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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1.0 Introduction_080409 I Introduction This Program Environmental Impact Report (EIR) has been prepared on behalf of the City of South San Francisco in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). This chapter outlines the purpose of and overall approach to the preparation of the EIR on the proposed South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment (proposed Amendment). The City of South San Francisco is the lead agency responsible for ensuring that the proposed Amend- ment complies with CEQA. 1.1 PURPOSE OF THIS EIR The proposed Amendment consists of policies to guide the future growth along the southern portion of EI Camino Real in the City of South San Francisco, as described in Chapter 2: Project Description. This EIR evaluates the potential impacts of the adoption and implementa- tion of the proposed Amendment. This EIR will also be used as a reference document during subsequent environmental review processes associated with infrastructure improvements, zon- ing amendments, impact fees, and development proposals within the Planning Area. The EIR for the proposed Amendment has three purposes: . Satisfy CEQA requirements for analysis of environmental impacts by including a com- plete and comprehensive programmatic evaluation of the physical impacts of the pro- posed Amendment and its alternatives. . Inform property owners, residents, tenants, members of the City Council, and mem- bers of the Planning Commission of the City of South San Francisco of the potential environmental impacts of the proposed Amendment prior to the Commission and Council taking action on the proposed Amendment. The information presented in this EIR will assist City officials in reviewing and adopting the proposed Amendment. . Provide a basis for the review of subsequent development projects and public im- provements proposed within the Planning Area. Subsequent environmental documents may be tiered from this EIR. CEQA requires that the agency with the primary responsibility over the approval of a project (the lead agency) evaluate the potential impacts of the project in an EIR. The City is required to conduct environmental review on the proposed Amendment in order to provide decision- makers with an informational document for use in evaluating the proposed Amendment. After adoption of the proposed Amendment, the EIR will serve the additional function of providing direction to the City in implementation of the proposed Amendment. No mitigations are iden- tified; impacts have either been addressed through existing General Plan policies, or new poli- cies in the proposed Amendment. The "No Project Alternative" discusses the result of not im- plementing the proposed Amendment or the Employment Center Alternative. An environ- mentally superior alternative is also identified as part of the alternatives analysis to inform de- cision-makers on this project. Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction 1.2 EIR PROCESS The EIR process includes several steps: publication of Notice of Preparation of an EIR (Nap); EIR public scoping meeting; publication of a Draft EIR for public review and comment; prepa- ration of responses to general public and other agency comments on the Draft EIR; and certifi- cation of the Final EIR. The Nap for the EIR was published on June 17,2009 (see Appendix A for the published Nap). The Nap and public comment period were advertised and a public scoping meeting was held July 1, 2009 to gather public input on the scope and content of the EIR. Written comments were also received during the public comment period (See Appendix A). Comments on the Nap are addressed throughout the EIR in the relevant issue area chapters. Environmental issues raised during the public scoping process included the following: . Project on-site storm runoff rates within the Colma Creek Flood Zone. . Compatibility with the Comprehensive Airport Land Use Plan. . Cumulative growth impacts on PG&E facilities. . Extent of the traffic analysis. This Draft EIR will be used by South San Francisco residents, elected officials, and City staff during the public review process. The Draft EIR and Final EIR, which includes responses to public comments received during the 45-day comment period, will be certified by the South San Francisco City Council prior to consideration of the proposed Amendment. CEQA mandates that lead agencies adopt mitigation monitoring and reporting programs for projects identified as having significant impacts where mitigation measures have been identi- fied. Mitigation monitoring and reporting programs are intended to ensure compliance during project implementation. These programs provide the additional advantages of providing staff and decision-makers with feedback as to the effectiveness of mitigation measures, as well as the experience and information to shape future mitigation measures. No mitigation measures are identified in this EIR. If significant and unavoidable impacts remain after all feasible mitigation measures have been identified and the City Council elects to proceed with the proposed Amendment despite these impacts, the City Council would be required to adopt a statement of overriding considerations prior to adoption of the proposed Amendment. The statement of overriding considerations must explain how the benefits of the proposed Amendment would outweigh any significant impacts identified. If adopted by the City Council, the proposed Amendment will be imple- mented through amendments to zoning regulations, capital improvements program, and other policies, plans, and programs. 