Where will the sand volleyball courts go? Don't see them in that rendering.

oskirules said:

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Conceptual schematic for People's Park released. I would propose to get rid of the community space, shift the buildings closer to the Telegraph side, and try to keep as many trees on the east side as possible.

http://www.berkeleyside.com/2018/05/11/its-not-just-peoples-park-that-will-see-housing-uc-berkeley-chancellor-vows-to-build-7500-beds-in-10-years

https://www.berkeleyside.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/peoples-park-preliminary-050918.pdf

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Agree. The community space will just become a smaller version of Peoples Park, populated by druggies, vagrants, and mentally ill folks.

Golden One said:

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oskirules said:

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Conceptual schematic for People's Park released. I would propose to get rid of the community space, shift the buildings closer to the Telegraph side, and try to keep as many trees on the east side as possible.

http://www.berkeleyside.com/2018/05/11/its-not-just-peoples-park-that-will-see-housing-uc-berkeley-chancellor-vows-to-build-7500-beds-in-10-years

https://www.berkeleyside.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/peoples-park-preliminary-050918.pdf

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Agree. The community space will just become a smaller version of Peoples Park, populated by druggies, vagrants, and mentally ill folks.

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I totally disagree with Chancellor Christ that the Park has deteriorated in the past few years. It has ALWAYS been terrible.
Other than that I totally agree with her plan. But I am concerned (as some else has already posted) that the open space in the middle may be taken over by druggies. I hope some plans are being made to address this problem.

While I'm glad we're finally putting this valuable piece of land to good use, to mix students and the mentally ill in such close proximity seems like a recipe for disaster.

No open space would be a bad design in my eyes. Natural light and air are your friend in high-density living.

Sebastabear said:

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okaydo said:

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Strykur said:

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Recent students have no attachment to the Park and mostly despise it, the only people interested in thwarting this plan will be outside the campus and be enormously outnumbered by those in support of it, especially the students.

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I believe the most "recent students" who were attached to the park are currently of retirement age.

(I'm the exception because, unlike my peers, as I've come to learn a lot about the history of the place, and got to know many of the park's central figures. And the people of the Telegraph Area Association, who were plagued by the park. I find it fascinating. I even went on a ridealong with the Berkeley PD as we visited the park late at night.)

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I'll make you a deal. You and I go to the park and if the number of people who know who Mario Savio is (much less Dan Siegel) outnumber the number of people who try to sell us heroin I'll buy you a Top Dog. Hell I'll buy you all of the Top Dogs. Pretty sure my wallet will stay firmly in my pocket.

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Hey, I resemble that remark

bearlyamazing said:

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While I'm glad we're finally putting this valuable piece of land to good use, to mix students and the mentally ill in such close proximity seems like a recipe for disaster.

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Eh, Unit 3 has existed for years in close proximity to the mentally ill.

okaydo said:

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bearlyamazing said:

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While I'm glad we're finally putting this valuable piece of land to good use, to mix students and the mentally ill in such close proximity seems like a recipe for disaster.

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Eh, Unit 3 has existed for years in close proximity to the mentally ill.

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You mean, as in, Eschleman?

Chancellor says all of the sites previously identified (including People's Park) are going to be developed. Interestingly no mention of Edwards Field in all this. Would have thought that would be high on the list given it was reported that was the price athletics paid for moving half the stadium debt off its books.

Looking like 2022 for People's Park (thought I'd previously seen 2020). That's about 4 years too late (honestly it's really 4 decades too late). Love to see that thing gone tomorrow.

http://www.dailycal.org/2018/05/14/chancellor-carol-christ-announces-campus-will-build-sites-listed-housing-task-force-report/

Believe Edwards site will be developed for academic use, no housing.

Since we recently heard the site for the new UC Hotel will probably used for student housing, I presume these pictures of the hotel design will now be scrapped.

http://www.weisbachad.com/hotel/

This was planned on the corner of Oxford and University Ave.

