As we happily left the end of 2014 and its rain and lurched back into the drought days of January 2015, we can’t help thinking about the three daunting streams of issues that cannot be ignored, no matter where you live or your life style, or whether you are a property owner or a tenant.
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- The sheer number of development proposals now on the table for City action:
- 2211 Harold Way, between Kittredge and Allston Way: Applicant Mark Rhoades for Hill Street Realty of Los Angeles. 194 foot (18-stories) high building with ground floor retail/commercial and 302 residential units with the loss of the Shattuck Cinemas and the lack of on-site affordable housing. For more, see the Neighborhood News, Round and About article in this issue.
- 2129 Shattuck, corner of Shattuck and Kittredge: The revived 16 or 18-story Berkeley Plaza Hotel project with 300 hotel rooms and condominiums, 3 floors of office spaces and a retail complex — exact plans to be announced in February.
- 1951-75 Shattuck, corner of Berkeley Way: Applicant Jim Novosel on behalf of Bay Properties. 120′ (plus extra for mechanicals) high with ground floor office/commercial with 78 (all 2-bedroom) residential units above — all said to be larger than the 600-800 sq ft units usually proposed for the Downtown. Also unusual is the developer providing a percentage of affordable units on site while not seeking an additional “density bonus” to the height of the building.
- Shattuck between Hearst and Berkeley Way: A proposed UC Berkeley building with parts of it rising to 112′ (plus more when you add on the roof mechanicals), eliminating a current UC employee parking lot. UC employees and residents are worried that UC has recently eliminated employee parking at Oxford and Addison for the new Museum and plan to eliminate additional UC parking at the Tang Center lot on Bancroft in order to build a new aquatics center, and that together these proposals will significantly increase lack of parking in a wide area.
- Gayley Road: The privately owned and operated Maxwell Field Parking Structure and the UC Berkeley decision to create “Sproul Hall East” and shift the Cal Visitor’s Center from UC’s west gate on Oxford to Memorial Stadium creates the potential to exacerbate existing traffic patterns and impacts. For more, see the Neighborhood Forum article in eNews Issue 8 and the Neighborhood Forum article in eNEWS Issue 9.
- 2539 Telegraph Avenue: Applicant, Patrick Kennedy. 6-story residential building, retail/commercial on the ground floor with 65 residential units and 8 parking spaces on Telegraph that replaces the former Center for Independent Living building and extends into the Regent Street residential neighborhood in the rear. For more, see the Neighborhood News, Round and About in eNEWS, Issue 11.
- 2585 Telegraph: The possibility that a six-story building will be proposed immediately adjacent to the south of the proposed building at 2539 Telegraph in the space currently occupied by The Buffalo Exchange. There is no information posted on the City’s website, so we can’t provide any information on the application. It is rumored that it will be on the same scale as its neighbor. If so, it will impact the adjacent residential neighborhood, particularly in regard to parking.
- 2001 Fourth Street, next to the University Avenue overpass: Applicant, Read and Trachtenberg. 5-story, ground floor commercial with 152 residential units (12 affordable) and 193 parking spaces, next to the Fourth Street Shopping District. This project will demolish the Grocery Outlet which has historically provided moderately-priced groceries to the West Berkeley neighborhood. For more, see the Neighborhood Forum article in this issue.
- 2201-05 Blake, 2401 Warring, 2601 Hillegass: Applicant, Nathan George. Issues are raised regarding density in ALL residential neighborhoods through the development of Mini-Dorms and how they should be regulated by the City. Further there are issues regarding the elimination of rent-controlled units and the demolition of older buildings. All things considered, will it all result in amendments that weaken the current Mini-Dorm Ordinance or will the Council go the other way and improve how Mini-Dorms are determined and regulated? For more, see the Featured Neighborhoods article in this issue as well as almost every back eNEWS issue, all of which can be accessed through the Archives.
- 699 Virginia (Lehigh Asphalt Co.) and 2nd and Gilman (Pacific Steel Casting): The Housing Advisory Commission and Community Health Commission, Ocean View Neighborhood Association, West Berkeley Alliance for Clean Air and Safe Jobs and neighbors have raised serious concerns about air quality in West Berkeley from industrial plants. A public hearing was denied and instead a two person Council Committee was formed that may or may not be open to the public. For more, see the Letters article in this issue and the Neighborhood Forum article in eNEWS Issue 12.
- 2029-2035 Blake, between Milvia and Shattuck: An emerging proposal from Mark Rhoades and Nathan George, for a 5-story, 3 work-live lofts and retail/commercial on the ground floor, 72 residential units and 61 parking spaces described as a “transition” from busy Shattuck Avenue to the abutting residential neighborhood.
