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The fact that the area is divided by the San Leandro - Oakland City boundary with part accessible only via substandard Oakland streets and a deteriorated area of Oakland. The area is very visible from BART and the San Leandro Boulevard gateway to the City so new development must have high quality design. In order to achieve high quality redevelopment, it is necessary to provide a second access and eliminate or respond properly to all the other constraints. This will require a comprehensive approach to planning and development and the new development will have to be intensive and valuable enough to bear almost all of the substantial costs of eliminating the constraints. Lower quality, piecemeal development that compromises the opportunity to properly improve the entire area should not be permitted. Present zoning should be amended to provide for discretionary review of all new development in the interim until the appropriate planning and development approaches are determined. That determination should be made at such time as either one or more property owners are prepared to take the lead and pay the costs for a private comprehensive redevelopment program or the City is prepared to undertake redevelopment or other public approaches to solution of the areas problems. In either situation, the most appropriate uses appear to be in the light industrial, business park, eF office categories or residential development that is master planned with the proper infrastructure and amenities such as access roads, utilities, outdoor open space (park area) and soundwalls to mitigate the noise impact from the adjacent rail lines. The site would be conveniently located to the goods and services offered at the City of San Leandro Downtown and is conveniently located to public transportation and freeway access for the aforementioned uses. The area- is-aet If acceptable access can be provided, such as by the northerly extension of Alvarado Street across San Leandro Creek, a plan for new use of the area using the procedural approach set forth in the General Plan should be prepared. The product of that approach might be a Specific Plan, to be implemented primarily by private owners and developers, possibly using an assessment district approach. Alternatively, and necessary to eliminate blighting factors, a Redevelopment Plan adopted by the City and Redevelopment Agency. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS REGARDING MAJOR CHANGE AREAS The major change areas discussed above are complex areas with numerous uncertainties which require further analysis by the City and any potential developers. The future use considerations listed above are only a guide to be used during the site analysis process described previously. The City's experience has been that major development proposals usually differ somewhat from previous expectations and plans, usually for very good and not fully foreseen reasons. The fact that a proposal does not exactly match some previously adopted plan does not necessarily make it "bad" as there are many variations and alternatives which can be "good" planning. As stated above, having a sound process for decision making is the key to good decisions. V - 96 (revised) December 3, 1998