The City of Oakland has just finished its preliminary analysis for the proposed 18-story building to rise upon the Oakland Acura Dealership site 277 27th Street, a development which includes up to 448 residential units and 65,000 square feet of retail space primarily oriented along its 24th Street frontage, with space for a large anchor tenant, rendered as a Ten Pins bowling bar, at the corner of 24th and 27th as proposed.
As the development falls within the boundaries of Oakland’s Broadway Valdez Area Plan, the City’s analysis should clear the way for the project to be exempted from additional environmental review and a streamlined approval from the City.
And if all goes as currently planned, the project team is expecting to break ground in the fall of 2017 and finish construction in early 2020.
Well, that’s good news. But these “streamlined approvals” sure seem slow.
Based on?
Nice looking building. Like the planted bulb-outs and variety of roof treatments. Better than most similar sized projects proposed in SF recently.
Did this go to the maximum height zoned? it would have worked even better, given its location, if it had been 30 plus stories.
Why is it you hate everything in SF and want to cut every proposed building in half. But, something gets proposed in Oakland and you love it and want it to go higher?
Can’t speak for Dave, whose previous comments are unknown to me, but here’s a thought: the relatively tiny areas of SF where height is allowed are starting to look glutted with really unappealing and homogenized (visually and economically) tall buildings that are destroying an engaged/engaging street life. Oakland at the moment (admittedly it’s been a very long moment) has exactly the opposite problem but with the same effect: vast areas of its core are preposterously underdeveloped, with zero chance of an engaged/engaging street life. So it seems like a reasonable enough hypocrisy to me. And anyway this building would be great at 30 stories.
You took the words out of my mouth.
I love SF actually (native born/bred) but do not like the recent changes that you summarize nicely – the newly developed areas looking homogenized and unappealing. And the lack of a neighborhood appeal in Rincon Hill for one. Coming across the BB the skyline looks a mess. Get a photo from the 70s and see what it once looked like – when you could actually see SF is a city of hills.
Beyond that, Oakland can absorb more housing easily and is more transportation centric. IMO most major office development going forward should be in Oakland. That would help the Bay Area transportation situation and improve lives of workers who, if they work in SF, mostly have to commute 30 and more miles to find a SFH they can afford. Including using the at capacity BB and BART tube.
Its not Oakland only. The stretch of El Camino from Colma to Burlingame is woefully underdeveloped yet near BART and two major freeways. More transportation friendly than SF. Many 40/50 year old one and two story commercially structures which could be replaced by 8/10 story mixed use projects and afford thousands of new housing units. Yet it sits there mostly as woefully underutilized as Oakland.
Its not just for the good of SF, its for the good of the Bay Area. if this were one city it would not be an issue. Zoning would shift major housing and office development from West Town (SF) to East Town (Oakland) and major housing development also to South Town (upper Peninsula along El Camino).
Well you are certainly entitled to your opionion. As for street life being destroyed, I half agree. SF is the second most densely populated City in the US over 250k. The n cut crop of Skyscapers do have an architectural uniqueness to them. These buildings going [to fill up with] thousands of people who migrate out at lunchtime and in the evening. Oakland still has a reputation to it. The building being proposed looks like an office building with no architectural uniqueness. A flat window line and coldness in colors scream office. Put some balconies out there to break it up.
With how nice the weather is over here I always think balconies are a nice feature. A lot of empty ground floor retail is finally filling back up. However I can tell you Sunday is a very dead day downtown.
It is a nice looking building and better than some of the stuff proposed or under construction in SF. Oakland is coming into its own and it’s about time.
Didn’t know this was considered auto row – thought that was actually on Broadway…
I would have called this area the “Whole Foods Adjacency.”
Well, there IS an Acura dealer there now – and the WF used to be a Cadillac dealership – so it seems reasonable.
Great building, and great commentary in the peanut gallery discussion here.
I love Oakland ( and SF too),
Can’t wait to see this one break ground hopefully before the downturn really gets going…. And it’s getting very very close now…
Yeah about that downturn… any facts to back up your fears?
Oh I’m not afraid at all…. this will be my third recession since entering the workforce in 2000 (I moved to SF just as tech 1.0 was imploding). Ive done quite well through both the tech crash and the housing crash. I’m well set up for what is coming next (though I couldnt tell you exactly what or when, I know its not far off). Its seeming pretty obvious to me at this point. Its always cyclical, its just about time again. Same story, new chapter. No big deal.
As for some facts…
SS has clearly noted facts about increasing vacancy rate in SF downtown commercial, increasing supply in homes both new and used, and condos, increasing price reductions, lots of entitles sites being put up for sale vs breaking ground…this will clearly impact employment in people working in those industries (construction work dwindles, loan underwriters reduce as deals slow, etc). People stop the bidding wars because they see all this…it feeds on itself. That is just in SF proper.
Look at the macro picture now. Midwest never really recovered. Stock market in 2nd or 3rd (its one of the 2) longest bull run ever (they always end!), strange geopolitics (Brexit & its impact, which is also a huge opp BTW). Debt levels as absurd as ever (CHINA), interest rates low to negative. This party is getting old….
Anecdotally, when I cram into BART trains that are busting with bodies, and I hear comment like “ya welcome to SF, its always like this,” or when I walk around lake merritt or downtown oakland and 90% of the conversations I over are “well ive been here 6 months now” and its overwhelmingly young 20-30 year olds……the party is about to end…
I’ll keep doing what I am doing of course. I love booms and the cranes, but its time for a pause. Hopefully its a mild recession.
Also. Approved 5-0, with no real debate. A law firm out of South San Francisco representing various labor groups is threatening a CEQA appeal to extract concessions (they’ve been sending similar threats to all recent downtown Oakland projects.)