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With Meta's ambitious plans to completely redevelop a 59-acre office park on Willow Road into a new neighborhood replete with more office space, housing units, a hotel and a grocery store, among a slew of other amenities there are bound to be significant impacts to the environment during and after construction.
Those effects range from impacts to air quality, noise, transportation even the potential to dig up human remains, according to a newly released draft environmental impact report on the development.
Meta's Willow Village has the potential to dig up Native American human remains and destroy an archaeological site, according to the report. That's due to the unique location of the development.
Around the project area, experts believe that an ancient Native American village is buried beneath the ground.
"There will be burials there," Michael Wilcox, archaeology professor at Stanford University, told the Almanac in 2019. "There's no doubt about it."
Wilcox said at the time that the land where Meta will develop is an archaeology site known as Hiller mound.
In an emailed statement, Mike Ghielmetti, founder of Signature Development Group, which is responsible for developing the project, said that they have taken steps to ensure the Willow Village project will avoid the burial site and other cultural resources in the area.
We understand, appreciate and respect the importance of the Tribal cultural resources on the site and have consulted and collaborated with several tribes over time to design Willow Village in a manner to avoid, protect and preserve cultural resources," Ghielmetti said.
He added that the developer has gone beyond state-mandated protocols and that the develop will continue to coordinate with Native American tribal representatives throughout the duration of the project
To reduce the level of impact to the burial site, the developer proposes construction techniques that essentially attempt to build around the Hiller mound as much as possible to avoid penetrating its boundaries and preserving the site in place.
"Great efforts have been made to ensure that no significant disturbance of the Hiller Mound will occur due to Willow Village construction," Ghielmetti wrote. "No building structures or foundations will be constructed on the Hiller Mound. The Hiller mound will be avoided and protected. Additional precautions will be taken to protect the area from future sea-level rise."
If disturbance to the site can't be avoided, according to the report, the developer proposes to seek "sensitivity training, in which "Native American tribal representatives shall conduct tribal cultural sensitivity training for workers and construction superintendents."
"There is a high likelihood that the project will result in the disturbance of burials and the destruction of cultural resources. We hope that (Meta) will consult and work closely with the tribe as this project unfolds," Monica Arellano, vice chair of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe of the San Francisco Bay Area, previously said in a written statement. She also serves as the point person of contact whenever excavation work uncovers potential Native American human remains.
In a statement, Ghielmetti said that Willow Village "plans to provide historical context and Tribal cultural sensitivity training for construction workers about the indigenous people who once called the land home."
As part of a state-mandated process, Meta and Willow Village's developer, Signature Development Group, must pay for consultants hired by the city to prepare an extensive report that details the scope of the project, timeline and the potential environmental impacts as well as any plans to mitigate them, if possible, all of which will be reviewed and must be approved by Menlo Park's planning commission in order to move plans forward.
On April 8, the city released the nearly 1,000-page report, which is now open to public review and comments for at least 45 days, with a public hearing expected in the next planning commission meeting on April 25.
Some environmental impacts will be unavoidable several of which have already been recognized by the planning commission.
"The elephant in the room is, for this project, the elephant in the room for all of our Bayfront projects, which is transportation," Commissioner Henry Riggs said in 2019.
The report recognizes that it will have "potentially significant" impacts to traffic without any mitigation, with more than 20,000 daily net new trips generated on the roadways.
But there are other significant impacts that a development of this scope could bring.
One that the report lists as unavoidable, even with mitigation measures, is the cumulative negative impact on air quality.
There's also the potential to significantly impact surrounding wildlife, state-protected wetlands and other natural habitats.
Some of the possible mitigation measures include avoiding or reducing the amount of wetland vegetation removed near the project's site. But if that can't be avoided, the report proposes to either restore the impacted habitats or provide a new one in an appropriate location or through purchasing "mitigation credits" that can compensate for unavoidable wetland losses.
The developer also proposes to remove 760 existing trees, 266 of which are heritage trees, which will require tree removal permits, and add 822 trees.
The developer anticipates Willow Village will be completed in two phases by late 2026, with demolition to begin as soon as mid-2022.
An online version of the draft report can be reviewed here.
Physical copies of the report are available at Menlo Park Library, at 800 Alma Street, and the Belle Haven Branch Library at 413 Ivy Drive.
Written comments can be addressed to Kyle Perata, acting planning manager of City of Menlo Park, at 701 Laurel Street. Comments can also be emailed, which is preferred, to ktperata@menlopark.org.
