EBI Pedestrian Path Now Requires Taxpayers Pony Up $1 Million

A 'Done Deal' Turns Into a 'Pie-In-The-Sky'

EBI Pedestrian Path Replacement to Cost More Than 
$1 Million 

News Analysis

On May 3rd the Emeryville City Council voted unanimously to amend our General Plan and Conditions of Approval for a private school to kill a needed pedestrian path in the Triangle neighborhood with promises to build a nearby and better replacement path sometime in the future.  A quick check into the costs associated with such a replacement (more than one million taxpayer dollars) however reveals a Council promise that will likely go unfulfilled.  And so the Emeryville City Council moved a much needed pedestrian infrastructure improvement from "in the bag" to "don't hold your breath".

Former Emeryville
Councilman
John Fricke
Identified the need
for better pedestrian
connections in the
Triangle Neighborhood.
He net us $525,000.

At their May 3rd meeting the Emeryville City Council finally made it official; at the request of Escuela Bilingue Internacional (EBI), a private school at 4550 San Pablo Avenue on the hook for building a public pedestrian path on their land behind their facility, the so called EBI pedestrian path between 45th and 47th streets is now gone, their Conditions of Approval and our General Plan having been amended by the Council to kill the path forever.  A finding of fact was inexplicably presented and entered into the record that the elimination of the path will "enhance the neighborhood".  
The Council, historically none too fond of pedestrian and bike paths, regardless, affirmed the need for a path connecting the two streets and they have assured the citizens they will build a new path further to the east to a more mid-block site, the problem with the EBI Path having been its location they tell us; too close to San Pablo Avenue.  What the City Council hasn’t told us however, is that whereas the EBI Path was a ‘gimme’, fully funded by EBI itself, the proposed mid-block path replacement will need to be funded by the taxpayers.  Further, the Council has not released a timeline on when they intend on building the new path.  The EBI Path, if it hadn’t been eliminated, would be here and being used by the community now.

Background

A pedestrian path at the EBI location was first brought to the fore by newly elected Councilman John Fricke, looking for ways to increase connectivity in the neighborhood in 2005.  The public thought so highly of his idea that they put it in the new General Plan along with a bike/ped path alongside of the Center of ‘Community’ Life that the City Council later eliminated (citing concern over gang rapists that frequently lurk on bike/ped paths).  The staff worked up a condition whereby any business newly locating and conducting a major remodel on the 4550 San Pablo Avenue building in question would be on the hook for building the path as part of a condition of approval.  A few years later, EBI having shown an interest in the site, entered into an agreement with the City of Emeryville to locate their school there and build the public pedestrian path.  EBI was irritated by the requirement to build the path even though they signed on to providing it and they made their grievances known to City Hall.  The Council, feeling their pain, voted to get rid of the path in 2012, presumably striking a blow against gang rapists trolling our bike/ped paths.  But the Council in their wisdom, kept EBI on the hook for the money in lieu of the path, determined to be $525,000.  That money was finally released in May after the Council amended the Conditions of Approval eliminating the path forever on the EBI site.

$525,000 In Lieu Of The Path…Sounds Like A Lot
The $525,000 the Council secured in the EBI negotiation in May has been set aside for the mid-block replacement path.  However it will not cover the added costs the City will incur by relocating it.  A breakdown shows a $1 million deficit at least.  Two existing homes, one on 47th Street and on directly behind it on 45th Street will need to be acquired by the City via eminent domain, torn down and then the path constructed.  A check of prices of homes in the Triangle neighborhood show an average of $700,000 to $800,000 for a total of about $1.5 million.  Combined with demolition and construction costs, the total approaches $2 million leaving a balance of at least $1 million perhaps as much as $1.5 million after the $525,000 credit is factored in.

Red Ink
The numbers show how little the $525,000 the City received will go in building a replacement path. Comparable Triangle Neighborhood home prices are from Zillow and other expenses are approximate:

Revenue:
$525,000

Expenses:
Buy Houses $1.5 million 
Demolition $50,000
Construct Path $250,000
Total $1.8 million

Balance:
-$1,275,000

Residents would be advised to question the City Council about how the public is being served by letting a needed pedestrian connection for the Triangle Neighborhood completed now and funded by agreement with a private party turn into a deal that puts us in the hole to the tune of $1 million +, done by hostile eminent domain destruction of established historic single family homes and completed in the distant future, if at all.

