As we first reported a couple weeks ago, the revived plans for a modern 144-unit building to rise up to 84 feet in height at 430 Main/429 Beale Street could be approved by San Francisco’s Planning Commission at the end of this month.

While the site was previously approved for development back in 2009, the proposed project was subsequently waylaid by a successful appeal to San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, an appeal which was championed by neighbors in the adjacent Baycrest condo building at 201 Harrison and technically challenged Planning’s issuance of a Community (Rincon Hill Area) Plan Exemption for the development, an exemption which should have obviated the need for additional environmental review.

The 2009-era developer subsequently abandoned the project and sold the site. And as such, while San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors had directed Planning “to conduct additional environmental review and prepare either a negative declaration or an environmental impact report that analyzes the [proposed development’s] potential impacts related to air quality, wind, and [greenhouse gas] emissions,” said additional review was deemed moot and never conducted.

Yesterday, Planning issued a new Community Plan Exemption for the revived development.  We’ll keep you posted and plugged-in.

9 thoughts on “Déjà Vu for a Waylaid Rincon Hill Development”
  1. The current sponsors of this project should have invoked the State Density Bonus Law in order to cut through NIMBY opposition and constrain the discretion of the Planning Commission.

    Accordingly, just like with the previous sponsor in 2009, they’re going to be throwing themselves on the mercy of the Commission and exposing their project to either disapproval or the death of a thousand cuts.

    The State law is not only useful to increase capacity, but extraordinarily useful to expedite and insure the approval of projects.

    1. Typical developer mentality: make money, ignore quality of life issues. We need INFRASTRUCTURE more in that area vs more housing.

      1. Uh, it’s not the developer’s job to pay attention to infrastructure. It’s the Board’s job, with assistance from planning, to ensure that developers pay enough in fees and taxes to fund the necessary infrastructure for the projects developers propose.

    1. Not yet.
      Issuance of the Community Plan Exemption is a good thing for the project. The environmental review normally precedes the project approval.

  2. This crystalline structure is finally different from the stucco formula crap usually foisted on the City…very handsome….

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