Berkeleyside » Downtown

The “before” pictures: Berkeley Art Museum/PFA

Tracey Taylor — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:00:55 +0000

The old printing plant in downtown that will one day be home to the Berkeley Art Museum. All photos: David Stark Wilson

Call it “beautiful decay”: these stunning photographs, taken by David Stark Wilson, show the interiors of the future home of the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA).

Just as with the new Magnes, which unveiled its new space on Sunday, BAM/PFA is to be housed in a ~~1920s-era~~ 1939 building originally designed as a printing plant for UC Berkeley. It is located at 2120 Oxford Street at Center Street, in the heart of downtown.

Is it not fitting that, as the demand for printed thesis, documents, books and monographs has waned, the engine rooms that produced these volumes are now being put to good use while remaining in the cultural realm?

(...)

Read the rest of The “before” pictures: Berkeley Art Museum/PFA (183 words)

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 7 comments |
Post tags: BAM/PFA, Berkeley Art Museum, David Stark Wilson, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, WA Design

Berkeley’s new Magnes building to be unveiled on Sunday

Tracey Taylor — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 21:00:38 +0000

The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life is housed in a 1920s former printing plant on Allston Way. Photos: Tracey Taylor

On Sunday, the doors will open to a new cultural institution in Berkeley. The many thousands of books, paintings, prints, textiles, and photographs that make up The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life – which was formerly located in an early 20th-century family home on Russell Street in the Elmwood neighborhood — will now be readily accessible to the public in a beautifully renovated, centrally located 25,000 sq ft space at 2121 Allston Way.

The building, which was designed in the 1920s as a printing plant for UC Berkeley, was most recently used by UC’s Bancroft Library, with whom the Magnes now partners. Before that, the Berkeley Public Library occupied the space. Marks left by book stacks on the stained, maple-colored concrete floors bear the stamp of the building’s history.

The heart of the new museum is an open exhibition space featuring elm wood and glass, transparency and warmth being key to the space's design

The building has been transformed by San Francisco architects Pfau Long in collaboration with local design and fabrication company Picassa Studios. The goal, said the museum’s Director Alla Efimova, was to create a warm, inviting place with an emphasis on transparency.

“We wanted an open space with a good flow where the community could spend time discovering the collection,” she said.(...)

Read the rest of Berkeley’s new Magnes building to be unveiled on Sunday (718 words)

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 8 comments |
Post tags: Alla Efimova, Magnes Museum, Pfau Long, Picassa Studios, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life

The “big clean-up” of downtown Berkeley begins

Tracey Taylor — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 22:45:52 +0000

An $850,000 clean-up operation will take place in the 30-block downtown Berkeley area over the next three months. Photo: Tracey Taylor

A clean-up has begun in downtown Berkeley, part of a larger campaign to improve the area’s environment and boost economic development. It is being funded to the tune of $1.2 million by the Property Based Business Improvement District (PBID) that was passed by 71% of local property owners last June.

Last Friday, following three days of training, ten members of the new Downtown Berkeley Association (DBA) Cleaning Team in their neon yellow shirts hit the streets en masse. The first day was spent painting furniture and fixtures, and general litter removal and weeding. On Sunday, the team started pressure washing sidewalks on Shattuck north of University.

The downtown cleaning crew: Front row, L to R: Jerrid Hilliard, Drakori Glaze, Jamie Bush, Valentina Austin, Larry Kazuo. Back row, L to R: Kirk Jacob, Marcus Miles, Okoye Jones, Nelson Chavarria, Operations Manager Lance Gorée

The intention is to deep-clean and beautify the entire 30-block area of Downtown Berkeley, and the work will include the removal of all graffiti and gum stains, painting all furniture and fixtures, and new landscaping, including new hanging flower baskets. Around $850,000 is being allocated to beautification services and improvements.

The DBA hired Louisville KY-based firm Block By Block to oversee the clean-up and ambassador services. The company has worked on similar projects in downtown Oakland, Santa Monica, and Pasadena, among others. Block By Block is also committed to hiring employees locally, as well as second-chance programs for hiring from social service agency partners.(...)

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By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 12 comments |
Post tags: Downtown Berkeley, Downtown Business Association, PBID

Parking around Trader Joe’s sparks “vigilante” action

Guest contributor — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 19:15:00 +0000

Handmade signs affixed to trees between Milvia and Bonita on December 20th warned of the risk of being ticketed. Photo: D.H. Parks

By Linda Hemmila

If you’ve received a parking ticket near Trader Joe’s on University Avenue in Berkeley, you’re in good company. So many people have been ticketed there over the past year and half it’s become a neighborhood cause, has provoked defiant action from a “parking vigilante”, and is up for renewed discussion at the next scheduled City Council meeting on January 17th.

