Urban Villages are some of San Jose’s key growth areas, but many lack approved plans, creating a barrier to new housing. The General Plan 4-Year Review Task Force is exploring ways to speed up the slow and cumbersome planning process to unlock more land for new homes in San Jose!
San Jose has begun the process to review and amend its General Plan, the City’s comprehensive, long-range plan for the physical development of the city. The Envision San José 2040 General Plan establishes a cycle of four-year reviews, providing opportunities to evaluate the City’s achievement of key goals and make mid-course adjustments to the General Plan. This work is done through public meetings of the Envision San José 2040 Task Force, Planning Commission, and City Council. The Task Force’s consideration of General Plan amendments is intended to be limited, hewing closely to the scope of work unanimously approved by the City Council on June 9, 2025.
Find earlier SV@Home coverage of the process here.
SV@Home, along with many of our allies concerned with land use and housing production in the city, have been meeting regularly with staff in the Planning Department to understand the scope of work and challenges of the process, and to share insights from our members who are developers of affordable housing.
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November 12, 2025 Meeting: Urban Village Strategy
San José’s 62 “Urban Villages” are areas the City has identified for growth of both jobs and housing. They are intended to be pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly, transit-oriented, mixed-use neighborhoods, and are a core component to implementing the General Plan, especially the General Plan’s Housing Element. The opportunity to redevelop residential and commercial parcels to allow for higher density uses is critical to San José’s ability to respond to the pressing issues of housing affordability, climate concerns, and traffic congestion.
However, only 16 of these have approved specific plans (with another 2 Urban Villages currently in the planning process) that have aligned land use policies and zoning with these ideals. For the remaining Urban Villages, most parcels of land conducive to development are zoned for commercial uses only.
Streamlining the Urban Village planning process is one of the four core tasks of the 4-Year Review, as completing the planning of the remaining Urban Villages will dramatically expand the capacity for residential development in the city.
Key insights from the November 12th meeting:
- At present, the average Urban Village planning process takes 3.5 years, with the lengthy timeline driven by a long community engagement process and an elaborate plan format that includes elements that are not core to the purpose of the plan. The Citywide Design Standards & Guidelines adopted in 2022 have allowed staff to shorten the process to 2 years and 9 months for the North 1st Street Urban Village Plan. Staff has identified the need to get the timeline for the “traditional” Urban Village process down to no more than 2 years.
- Since the underlying zoning of most unplanned Urban Villages is for Commercial uses, the City has created processes that allow two types of projects with residential uses to move forward on this land: a Signature Project or a 100% affordable housing development. However, there is broad recognition that the lack of completed plans impedes the development of housing in these growth areas.
- SB 79, signed into law in October 2025, overrides local zoning limitations to allow greater heights and densities for residential development near transit stops. It will interact with the City’s Urban Village planning decisions in ways that have not yet been fully assessed by staff. It will be important to ensure that SB 79 is implemented locally in ways that allow it to reach full potential to expand residential capacity.
- One of the ways staff intends to decrease the timeline for Urban Village planning is by standardizing and clearly communicating the engagement process. Planning commissioners challenged staff to ensure that this does not result in less engagement of residents from marginalized and underrepresented communities. They emphasized the need for digital engagement, working with trusted community partners, and going to existing community meetings rather than expecting residents to come to a City meeting.
- The planning process for many Urban Villages that share common characteristics and are close together will be consolidated, reducing the total number of plans that need to be prepared.
- The smallest category of Urban Villages, called Neighborhood Villages, often have only a few parcels appropriate for redevelopment. They will be examined individually, but addressed through a single rezoning process rather than by full Urban Village plans.
This approach, based on the high-level information shared in the meeting, seems appropriate. SV@Home will closely monitor this body of work as it progresses, especially the need for equitable community engagement processes and the implementation of SB 79 to expand residential capacity.
Find the recording of the meeting in English here, or in Spanish here
Meeting Schedule
During the current phase of the 4-Year Review, meetings are held from 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m. in the Wing Rooms 118-120 at City Hall. (See the meeting schedule below). Meetings can be attended in person or watched online, although no online viewer participation is possible at this time. Recordings of the meetings will be posted on the City’s General Plan 4-Year Review webpage, and agendas for each meeting are posted under the “4-Year Review Cycle #3 – 2025/26” section.
Process Timeline
June 2025: General Plan 4-Year Review Scope of Work approved by City CouncilSeptember 2025: General Plan amendment for Task Force composition changes to Council- Late fall 2025: Task Force study sessions & convenings begin (at least 6)
- June 2026: Task force convenings complete
- Late 2027: Environmental review of task force recommendations complete
- December 2027: Final Task Force recommendations to Council for consideration