SAN FRANCISCO | City College Chinatown Campus | 215 FT / 66 M | 14 FLOORS

peanut gallery · #1 Posted **Oct 22, 2008, 6:07 AM**

Even though it's short, I thought I'd start a thread for this. The way things are going right now, we might not have too many projects to follow in the coming months and this one looks pretty solid.

City College of San Francisco has proposed a new campus in the Chinatown/North Beach neighborhood. This pdf document has the best renderings and illustrations of how the two buildings will be laid out, including photos of models.

This is actually two buildings: a 14-story, 215 foot tall tower at Kearny and Washington, and a 4-story building closer to Columbus and Washington. It's been contested by the Hilton Hotel across the street (which is utterly hideous) and a company called Montgomery Washington, which owns commercial offices in a nearby building. But according to this article, the path has all but been cleared and construction is due to begin next summer, with a tentative completion date in early 2011.

The Washington St. elevation:

3/4 view of same:

This gives a better idea how it fits in with the nearest towers:

This is the 4-story building:

peanut gallery · #2 Posted **Oct 22, 2008, 6:40 AM**

This is what the area looks like today.

Here's the same view as shown in the first rendering above, taken from across Columbus and Washington (in front of Transamerica):

This is where the tower will go (Kearny and Washington):

There's another building proposed to go between the City College tower and the building seen in this shot:

The fenced area is where the 4-story building will go (looking across Columbus):

It's currently being used for parking (viewed from Washington):

peanut gallery · #3 Posted **Oct 22, 2008, 6:46 AM**

double post

CityKid · #4 Posted **Oct 22, 2008, 5:54 PM**

Conveniently located within a couple of blocks of the new central subway line? Should we anticipate more development to follow?

peanut gallery · #5 Posted **Oct 22, 2008, 6:54 PM**

There is a proposal for a new condo tower right next to the Pyramid. Haven't seen anything on that for awhile.

peanut gallery · #6 Posted **Nov 3, 2008, 8:25 PM**

According to Curbed SF, they held the official ground-breaking ceremony on Saturday.

Here's a photo of their render-cake (also from Curbed):

peanut gallery · #7 Posted **Dec 6, 2008, 3:08 AM**

They've fenced off the site:

No signs of work within the fence yet, but there is signage for the development and you can barely see Bovis' sign through the blue fence:

I also saw a crew removing old appliances from the smaller lot where the 4-story will go. There were still some cars parked there though.

peanut gallery · #8 Posted **Feb 13, 2009, 4:20 PM**

According to the SF Business Times (see BT's post in the SF Rundown thread), $90M in funding to start this is frozen due to the state budget situation. We'll see how long that takes to get solved. Bottom line: this will not start for at least a few months.

Downtown Dave · #9 Posted **Apr 25, 2009, 8:45 PM**

Lot for the tower is all cleared out:

peanut gallery · #10 Posted **Apr 27, 2009, 5:38 AM**

Finally, some progress. I was getting tired of walking all the way over there just to look at the same old empty pavement.

peanut gallery · #11 Posted **Jun 9, 2009, 4:05 AM**

They are shoring up the perimeter in preparation for excavation.

This is the northern edge of the site:

Same story on the Washington side:

And taking care of the neighboring building:

The smaller lot down the street is currently a storage and parking area for Bovis, who is the head contractor. I'll keep looking for signs that they've started on that as well.

peanut gallery · #12 Posted **Jun 9, 2009, 4:08 AM**

I just realized EHDD Architects, who designed this building, also designed One Hawthorne.

Reminiscence · #13 Posted **Jun 9, 2009, 8:20 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Downtown Dave

Lot for the tower is all cleared out:

Great to see. Now, if they can just level that fugly gray monstrosity looking thing behind it.

peanut gallery · #14 Posted **Jul 8, 2009, 2:02 AM**

Excavation is moving right along:

peanut gallery · #15 Posted **Aug 21, 2009, 9:19 PM**

My goodness, they are digging way deeper than I realized:

Lots of underground parking, I presume?

FYI: the smaller lot is still being used for construction parking and staging.

peanut gallery · #16 Posted **Sep 3, 2009, 11:43 PM**

It's been 2 weeks since the last update and nothing has changed. At all. Anyone heard anything about this project? Seems strange that the site looks untouched for at least 2 weeks.

Gordo · #17 Posted **Sep 3, 2009, 11:46 PM**

Nope, haven't heard a thing. That does seem odd that nothing would change in two weeks.

peanut gallery · #18 Posted **Sep 23, 2009, 6:21 AM**

I can't figure this out. There still appears to be nothing happening in the hole. No equipment, no workers, nothing. But they're still pumping water from the bottom and they've added a security gate for workers to enter and exit the site. They've also moved the fences along Kearny off the sidewalk and just into the street. So, there's still some form of activity happening, but no major work. I can't find anything on the school's nor Bovis' website. Strange.

BTinSF · #19 Posted **Sep 23, 2009, 6:41 AM**

They seem to be at the stage between contractors. Usually the excavation is a different outfit than the primary builder, so maybe they are just in an interregnum. The hole is done, time for the builder to move onsite and there is just some delay with their getting going.

This same phenomenon is happening with the PUC HQ however there the reason is clearer (it's only been a month or so since the Board of Supes gave the actual constrcution the go-ahead so I imagine they could still be bidding the actual construction).

I would guess the budgetary chaos both locally and in Sacramento could have something to do with it.

tommaso · #20 Posted **Oct 15, 2009, 11:03 PM**

A photo update of the construction site please. Thank you.