Category Archives: Urban planning
Help to Google-map public drinking fountains in Berkeley
Peter Gleick is upset about the dwindling number of public drinking fountains in our communities and is determined to do something about it.
“It’s harder and harder to find public water fountains and there is bottled water everwhere,” Gleick, president and co-founder of the Pacific Institute and an internationally recognized water expert, told Berkeleyside.
Gleick became acutely aware of the decline of public drinking fountains when he was working on his book, Bottled and Sold, which was published last year. It’s a detailed look at our society’s “obsession” with bottled water. Part of the history Gleick recounts in the book is the growth of public drinking fountains from the late eighteenth century, when access to reliable water supplies was a rarity.
“There were huge celebrations when they were opened,” Gleick said. “You couldn’t call a city civilized unless it had public drinking fountains.” … Continue reading »
John King talks cityscapes, including his Berkeley picks
John King, staff writer at the San Francisco Chronicle, is a skilled observer of the urban terrain. His new book, “Cityscapes: San Francisco and Its Buildings” (Heyday; $14.95), is drawn from his “Cityscapes” column in the Sunday paper and celebrates serendipitous juxtapositions of 50 of his favorite buildings. Berkeleyside caught up with King, who lives in Berkeley, and asked him about his perspectives — including on Berkeley buildings that speak to him.
Do you bump into a lot of … Continue reading »
Urban homesteader challenges city on sale of edibles
Should city dwellers be allowed to sell their backyard bounty?
Sophie Hahn thinks so. The North Berkeley resident wants to share the abundance from her residential produce plot and offset some costs she incurs maintaining her edible garden.
But Hahn ran into hiccups with the city last year trying to get her idea off the ground. “I had no idea it would be so complicated,” she says. “It’s actually easier in Berkeley to have a pot collective than to have a vegetable collective,” a frustrated Hahn told a New York Times reporter in August.
Or pretty much any other home-based business. That’s because Berkeley’s zoning codes prohibit selling or otherwise conducting commerce outside a house in a residential neighborhood. Never mind that many residents (this writer included) toil from inside their homes. City codes allow for small, low-to-moderate impact home businesses, such as piano teachers, explains Dan Marks, director of planning and development for the city. … Continue reading »
Historical north Berkeley corner is renovated
Update, 04.10.11: Commenting on this story, several readers have mentioned Ninepatch, a store which served the community for 36 years in this building. Pam Zelnik, daughter of the store’s founder, sent in a photo of the shop, which you can find at the foot of the piece.
Update, 4:40pm: Because this story provoked a lively discussion about the architectural renovation under way for this building, we are publishing some additional photographs of the building in its pre-remodeling state, as well as some more renderings from the architect of what the finished result will be like. They can be found at the foot of the story…
The building at the corner of El Dorado Avenue and Sutter Street, near the entrance to the Northbrae Tunnel, has been through myriad incarnations. And now it is undergoing an overdue renovation with a new purpose in mind.
Berkeley architect David Trachtenberg is working with Kaufman Construction, another Berkeley business, to transform the neglected structure into a 7,900 sq ft office building with two retail spaces on the first floor. The $3.2 million re-build will create offices to house Tom Sawyer Software which is moving its headquarters to Berkeley from Oakland. There is no news yet on who will occupy the stores.
Berkeley’s Sacramento Street post office to close
Marcell Walls rode his bicycle up to the blue mailbox outside the Park Station post office, dropped in a letter, and sped away. It’s a trip Walls often makes, since his grandparents in Baton Rouge, Louisiana mail packages to his post office box a few times a month.
But, starting in May, Walls will have to ride to a different post office. The Postal Service announced on Monday that the Park Station at Sacramento and Russell Streets would close on April 30. All the post office boxes and will be transferred to a post office, Station A, on San Pablo Avenue near Addison.
