Pleasant Hills
In Design
2079 S White Rd, San Jose, CA 95148
Project Overview
• Project Type: Market-rate & affordable
• Owner/Developer: Terrascape Ventures
• Presented to our members: November 2024
Catalyze SV evaluates project sustainability, equity, and vibrancy. Learn about our project review process.
Pleasant Hills Project Scorecard
Terrascape Ventures is proposing 1,716 units—342 of which are deed-restricted affordable—on an approximate 113.5-acre site residing within Santa Clara County. 73.4 acres are dedicated to residential uses, and homes encompass a range of housing typologies, including detached single-family homes, townhomes, and stacked townhomes. At the southeast corner of the site, 4.9 acres are allocated for mixed-use residential buildings, totaling 342 units. Additional amenities include a 4.9-acre linear park, a centrally located public park, and a large public plaza.
Pleasant Hills scored an overall 2.75 out of 5 from our Project Advocacy Committee members.
Community Score: 3/5
While there are some initial good first steps, the community engagement process still has room for substantial improvement. As part of the visioning process for this site, the City of San José developed the Pleasant Hills Guiding Principles. The Pleasant Hills Guiding Principles are the product of nearly a year's worth of quality, city-led community meetings, beginning with the first round in February 2024. The city conducted two more rounds of meetings in April and August 2024 to gather additional feedback, culminating in the publication of the Pleasant Hills Golf Course Guiding Principles. Our members appreciate the developers attending each of these meetings. However, members want to encourage the developer to build upon the City’s groundwork. We encourage Terrascape Ventures to return to the community with a series of engaging, interactive design charrettes to collaboratively explore site potentialities. It would be great to see the developer put forward multiple diverse designs to drive inspiration. We also encourage Terrascape to engage pro-housing and urbanist groups like ours who are very open to major redevelppment projects; we were disappointed they didn’t respond to our invitation to present their project to our members.
Vibrancy Score: 3/5
Terrascape Ventures' proposal is a modest first attempt at creating a vibrant community with a heavy mix of housing, a healthy dose of park space, and a fair amount of commercial space. This project has immense potential, and with some enhancements, our members believe it could truly become a vibrant community hub. Members recommend revamping the design, focusing more on placemaking, and creating engaging public spaces. An expanded commitment to mixed-use, walkable, and community-centered features would significantly improve its impact on the public realm. A proposal like this one – the vast majority of which is low-density, single-family residences – doesn’t foster a dynamic neighborhood. A greater mix of residential, office, and commercial amenities would encourage walkability and allow residents to fulfill their day-to-day needs.
Transportation Score: N/A
Our members do not feel there is enough information regarding proposed transportation measures currently available to properly assess this category. However, they would like to note that the site's multi-modal accessibility is rather limited and advise improvements to bike lanes and sidewalks along South White Road and Tully Road.
Intensity/Zoning Score: 1/5
It is rare for our members to score any of our seven categories on any project a 1 out of 5. Yet our members felt especially strongly about this criterion on this project. A density of 21.9 dwelling units per acre (du/ac) is far too low to meet the region’s extreme housing needs; our members want to see far more than the proposed 1,716 units. At 113.5 acres, this site is one of the largest developable lots in all of Silicon Valley. San José can not afford to continue to indulge in outdated 20th-century development patterns. This last-century style of development is responsible for much of the region's housing crisis and transportation issues—we must not repeat these mistakes. Single-family homes make up roughly 43% of the 73.4 acres dedicated to residential use. The remaining 42 acres are reserved for townhomes. Land for mixed-use, multi-family housing is only 4.9 acres of the total site, or 4%. Our members find reserving such large swathes of land exclusively for new single-family homes unacceptable in 2024. Earlier this year, Catalyze SV members scored Santa Clara Park, a project in the City of Santa Clara proposing 1,792 units—a similar, yet slightly greater number of units than what is proposed for this project—on a just 25-acre site. The former Pleasant Hills Golf Course could fit roughly four and a half Santa Clara Parks, providing 7,910 units and 29 acres of public parks! Pleasant Hills should, at a minimum, aim for a density similar to Santa Clara Park. With San José facing a state-mandated goal of building over 60,000 homes in the next 8 years, while development conditions are difficult and available land is rare, Pleasant Hills could play a key role in helping the city reach over 10% of its goal on a single project. Terrascape Ventures needs to go back to the drawing board and design a 21st-century proposal befitting the needs and realities of San José in 2024.
Sustainability Score: N/A
Our members do not feel there is enough information regarding proposed sustainability measures currently available to properly assess this category. It’s important to note that San José Council Policy 6-32 requires proposals to meet minimum green building standards as verified by the U.S Green Building Council (USGBC) or Build It Green. Based on USGBC’s LEED rating system, this proposal would need to achieve at least LEED Silver.
Affordability Score: 4/5
Santa Clara County has an Inclusionary Housing Ordinance (IHO) that requires new residential developments of 3 or more homes to dedicate 16% of units as affordable housing. As currently proposed, this project exceeds IHO requirements by providing 342 affordable rental units. Our members commend Terrascape Ventures for going above and beyond what is required of them and offer further praise for the very deep levels of affordability provided. The proposal offers 228 units that would be affordable to Very Low-Income households (50% or less than the Area Median Income) and 114 units to Low-Income Households (80% or less than AMI). As a portion of Santa Clara County’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA), this single project would account for 27.5% of the County’s required Very Low-Income units and 24% of the required Low-Income units—a substantial contribution toward fulfilling the County’s goals. However, members would like to see some additional commitments from the developer. While this project is currently within Santa Clara County, it also falls within the City of San José’s Urban Service Area and Urban Growth Boundary. In the eventuality that this proposal is processed by the City of San José instead of the County, our members want the project to maintain the existing dedication of affordable housing. As is, the project would also exceed the requirements of San José’s IHO. The project’s affordable housing was a standout of the proposal yet was unfortunately easily overshadowed by its deep, obvious deficiencies in other criteria.
Legacy Score: N/A
Members of Catalyze SV did not find our Legacy category applicable to this site.