A developer has submitted an application to Menlo Park with new renderings for its project at the former Sunset Magazine campus, showing plans for four buildings that will include 665 new housing units, a 130-room hotel, 324,000 square feet of office space, a Montessori school and nearly 5 acres of park and green space. The development, located at 80 Willow Road just north of downtown Palo Alto and bordered by San Franciscquito Creek, would become the tallest in San Mateo County if built. A development company operating as N17 proposed the massive new development.
The property’s owners are a group whose principal executives include Vitaly Yusufov, son of a former top Russian government official with close ties to Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, . To get approval for its project, N17 is invoking an obscure provision of state law called the builder’s remedy, which allows developers to propose projects that exceed local zoning in cities that lack a state-approved housing element, so long as 20% of the homes in the development are deemed affordable. Menlo Park did not have an approved housing element between January 2023 and March 2024, allowing N17 to propose its initial plan in July 2023.
To meet the requirements of the builder’s remedy, 133 homes in Willow Park will be offered to those making up to 80% of the area median income, “making much needed strides to help provide stable, affordable homes for low-income residents,” N17 noted in a press release. Those mak.
