SAN FRANCISCO | Projects: Under Construction, Approved, and Proposed

[Jerry of San Fran]

I had lunch today at the Salt House (recommended) next door to 535 Mission. An impressive building - like a dark crystal. I discovered a "secret" garden next door to 535. A long set of stairs lead up to a plaza with a glass fountain with a base view of the new highrise and development just south. You can see it in in the photo below - the white base with trees on top.

535 Mission St. May 8, 2014
535 Mission St. May 8, 2014
View from the "secret" garden next door.

[simms3_redux]

That "secret" garden is a favorite lunch spot for workers I snapped some pics today, too. I agree 535 Mission looks pretty sharp!

[simms3_redux]

SFMOMA:











Crane city:

[peanut gallery]

Thanks for all the photo updates, simms. Above, you can see why SFMOMA is confident in topping out this summer. A lot of progress there.

Forgive the boosterism, but this SF Business Times article points out the potential for continued development on the commercial side:

Bay Area ranks as the best commercial real estate market in the country, again
Blanca Torres, San Francisco Business Times
May 6, 2014

For the second year in a row, the Bay Area ranked as the best market for commercial real estate in the country, according to a report from the Wells Fargo Economics Group.

The report found that the Bay Area’s strong gains in employment, housing inventory and technology sector push the Bay Area far ahead of other markets in terms of increasing value and potential for more growth.

“The San Francisco Bay Area remains the epicenter of many of the most rapidly growing technology sectors, including mobile devices, social media, cloud computing, data analytics and life sciences,” the report states. “Overall job and income growth have significantly outpaced the nation in recent years and the unemployment rate has fallen to its lowest level in nearly six years.”

[mt_climber13]

^But, Texas is the bestest place in the world, and California totally sucks for business, that's why they're all leaving and the job market is so so bad, cause taxes, and libruls. California is a total failure! That's why it's the 7th largest economy in the world.

/s

[Folks3000]

Originally Posted by wakamesalad

^But, Texas is the bestest place in the world, and California totally sucks for business, that's why they're all leaving and the job market is so so bad, cause taxes, and libruls. California is a total failure! That's why it's the 7th largest economy in the world.

/s

Yup, pretty much haha... "But TEXAS is biggarr and beyyteerrr!!!!!!"

[fflint]

Another great J.K. Dineen article in the Chronicle today, covering the planned condos on the current site of the Flax store at Market and Valencia, provides a quick summary of recent, current and proposed Upper Market housing construction:

Originally Posted by the article

The proposal to redevelop the Flax store site, a 23,000-square-foot parcel that includes a 17-space surface parking lot, is hardly surprising. Over the past year, Upper Market and the Castro have emerged as a magnet for mixed-use projects by transit-oriented developers taking advantage of Market Street's strong transit infrastructure and busy bike lanes.

Just last year, three major projects opened as part of a first wave: 83 Dolores St. (83 units and a Whole Foods); Venn at 1844 Market St. (113 units); and Linea at 1998 Market St. (115 units). Another major development, Forest City's 88-unit 2175 Market St., is under construction, and Graystar's 87-unit project at 2198 Market St. just won approvals.

Now the neighborhood is bracing for another wave. In addition to the Flax property, the Arthur J. Sullivan funeral home is under contract to the Prado Group, which built 83 Dolores. At the former Home Restaurant at 2200 Market St., Spiers Development Group is looking to follow its wildly successful Linea with 65 apartments.

Castro resident Judy Hoyem said the planning committee at the Castro/Eureka Valley Neighborhood Association can barely keep up with the proposals coming in.

"They are just rolling over us - it's unstoppable," she said. "All we can do is react. We try to work with specific developers the best we can, but we are not too happy about it. But what can we do?"

Developers and smart-growth advocates say the infill projects, mostly replacing gas stations and parking lots, are exactly what should be happening.

Developer Brian Spiers, who built Linea and is proposing the 2200 Market St. project, said the demand for housing in the neighborhood is overwhelming.

"This area can take a lot of density - it was always very dense," Spiers said. "I do think you see more people on the street, but I don't see an increase in traffic. Most of these units are being built at 50 percent parking, max, with full bicycle parking. ... The scare we heard about Whole Foods - that there would be traffic queued up around the block all the time - has not materialized."

[timbad]

not a big project, but the new North Beach branch of the public library opened recently. for those not familiar, the new building was placed on what used to be a small triangle island parking lot formed where diagonal Columbus nearly intersects with a regular 90-degree intersection. the little sliver of street that is now behind the library was closed to traffic and converted to a pedestrian pathway. on the other side of that pathway lies the old library (which will now be demolished) and the DiMaggio Playground (which will be renovated and reconfigured)

wandered over there this evening - here is the Columbus side:



here you can see the relation of the new library on the left, and the old red-orange one on the right, with the space which is the pathway between them:



another look from Columbus into the pathway (note this is not its final look - it will get a further makeover with nicer landscaping when they start work on the playground part):

[peanut gallery]

Thanks for those photos, timbad. It will be nice when they finish the playground too.

I posted a link to this article in the One Van Ness thread, but it pertains to the greater Market/Van Ness developments that have been discussed lately. It's a good read.

[peanut gallery]

The SF Business Times reports that the KRON headquarters already sold.

