NYT article

This is perhaps old news for us residents, but it was good to see Alameda get a prominent mention in the NYT article on the commercial real estate in the Bay Area.

At the north end of Alameda, an East Bay island city of 72,000, Catellus, a unit of ProLogis that specializes in mixed-use and retail development, is converting the Navy’s old 213-acre supply facility into a planned community. Roughly half the land has become Bayport, a neighborhood of 485 single-family homes, a new elementary school and an 11-acre park.

Catellus is set to start construction of Alameda Landing on the remaining 97 acres. This includes thousands of feet of shoreline where the company is planning to build a promenade and a 32,000-square-foot waterfront district with restaurants, entertainment and retail facilities. Other features include a 300,000-square-foot retail center, 400,000 square feet of offices and up to 300 residential units.

“We expect that Alameda Landing will sell as well as Bayport did,” said Aidan Barry, Catellus’s first vice president. “The location on the bay just can’t be beat.”

Hello Ithaca!

Today’s NYT has an article on how Ithaca is considering deploying the very same pod cars that are under consideration for Alameda Point. Perhaps SunCal might want to exchange notes with the folks at Ithaca.

Tidbits on Toxicity, via the web

Perhaps they (or somebody else) can produce a similar listing for Alameda Point!

HAVE you ever wondered about health hazards lurking underground near your home, your workplace or a property that you are thinking of buying or renting? For locations in New York State, there is now an easy way to find out, without resorting to costly testing of groundwater and soil core samples.

File under “stupid ideas”

Way back when, Bill Wattenburg a.ka. a “visionary”, had a brainwave (?):

The idea came to Bill Wattenburg from his perch in the Berkeley Hills one day as he watched the morning commutathon far below, creeping like an undulating snake along the East Bay freeways. To Wattenburg, a Bay Area engineer, consultant and talk-show host long known for his esoteric proposals — many of them questioned at first, then adopted — the thought of turning the (Alameda Naval) air station into a commuter station was a natural.

Here’s Wattenburg’s latest idea: to have thousands of drivers park at the air station, be collected up on buses that in turn are loaded onto ferries for the bay crossing, and then rolled off in San Francisco and on to their final destinations.

’nuff said!

“Captive Audience”

Nah … not the Olympics, nor the “award winning” Don Roberts show, but that’s the name of a small budget movie filmed at the Acquacotta restaurant.

The story revolves around a frustrated novelist who takes a group of restaurant diners and staff hostage. Alameda resident Leonard Bael is one of the film’s actors. Lead actors include Tony Mathews of Pleasanton, who plays writer Harvey Templeton, and Mark McGrath, an Alameda native now living in San Francisco, who plays restaurateur Rick Delano.

On a related note, check out the list of movies filmed in Alameda!

Alameda residents on the US Olympic team

Alameda residents Wes Piermarini and Elliot Hovey are in the US double scull rowing team, according to this article. Rowing schedules, if anybody wants to keep track

Go Peet’s!

Alameda’s very own Peet’s appears to be weathering the recent downturn fairly well. Contrast their recent earnings report to Starsucks closing 600 of their stores!

The company said the rise was partly due to strong growth in its grocery and wholesale business. Peet’s has been expanding by selling its coffee in more grocery stores around the country. Grocery sales jumped 27 percent. Revenue at its retail stores, meanwhile, rose 13 percent, mainly from sales at new locations.

And in other Peet’s related news:

Peet’s new roastery in Alameda, on the bay’s shore right at the northern tip of the main Oakland Airport runway, was awarded LEED gold certification, an unusual honor for a factory.

How many Starbucks does Alameda need?

There are 6 Starbucks stores in Alameda … of which there are two sets of stores that are located in close proximity to each other.

1. The Webster store is less than half a mile from the Marina Village Lucky location.
2. Alameda Towne Center has 2 stores located approx a couple of hundred feet from each other

While it certainly can be traumatic for Starbucks employees who might lose their jobs as a result of the proposed consolidation, you have to wonder why the brainiacs running the company couldn’t foresee this situation! Having a large number of stores in close proximity to another (especially for a product that is as generic as it gets) doesn’t seem like a great idea to start with (despite the pretentious “tall/grande/venti” labelling)

Needless to say, definitely not my favorite place to get a cuppa!

What might’ve been!

It is too late now … but after a recent article in the Chronicle on some of the more innovation designs for parking garages, I couldn’t help but wonder what might’ve been had the city chosen a better design for the Civic Center garage instead of the boxy structure we’re stuck with!

Oh well!

Seeing is believing … or is it?

NYT is reporting that Philadelphia is trying out a rather innovative approach to speed bumps:

The triangles are known variously as 3-D, virtual or just plain fake speed humps. The virtual variety — flat pieces of plastic that are burned into the street, with the configuration of the colored lines conveying the illusion that a driver is about to cross the real thing — is less expensive ($500 each, versus $2,000), does not impede water flow and poses no threat to ambulances or other speeding emergency vehicles.

Would this work in Alameda?