1-2 Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction 1.3 APPROACH TO THE STUDY APPROACH This Program EIR evaluates the potential environmental impacts associated with complete build-out of the proposed Amendment. A Program EIR is defined in the CEQA Guidelines Section 15168 as: "...an EIR which may be prepared on a series of actions that can be characterized as one large project and are related either: (1) geographically; (2) as logical parts in the chain of contemplated actions; (3) in connection with the issuance of rules, regulations, plans, or other general criteria to govern the conduct of a continuing program; or (4) as individual activities carried out under the same authorizing statutory or regulatory authority and having generally similar environmental impacts which can be mitigated in similar ways. " A Program EIR can be used as the basic, general environmental assessment for an overall pro- gram of projects proposed over the approximately ll-year planning horizon. A Program EIR has several advantages. First, it provides a basic reference document to avoid unnecessary repe- tition of facts or analysis in subsequent project-specific assessments. Second, it allows the lead agency to look at the broad, regional impacts of a program of actions before its adoption and eliminates redundant or contradictory approaches to the consideration of regional and cumu- lative impacts. As a Program EIR, this document focuses on the overall effects of the proposed Amendment in the Planning Area. Individual development projects will continue to require project level envi- ronmental assessment. The project-level environmental review will need to focus on project- scale impacts; cumulative and citywide impacts (such as traffic), would not need to be eva- luated, provided the data and assumptions used in this EIR remain current and valid. The nature of general plans is such that many proposed policies are intended to be general, with details to be later determined during implementation. Thus, many of the impacts can only be described in general or qualitative terms. In order to place many of the proposed Amend- ment policies into effect, the City would adopt or approve specific actions, such as zoning regu- lations, zoning map amendments, design guidelines, development impact fees, capital im- provement programs, or development projects, that would be consistent with the policies of the proposed Amendment and therefore reflected in this EIR. The proposed Amendment and the EIR have been prepared concurrently, and the policies pre- sented in the proposed Amendment consider the discussion of impacts and mitigation meas- ures identified in the EIR. The proposed Amendment is intended to be self-mitigating, in that the policies and programs of the proposed Amendment and existing General Plan are designed to mitigate environmental impacts. This EIR demonstrates how the impacts of future devel- opment in the Planning Area will be mitigated through implementation of the policies and programs of the proposed Amendment and existing General Plan. Any residual impact after implementation of these proposed policies and programs is measured against the significance criteria established for each impact area. The significance criteria is an identifiable quantitative, qualitative, or performance level thresholds and are based on the suggested criteria provided in CEQA Guidelines Appendix G. 1-3 Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction ASSUMPTIONS This EIR represents the best effort to evaluate the potential environmental effects of the pro- posed Amendment given its long-term planning horizon. It can be anticipated that conditions will change; however, the assumptions used are the best available at the time of preparation and reflect existing knowledge of patterns of development and travel patterns. This EIR is based on the following assumptions: . Full Implementation. The EIR assumes all policies in the proposed Amendment would be fully implemented, and all proposed Planning Area development would be consis- tent with the proposed Amendment Land Use Diagram (see Chapter 2: Project De- scription) and other land use controls, such as building heights and floor area ratios. Key elements of the proposed Amendment include the designation of a significant part of the Planning Area as a mixed-use area and enhanced livability through improve- ments to pedestrian connectivity and pedestrian oriented retail. . Buildout in 2020. This EIR assumes that buildout of the proposed Amendment will oc- cur by 2020. It is understood that development under the proposed General Plan will be incremental and timed in response to market conditions. For a full explanation and projection of build out, see Chapter 2: Project Description. . Cumulative Impacts. Cumulative impacts are defined by CEQA Guidelines Section 15355 as "...two or more individual effects which, when considered together, are con- siderable or which compound or increase other environmental impacts." CEQA Guide- lines permit the use of either a "list" or "projections" approach for definition of area- wide conditions for use in the cumulative analysis. That is, either a list of all past, present and reasonably foreseeable future projects that could collectively contribute to significant cumulative impacts, or regional growth projections from adopted planning documents relevant to the project, to define an area-wide set of future conditions for cumulative analysis. The proposed Amendment is a planning document; therefore, re- gional growth projections are considered more appropriate for a program-level cumu- lative impact analysis. Throughout the EIR some sections identify impacts as cumulatively significant, while also determining that the project's incremental effect is not cumulatively considerable. As noted in CEQA Guidelines section 15130(a), "An EIR shall discuss cumulative im- pacts of a project when the project's incremental effect is cumulatively considerable, as defined in section 15065(c). Where a lead agency is examining a project with an incre- mental effect that is not "cumulatively considerable," a lead agency need not consider that effect significant, but shall briefly describe its basis for concluding that the incre- mental effect is not cumulatively considerable." Therefore, for all impacts that find that the project is not cumulatively considerable, a discussion of the cumulatively signifi- cant impact is included, as is a discussion regarding the conclusion that the incremental effect is not cumulatively considerable. Further, "an EIR may determine that a project's contribution to a significant cumula- tive impact will be rendered less than cumulatively considerable and