Albany Bulb

Reported on InsideBayArea.com

Full Article: http://www.insidebayarea.com/bay-area-living/ci_11890730

The owner of Golden Gate Fields filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Thursday, and intends to sell multiple assets, including the horse racing track in the East Bay.

“It’s really business as usual for us,” said Robert Hartman, general manager of Golden Gate Fields. “We are open for business. There are going to be no changes. We plan for horse racing to be at Golden Gate Fields for a very long time.”

Some Albany city officials seek major changes at the track complex. The big parking lot next to the track has caught their eye in particular.

“The race track is not the best use of the property as a whole,” Albany City Councilman Robert Lieber said. “I hope the new owners of the racetrack will work with the city for something that benefits everyone.”

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Is the future of Albany’s Waterfront in question again.
News of The Golden Gate Fields being for sale “has stoked a decades-long local debate over the fate of the prime piece of real estate along the Albany waterfront.

It’s unclear whether the Albany track would be among those put on the block, and if so, be sold as a racetrack business or simply as real estate.

Golden Gate Fields, bought by Magna in 1999, sits on 80 acres along the bay.

In 2002, Magna proposed developing part of the land for retail, entertainment and lodging, but by 2006 abandoned the idea after facing community opposition to a mall on the site.

“They discovered that’s a very difficult thing to do in Albany,” said Albany City Councilman Farid Javandel.”

Read the full article Weighing Odds on Golden Gate Fields
Where does   Marge Atkinson  the newly elected mayor of Albany stand on the waterfront controversy?

Other Articles:

Owner may sell Golden Gate Fields – Inside BayArea.com

Quarrel on Albany’s Waterfront subsides – AlbanyToday.com

A developer is proposing to amend Richmond’s General Plan Land Use Map from Light Industrial (low-intensity uses) to a Regional Commercial District (high-intensity retail uses), demolish all buildings at 2700 Rydin Rd. and 4903 Central Ave., and construct a 99,000-square-foot Kohl’s department store with almost 400 parking spaces near Costco on Pt. Isabel.

The plan also includes reservation of a 76,000-square-foot pad for chain restaurant, bank, and/or retail uses directly on the corner of Central Avenue and Rydin Road.

Proposed Regional Commercial land use activities and circulation would be in close proximity to sensitive habitat areas–less than 200 feet from Hoffman Marsh to the east and less than 400 feet from the Albany/Richmond mudflats and wetlands (wildlife sanctuary) to the south.

The resulting activities and circulation (including late-night commercial hours) could negatively affect the long-established Hoffman Marsh and the Albany mudflats, which have one of the highest densities of shorebirds in Eastshore State Park.

Help protect the dog park and shoreline! Attend the Richmond City Council meeting on Tuesday, Dec. 16, at 7 p.m. to protest the proposed rezoning and new Kohl’s store.

1 Owl – 8.0 Acres – $125,700

Would someone please educate me on this whole burrowing owl plan. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know everything about the burrowing owl or its habitat – not for lack of trying though.

I can’t find much from the newspapers, council meeting minutes or the waterfront plans.

What I have found out is  The Environmentalists: “ were also concerned about the potential impacts of developing the Gilman Street site because a burrowing owl was spotted there two years ago. No nests were found, however, and plans now call for burrowing owl habitat to be enhanced and protected at the Albany plateau.”

So, okay I got it – A burrowing owl was spotted two years ago, and no nests were found.

Albany Waterfront coalition says “This was a trade-off agreed on when the future ballfields . were planned: It is hoped that Burrowing Owls on the ballfields will choose to relocate to the Plateau.”

Seems that single owl spotted some two years ago is now plural and there is hope they will relocate.

Please someone tell me – help me to understand.

Just where is that Burrowing Owl now? And what are the chances of a successful relocation which would warrant 8.0 acres of land?

Is it simply a matter of “If we build it they will come”?’

I can’t imagine it is as easy as that – especially after reading an article “Passive Relocation: A Method to Preserve Burrowing Owls on a Disturbed Site” – a relocation protocol used at sites in the Bay Area “to relocate birds living in burrow directly in the path of commercial development”. Guidelines recommend surveys on site and artificial burrowns placed close to the burrows to be destroyed.

So far I can’t find anything about surveys or artificial burrows at the site of the Berkeley Sports Fields.

Again, I repeat – ONE owl spotted TWO YEARS ago, NO nests found = Fencing off 8.0 acres of land – at an expense of $125,700? And where is that Owl?!

News Update: From Albany City Webiste

“Albany Council voted (Yes: Lieber, Atkinson, Wile; No: Javandel, Okawachi) to approve the recommendation of the Waterfront Committee and spend an estimated $590,000 on a waterfront visioning contract with Fern Tiger Associates (FTA). Of the $590,000, approximately $300,000 was already put aside in an earlier budget. However, the remainder of $290,000 has not been identified. It was “hoped” that the city-hall renovations might come in under budget so that some of those monies could be used. Note that the total is still only an estimate and may be exceeded. A number of speakers who generally approved the visioning process still considered the cost excessive.

According to the Waterfront Committee wishes, FTA will consider only “visions” for the waterfront that assume that the Golden Gate Fields (GGF) racetrack goes away. However, Robert Hartman, manager at Golden Gate Fields, noted that the number of race days at the track will almost double in the 08/09 racing season, making the track more profitable than it already is. He reiterated the company line that the racetrack is not going away.

The visioning process, and associated budget, provided by FTA can be found on the Waterfront Visioning Process page of the City’s website.

Phase I of the process calls for extensive interviews (50-60) with “stakeholders” in the process, plus a city-wide survey to gather visions from a range of Albany residents. However, it is not clear at this stage what percentage of the GGF property would be available for parkland, because some portion of the property must be devoted to commercial development of some kind in order to finance the entire purchase and development. Early guesstimates for the purchase alone — without the substantial development costs — came to $100 million; so the percentage of the property needed for development to offset this and all other costs could potentially be quite large. Of the $590,000 budget, only $52,000 (mid-point) is available for working with consultants and sub-contractors in order to gather a wide range of economic and environmental analyses.”