As we first reported last year, the Yellow Cab Cooperative of San Francisco has been offering to sell its six-acre headquarters at 1200 Mississippi Street for $16,000,000 and deliver it vacant. And while we didn’t have the official word on what the next move for the Cooperative might be, the Cooperative’s President and General Manager quickly chimed in:
“Yellow Cab Cooperative of San Francisco is alive and well. Because we have grown from 300 cabs to almost 600 cabs and growing, we are looking for a larger facility or we will build a parking garage at 1200 Mississippi Street. For that reason, we put out a feeler to see if there is interest in purchasing our existing property.
We are embracing all the new technology with new Apps and a growing fleet to better respond to our high demand. We are aligning ourselves to be not only bigger but better in 2014!”
While nothing official has been announced, the Cooperative appears to be abandoning the sale and has recently submitted new plans to build a four-story garage for 483 cars on the 1200 Mississippi site and reconfigure their existing lot to accommodate an additional 225 cars for a total of just over 700 spaces.
I am impressed with the aerial photography on SocketSite. I recall that you got shots from a drone on the Mission Bay fire. I often wonder where shots like this come from.
Agreed, the high quality of imagery on here helps make this blog an enjoyable read. In this case, it appears the photo was taken from Kidder Mathews’ marketing brochure for this property (though it’s hard to tell where they got it from).
As Tim said, it’s from the marketing brochure. I posted the link as well but for some reason my comment is “in moderation” so it’s not showing.
This site, which is carved out of solid rock and to the south east of the projects (which are to be rebuilt), should be planned and rezoned to provide a significant chunk of the 30,000 unit goal for new housing.
With 200′-300′ height limits and green roofs on top, the roofs of buildings there would be only just be level with the park atop Potrero hill. Its quite a hill behind.
The idea that due to lack of interest they are going to build a 4 story garage there is just sad. Really need a visionary plan for the city that puts housing where it would have least impact and this seems like a good spot.
Lots and lots of other areas in The City for housing. Let the cab company do what they want with their land. It may change again someday, anyway.
Speaking of the rebuild of the SFHA Potrero projects, just what is the status of that proposal which stands to be one of the most significant of renewals in decades?
Editor?
Probably in planning and EIR phrase. If a child is born when the project is first proposed, it will be done around the time he goes to college.
Spot on Jose. Photo also shows how that highway bisects now evolving hoods , and in time the entire elevated construct will become surface or tunneled allowing the neighborhoods to knit back together. Probably won’t happen until there’s another 20-30,000 units (and a voice for change) within a few blocks of this elevated conduit. All in time.
The effect of 280 on the “evolving neighborhoods” is indeed aptly demonstrated and prime evidence in support of its teardown all the way back to C Chavez.
And what about the effect IF this essential freeway was turned into one giant surface street. Think about the impact that would have.
OR- leave it as is and make it a green ‘High Line’ all the way to the elevated transit center park
Hardly “essential.” Given its huge footprint, there would be ample room for surface roadways on which traffic would move just fine enough without all the negative impacts of the current hulking structure.
Oh for the love of god. Let’s tear out the Bay Bridge too, it really bisects Yerba Buena Island, which could otherwise be a lovely park.
Funny how no one talks about ripping out 80 – nor even tries to suggest that 80 “bisects” SoMa and hinders development to its south …. because it doesn’t! If anything, SoMa is the booming-est neighborhood in the City, with zero regard for 80 slicing through it.
The problem is not 280; the ‘problem’ is that the entire eastern stretch of the City is going through a painful transition from industrial to post-industrial uses. And that results in a lot of fugliness and “transitional” uses that keep Potrero, Dogpatch, etc. from being bucholic neo-Noe Valley. I’m not saying 280 is a gem, but in my time living at 6th & Bluxome, and frequently walking to the Portreo center for gym or groceries, 280 was the least of my concerns.. the razor-wire topped fences around abandoned parking lots are far more off-putting than a freeway 40 feet in the air.
Horrible place for housing. Below the projects, backed up against the hill, lots of pollution sources nearby. Never mind that the property is zoned PDR-2 which precludes all types of residential use and large scale office use. No developer in his right mind would put an office building there anyway, though. Public transit is terrible at that location. 3rd Street light rail several blocks away, CalTrain station at 22nd with limited service, almost no bus lines.
What if the city agreed to pay for the entire construction of this proposed garage, if the structure rose to seven or eight stories instead of four, and the cab company deeded those additional floors to the city in perpetuity for parking places for city vehicles?
What if Willie Brown helped make this happen?
Just adjust the plans to build several stories of office or housing in top of Yellow Cab’s parking garage. Everyone wins.
Yellow Cab has some big balls to go toe to toe with Uber and other ride-sharing programs. Maybe some of the smaller cab companies will drop out.