The fact that Nancy Pyle is having the city look at alternative sites for a sports field complex in Almaden Valley--including a parcel on Harry Road--is great news. We just have to ask what took so long?
The Almaden Resident has never been against building soccer, baseball and softball fields for the children of the valley. Soccer is king in Almaden, with thousands of youth soccer players living in the 95120 ZIP code, not to mention the baseball and softball players. And there is no arguing that there is a dearth of fields in the valley for them to practice and play on. The few fields we do have at the local schools and the odd city fields here and there are overused.
We were just worried that the McKean Road site had too many drawbacks and concerned about the way the city went about approving the site, shrugging off neighbors' water and traffic concerns.
When Pyle came into office, she was handed an albatross in the form of the fields. The grandiose plan for multiple soccer fields and a half-dozen baseball and softball diamonds on 35 acres at Caglia Ranch land were eventually scaled back to a handful of fields that would be built a couple at a time, to make sure the fields wouldn't sap the ground water in the area dry.
Although the city insisted last winter that all possible alternative sites in Almaden Valley had been reviewed and dismissed, it turns out there is a list of parcels in the valley that may be able to support a sports complex without any of the flaws that have hamstrung the proposed McKean Road complex.
All of the sites on the list--drawn up by the South Almaden Valley Rural Alliance two years ago and then ignored by the city--are within city limits, so that eliminates the water issue right away. Secondly, any traffic concerns will pale to the nightmare that would have happened along two-lane McKean Road when the fields were in full use. Regardless of what the city and site supporters have said, the backups going to and from the field would have been huge. And since the McKean Road is so narrow, the safety factor for cyclists, pedestrians and equestrians is a major concern.
Finally, since the city council passed a General Plan amendment to clear the way for the McKean Road fields, developers have been salivating at the thought of opening up the reserve for development. Instead of having to wait for several years to get a General Plan in place after the triggers have been met, like in Coyote Valley, there is now talk about generating a General Plan for South Almaden Valley Urban Reserve so that when the triggers are tripped in Almaden, development could begin right away. By keeping a sports complex out of the urban reserve, there will be one less project that could artificially trip the trigger.
What we can't understand is why the city didn't look at these alternative sites sooner. It's not as if these pieces of land simply showed up overnight; SAVRA had identified these parcels long ago.
But the city fixated on the McKean Road site and poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into a pair of environmental impact reports, as well as other tests and costs, all the while ignoring other alternatives.
Yes, the San Jose Unified School District was willing--at the onset--to rent the land to the city for a dollar a year, but all the money spent trying to make the round McKean Road site fit into a square hole has been squandered. The school district is now having second thoughts and will only offer a five-year lease on the land, instead of the 10- or 20-year lease the city wants.
Nancy Pyle should be commended for stopping the process and stepping back to look at the big picture. If she is able to identify an alternative site for youth sports fields, one that doesn't have all the roadblocks the McKean Road complex is facing, the children of Almaden Valley can only benefit. |
