Certainly not promising news, but a realization of the state’s troubled finances nevertheless… “Hercules has weathered the recession better than many of its neighbors, but a state take-away of redevelopment funds could force some changes of plans.”
The following projects would be delayed if the California Redevelopment Association loses the lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the [...]
There will be an informative update (presumably similar to the one provided to the City Council on Tuesday, but it may go into more detail) on the status of the Intermodal Station project at Monday evening’s Planning Commission meeting — 7pm at City Hall.
The complete agenda is available on the City’s website (and it [...]
It is disheartening to discover that a councilmember that would most likely be in jail, or at least out of office, if it weren’t for the remaining councilmembers being a series of dastardly passive puppets, has such great influence on the developer of the Waterfront. What also remains unclear is exactly what AndersonPacific received in [...]
The City Council will receive a report on the Intermodal Station and Hercules Bayfront project at their next meeting on Tuesday — 7pm at City Hall. Other items on the agenda include:
Construction of an “innovative classroom” for the John Swett Unified School District. Cost: $15k.
Design work for the Bayfront Boulevard bridge. Cost: $78k.
Additional architecture work [...]
The planned Hercules Intermodal Station — expected to start construction later this year — was positioned to receive up to $6m from a federal TIGER grant, however it was not to be. The final list of grant recipients was diverse, although the U.S. Department of Transportation opted for larger profile projects in general, with grants [...]
The future Hercules Intermodal Station and “its relation to the Bay Trail will be discussed Thursday at a meeting of the Pinole/Hercules/East Bay Regional Park District [EBRPD] Joint Powers Agency board.” The meeting will be held at 2pm at Pinole’s City Hall.
The design team has been referring to the Bay Trail segment through the Hercules [...]
In a somewhat remarkable turnabout, the City has released drawings of a redesigned café building that will be the focal point for the transit plaza in front of the Intermodal Station. The newly proposed design incorporates historical features (borrowing from the factory buildings that once stood on the site) and separates itself stylistically from the [...]
The City of Hercules is positioned to receive federal funding on a variety of projects. Tuesday evening’s City Council meeting includes a staff report that summarizes those opportunities, which include:
$6m for the Intermodal Station (TIGER Grant, which should be announced by February 17);
$1.54m for Chelsea Wetlands restoration (WRDA);
$9m for ferry dredging (also WRDA);
$12.35m for Willow [...]
The City listed the design components of the future transit plaza during their presentation to the BCDC design review board on Monday (which apparently went very well, as it should have; there is very little to quibble over with the project as a whole), but it included a more historic-themed hipped-roof cafe building as inspiration [...]
The staff report for BCDC’s initial design review of the Intermodal Station included an outline of construction phases, as well as a corresponding and somewhat complex figure that shows the construction phasing of station elements in plan (click image to enlarge)…
Two items of note…
the transit plaza and cafe building will be part of the second [...]
The BCDC’s staff report for its first review of the Intermodal Station concludes that “at this conceptual stage [...] the Board should focus on the siting and massing of the new station building, the amount and quality of the proposed public access, the proposed extensions of the Bay Trail, the proposed connections and circulation around [...]
BCDC’s design review report also includes a summary of future phases of the Intermodal Station, including the proposed cafe building….
Phase 2 — The construction of a café/retail building at Bayfront Boulevard with a covered transit waiting area adjacent to the Transit Loop and public restrooms, and an approximately 12,273-square-foot Transit/Civic Plaza in front of the [...]
BCDC’s design review includes a report on the Intermodal Station that summarizes the initial phase of the project…
Constructing an approximately 11,075-square-foot station building, providing grade-separated pedestrian access to an approximately 25,100-square-foot center island station platform and access to the UPRR tracks;
Reconfiguring and relocating the UPRR mainline line tracks, including replacing the UPPR bridge (2-span structure, [...]
The San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC) will conduct its first design review of the Hercules Intermodal Station by way of a public hearing this Monday…
BCDC’s Design Review Board will hold a public hearing on a proposal to construct Phase I of a multi-phased project to develop the Hercules shoreline with transit-oriented development. [...]
The topic of future ferry service in Hercules made its way into yesterday’s agenda for the Water Emergency Transportation Authority (WETA) meeting…
Hercules Environmental Review/Conceptual Design — WETA has worked cooperatively with the City of Hercules to prepare the necessary environmental documents to support new ferry service in coordination with a Capitol Corridor commuter train station [...]
The city of Crockett has a handsome community board that is prominently located on Pomona Street (across from the high school). It is one of my favorite parts of a very charming city…
I think it would be neat to have something similar in our planned transit plaza: an old-fashioned message board, possibly covered beneath the [...]
When the Planning Commission made their recommendation on the design of the train station on October 5, 2009, the commissioners asked the design team how the modern design of Alternative 1 would work with the planned development that would surround it. The design team deferred to the developer (Jim Anderson of AndersonPacific) to answer the [...]
I should be clear. The proposed cafe building isn’t ugly, or bad architecture, or anything like that. It mimics the train station. It is what it is.
When the design team, however, stresses the importance of the historic element in public workshops (i.e., rhetoric), and at the same time, the design team presents a modern building [...]
When I labeled the cafe building, or mercado, as uninspired in a recent post, that wasn’t entirely true. The architect did, in fact, have inspiration for his modern design: himself.
The cafe building is meant to carry the architect’s modern interpretation of a train shed forward through the transit plaza, engulfing the civic space that it [...]
Outside of commissioner reports, the only item on Monday evening’s agenda for the Planning Commission — 7pm at City Hall — is a presentation on the status of the Intermodal Station and related infrastructure improvements, including Creekside Park, bridges and the temporary parking lot.
One item that apparently will not be included in the informative report [...]