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Redevelopment & Revitalization Vignettes

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This series of vignettes offer snapshots of California communities before and after redevelopment or revitalization projects.

Integrating affordable housing, mixed-use and transit access was often a key part of the revitalization projects.

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Emeryville Turns an Abandoned Card Club Into New Affordable Residential Opportunity

23766_Emeryville_0.gifThe Community Before

In 1998 the King Midas Card Club was nothing more than a rundown, boarded-up building along Emeryville’s San Pablo Avenue.

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Foster City Replaces Blighted Shopping Center with Housing For All Income Levels

The Community Before

Before Foster City replaces blighted shopping center with housing for all income levelsFoster City had a rundown shopping center with an abandoned gas station. The gas station was unused for some fifteen years and two of the remaining nine shopping center tenants had abandoned their sites.

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Hercules Cleans Up Industrial Site and Creates Mixed-Use Development

The Community Before

Once part of th23772_Hercules.gife Bay Area’s industrial belt, the waterfront site in the City of Hercules had been an active powder company that manufactured dynamite.

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Monterey Converts Parking Lot Into Mixed-Use Development

The Community Before

Located in historic downtown Monterey, Osio Plaza was a23798_Monterey.gif small parking lot owned by the agency since 1975.

Over a 10-year visioning process the community provided input and ultimately tremendous support for the transformation from an empty 15,000 sq ft lot to a 33,000 square foot multi-level mixed-use project. 

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Oakland Creates a “Transit Village,” Including HUD Housing

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The Community Before

Fruitvale, one of Oakland’s seven community districts, is a low-income, predominantly minority community that was experiencing economic stress. The transit village project dates back to 1991, when BART announced plans to construct a multi-layered parking facility next to the Fruitvale station.

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Orange County Improves Housing Conditions

The Community Before

The site was comprised of 58 older apartment units that suffered fr23805_Orange.gifom long-term deferred maintenance and overcrowding. 

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Redwood City Creates Mixed-Use Development Which Includes Low-Income Housing

 

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The Community Before

This site was home to an abandoned gas station and several dilapidated buildings, some of which were boarded up. A nearby hotel was a hotbed for prostitution, drug use and drug sales were rampant, and homeless people were loitering and sleeping in the area.

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Santa Ana Rehabilitates Apartments

The Community Before

23808_SantaAna.jpgThe area that is now Cornerstone Village was a blighted and densely populated apartment building, initially constructed for off-base Marine Corps housing in the late 1950’s.

Crumbling stucco, broken windows, graffiti, trash littering the streets and sidewalks, and overcrowded apartments all added to the demise of this area and demonstrated the need for redevelopment.

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Santa Cruz Rebuilds After Earthquake

The Community Before

In 15 short seconds during the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake the 23800_SantaCruz3.gifdowntown area of Santa Cruz was transformed from the City’s commercial core to a series of destroyed and severely damaged buildings.

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South San Francisco Renovates Fourplexes to Improve Neighborhood Appearance

The Community Before

Willow Gardens Neighborhood was plagued with vandalism, 23786_SoSanFrancisco.gifbroken windows, graffiti, trash, broken down cars, and buildings without property management. Police and code complaints regarding deteriorating conditions and illegal activities proliferated.

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Vallejo Transforms a Vacant Lot Into a Transit Village

 

Sereno Drive Before

For years this 5.86-acre, vacant lot on Sereno Drive had been a magnet for illegal dumping and other activities.23796_Vallejo.gif

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