Townhouses Could Help Fulfill Housing Requirements

A proposal to put in a seven-unit townhouse complex where a now stands could go a ways toward fulfilling Piedmont's housing needs. The City Council considers the project .

Last month, the Piedmont Planning Commission unanimously recommended that the 1926 PG&E substation at 408 Linda Ave be torn down to make way for the development.

The four-bedroom units, located on a pleasant, leafy block near Beach Elementary School, Beach Play Field and just around the corner from the Grand Avenue business district, are expected to be priced at market value.   

Development of housing in place of the substation was listed as a "key objective" in Piedmont's recently passed housing element, which lays out the city's plan for meeting what the state has calculated to be its “fair share” of the housing needs of the region.

Piedmont’s allocation for the period 2007-2014 was for 40 units. That's roughly 0.1 percent of the total allocation for Alameda County, but still much greater than what the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) has predicted Piedmont can achieve.

The housing element quotes ABAG's estimate that no more than 10 new households will be built in Piedmont between now and 2025, roughly one house per year for the next 14 years, “reflecting the fact that the city is fully developed and has almost no vacant land.” 

Piedmont City Planner Kate Black said the seven proposed units on Linda Avenue would at least accomplish some of the required housing expansion.

“We do not want fewer units because this is one of our only locations to get multi-family for the standard density for that zone,” she said. “In fact, we would have permitted more units if they had made some of the units affordable in accordance with housing elements within state law.”

The complex would be the first multi-family units to be built in Piedmont since the mid-1950s.