San Jose Officials Say VTA Error Will Delay Environmental Report on Proposed Stadium
Oct. 28--San Jose's planning staff will have to revise part of an environmental impact report it prepared in 2006 for a downtown baseball stadium after recently noticing a mistake in data provided by the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority on freeway traffic volume.
Akoni Danielsen, principal planner in the planning division, said that when staffers analyzed the traffic impact on freeways and local streets from what was then proposed as a 45,000-seat stadium, significant congestion would occur on Interstate 280 and Highway 87.
While updating the report to reflect the current proposal for a 32,000-seat facility, planners wanted to know if the traffic impact would be as significant as previously projected. Danielsen said updated 2008 data from the VTA revealed that even though the planned stadium now is 30 percent smaller, congestion on a segment of I-280 between Highway 87 and 10th Street would be worse than the VTA's 2006 data had indicated.
Just that portion of the environmental impact report will be corrected, Danielsen said, and the revised report should be released by late December or early January for public comment. He said the delay would not interfere with the city's plans to place the stadium proposal on the ballot next year. VTA spokeswoman Jennie Loft said her agency did not prepare the study, and she would not comment on how VTA data may have been used.
-- Tracy Seipel, Mercury News
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