SF Chronicle update from this weekend on Oakland's Uptown Development. The Forest City plot mentioned in the article is where the A's had hoped to build a new urban ballpark village. Ex-Mayor Brown preferred it to be developed into housing. As an A's fan, I was dissapointed. But I'm glad to see the development become reality, rather than nothing at all.
Also buried in here is a very brief update on Oakland's Oak-to-Ninth Street development along the waterfront. Signature Properties (one of the developers at Uptown) hope to break ground on that next year. All-in-all there's a lot happening in Oakland these days.
Quote:
Jerry Brown's downtown vision still sparkles with Signature and other developments
Dana Perrigan, Special to The Chronicle
Sunday, October 14, 2007
When Jerry Brown was elected mayor of Oakland in 1998, a lot of people thought the city was a bit like the Tin Man in the "Wizard of Oz": It had a lot of things going for it, it was full of potential - but it didn't have a heart.
Career politician Brown has since gone on to work as state attorney general, but long before embarking on the yellow brick to Sacramento he announced his 10K Housing Initiative. Bring 10,000 new residents downtown, he said, and their collective heartbeat would surely revive the area from its lingering malaise.
It has been nearly a decade since Brown began his initiative. Those who believed in it, invested in it and remained behind to carry it out say the former mayor's vision - despite the recent cackles of the wicked witch over the current real estate market - is alive and well.
Mike Ghielmetti counts himself among that group.
"Twelve months from now, this area will be transformed," said Ghielmetti, president of Signature Properties.
On a bright and blustery afternoon with more than a hint of autumn in the air, Ghielmetti leads the way from his firm's sales office to the entrance of the new Broadway Grand - a stylish, Art Deco-inspired building featuring 132 new condominiums and town homes in the heart of Oakland's Uptown neighborhood.
With underground parking and 20,000 square feet of retail space on the ground floor, Broadway Grand represents Signature's contribution to the revitalization effort. Signature bought the property two years ago, broke ground soon after that and plans to have it ready for occupancy in a month or two.
The condos begin on the fourth floor of the seven-story building. Built around the perimeter of a large central courtyard lined with planter boxes and private patios, they range in size and price from the 722-square-foot one-bedroom for $387,000 to the 2,108-square-foot four-bedroom, three-bath for $901,900.
With hardwood floors, recessed lighting, room-by-room temperature control, higher-end appliances and fixtures and generous views of the urban landscape below, they seem to be the embodiment of Brown's promise of "elegant density."
Ghielmetti isn't very worried about the condition of the current market. He's been in the business long enough to know that it's cyclical, and that if you build a good product it'll usually work out. He plans to break ground on Phase II - an adjacent parcel that runs up to 24th Street - next summer. When completed, it will add 370 new homes and 120,000 square feet of retail space to the area.
"I think in a market like this there's a certain amount of caution," he said. "(People) aren't buying sight unseen like they were a couple of years ago, but we're making sales."
Ghielmetti is also moving forward on the huge Oak-to-Ninth project, a 62-acre mixed-use, urban-infill development on Port of Oakland land south of Jack London Square. The project includes 3,100 housing units and 200,000 square feet of retail space. Signature hopes to break ground on the 15- to 20-year project next year.
Standing outside once again at the corner of Broadway and Grand, Ghielmetti gestures toward the surrounding area. Signature plans to install antique streetlamps, plant trees along the wide sidewalks and tulips in the center divider of Broadway. The Paramount Theater, a block down Broadway, and the Fox Theater, in the process of being renovated over on Telegraph, will serve as the linchpins of a burgeoning new entertainment district. Ghielmetti envisions visitors and residents strolling in the evening on their way to dinner, followed by a show or a cocktail.
"There's good bones down here," Ghielmetti said. "You look at all the revitalized areas around the county, there's no reason why Oakland can't be part of the renaissance." As if in anticipation of the transformation, a number of restaurants, cafes, clothing stores and galleries have already opened.