New owners of the KRON TV headquarters at 1001 Van Ness Ave. in San Francisco plan to transform the site from office to residential. The property joins a slew of new housing proposals along Van Ness and sits just two blocks from the $2 billion rebuild of the California Pacific Medical Center.

A partnership between South Beach Partners and Oryx Partners bought the 106,777-square-foot building that was owned by Media General, KRON’s parent company, since 1967. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The station plans to move to a new space in the north waterfront later this year.

Oryx Partners, a new venture, will manage the redevelopment of the property, which is zoned for up to 200 units of housing.

……

The site at 1001 Van Ness is up the street from sites near Market and Van Ness where thousands of other housing units are in the pipeline such as Emerald Fund’s proposed 1,000 on various sites including 162 units at 101 Polk St. Other developers like Crescent Heights and Related Co. are tying up other sites.

……

Besides 1001 Van Ness, Trumark Urban is working on entitling 120 units at 1533 Pine St., Gerding Eldin has 106 units under construction at 1285 Sutter St., and Oyster Development is close to securing approval for 261 condos at 1688 Pine St. with plans to start construction later this year. Oyster Development recently sold out of 98 condos at Marlow at 1800 Van Ness.

Stop and think about this for a minute: Transbay, Rincon Hill, Mission Bay, Mid-Market, Upper Market, Van Ness corridor. Any one of these areas going off would be a noteworthy amount of development. That they are all in full build out mode at the same time is just incredible. And there's a lot more just over the horizon: Hunters Point, Candlestick, Treasure Island, not to mention developments outside the 7x7. It's just crazy right now.

[timbad]

Originally Posted by peanut gallery

... Stop and think about this for a minute: Transbay, Rincon Hill, Mission Bay, Mid-Market, Upper Market, Van Ness corridor. Any one of these areas going off would be a noteworthy amount of development. That they are all in full build out mode at the same time is just incredible. And there's a lot more just over the horizon: Hunters Point, Candlestick, Treasure Island, not to mention developments outside the 7x7. It's just crazy right now.

certifiably nuts, and we could probably even add Hayes Valley/Central Freeway Corridor to the list, as one by one all those parcels get filled in, with 55 Laguna sort of next door.

[fflint]

And then there's all the stuff flying under the radar, even among afficianados such as ourselves--four, five, six floor residential infill popping up in random places throughout the eastern half of the city. Ten years ago, so little was being built that here on the forum we had a good handle on all the substantial infill projects, but today we just can't keep up.

[fimiak]

Some pics
First is twitter courtyard.


350 Mission


535 Mission


1400 Mission

[peanut gallery]

Good points, fflint. The contrast to several years ago is quite dramatic.

fimiak - thanks for those updates. It's only a small slice, but I like what I see in that courtyard. I assume that's the wall treatment within the lobby of 535, correct? You should post those photos to the 535 and 350 threads, they're great.

[edwards]

535 Mission reminds me of a mini 1 WTC.

[fimiak]

SFMOMA coming right along.

[a very long weekend]

man, great perch you have there.

sfmoma, i'm so so pleased about this project, but the location is just so un-monumental. like, one wishes one could have gone back in time to build on the metreon site or where the new apple store will go in on union square (former levi strauss shop). or even on the civic center or on the embarcadero space where the bocce area is. just disappointing that they have to squeeze such a stunning building in there all out of site, as if we were in manhattan and not sf, where this thing is totally unique.

[fimiak]

I wish that was my perch! Its actually a screen grab from the SFMOMA webcam in my signature, so anyone can watch! I think I remember reading that the steel frame will be finished by the end of summer.

[chris08876]

Not a project, but just some news/ food for thought concerning the boom in San Francisco when it comes to housing units. Thats a lot of potential units in the works! Even though these projects are in the long term, its still something positive for the future.
------------------------------------------------------------

Up to 50,000 New Housing Units are in the Works for SF

When the most recent housing crash and recession hit back in 2008, new construction in San Francisco virtually ground to a halt. Now, with demand and the economy booming, the pace has picked back up and the city, already the second densest city in the country, is about to get even denser. Local agency Paragon Real Estate has analyzed the extensive Housing Inventory and Pipeline reports for the San Francisco Planning Department and found that as many as 50,000 new units could be on their way. There were only 4,200 units built between 2010 and 2013, but as of January 2014, 6,000 new units were under construction, 4,200 had received building permits and were in pre-construction and a massive 29,700 units has been approved but didn't yet have planning permits issued. Another 10,500 units were under planning review.

Back in 2011, with the effects of the recession still lingering, only 348 new units were built. That number rose to 2,330 in 2013, and the city has already added more housing this year to date than it did in all of last year. Most of the new housing built in recent years has been in the Downtown-Civic Center and SoMa/South Beach/Potrero Hills areas, but there is lots of housing coming to the city's less central areas. Big new projects in Hunters Point, Park Merced and Treasure Island account for 26,000 of the upcoming new housing units.

Construction will also continue to be primarily of new condo buildings. Over the past ten years, almost no new single-family homes have been built. With land supply limited, developers prefer to create higher-density projects. The average price of new condos has soared past $1,000 per square foot, providing a major incentive for developers to keep building.

==========================================
Tracy Elsen
May 15, 2014
http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2014/05/15/up_to_50000_new_housing_units_are_in_the_works_for_sf.php

[peanut gallery]

^^fimiak, you might have read it on the previous page. Topping out ceremony scheduled for September 10.