bay area funding innovations" are - assuming some mitigation on developers? carbon trading? I need to be educated on this. but the picture is one I like.
107.	Fri, 9/7/07 6:28 PM	But I don't think it's possible with how schools are funded now. This scenario is pollyanna.
108.	Fri, 9/7/07 6:46 PM	I would put this scenario in the category of "wishful dreaming." What is LA doing about the problem? What about Bakersfield and Fresno? Also see my answer to Scenario 1.
109.	Fri, 9/7/07 8:22 PM	sounds good but don't know how it can be enforced. It may overlap with discriminary housing policies.
110.	Fri, 9/7/07 10:10 PM	while this sounds magical, and trip reduction of interest, I'd suggest they don't even do what they say. Example: Palo Alto utilities will only take credit cards if you drive to their office once per month. For 10 years they've been 'on the verge' of taking credit cards by another method (phone, mail, web), but there's always some problem. If each Palo Alto homeowner has to drive to downtown and park to use a credit card to pay their utilities, what are the chances they can enforce your utopia? The people that work in the city of Palo Alto don't like the people of Palo Alto. They don't live in Palo Alto. The city does short sighted moves like selling schools, only to regret it later. Rather than buy a home to house thier future city managers, they buy a home for the city manager and he lives there, gets the appreciation, and likely heads out of town when the job is done. How much will the next house for a city manager--School Superintendent--etc, cost? How do you know these Stanford dwellers drive less than other Palo Altans. I don't recall anyone asking me how much I drive.
111.	Fri, 9/7/07 10:43 PM	Obvously this is good, but what are the "funding innovations" that are mentioned? What is the projected cost of doing this?
112.	Sat, 9/8/07 12:56 AM	This community should continue to lead in reduction of cars, planned walkways, better bicycle lanes, reduced traffic, recycling, telephone lines underground, cutting down dangerous trees that kill people when they fall in rainstorms, putting in wireless WIMAX, and increasing the chances for physical mobility in the community.
113.	Sat, 9/8/07 4:40 AM	This looks quite ideal
114.	Sat, 9/8/07 5:17 AM	This is far too idealistic, i.e. not realistic. Add more people, and the environmental impact will increase. Build better mass transit and more efficient transportation, and things might improve without a need to accommodate a larger local population on the peninsula.
115.	Sat, 9/8/07 3:12 PM	Even with GHG and energy-saving conditions, the basic problems still exist with additional cars, more children in schools, not enough service & grocery stores.
116.	Sat, 9/8/07 10:26 PM	"Good" as the results are envisioned. The following comment applies to both scenarios. I've worked for highly visionary companies (Apollo Computer and SGI) that have gone down the tubes because the visions didn't stand up for reasons both outside and within the firms.
117.	Sun, 9/9/07 4:45 AM	dream on!
118.	Sun, 9/9/07 9:58 PM	Essentially all but impossible to accomplish. Remember that Standord is one of the few if only major employer that both has the land to build housing and the internal desire to build housing. Trying to control occupancy re "local employment" on smaller sites not controlled by employers would mean a bureaucratic machine that the area wouldn't fine acceptable---imagine a government program to tell households that because one resident took a job in Santa Clara, they have to sell the unit (or evicting rental units).