"I was aware of the plans when I bought the place," said Rick Mitchell, owner of Luka's Taproom and Lounge, across the street from Broadway Grand. "There haven't been a lot of changes, but they're imminent. Here in Oakland it's good to be skeptical, but we're excited about the changes and we want to be a part of it."
So does John Eudy, executive vice president of Essex - a real estate investment trust that is putting up 238 apartments a block or so from Broadway Grand at Grand and Webster. The steel for the 10-story building, which will also contain 9,000 square feet of retail space on the ground floor, is already up. Begun in late 2006, the project is scheduled for completion in about a year.
"We bought into the whole revitalization idea he (Brown) was pushing, and we believe in it," said Eudy, whose firm has invested $90 million in the downtown area. "What's been happening in Oakland during the last eight years has been pretty phenomenal."
Like Ghielmetti, Eudy isn't very concerned with how the market will affect Essex's interests in Oakland.
"It may slow some of the condo development," he said, "but the rental market's only firmed up."
For Forest City Development, whose mixed-use project a few blocks away from Broadway Grand is considered by some to be the anchor of development in the Uptown area, the decision to invest in the neighborhood was largely based on logic.
"It's a transit-oriented site," said Susan Smartt, senior vice president for Forest City Residential West. "It's the centralized hub of the BART system, and the city has a positive attitude toward redevelopment."
Other factors that weighed in the decision, Smartt said, included good weather and the fact that 70,000 people work in downtown Oakland.
And then there was the intangible factor.
"There is something very unique about the ethnic diversity of downtown Oakland," Smartt said. "It's full of good spirits. The people who live in Oakland know it and love it."
Situated between 19th and 20th streets, Telegraph and San Pablo avenues, Forest City West's Uptown Project received a $40 million subsidy from the city to buy land and finance 140 below-market units. The development is a joint venture between Forest City Development and MacFarlane Partners, which are making a $187 million investment in downtown Oakland. In addition to urban infill developments in Denver, Chicago, Boston and Brooklyn, Forest City built the 800-unit Bayside Village at the San Francisco anchorage of the Bay Bridge. Forest City will also be the developer of the Public Health Services Hospital building in San Francisco's Presidio.
Altogether, there will be about 1,000 units, including 665 apartments, and 9,000 square feet of retail space on the site. A 25,000-square-foot park adjacent to the project is also planned. The first phase, which includes the park, is scheduled to open by next spring.
Smartt said the city of Oakland is intent on continuing the revitalization efforts.
"It's begun to take on a life of its own," she said. "It's happening organically - and that's good."
Oakland City Councilwoman Nancy Nadel, whose district contains the new development in the Uptown neighborhood, says it's difficult to say whether 10,000 new residents have come to the downtown area, and she believes the softened market may slow the influx.
"We are subject to the whims of the market just as every other city is," she said. "But the market will rebound. And Oakland is a city that's in the center of everything: It's a great place to develop."
The former mayor - dubbed by some at the time as "Downtown Brown" - he couldn't be more pleased by what's been happening in Oakland.
"When I became mayor," he said, "there hadn't been any significant building in downtown Oakland in decades. Now it's gone beyond my imagination."
Brown, who still has his loft on 27th Street, was excited about the grand opening, which he attended the day before, of the Whole Foods store, built on the site of a former Cadillac dealership at 27th and Harrison streets. He attributes the continued influx of business and real estate investment in the area to "private investment and a minimum of red tape," and a city that isn't afraid to invest in itself.
"You have to see development as a positive factor, as an asset and not a liability," he said. "Unfortunately, there are those who have more of an affinity to poverty than prosperity."
Having completed the tour, Ghielmetti walks back across the street to Signature's sales office. Sure-footed workers methodically dismantle the scaffolding from the face of Broadway Grand. One worker picks up a plank, passes it down to the next man who, in turn, hands it off to a third man standing on a flatbed truck.
As the third man drops the plank into place, a cloud of white dust explodes into the air and, caught by the wind, is swept down Broadway.
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