thus is not signifi- cant. A project's contribution is less than cumulatively considerable if the project is re- quired to implement or fund its fair share of a mitigation measure or measures de- 1-4 Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction signed to alleviate the cumulative impact" (Section 15130(a)(3)). Where the cumulative impact is significant, this EIR identifies existing General Plan policies and polices in- cluded in the proposed Amendment that are designed to alleviate the cumulative im- pact. APPLICABILITY As a Program EIR, this document focuses on the overall effects associated with adoption and implementation of the proposed Amendment; the analysis does not examine the effects of po- tential site-specific projects that may occur under the overall umbrella of this program in the future. When specific development proposals for the Planning Area are submitted to the City, the City will determine whether the environmental effects of the proposed projects have been adequately addressed by this EIR. If the City finds that the proposals would not result in any additional potentially significant adverse environmental impacts beyond those considered in this EIR, no new environmental analysis will be required. If the City determines that a project could create potentially significant adverse environmental impacts that have not been studied in this EIR, or if the City determines that environmental conditions have changed substantially since the EIR was prepared, the City may require further environmental review to determine appropriate revisions to the project, conditions of approval, or additional mitigation measures. 1.4 SCOPE OF THE EIR Information gathered about the environmental setting is used to define relevant planning is- sues, determine thresholds of significance, and evaluate potential impacts. Based on the initial analysis of environmental setting and baseline conditions, and comments on the Nap, the fol- lowing issues are analyzed in this EIR: . Traffic, Circulation, and Parking . Noise . Air Quality . Parks and Recreation . Public Services and Utilities . Energy and Greenhouse Gases . Aesthetics and Visual Resources . Land Use and Housing . Impacts Not Potentially Significant Cultural Resources Biological Resources Geology, Soils, and Seismicity Hazards and Hazardous Materials Hydrology and Flooding - Mineral Resources 1-5 Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction Each potential impact is addressed in Chapter 3: Settings, Impacts, and Mitigation Measures. 1.5 OTHER RELEVANT PLANS AND ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES The following documents are most closely relevant to the proposed Amendment and this EIR, and are available from the City for review: . City of South San Francisco, South San Francisco General Plan, October 1999. http://www.ci.ssf.ca.us/depts/ ecd/planning/ generaLp Ian. asp . City of South San Francisco, South San Francisco General Plan Update Draft Environ- mental Impact Report, June 1999. 1.6 ORGANIZATION OF THIS EIR The Draft EIR is organized into the following chapters, plus appendices: Executive Summary. The executive summary summarizes the EIR by providing an overview of the proposed Amendment, the potentially significant environmental im- pacts that could result from the project, the mitigation measures identified to reduce or avoid these impacts, alternatives to the project, and identification of the environmen- tally superior alternative. 1. Introduction. This chapter introduces the purpose for the EIR; explains the EIR process and intended uses of the EIR; the assumptions critical to the environmental analysis; and overall EIR organization. 2. Project Description. This chapter includes a detailed description of the proposed Amendment. Project location, objectives, the Land Use Diagram, the proposed land use classification system, key policies and buildout estimates are presented. 3. Settings, Impacts, and Mitigation Measures. This chapter analyzes the environmental impacts of the proposed Amendment. Impacts are organized by major topic. Each top- ic area includes a description of the environmental setting, significance criteria, and impacts. The existing conditions serve as the baseline for the analysis of potential pro- gram-level environmental impacts that would result from implementation of the pro- posed Amendment. The environmental analysis examines construction and operation- al impacts and identifies mitigation measures for potentially significant impacts. As discussed previously, cumulative impacts from the implementation of the proposed Amendment are analyzed for certain environmental topics in this Chapter, as appro- priate. Policies in the proposed Amendment that would avoid or reduce the impacts are discussed. No mitigation measures have been identified in this EIR. Section 3.9 dis- cusses all impact areas with no impact or no potential significant impacts. 4. Analysis of Alternatives. This chapter presents a reasonable range of alternatives to the project, provides discussion of environmental impacts associated with each alternative, compares the relative impacts of each alternative to those of the proposed project and other alternatives, discusses the relationship of each alternative to the project objec- tives, and identifies the environmentally superior alternative. 1-6 Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction 5. CEQA Required Conclusions. This chapter provides a summary of significant envi- ronmental impacts, including growth-inducing, cumulative impacts, unavoidable sig- nificant effects, and irreversible effects. 6. Report Authors. Identifies EIR consultants and sub consultants, persons and organiza- tions consulted during EIR preparation, and lists persons who contributed to report preparation. 7. Bibliography. A list of documents used during EIR preparation. 8. Appendices. Technical appendices include the NOP and compilation of agency and public comments received on the NOP, as well as other technical appendices related to transportation. 1-7 Draft Environmental Impact Report for South EI Camino Real General Plan Amendment Chapter I: Introduction This page intentionally left blank. 1-8