City Council Kicks the Can Down the Bike/Pedestrian Paths

Bike/Ped Paths Will Bring "Gang Rapes" 
to Emeryville Says Councilwoman Davis

Opinion
Two amendments to the General Plan came before the Emeryville City Council Tuesday night, both aiming to remove bicycle and pedestrian paths from the plan.  The Council failed to act after deliberation, opting instead to postpone the decisions but not before providing council watchers with another evening of entertaining histrionic hyperbole.  
The General Plan, adopted in October 2009 after thorough vetting by residents, called for these paths, in keeping with its guiding principles of Emeryville as "A connected place", "Enhanced and connected open space network and green streets," "A walkable, fine-grained city, emphasizing pedestrians," and "A diversity of transportation modes and choices."

The General Plan’s guiding principles didn’t seem to mean much to the City Council Tuesday night as they looked for ways to remove these paths.  The first path would have connected 45^th Street and 47^th Street just east of San Pablo Avenue, and was a requirement of approvals sought by the private school Escuela Bilingue Internacional (EBI) when the school moved into the Triangle neighborhood.  The second path was intended to provide bicycle and pedestrian access between 53^rd and 47^th Streets along the western property line of the proposed Emeryville Center for Community Life (ECCL). 

In both cases, the Council voted to continue the discussion to the next Council meeting, asking staff to bring them amendments to the General Plan that, rather than deleting the paths entirely, would simply move the paths to undetermined locations elsewhere within these blocks.

One need only look at a map of Emeryville to see that the Council has dodged the issue in completely unrealistic ways. Neither of these blocks provides any realistic alternative locations for these paths.

In the case of the EBI path, the rest of 45^th and 47^th streets are filled with residences.  The City would have to purchase adjoining properties on both streets to ever have an opportunity to put a path elsewhere on the block.  Such an opportunity will obviously never arise and the City is unlikely to have the millions of dollars such an alternative would require.  But, in the fanciful hope of some multi-million dollar option arising some time in the distant future, the Council rejected the opportunity to get such a path at EBI’s expense today.

In the case of the path that could have enhanced access to and around the ECCL, the Council actually suggested that the General Plan be altered to show the path somewhere else on the School site.  The General Plan is supposed to guide our City for a twenty-year period and Council member West objected that she didn’t think it was likely that the ECCL would be redeveloped within the next 20 years.  Council member West was right about this. Imagining that a path might one day exist elsewhere on the site is pure fantasy.  Even City Manager, Patrick O’Keeffe, seeming exasperated by the Council’s unwillingness to simply delete the path, explained that it was not realistic to ask the District to come back in two weeks with an alternative location for the path: it must be on the western edge of the site, or not be a part of the design.

To their credit, Council members Jac Asher and Jennifer West tried to reject the proposed amendment to the General Plan deleting the ECCL bike/ped path, but they lost that vote 3-2.  In a subsequent vote, they joined Council member Ruth Atkin in postponing the issue to the next Council meeting, so that we can all consider this fantasy alternative location for the path.

The idea of these bike/pedestrian paths produced some entertaining hyperbole from those seeking to shut down consideration by the Council.  School District Superintendent Debra Lindo, alarmed at the prospects of the path near the future school site at the Center of Community Life told the Council members "bike/ped paths aren't helpful" to schools and the ECCL path would represent a "supervision problem" for the School District.  
Council member Nora Davis was less circumspect stating bike/ped paths represent "a place where crime can flourish" and she chastised her colleagues on the recklessness of the paths, "We have a responsibility to the citizens of this town" to stop these paths she said.  Emeryville residents could expect to see "Richmond style gang rapes" she said, if these paths are approved. 

Unfazed by Councilwoman Davis' antics, Planning Commissioner Sean Moss spoke in favor of retaining both paths, going so far as to say that the Council "could not in good faith" make the findings necessary to amend the General Plan in these ways, calling them "findings from nothing".  Commissioner Moss is right.  He simply wrongly assumed that this Council cares about acting in accordance with our City’s stated principles.

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