Formal permits have been filed for a residential subdivision at 6821 Silver Creek Road in southern San Jose, Santa Clara County. The project will continue the city’s suburban sprawl, covering the open space towards Morgan Hill. Hai Huynh of Silver Creek Valley Estates LLC and H&L Realty is listed as the project sponsor.
The updated application has increased residential capacity from 77 to 92 units. This includes 87 single-family homes and five detached townhouse-style units. The townhomes will be deed-restricted as affordable to low-income households, allowing the developer to utilize the State Density Bonus law. The filing has been streamlined utilizing Senate Bill 330.
6821 Silver Creek Road, image via Google Street View
Detailed plans have not yet been published.
Morgan Hill-based broker Larry Grattan is listed as the property owner. Public records show that Grattan owns several parcels off Silver Creek Road along Road M on the outskirts of a suburban neighborhood. Details about how much of the property would be developed for housing are not specified.
The estimated cost and timeline for approval and construction have yet to be shared.
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Just say no.
Dear YIMBY Editors: PLEASE stop describing projects that include single-family homes on greenfields as “suburban sprawl” with an implicit sneer in your tone. Housing is housing, and not everybody wants to live in dense urban areas like I do (and you obviously do as well). California needs lots and lots and lots of housing, and some of it is going to be dense, some will be mid-rise or garden apartments, and some will be neat little single-family homes each with a garage and a small backyard. It’s all housing.
What I have noticed with amusement over the past 10-15 years, is that in most single-family home developments near the Bay Area, the houses are so close together with such teeny-tiny front yards and back yards that you may as well just build a set of attached Townhouses and have a shared park/playground area in the back – I saw lots of that type of development when I lived in the Washington DC metroplex.
Dear YIMBY, thank you for calling sprawl as exactly what it is. Sprawl. And we don’t need any more of it.
Unfortunately, this version suburban sprawl likely means hundreds of more cars on the road. And more people livings farther away from job centers, family and dialysis life. I see no problem with a detached single family home, but there’s no attempt at building a neighborhood or community with many of these proposals. Look at the example of Bishop Ranch in San Ramon. Single family homes, apartments, townhomes, and commercial properties that’s the kind of suburban sprawl that contributes positively to the community. Even better if they have transit to major employment centers!
Very good points Anthony and I agree – there’s a big difference in the damage done by a development like this with only homes and no services or amenities, and one that includes amenities such as shopping, transit, services, and employment, all of which would reduce the number of car trips out of the community. I defer to others (developers, city planners) whether that can actually be done at a small or medium-sized development such as this, it certainly can and should be done for a larger one.
The lack of self awareness is incredible
I don’t think you could find a more textbook example of sprawl. And to build in a wildland interface area like this is just asking to be burned down. Leave this land to the hawks and the gophers and go up downtown.
Should burn nicely the next time a brush fire starts nearby…
I was born and raised in San Jose and watched it being ruined by urban sprawl. Some of the finest agricultural land is the valley was destroyed. Build up, not out.
Yes,a lot of agricultural land has been lost to subdivisions like in south Gilroy. But this property is not suitable for agriculture, or parks, or much of anything except residential. Instead of a knee jerk reaction, stop, think, and try to be a little more discriminating.
What about wildlife habitat? Is that so worthless?
Or open space??
The concept of low density in the exurbs often divides YIMBYs. This is because a secondary point is whether all supply is good supply, or whether high density near transit is the true priority.
The bargain that a good leader can make is that if exurbs around San Jose want to avoid this sort of low-density housing, they have to contribute to a YIMBY fund to assist activism to get Palo Alto and Menlo Park to get upzoned to 8 storys. A large supply increase in Palo Alto and Menlo Park can eliminate the need for exurb low-density housing on the fringes of San Jose.
Menlo Park and Palo Alto are not realistically going to be upzoned en masse to eight stories. Maybe their downtowns, along El Camino Real and other arterials, or around Caltrain stations, but blanket upzoning is silly and counterproductive. Can the Bay Area absorb a lot more people? Sure. But it does have a natural carrying capacity: newcomers need water, open space, clean air, the ability to move around etc. Your eight story buildings are going to increase the density of these suburban towns by a huge factor. And this being America, they’re all going to drive cars…I say this as a Caltrain rider myself. If you were able to make this happen, those cities would be hellish to live in, thereby defeating the entire reason to upzone.
Can YIMBYs not be reasonable? Some targeted density is good. Density for its own sake, not so good.
There needs to be a new design of home that becomes way more common as a replacement for single family homes. It’s a ~four story building, but with *full floor flats* as the unit type. The ground floor is parking, trash, storage, elevator, maybe an ADU facing the yard, followed by super spacious full floor flats. You could very easily have 3,000 square foot flats, like there are in many Victorian buildings in SF. With properly designed floor plans that maximize the lot space, this can replace single family homes for families in places like San Jose.
Thank you for calling sprawl, sprawl. We have a climate crisis as well as a housing crisis! We need new housing bad and this development unfortunately sucks. We have to make it easier to do infill and ban this crap
Yes we need housing. No we shouldn’t build this. It’s terrible for the environment and all that beautiful open space will be destroyed forever.
More houses
More people
More climate change
Why would anybody in their right mind purchase one of these? They will be uninsurable from the day they are finished.