The trouble stems from parking signs in the area, which, according to councilmember Jesse Arreguín, are “very confusing”. The city has acknowledged as much by dismissing most contested citations because, it says, the signage is not sufficiently clear to visitors.

It all started in June 2010 when, as part of the redevelopment of the downtown area — and with the June 11 opening of Trader Joe’s — the city altered parking signs in the neighborhood that designated one side of the street as resident-only parking and the other side two-hour parking. The signs on the residential side were adorned with red and white city-made stickers denoting “no parking” that were placed directly over the old sign which said “two- hour parking”. The streets in questions include Berkeley Way, Addison Street, Bonita Avenue and Grant Street.(...)

Read the rest of Parking around Trader Joe’s sparks “vigilante” action (705 words)

By guest. | Permalink | 75 comments |
Post tags: Jesse Arreguin, Parking citations Berkeley, Trader Joe's Berkeley

Despite eviction notice, no raid on Occupy Berkeley

Guest contributor — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 16:32:21 +0000

Craig Evans keeps watch as his wife sleeps in their tent. Photo: David Yee

By Frances Dinkelspiel and Judith Scherr

Under the threat of eviction, protestors at Occupy Berkeley took down about 40 tents in Civic Center Park Wednesday night, preparing for the raid that never came.

As a 10 pm deadline to stop camping in the park loomed, many activists were packing up their gear and loading it up on trucks. Some had stashed their possessions in a safe place, but had returned to the park to confront the police if they showed up. Soon, only about 29 out of about 70 tents remained.

“I’ve got my stuff packed but I’m not leaving,” a man who identified himself as Cincinnati said as the deadline loomed. “I’m going to take the streets.”

But the desire to confront police and stand ground was shared by only some of the 150 people who have made up Occupy Berkeley. Maxina Ventura, who has been staying in the park off and on with her children ever since it started two months ago, took down her tent on Wednesday. She said she could no longer stand behind the radical fringe of protestors who seemed determined to fight police at all costs.

“We had to make it clear we were not a front for those people,” said Ventura.

Berkeley police, acting on orders from interim City Manager Christine Daniel, handed out notices on Dec. 20 that the city would no longer look the other way during the park’s 10 pm to 6 am curfew.(...)

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By guest. | Permalink | 18 comments |
Post tags: Christine Daniel, Jesse Arreguin, Kriss Worthington, Occupy Berkeley

Are Blackberries best bet for Berkeley in emergencies?

Tracey Taylor — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 17:58:13 +0000

The city of Berkeley's executive team, which includes all councilmembers, department heads and senior managers, relies on Blackberries to communicate with each other and externally

On Tuesday, October 11th, at about 4:00 pm, a power outage in Berkeley shut down the downtown BART station and disabled the city’s computer system, which meant services and documents for elected officials, city agency staff, and city residents were inaccessible for several hours.

On the same day, owners of BlackBerries across the country — which includes all senior City of Berkeley personnel — were experiencing outages on their handheld devices after a system hardware glitch caused a backlog of data to build up in the European servers of Research In Motion, the makers of the BlackBerry.

Both incidents highlight Berkeley’s dependence on potentially unreliable technologies. They also underscore how vulnerable our city’s government might be in a state of emergency. (...)

Read the rest of Are Blackberries best bet for Berkeley in emergencies? (539 words)

By Tracey Taylor. | Permalink | 16 comments |
Post tags: Berkeley City Council, Berkeley Disaster Mitigation Plan, Berkeley Emergency Notification System, Blackberries, Blackberry, City of Berkeley, Kriss Worthington, Research in Motion, RIM

City Council tackles housing development downtown

Judith Scherr — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 21:15:31 +0000

"Downtown" area expanded under Measure R

With the passage of Measure R last year, Berkeley voters set the stage for a taller, denser, greener downtown.

While developers will be allowed to build one hotel and two residential buildings of 180 feet, a couple of office buildings at 120 feet and other buildings that are taller than in today’s downtown, what the city’s core will actually look like – who will live there, how much open space will be retained and how people will get around – is likely to be the focus of many late-night council and commission meetings over the next months and years to come.

The question the council debated at its Tuesday evening work session was whether paying a $20,000 per rental unit fee to an affordable housing fund would negatively impact the developer’s bottom line, affecting a proposed project to the degree that it would not to be built.

Developer fees are not taxes. They are intended to pay cities back for partial costs they bear for new development. Currently in Berkeley developers pay into a childcare fund, commercial developers pay into a fund for affordable housing, and condominium developers pay into a fund for affordable housing if they don’t choose to build lower-cost housing on site.

