Drama Continues at Alameda Marina
Developer Bay West hasn’t submitted final plans to the City of Alameda for its vision for Alameda Marina, but has been discussing updated designs with community groups through community advisory meetings. “The news is not good. The multiple meetings that Bay West held with their stakeholders has resulted in a bubble concept that is not much of an improvement over their original pictures we saw on their website that showed houses throughout the property after they planned to bulldoze all of the buildings,” says Nancy Hird, a leader of the Save Alameda’s Working Waterfront community group.
Tenants report that Bay West has raised slip fees by 30% beginning July 1, and rates have also gone up for dry-docked boats. Many commercial tenants haven’t received promised new short 18-month leases, in many cases for considerably less space than they currently have. Short leases are a particular concern for DOER Marine which needs a longer lease to bid grants for government and scientific projects.
The new designs that are being discussed show a commercial area (in purple on the designs) that allows for 150,000-sq-ft commercial space to house commercial, maritime, office and retail space. Space for dry-docked boats drops from 300 to 50-75. Bay West explained that it was allocating those for sailboats, with the priority going to Alameda-based owners. To conserve space, mules would replace vehicle access. “Bay West thinks the fact that only 24% of the boaters using slips and spaces are Alamedans is reason to classify the other 76% as second-class citizens even though they spend their money and pay sales taxes in Alameda like everyone who lives here — using fewer infrastructure resources in the process,” says Hird. “To SAWW’s way of thinking, this statistic illustrates the importance of Alameda Marina as a regional asset.”
As expected, the bulk of the property would be housing – referred to in the designs as Dwelling Units. “The total number of units — 500-650 — indicates they expect to use Density Bonus Laws to inflate the 396 units that the city originally thought appropriate for the site,” says Hird.