New Market-Rate Housing in Oakland? (Berkeley, Richmond: transplants, renters, houses)

[Malloric]

Originally Posted by Obamadon1

Also apartments being built at 21st/San Pablo/22nd. The city needs to tell the developers of those two projects in particular to **** or get off the pot. There's no demand for big new office towers in Oakland and no reason to expect that to change so I don't know why the city (and developers) are sitting around expecting that any day now companies will be demanding a million SF of new office space. Build housing. Especially at 1100 Broadway - that stretch of Broadway has always been desolate at night and the city should be encouraging residents to live there to make it more hospitable after office workers go home. There's zero housing on Broadway between ~7th and 17th

There isn't?

Class A office space in Oakland, especially down town, amazingly tight. You might not like offices, but that doesn't mean there's not demand.

[wooliemonster]

I will probably end up in Oakland. I love Rockridge, but we might try and stake a claim in West Oakland and gamble on SF spillover changing the neighborhood over time.

[wooliemonster]

But yes, in response to the OP, I wonder out loud all the time why there isn't already massive redevelopment in Oakland given the prices in SF. Even Berkeley is allowing a number of new apartment blocks to go up in relatively transit friendly locations. Gentrification is a multistage process with different demographics in each phase... just think Oakland BART areas would be on an accelerated trajectory given the horrors of Bay Area real estate.

[Malloric]

Originally Posted by wooliemonster

But yes, in response to the OP, I wonder out loud all the time why there isn't already massive redevelopment in Oakland given the prices in SF. Even Berkeley is allowing a number of new apartment blocks to go up in relatively transit friendly locations. Gentrification is a multistage process with different demographics in each phase... just think Oakland BART areas would be on an accelerated trajectory given the horrors of Bay Area real estate.

Oakland is run similar to Detroit. It's a class-warfare town where there's a lot resistance to gentrification and the city regularly goes about cutting of its nose to spite its face. I mean, look at Emeryville. It's really a stupid place for all that development to be going, but for political reasons that's where it's occurring rather than in Oakland.

[athleticsfan72737489]

Originally Posted by Malloric

There isn't?

Class A office space in Oakland, especially down town, amazingly tight. You might not like offices, but that doesn't mean there's not demand.

Class A office space in Oakland is very tight. However, developers of approved buildings have stated they won't start construction until they sign an anchor tenant. This is the case of 1100 Broadway and 601 City Center. I don't see any large companies packing up their bags and moving to Oakland all of a sudden.

I think the only way an "anchor tenant" moves into either of these buildings is if a company already in Oakland moves in. The last large office building to be built in Oakland was in 2007 - it was 2100 Franklin. Pandora was already established in Oakland and became the anchor tenant.

[wooliemonster]

I hadn't heard of the Broadway Valdez plan, but here is a good document describing the idea.
http://www2.oaklandnet.com/oakca1/gr.../oak034847.pdf

However, I'm not a fan of grandiose redevelopment. Just upzone the area, cut red tape, make it easy for an area to develop organically. Add improved transit -- maybe some light rail lines on major thoroughfares like San Pablo to Berkeley/Richmond and Broadway through JLS and Alameda. BART is just commuter rail outside of SF. I dunno. I'm still going off my couple visits; once I move in a few weeks I will be making detailed surveys and brainstorming for my Sim City East Bay sketches

[jsba]

I think another issue is that land in downtown Oakland really isn't all that cheap and most of the plots are pretty small. A developer would have to buy several small plots to place one decent sized development and who knows how much some of these greedy land bankers will charge. Land banking is a huge problem in Oakland. You can make more money sitting on a vacant plot and then selling it to a new developer than you can trying to put something up yourself. In the interim you pave the lot over and rent it out to Douglas for a little extra revenue.

[CirclingLogan]

Originally Posted by 04kL4nD

I was mostly just responding to the claim that Oakland didn't have any history worth preserving and that it's just filled with parking lots. In any event, I still think there are much better places to build a highrise than in that particular neighborhood, old folks home or not.

Obviously, there is history. I was exaggerating. I walk by the Oakland Hotel often and am always amazed and surprised every time I see it in such a lifeless area. My point is that the greater issue in downtown Oakland is *not* losing history, but that there is no reason for anyone to visit the areas where the history is, so no one is ever going to see and enjoy it. If no one ever sees an old building, does it really exist?

[CirclingLogan]

Also apartments being built at 21st/San Pablo/22nd.

That's affordable housing. Which is fine. But, it's not what Oakland needs right now. That just shifts low income people around within the city. New, market-rate housing will attract people from outside the city, help the downtown restaurants thrive and increase the tax base.

[Obamadon1]

Originally Posted by jsba

I think another issue is that land in downtown Oakland really isn't all that cheap and most of the plots are pretty small. A developer would have to buy several small plots to place one decent sized development and who knows how much some of these greedy land bankers will charge. Land banking is a huge problem in Oakland. You can make more money sitting on a vacant plot and then selling it to a new developer than you can trying to put something up yourself. In the interim you pave the lot over and rent it out to Douglas for a little extra revenue.

Which is why we should tax land, not the buildings on it. Incentivize people to use land efficiently instead of just sitting on empty/parking lots in prime downtown areas.