(The following story by Cecily Burt appeared on the Alameda Times-Star website on December 15.)
OAKLAND, Calif. — It’s hard to imagine the bleak landscape around the old Southern Pacific train station was once a bustling hub, teeming with travelers and commerce.
Now, developers are planning to bring life back to the abandoned station at 16th and Wood streets, and to the empty blocks surrounding it.
A $400 million Central Station plan would create a mini-city of at least 1,500 market-rate homes on 28 acres surrounding the depot. The centerpiece would be the restored station serving as a museum honoring the railroad’s historic contributions to transportation and the African-American community.
Oakland’s railroad terminus was the entry for many new residents who flocked West with the railroad. It served as the birthplace for the black labor movement through the efforts of Pullman car porters.
The 1912 Beaux Arts building, which has historic landmark status, was damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and closed permanently not long after. Squatters took over and looters destroyed and stole everything that wasn’t nailed down and most of what was.
Emeryville-based developer Rick Holliday bought the station and 26 linear acres surrounding it more than three years ago. His plans have ranged from a high-tech campus surrounded bylive/work lofts to big-box retail to a catering center to an auto mall.
Through every iteration, the train station was always going to be renovated, and he has met several times with the community to get their feedback. Under the plan revealed last Monday, the development team announced they intend to seek public funding to help pay for the estimated $8 to $10 million restoration.
Holliday has sold much of the property, including the train station, to BUILD, a for-profit affiliate of nonprofit BRIDGE Housing, Inc. BUILD is constructing the bulk of the for-sale housing units, using a $15 million investment in infill development from CalPers, the state employee retirement system.
Another parcel was sold to Andrew Getz of HFH Ltd. of Emeryville. Getz plans to construct about 450 rental apartments, the only rental units in the entire development. Aside from the train station and adjacent switching station, only the old icehouse building at 11th and Pine streets will be saved and turned into lofts.
The massive project is broken down into eight different parcels starting at 10th Street and extending as far as it physically can — to the elevated portion of West Grand Avenue. The east/west boundaries are Wood Street and the Interstate 880 freeway, or Frontage Road. Holliday owns parcels two, seven and eight, HFH owns parcel four and BUILD owns the rest:
Parcel one: 82 live/work units that parallel the Frontage Road for four blocks from 10th to 14th streets.
Parcel two: Reusing old icehouse building for 170 lofts between 11th, 13th and Pine streets.
Parcel three: 200 townhouses between Pine, Wood, 12th and 14th streets.
Parcel four: 450 rental apartments between 14th, 16th, Wood and the Frontage Road, plus some small retail space.
Parcel five: Train station and station plaza at 16th and Wood streets.
Parcel six: 215 live/work lofts between 17th, 18th, Wood and Frontage Road, plus some small retail space.
Parcel seven: 170 townhouses between 18th and 20th streets
Parcel eight: 283 high-rise condominiums or office building if the economy allows. Parcel abuts elevated roadway.
The project will take at least five years to complete, with parcels four, two and three going up first, in that order.
Old army base area
The development is within the Oakland Army Base redevelopment area, and 25 percent of the increased property tax revenues from the new development will go into the city’s affordable housing fund.
The developers are not obligated to hire local workers or include affordable housing in the project because there is no city money invested.
But Carol Galante, president of Bridge Housing, Inc., said the team will request that the city’s Redevelopment Agency use the 25 percent to assist first-time homebuyers who want to purchase one of the units, either through down payment assistance or reduced purchase price.
As many as 200 homes could be set aside for lower-income buyers if the affordable income criteria is set at 80 percent to 120 percent of area median income, she said. The total could vary depending on whether interest rates change significantly, or if the city wants to reduce the affordability threshold to include lower-income residents, she said.
Several residents applaud the project. They believe that West Oakland has a glut of affordable housing projects, and retail stores and grocery stores will never consider West Oakland a viable market until more new market-rate housing is built to boost the depressed area.
But just as many resist development that fails to offer housing that could likely be purchased or rented by West Oakland residents, the majority of whom are renters and cannot afford to pay market rates. Renters are being pushed out as the area is increasingly gentrified and newcomers snap up Victorians that were previously subdivided into rentals, critics say.
Critics’ concerns
Even with down payment assistance, prices and monthly payments of a new market-rate development would be out of reach, they said. They also worry about increased traffic from such a large housing development and wondered where the people would shop.
“Last I looked, there was one grocery store in West Oakland,” said Jumoke Hodge, director of the 7th Street/McClymonds Neighborhood Improvement Initiative. “You’re talking about what’s good for West Oakland, but you don’t know what’s good for us.”
Councilmember Nancy Nadel (Downtown-West Oakland) supports the development, but she questioned the lack of affordable housing. She said the project would be the densest in West Oakland and contain hundreds more units than the vast Forest City project in uptown. She also expressed concern over funding for the train station restoration.
Public funds sought
“I know it’s a blighted property, but to be proposing to only use community redevelopment money to restore the station concerns me,” Nadel said. “I thought you were going to invest your own money in the train station.”
Galante said the public investment in the train station would be small compared to the benefits to the community from the overall project. It will add housing, not replace it, and offer home-ownership opportunities to people who would not be able to afford it otherwise, she said.
“We believe our proposal makes the most sense,” Galante said. “There are already a lot of renters in West Oakland.”
Stefanie Parrott, a West Oakland resident and Realtor, said there needs to be a balance of housing types in West Oakland, including market-rate, to bring the schools up and bring in retail. At the same time, giving people a hand in owning property is a good move.
“I love the idea that some of the funds for the Army Base helps to subsidize the down payment, or just lowering the purchase price to make them affordable,” she said. “The best way I can think of to break the cycle of poverty — especially generational poverty — is the promotion of home ownership, so they have a stake in something, so they care.”
Locals seek jobs
Affordability wasn’t the only issue. Resident Margaret Gordon complained that locals are shut out of jobs on West Oakland projects, including those completed by Bridge Housing, BUILD’s nonprofit affiliate.
Galante countered that. She said 55 percent of the subcontractors hired on the Chestnut/Linden Court project were local, and 900 union workers hired live in Oakland. She also said that 57 of the workers were low-income residents of the neighborhood who were not members of the union when they started. On the Mandela Gateway project, 31 percent of the subcontractors hired so far are mostly local minority businesses. About 17 housing authority tenants and other low-income residents have been hired, Galante said.
“It’s an ongoing dilemma,” Galante said. “We work with the contractors and we work with the local hiring hall, but often the local residents are not in the union, so we make a big effort to have the contractors get local residents into the union.”
Manny Granillo, a longtime resident of West Oakland, said it may not bring jobs or housing for West Oakland residents, but the area needs a boost, and this project will do it.
“Private industry is trying to correct a blight in our community,” he said.
Hearing scheduled
An environmental review of the proposed project will be done before any architectural drawings are completed. The project also requires a change to the city’s zoning code to allow residential and commercial uses on the property. A hearing on that issue is scheduled before the Planning Commission’s Zoning Update Committee at 4 p.m. Wednesday in Hearing Room 1 of Oakland City Hall.