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What's Happening With the Condos at 16th and South Van Ness?

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By Sally Kuchar
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From the Curbed inbox:
What's going on at the corner of 16th and South Van Ness? It's the site of an old service station, next door to the Redstone Building. It's been torn up a bit more than usual, but I can't see what, if anything, is happening there.

This site was once home to a gas station and has since been a Green Cab storage lot, but is slated to turn into a seven-story building with 84 condo units. The project has been in the works since 2010, but has hit some major speed bumps along the way.

When the project at 16th and South Van Ness was first proposed, many Mission locals were not happy. Neighbors thought the building was too tall, and reps from the adjacent Redstone Building thought it would overshadow their landmark. The Redstone, also known as the San Francisco Labor Temple, has housed dozens of unions over the years and was instrumental in the 1934 labor strike (it's already a San Francisco local landmark). They pushed for a full-on environmental review, which was held up when the contractor failed to reply to a request for additional information from the Planning Department.

In the meantime, the developer got permits to remove soil contaminated by underground gasoline tanks that had already been removed. They hit a major speed bump when neighbors started smelling bad odors during the excavation, and the Department of Public Health ordered a cease-and-desist of the work.

There hasn't been a lot of movement since, but in April of this year the Planning Department started a Community Plan Exemption Exclusion. A Community Plan Exemption is "an exemption from environmental review for projects that are consistent with the development density established by existing zoning, community plan or general plan policies for which an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) was certified." A project can be excluded from this exemption if "there are project-specific effects which are peculiar to the project or its site." Since an exclusion has been started for this project, it looks like they're about to start tackling the environmental review process which will likely include a full EIR. We'll keep you posted.
· Opposition Builds Against Condos Next to Historic Labor Temple [Mission Local]
· Health Officials Halt Work at Proposed Condo Site [Mission Local]
· San Francisco Landmark #238: San Francisco Labor Temple [Noehill]
· CEQA Community Plan Exemptions [SF Planning]

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