The ghost of Hayes Valley
What will become of the valuable six-acre parcel the University of California has abandoned?
From this week’s SF Bay Guardian, “In the heart of a busy San Francisco neighborhood, there’s an eerie silence. Just northwest of Market Street and southeast of the Lower Haight, a six-acre plot of immensely valuable land is gathering weeds and dust. The University of California at Berkeley closed the doors on its Laguna extension campus in late 2003, and now the place is effectively sealed off, compound-style, windows and doors facing only the interior court area and little to connect its several buildings in any intimate way with the surrounding neighborhood.”
“Now there’s finally a development plan: After months of negotiations with the university, private developers A.F. Evans and Mercy Housing California have proposed building 351 units of housing on the site. But that would, in large measure, take the property out of the public domain. So the neighborhood is up in arms, clamoring for an alternative — and so far, the only other prospective user is an educational institution that has shown no ability to raise the cash to lease and develop the place.”
“The university simply wants to maximize its cash flow — and in this red-hot housing market, building condos is the best way to guarantee profits. The people at Evans and Mercy are no fools; they preempted potential political resistance with a laundry list of progressive planning concepts: 83 market-rate apartments (out of 351) for independent seniors, with services targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered tenants, 10 City CarShare pods, 67 low-income housing units, continued operation of an on-site UCSF dental care facility, a community garden, and the “adaptive reuse” of 75 percent of the existing buildings.”
“Enter New College of California, the Valencia Street educational institution that is looking for expansion space. The school has drafted an alternative plan that offers more green space and community-use facilities. But New College is hardly a wealthy operation, and right now it’s far from clear whether it can find enough money to compete with the private developers.”
“New College’s president, Martin Hamilton, said in an interview that administrators have had their eye on the extension campus since it closed. The school’s plan includes new student and faculty housing, a child-care center, and room for its GLBT Historical Society Archives and “green businesses” at street level.”
“But given UC’s greed, the only way the New College plan — or any other community-based alternative — can compete is if the supervisors refuse to rezone the site for the housing density Evans and Mercy want. In the meantime, UC’s Laguna Extension remains a ghost town, best suited for graffiti and memorable teen experiences.”
