Oak Knoll Redevelopment Plan

Assignment #1 Oak Knoll Redevelopment Plan 1) Demographics of the area Oak Knoll Naval Hospital is located in Oakland, Alameda County, California. According to City Data, recorded population of city of Oakland in 2010 was 390,274, ranked as 47th city with high population in the nation. Oakland’s highest numbers of population age groups are between 25 and 40 years old. Age groups between 25 and 40 are more likely to rent or buy homes than any other age groups. Oakland has various ethnicities with African American highest and above average numbers of residents born in foreign countries.

Oak Knoll Naval Hospital is located next to highway 580 and close to other highways.

Also, it’s located between Bay Bridge and San Mateo Bridge that provide easy access to both San Francisco and San Mateo. In Alameda County, 68. 4% of residents work within the County with more than half of them drives their own cars alone to work. Unlike many other metropolitan cities, most people who work in the city travels to work from out of city. This prime location grants the site an advantage as either residential or commercial opportunity in the future. ) Background and history of the site and the community The Oak Knoll Naval Hospital was established in 1942 during World War II to treat wounded American soldiers from the Pacific theater.

In 1990, the President George Bush signed Public Law 101-510 that required Department of Defense to cut down the numbers of military operated facilities in the country. Oak Knoll Naval Hospital was shut down in 1996 due to closure of several military bases in the San Francisco Bay Area that made the costly military hospital unnecessary.

When the hospital was chosen to shut down, the Oakland community was concerned with remaining active duty Navy and veterans in Alameda County who may not get needed and affordable medical care. In 2005, SunCal and Lehman Brothers bought this land for $100,000,000 for housing and shopping center. However, financial institution crisis in 2008 drove Lehman Brothers into bankruptcy when SunCal already began demolishing the hospital. SunCal had to drop the project due to collapse of Lehman Brothers that financed SunCal.

In 2009, SunCal Oak Knoll LLC also filed bankruptcy. The abandoned construction site attracted homeless and neighborhood kids who could easily trespass through broken fences. The community was concerned with the deserted space and called for change. Between 2009 and 2011, SunCal acquired fund from Lehman Brothers through Bankruptcy Court and used it to continue demolition. 3) Uses and conditions affecting the site Currently, Oak Knoll Naval Hospital is an empty property and there haven’t been any redevelopment plan ever since SunCal stopped the project in 2008.

Despite the past, SunCal still hopes to carry on the project in the future with new financial partner and strategy.

At the moment, this site only has 3 ways out to main roads, Mountain Blvd, Keller Ave, and Sequoyah Rd. In order to provide modern traffic circulation and hold more people, the site will need to have better road system and parking structure. 4) Economic profile of the community The Port of Oakland is one of the busiest ports in the world with high numbers of related occupations and industries. Oakland was once ranked as 8th best city for business in the nation by the Forbes annual survey.

However, Oakland’s unemployment rate in 2012 was 14. 7% compared to state average 11.

5%. Additionally, as the median price of home in 2012 increased by 30% since 2009, number of home sales decreased immediately. Likewise, Oakland has higher percentage of renters than California average. Interesting fact is that estimated median household income in Oakland ($51,473) in 2009 is lower than median of California ($58,931) while estimated median house or condo value in Oakland ($445,200) is higher than median of California ($384,200).

Income and earning statistics show that Oakland has huge portion of families earning way less than state average especially under $10,000 and $10,000~20,000 while there are above state average families who make more than $200,000 annually. 5) Planning status When Department of Defense decided to shut down Oak Knoll hospital in 1993, the Oakland Community wanted a replacement hospital.

With a history of being hospital for over 50 years and demand, Oak Knoll land could accommodate a new hospital for the community in the future.

On other hand, In 2007, SunCal’s original plan was to build only 72 affordable apartments out of 816 units while state redevelopment law required at least 15% affordable housing units. As mentioned above, with high numbers of low-income families and unemployment rate, city of Oakland really could use the space for more low-income housings unlike SunCal originally wanted to. According to Redevelopment Land Use Map, there can be 3 types of housing in the property: hillside residential, detached unit residential, and mixed housing type residential.

Using these different types of zoning, Oak Knoll can be built into mixed-income housing property with more low and moderate-income level rather than high-income housing. Preferably, part of hillside residential zone could be used for higher rate housing for views and other zones for low to moderate income and mixed units.

With its natural surrounding forest and Rifle Range Creek located through the center of property, Oak Knoll will need minimum additional space for park ;amp; urban open space.