Adding open space on the eastern end makes sense, and it’s not precluded here. In fact, Safeway’s drawing also included something to that effect. I was most interested in the interior of the site, because that’s where Safeway’s proposal was really inadequate. Note that you could enlarge the pedestrian plaza I included, or potentially even close “Bilger Street” or the last chunk of “McAdam Street” off to cars altogether, as well. And the pedestrian alley storefronts could have outdoor seating, making a bit more open space.

The other thing is that the wetland/pond is a nice view from a plaza, so I would want to take advantage of that. Instead of just having the one plaza smack in the middle of cars and shoppers (which can still be an enjoyably busy place to be), I would add another, possibly somewhat narrow stretch along the east side of the property that would connect to CCA and include bike paths.

Overall it is a much more appropriate design that Safeway’s. I could see a bit more open space- as much as I dislike the creepy plastic vibe at San Jose’s Santana Row, their middle strip of pocket parks with benches and fountains is really well used.

Also, the lower end of College is already quieter than the area near the BART station. There aren’t as many popular commercial establishments packed in a row on the south stretch. It seems unlikely that the somewhat dispersed businesses on lower College would suddenly give rise to development on Broadway, when that hasn’t happened so far.

The point is: more parking doesn’t suddenly create a destination if there isn’t already one there. You need to give people a reason to visit a place.

The need for parking declines in part because we shape development that lends itself to carfree living. Change doesn’t occur in a vacuum — it occurs because we support and implement policies that effectively guide behavior in a certain direction.

I’m not sure we need to think of this as development “spreading” from Uptown or from College. What we’re doing is concentrating on important nodes along Broadway, and improving those individually. The Upper Broadway Specific Plan would address Broadway through 27th. There’s the area around Pill Hill, and MacArthur/Kaiser. There’s already a little node at 40th that could be expanded and reinvigorated. And now we’re talking about 51st. Once we’ve really done a solid job on reinvigorating those hotspots, then, it’s easier to connect the dots, so to speak — to fill in the gaps to make the entire length of Broadway the really great street that Oakland deserves and has been missing.

Lastly, I would just point out that planning itself takes a long time. It can take years to produce a finished plan (if it covers a large area), and then it takes even longer to implement, depending on economic cycles. If Broadway is really 20-30 yrs away from being developed, then serious corridor planning should begin now — not in 20 to 30 years.

Why you ask? The BART end of lower College currently has lots of parking evenings and weekends at the BART station. This currently doesn’t exist at the B’way end. More convenient parking might indeed allow better utilization of lower College. This would allow College to expand down to Broadway organically, and eventually up and down Broadway, much sooner than waiting for development to spread from Uptown to Safeway. This provides a second focus for commercial and residential development, which will always be faster than spreading from a single focus. While this doesn’t force folks onto transit immediately, it does provide a path for higher density development that will allow the natural evolution to non-auto oriented means of transit. By the time that Safeway is ready to remodel again, natural evolution of transportation will have decreased the need for parking. In the meantime, building elevated paring on the Safeway site will allow that to be repurposed gradually as parking needs decline.

In any case, it’s not so much the identity of the stores that I was after, but rather, what the built environment looks like. Adapting big box stores to an urban setting is no longer a new thing. See, for example, the Target stores in Chicago or Minneapolis. It’s possible to have both big box and a walkable environment.

Robert: You’re right, it should be planned carefully, and my apologies if I sounded a bit flippant in my earlier comment. Completely eliminating parking won’t happen, but at the same time, if you create a high quality destination with less parking than is “needed,” people will still want to visit — but those who can use transit will find that to be the better option. Encouraging patrons to find alternatives is also a component of ensuring good circulation. You can’t really build something of high urban density and then have everyone drive to it.

By “reduced amount,” I really just meant reduced as compared to the current amount, which is an overabundance. I stated underground as a preference because the Whole Foods (and similar structures with garages embedded in between the ground floor retail and the upstairs apartments) do tend to look a bit bulky, and not as nice as buildings where the parking is hidden. Financial realities determine the final product, but to the extent that some parking can be moved underground, the option should be investigated.

Be careful what you wish for! God forbid we end up with another 9th and Bryant/Brannan Shopping center showing nothing but its butt to the sidewalk.

The city does need to step in with a vision if this site is to be anything special. Currently both Plesant Valley/51st and Broadway are extremely pedistrian unfriendly. I think it is unreasonable to ask Safeway to plan a little pedistrian enclave without a plan and timeline for how and when their development would integrate into the overall environment. I am hard pressed to see Oakland ever providing this vision.

A 51R could be a good alternative, though. My big concern there is just that, anecdotally, it seems that much of the 51’s delay along College and Bancroft comes not from dwell time but from traffic congestion and (near UC) pedestrian congestion. I’d worry about the buses themselves getting caught up there and then bunching by the time they’re back in the rapid corridor, where they’d move rapidly but in posses (which is already a huge 51 problem). On Broadway, in contrast, the delay is basically all from dwell time or hitting lights at a bad point, so it seems like there’s a lot more potential to fix that with infrastructure (BRT or otherwise).