Transportation, work/live issues dominate in race for Alameda City Council

By Susan McDonough, Alameda Times Star, October 20, 2004

There are 134 miles of road in Alameda, enough to stretch from here to Big Sur. Figuring out how this balance of arteries, avenues and bridges can comfortably support a growing city of nearly 75,000 people is at the root of the myriad issues facing this Island city as the Nov. 2 elections approach.

"All important is transportation, (specifically) alternative transportation," said Doug deHaan, former chairman of the city's Economic Development Commission and one of five candidates running for City Council in November.

DeHaan, 63, said he believes the future of Alameda Point and the city's Northern Waterfront District -- two areas that planners say are underutilized and in transition -- rests on the quality of transportation solutions developers can create for the areas, specifically non-automobile-based alternatives.

City Council candidate Pat Bail says the city can't handle any more traffic, period.

"Even if we did no further development, we'd still have a traffic problem," she said.

The city of Oakland sued Alameda in January over what it considered a deflated projection of traffic generated from development at Alameda Point.

Oakland's concerns focus mostly on Chinatown, and neighborhood groups regularly complain that new construction brings heavy traffic through their narrow city streets.

"If we can't get our hands completely around our transportation issue ... that's the key to how well we can develop out there," DeHaan said.

City Councilwoman Marie Gilmore, 43, agrees relieving traffic congestion in and around Alameda and minimizing future problems that more development at such places as Alameda Point and South Shore Center will bring is a key component of the election.

"I'm one of these residents who goes though the tube every day. It's a reality for me," Gilmore said.

But solutions aren't simple.

It's hard to motivate people to provide transportation solutions without a definitive redevelopment plan, Gilmore said in speaking about Alameda Point, where nearly a decade after the Navy's departure a maze of vacant warehouses and boarded-up barracks remain.

"A lot of things are in flux until we can say ... we have the land," said Gilmore, former president of the city's Planning Board and a favored incumbent this election, having won endorsements from the city of Alameda Democratic Club and the Alameda County Democratic Party.

"We need to close the deal with the Navy," she said.

Negotiations for transfer of the former Alameda Naval Air Station to the city continue, but at a slower-than-anticipated pace since August 2003, when the parties disagreed over cleanup costs.

The Navy pegged cleanup of the land at roughly $180 million, while a private contractor hired by the city's developer said it would cost closer to $558 million.

As a result of the dispute, the Navy resumed responsibility for cleanup and has maintained its hand in the already-complicated restoration process.

Future City Council members will be called upon to select a new city manager to lead that process after current City Manager Jim Flint retires at the end of the year.

Further complicating redevelopment at Alameda Point and elsewhere in the city is Measure A, a 1973 law that restricts new residential construction here to nothing larger than a duplex, and a related 1998 ordinance excusing certain work/live lofts from that measure.

Both issues are likely to be revisited over the next few years.

The city plans to take the work/live ordinance to voters in a future election. In the meantime, the City Council will be asked to refine the ordinance's language and debate its validity.

Camps are divided on the issue, with some, like candidate Bail, who say it is a violation of the spirit of Measure A and others who see it as good reuse of vacant buildings in the city's industrial areas.

Perhaps one of the city's staunchest Measure A supporters, Bail, 62, has said she is not against work/live as a concept but would prefer to see other uses, such as retail, in the city's empty industrial buildings.

Similar controversy is occurring at Alameda Point.

The prime waterfront property comprising a third of the city was once planned for a mix of commercial development, retail and housing, but with the downturn in the economy and a soft research and development market, city leaders are reevaluating their original plans and have talked of building additional housing in lieu of commercial development.

The move would require the demolition of historic Navy buildings, though, and will require the future City Council to make some tough decisions.

They will also work toward integrating a city that is often divided between its more affluent East End and racially mixed West End.

Merchants and others complain redevelopment of Webster Street lags behind growth on Park Street and elsewhere around town.

"I want to see that imbalance corrected," said City Council candidate Marilyn Ezzy Ashcraft, 52.

People have told her as she walks the streets campaigning that they want more retail in Alameda, she said, and she agrees.

"We want to shop locally, both for convenience and also to keep our sales tax dollars local so we are contributing to the (city's) general fund," she said.

City Council candidate Ruben Tilos is passionate about this city's parks. The lifelong Alameda resident grew up playing ball in Longfellow Park, coached tennis at local courts and worked summers and winter breaks as a local parks director while at Santa Clara College.

He says the parks contribute significantly to the quality of life in Alameda and spurred him to his first bid for political office.

Tilos successfully initiated a campaign to return control of Longfellow Park to neighbors in December 2002 after parks staff accidentally locked families out on a sunny Thanksgiving Day.

An angry Tilos petitioned the city and neighbors to return to a system where neighbors volunteered to open and close the park daily, a practice the city had abandoned a few years earlier after vandals stole locks off the park's gates.

Tilos, 28, is a financial analyst for Cypress Semiconductor in San Jose.

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Last modified: Ocotber 21, 2004

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