Menlo Park’s Downtown Dilemma: Parking, Plazas and the Stakes of Measure P

Menlo Park is a city of striking contrasts. Sand Hill Road, where a remarkable share of the world’s venture capital is allocated, runs through it. So does Belle Haven, a neighborhood that has waited years for a grocery store. Meta’s headquarters sit on its bayfront, while its downtown along Santa Cruz Avenue retains the scale of a small Peninsula town.

This fall, that downtown has become the center of the city’s civic life, and of its sharpest argument. On November 3, voters will decide Measure P, a citizen initiative that would require a citywide vote before the city develops its downtown parking plazas in ways that reduce parking. It arrives at a moment when the city’s own plans for those lots are under financial strain.

The Arithmetic of the Parking Lots

Menlo Park’s housing plan relies in part on building affordable homes on city-owned downtown parking lots. In December, the city received three proposals for plazas 1, 2 and 3, from Alliant Communities, Presidio Bay Ventures, and Related California in partnership with Alta Housing, the Palo Alto Daily Post reported. The homes would be priced for households earning between 15 percent and 80 percent of the area median income, which in 2025 was $130,600 for a single person and $186,600 for a family of four.

The difficulty is parking. The city asked developers to replace all 556 spaces now on those lots without financial help from the city. A finance report presented to the council in late September found gaps of $19 million to $45 million across the three proposals.

At that meeting, Councilmembers Jeff Schmidt, Cecilia Taylor and Jennifer Wise said they did not want to close the gap by reducing either the parking or the number of subsidized homes. Mayor Betsy Nash expressed interest in exploring paid parking while sparing business owners. Other ideas included a sales tax measure for new garages and an annual fee on downtown businesses and property owners. Councilmember Drew Combs said he would not yet take any option off the table. Thirty members of the public spoke, some fearing for downtown businesses and some arguing that more residents would mean more customers.

Measure P would add a further step: voter approval. The Daily Post has reported that the campaigns for and against it have together raised about $500,000, a remarkable sum for a local measure in a city of Menlo Park’s size.

The Block That Became a Plaza

A few steps away, the 600 block of Santa Cruz Avenue has been closed to eastbound traffic since 2020, when the city gave restaurants and shops room to operate outdoors during the pandemic. In June 2025, the council voted to keep it closed, in part because residents, including teenagers after school, had embraced it as a gathering place. Fourth Fridays, a free evening of live music downtown, launched there in August.

At an October 13 study session, The Almanac reported, a majority of the council signaled support for a different approach: piloting a redesign that would reopen the eastbound lane, remove the bike lane and keep a smaller gathering area in former parking spaces. Combs proposed running the pilot for six months to a year to gather data. “What I’m proposing is something that punts this to a new council in a year,” he said, “but at that point they will have additional data points about how (this option) looks in practice.” The council will vote on any change later.

A Megaproject on Pause

East of Highway 101, the city’s largest planned development is in suspended animation. Meta paused Willow Village, its mixed-use master plan on the former Menlo Science and Technology Park, as of May 1, the city announced. The approved plan included up to 1,730 homes, among them 312 below-market-rate units, as well as 1.6 million square feet of office and accessory uses, a hotel, a town square, a park and up to 200,000 square feet of retail, including a long-promised grocery store and pharmacy.

The development agreement remains in effect, and the city says it will continue its annual compliance reviews. Because the Willow Village homes were counted in Menlo Park’s housing plan, the city has said it will evaluate the pause’s effect on its housing obligations. For Belle Haven residents, the more immediate loss is the grocery store.

Three Districts, One Direction

Those questions are now on the ballot in human form. At an October 8 candidate forum hosted by The Almanac, the six candidates for three council seats debated downtown, Meta’s role in the city and problems at Belle Haven’s new $65 million community campus. In District 1, which covers Belle Haven and the Bayfront, Wonman Lee and James Rohr both pressed the need for a grocery store and pharmacy. In District 2, incumbent Drew Combs, the only incumbent seeking reelection, faces Vamsi Velagapudi. In District 4, which includes downtown, Charlotte Reed and Laura Melahn sparred over the parking-plaza housing plan and Measure P. Reed opposes the measure; Melahn declined to take a yes-or-no position, saying, “I am on team Menlo Park.”

What Is at Stake

Underneath the procedural details lies a question every Peninsula city is being forced to answer: whether a small downtown can absorb new residents without losing the convenience and character that made it attractive. Menlo Park’s answer will matter well beyond its borders. Its downtown sits a short walk from a Caltrain station, a short bike ride from Stanford, and squarely within the region’s most acute housing shortage. Some of the university’s graduate students, postdoctoral scholars and staff already live there; many more would like to. Whatever voters decide on November 3, the parking lots on Santa Cruz Avenue have become a test of how the region plans to house the people who make it work.

Photo: LPS.1 / Wikimedia Commons, CC0