The first phase of a major transit-oriented development project at Oakland’s MacArthur BART station could break ground in the next few months.
The developers are hoping to secure the final approvals for the project from the Oakland Planning Commission on Wednesday.
The first phase involves a 480-stall parking garage with 5,200 square feet of ground-floor retail, site clean up and infrastructure for the entire development, which includes paving of two new streets.
A team comprised of Bridge Housing and McGrath Properties joined forces as master developers of the site which is slated for up to 675 residential units, including 108 affordable units, and 42,500 square feet of neighborhood-serving retail and commercial space.
City officials have been working on the planning process for the project for more than a decade.
Oakland’s city council will have the final say after the planning commission’s review on April 6. Bridge expects the construction on the garage to start in early summer and wrap up in two years.
via Phase 1 of MacArthur BART TOD to start this summer | San Francisco Business Times.
Oakland’s San Pablo corridor, a once-thriving but now deteriorating commercial strip, sits in between the city’s hip Uptown neighborhood and the Emeryville border — two areas where development took on urban blight and won.
The East Bay Asian Local Development Corp., an affordable housing developer and community outreach group, has turned its eyes to the corridor.
“We’re investing in the San Pablo corridor with the goal of transforming it from a lost mile to a miracle mile,” said Jeremy Liu, executive director of EBALDC.
The developer recently paid $1.95 million for three adjacent parcels near the intersection of West Grand and Brush Street totaling 57,000 square feet.
The properties had been taken back by East West Bank after the previous owner, San Francisco-based AGI Capital, defaulted on the site, which it had entitled for 148 units of market-rate housing.
The purchase is exactly the type of deal that makes sense for affordable developers, Liu said, because it was bank-owned, entitled and located in a blighted area.
“This is a good time for the affordable housing industry,” he said. “In this case, it’s the right property and the right opportunity to address a need for neighborhood development.”
EBALDC is also working on revamping the California Hotel, an iconic building at 3501 San Pablo Ave. that has fallen in disrepair and was previously managed by the now-defunct Oakland Community Housing Inc.
The developer plans to remodel the building, which currently has 157 units, to a little more than 130 units by combining some units into one.
Liu is also working with city officials and the San Pablo Corridor Coalition on beautification, streetscaping and landscaping programs. The area has severe challenges — crime, prostitution, drug trade — to combat, but longtime residents want to see more investment.
“There is great potential for development in the area as long as it’s well-managed,” said Dedoceo Habi, chair of the of neighborhood coalition and resident of the San Pablo corridor. “We’re looking forward to working with EBALDC. We hope to make sure we have the right mix of development going forward.”
EBALDC currently operates 22 affordable communities comprising 1,500 units in Emeryville, Oakland, San Pablo and Richmond.
It has other projects moving forward such as Lion’s Creek Crossing, a multi-phase project that replaced an out-dated public housing community near the Oakland Coliseum. So far, 283 units have been built and a fourth phase of 72 units will break ground later this month.
“That project continues to have momentum that the city can build on to attract redevelopment of the entire Coliseum area,” Liu said.
The firm also hopes to target other parts of East Oakland and the Fruitvale district, where city officials and developers are working on a transit-oriented development plan along International Boulevard.
“It’s a challenge to create a healthy and vibrant neighborhood,” Liu said. “Our goal is to find the right opportunities.”
via EBALDC fights Oakland strip’s blight | San Francisco Business Times.
San Rafael-based Wareham Development Co. is pushing forward with construction of a 100,000 square-foot speculative lab project in Emeryville.
Tup Fisher, director of real estate investments for Washington Capital Management Inc. in its downtown San Francisco office, says his company and Wareham are close to closing a deal whereby Washington would invest about $18 million in equity in the project. The investment would not include construction financing, which is to be provided by an as-yet-to-be determined third-party construction lender, he said.
Wareham declined comment for this story.
According to officials from the city of Emeryville, the developer pulled foundation permits for the project during the first week in February. Remediation work on the site related to underground storage tanks has already started. The project, Emeryville Greenway Station, is at 5850 Hollis St. and 5812 Hollis St. It is expected to take 18 months to construct and is intended as a multi-tenant or single-tenant property.
Bill Nork, a senior vice president with the life-science team at Cornish & Carey Commercial Newmark Knight Frank, says vacancy rates in biotech and life-science properties in the Emeryville-Berkeley submarket were below 1 percent at the end of last year. “There just aren’t many places for companies in the industry to grow into,” Nork said. Nork will be the leasing agent for Greenway Station.
“There is going to be growth on both the government and private-company sides for alternative-energy resources and bio-tech services companies. There is definitely going to be demand from these kinds of tenants in the future,” he said.
The total square footage of life-science properties in the Emeryville-Berkeley market is 1.45 million square feet, according to the Cornish & Carey’s fourth quarter 2010 report.
Greenway Station will be the second San Francisco Bay Area development project that Washington Capital Management has invested in of late. The other is the 82-unit, 33 North condominium project in San Rafael. The developer is Monahan Pacific Corp., which is based in San Rafael.
The real estate manager represents more than 40 institutional investors, the majority of them union pension funds.