The news came as a blow to nearby residents who have been trying to stave off this possibility. Ever since the Postal Service put the Park Station on a closure list in the fall of 2009, those living on the south side of town have worked to keep it open. They circulated a petition, wrote letters to the Postmaster General, and met with Congresswoman Barbara Lee to plead their case. … Continue reading »
City honors planning pioneer Dorothy Walker
By Alan Tobey
The Berkeley City Council last night approved a proclamation honoring longtime resident Dorothy Walker for her exceptional life record of contributions to the Berkeley community.
As the proclamation states: “Over the past five decades, Dorothy has served the City, and contributed to significant improvements to the quality of life in Berkeley today, including leading campaigns to fund new parks and school buildings, protecting neighborhoods from traffic, preserving the waterfront, improving transit, supporting affordable housing and advocating for social and economic justice.” Overall, “Dorothy has spent over 10,000 hours in community meetings in the interest of making Berkeley a better city.” … Continue reading »
A planner who favors edible, eco education — and risks
In the course of her travels researching her new book Asphalt to Ecosystems: Design Ideas for Schoolyard Transformation, Sharon Gamson Danks was struck by two things: First, the United States is a world leader in school food gardens and Berkeley is firmly at the epicenter of that movement.
And second, the U.S. lags far behind other countries when it comes to building green schoolyards with eco-friendly aspects beyond a produce patch — in other words spaces that encourage play with potential risk. We’re talking less asphalt and metal structures, and more nature nooks and shaded ponds.
An environmental planner, Danks and landscape architect Lisa Howard run Bay Tree Design in Berkeley, which specializes in designing ecological outdoor play spaces. They incorporate ideas Danks picked up from her playground adventures overseas. … Continue reading »
Fourth Berkeley site proposed for LBL second campus
The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory received a fourth Berkeley proposal for a new campus – the old Marchant Building on San Pablo Avenue near Ashby Avenue.
Redico, a Michigan-based real-estate development company, suggested to the lab that the 540,000 square foot building on a 6.5 acre plot of land become its new second campus, according to a knowledgeable source who asked not to be named.
The Marchant Building, which was used by the University of California as a storage facility for 28 years, straddles Berkeley, Emeryville and Oakland. The university vacated the building in 2010 and Redico has been promoting it since then as prime R&D and office space for the East Bay Green Corridor. … Continue reading »
Malcolm X parents raise concerns over pedestrian safety
Perhaps it’s because this particular school is located on a state highway, or perhaps it’s because one of its six-year-old students was run over on a crosswalk next to the school three years ago. Most likely both factors have contributed to a strong feeling among many parents at Malcolm X Elementary School that pedestrian safety needs to be improved on Ashby Avenue (State Highway 13), in particular at the point where it intersects with Ellis Street.
Promised improvements, they say, have been a long time coming and many problems have still not been addressed. In response, the city cites the particular difficulty it faces with green-lighting work on Ashby which, because it is a highway, comes under the jurisdiction of Caltrans. “It is very challenging for us, because any work we want to do involves submitting an encroachment permit to Caltrans, and, with state budget issues, Caltrans has been very slow to respond,” says Farid Javandel, Berkeley’s transportation division manager. … Continue reading »
Slim council majority for changing West Berkeley zoning
After three marathon public hearings, a narrow majority of the Berkeley City Council supports lifting protections on zoning in West Berkeley.
The council voted 5-4 Tuesday night to have staff report back on impacts within 30 days once 100,000 sq. ft. of protected warehouse and manufacturing space have been converted to new uses. Four members — Jesse Arreguin, Max Anderson, Kriss Worthington and Linda Maio — opposed the measure, seeking instead a plan that would set a cap of 100,000 sq. ft. for changes to currently protected properties. The impact study — supported by Mayor Tom Bates, Darryl Moore, Gordon Wozniak, Laurie Capitelli and Susan Wengraf — was an attempt to answer concerns about changes.
The vote last night is the first of many stages that will lead to a council vote on a final ordinance. … Continue reading »