Berkeley formerly mandated that 20% of new rental units a developer built would be affordable, with an option for the developer to pay into a fund to house lower-income people in lieu of creating new affordable units. The 2009 Palmer decision by the state supreme court made that illegal.

The council is also likely to impose developer fees dedicated to open space and transportation, but that wasn’t part of Tuesday’s discussion. (...)

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By judith. | Permalink | 20 comments |
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Free outdoor screening of Pixar’s “Up” on Center Street

Lance Knobel — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 20:00:14 +0000

Several hundred Berkeleyans enjoyed the debut of free outdoor movies, organized by the Downtown Berkeley Association, last Saturday night. Tomorrow, the second in the series, Up, will play as the evening skies get dark around 8:30 p.m.

Before the main feature starts, moviegoers are encouraged to eat al fresco (Center Street is pedestrianized for the evening), enjoy musical entertainment, and enter a costume contest at 7:30 p.m. Last week, for The Princess Bride, is was pirates; this week, for Up, the required costume is bow ties or scout badges. Interpret that how you will.

Chairs are available for rent on Center Street, or you can bring your own. Last week, one enterprising visitor hauled in a two-seater couch from his garden. Looking at the weather forecast, moviegoers should probably dress warmly and bring a blanket or two. In return, you get a free viewing of one of the most charming movies of recent days — and one based (architecturally at least) on a house in West Berkeley.

Berkeleyside is the media sponsor of the Center Street Summer Cinema.

By lance. | Permalink | One comment |
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In Berkeley: Thousands of free songs just a click away

Frances Dinkelspiel — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 22:30:13 +0000

With a Berkeley Public Library card you can enjoy listening to a huge selection of free music. Photo: Frances Dinkelspiel

It may be one of Berkeley’s best-kept secrets: Residents can access 500,000 classical, blues, rockabilly, rock, world beat, opera and jazz songs through their computers or smart phones.

All anyone needs is a Berkeley Public Library card.

The library subscribes to the Music Online database, which has uploaded thousands of songs from a wide canon.

“It’s one that a lot of people don’t know about,” said Shani Leonards, a supervising librarian at the Central Library. “It’s really nifty and you can access a lot of great music.”

The library is trying to get the word out about its resources in a workshop series called “Be an expert @ Berkeley Public Library.” Library staff will hold a workshop to teach people about the online music database on Saturday August 6 at 2 pm. The class will be held in Central’s electronic classroom, a room outfitted with about a dozen computers set up for teaching. The class will present an overview of the data base and teach people how to search for songs, and create and save a playlist, said Leonards.

Other classes in the series include one using the library’s databases to research family history at 2 pm on August 31, how to use the databases to look for a job on September 13, and a class on how to find articles on line on September 3.

Music Online is a curated collection of licensed music that can be streamed from any computer by logging in using a BPL card. Patrons can create and save private playlists, listen to songs or whole albums without time limits, and explore music by artist, label, country of origin, genre. The music cannot be downloaded or copied, but only streamed through a computer or phone. It works on iPhones and Androids.

The library also has a strong collection of CDs and vinyl records that patrons can check out.

By Frances Dinkelspiel. | Permalink | 4 comments |
Post tags: Be an expert @ Berkeley Public Library, Berkeley Public Library, Music online, Shani Leonards

The last Harry Potter keeps Berkeley up late

Tina Zhu — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 15:00:48 +0000

Some moviegoers want to be Death Eaters. Photos: Tina Zhu

It’s 10:40 p.m. in Downtown Berkeley, and the line at the United Artists Theater near Shattuck and Bancroft has already started moving. The last Harry Potter movie has officially hit cinemas nationwide.

A pretty good attempt at the core three characters

Hundreds of excited moviegoers banded around the edge of the Berkeley Public Library in anticipation of the midnight showing on Thursday night. According to theater employee Yurida Ramos, devoted fans started lining up for the film at least around 1:00 p.m.

“Since this is the last one, people are more excited,” said Ramos, who has worked for the Berkeley UA 7 for a year and a half. “A lot more dressed up this year.”

Five UA screens played the film at midnight, and two played at 3:00 a.m. Pre-sale tickets were sold out for every showing except for one of the 3:00 a.m. showings.

“Harry Potter is one of the busiest consistently every time,” said Assistant Manager Andrew Morales. “There’s a bigger following for this than Twilight.”

Although Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II marks the end of the Harry Potter saga, not all has been said and done. Author J. K. Rowling is launching website Pottermore in October, where — for some of us — the magic will continue.

By tinazhu. | Permalink | 5 comments |
Post tags: Harry Potter