- Given all this development activity, we quickly come to the issue of Density, how it’s currently defined and how it might be redefined in the future.
- Through current court cases:
- It’s pretty clear that the Alameda County Superior Court Judge Emilio Grillo’s decision regarding 2133 Parker will have an impact. How — we don’t exactly know — but we do know with a certainty that ALL neighborhoods, R1 single family through R3 multi-family must keep a close eye on this issue. For more, see the Featured Neighborhoods article in this issue as well as the BNC eNEWS Archive of back issues.
- 2707 Rose Street: The City’s approval with no California Environmental Quality Act Report and no other geotechnical or engineering studies for a 10,000 square foot house, including a 10-car garage on a steep North Berkeley hillside lot has gone all the way to the California Supreme Court. This is a decision that could well impact “McMansion” development throughout the State. It’s expected to come down soon. For more, see the Neighborhood Forum article in eNews Issue 11 and the Neighborhood Forum article in eNews Issue 13.
- And through proposals currently being put forward and discussed by individuals and elected officials:
- Newspaper articles such as the West County Times, May 5, 2013 article by Scott Watkins, managing partner of Buildaberg and a leader in the USGBC Sustainable Neighborhoods Committee, writes that increased density is an essential element to having healthier neighborhoods. Zach Franklin, a South Berkeley resident writes in Berkeleyside a call for citywide up-zoning using the Downtown as a model for the whole city.
- Mayor Bates stated in a December 2014 speech to the Berkeley Property Owners that discussions are currently being held between himself and Council Members Capitelli and Maio around a proposal to build secondary dwelling units in the backyards of single parcels with no notice or zoning review. These “by-right” units would be allowed in all residential neighborhoods, and be about 750 square feet in size, 14 feet tall, have 4 foot setbacks and require no additional parking.
- BNC seriously asks that if the standards for density that are currently contained within our General Plan are not binding, and individual residential parcels can be developed to accommodate much higher densities, what then is the difference between the residential zoning districts?
- And lastly, just what kind of city will Berkeley become in the future?
We once were a City of homes and neighborhoods, one that valued beautiful architecture and the arts, the energy of the greatest public university in the world, the excitement of free speech and innovative ideas, and the vitality of diverse cultures and people. It’s a legitimate question to ask: What are we now and what will we be in the future? With the results of gentrification so strong its effects cannot continue to be swept under the rug, we ask whether our City has failed us? How many of us even care? BNC answers that question with a resounding: We care and we think neighborhoods care too.
There’s a very interesting article by Joe Kotkin, posted August 19, 2014 entitled, The people designing your cities don’t care what you want. They’re planning for hipsters.
He starts out by saying that pundits and developers answer the question “What is a city for?” by saying:
- The sheer number of development proposals now on the table for City action:
Their current conventional wisdom embraces density, sky-high scrapers, vastly expanded mass transit and ever-smaller apartments. It reflects a desire to create an ideal locale for hipsters and older, sophisticated urban dwellers. It’s city as adult Disneyland or “entertainment machine,” chock-a-block with chic restaurants, shops and festivals.
Overlooked, or even disdained, is what most middle-class residents or the metropolis actually want: home ownership, rapid access to employment throughout the metropolitan area, good schools and “human scale” neighborhoods.
Sound familiar, but that’s what he said to a national audience. We can’t quote the whole article here, but you can easily find it on the internet: www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/08/15/the-people-designing-your-cities-have-no-idea-what-you-or-the-rest-of-the-middle-class-want/
He goes on to look at the national picture and divides cities into two categories: “luxury cities” e.g. San Francisco, New York, Boston, Seattle and Miami and “cities of opportunity” e.g. Salt Lake City, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Riverside-San Bernardino and San Antonio which turn out to be the cities with the largest share of children, ages 0-14.
Well, BNC is not so crazy about the list of “cities of opportunity” — but those named were the top 10, so there must be plenty of urban areas (not suburban) on that list that are models which are more appealing. We don’t know, but we do know what is happening in cities like San Francisco where we understand that the average home price is now somewhere around $1 M.
The other thing that we know with a passionate certainty is that BNC isn’t going to walk away from these issues. We’re going to talk about them and hopefully with all of you out there, find some solutions to these problems so that the future City of Berkeley won’t be as a City of Luxury. Berkeley is too important for that to happen!
So, join with us and gives us your comments, suggestions, opinions and news, either as individuals, neighborhoods or businesses.