Cal Strong played strong games of pick up basketball at PP one afternoon junior year when RSF wasn't accepting his strong ID because of some weak glitch in the otherwise strong system. PP never put up plaque to commemorate Cal Strong's strong post moves and strong work on the defensive glass. Not commemorating Cal Strong WEAK!

Cal Strong feel similarly about PP as he did about the Oak Grove. Cal Strong liked the Oak Grove. It was fun to walk strongly through Oak Grove on way to 8AM class from Clark Kerr. Cal Strong would get strong coffee at International House (ex-gf used to work there and would hook up Cal Strong, who used to drink espresso drinks back then). It was strong and peaceful walk before strong day being strong at strongest university on earth. But Cal Strong recognized that Cal Football needed to tear down Oak Grove for SAHPC. Recognizing such things STRONG . . . like Cal!

Cal Strong feels same way about PP. Cal Strong recognize PP as part of Berkeley culture. Cal Strong grants that it weak and dangerous at times. But it part of Berkeley. If there was no housing crisis, Cal Strong would say keep it there. But Cal need space for dorms. So Cal Strong recognize it need to be torn down.

But Cal Strong think Cal should lower dorm prices. Student Housing office charge way too much for dorms. They should come down from weak overpriced gouging.

oskirules said:

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Since we recently heard the site for the new UC Hotel will probably used for student housing, I presume these pictures of the hotel design will now be scrapped.

http://www.weisbachad.com/hotel/

This was planned on the corner of Oxford and University Ave.

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Gee a big tall plain square building dominating the corner across from West Gate and its beautiful entrance to campus.
Do we actually pay architects to come up with these boring structures ??
Why not something that matches the style of the more beautiful buildings on campus: CMS or Doe Library or the Campanile or Haas School of business or Boalt Hall or the East Asian Library or even the new Eschleman. Was the architect trying to replicate a slightly less ugly version of Evans.
Glad it's been scrapped.

They're looking for max occupancy for the footprint but I agree..Cal can and should do better.

For anyone that is interested, I can post pictures of the mostly-finished rooms inside the new Blackwell Hall dorm at Bancroft and Dana in a couple weeks. From what I've heard, they made the rooms pretty compact to maximize the number of beds in the building. I can't wait to see how the rooms there compare to Unit 1 where I lived.

If you know Stanley Saitowitz (the lead architect) then this design makes sense. He does a lot of high end minimalist buildings with clean lines, white walls, glass etc. I don't like how it activates the sidewalk on Oxford, but overall, I like it.

Anyhow, will be interesting to see what happens with the site now.

Is this going to be student housing or a hotel or both? Either way, the building is just okay but it doesn't fit in to the rest of the neighborhood at all. I guess that can become a trigger for change...otherwise it becomes a eyesore that people stay away from.

tequila4kapp said:

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Is this going to be student housing or a hotel or both? Either way, the building is just okay but it doesn't fit in to the rest of the neighborhood at all. I guess that can become a trigger for change...otherwise it becomes a eyesore that people stay away from.

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The hotel project has been put on hold, but per the Chancellor's recent interviews, it is still a development priority. As for for the neighborhood, it would be going up right next to a massive new housing development right next door. If you've gone passed this block recently, you'll see that all those buildings/businesses on the corner of Shattuck and University have been closed down in preparation for the new project.

The hotel was green lit back in 2016, but I think the optics of breaking ground on a high end hotel while headlines of students burdened by a ridiculous housing crisis with the fewest % of housing of any UC campus, were just starting back up, would have been poor to say the least. I don't think the timing was right for it then.

CaliforniaEternal said:

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For anyone that is interested, I can post pictures of the mostly-finished rooms inside the new Blackwell Hall dorm at Bancroft and Dana in a couple weeks. From what I've heard, they made the rooms pretty compact to maximize the number of beds in the building. I can't wait to see how the rooms there compare to Unit 1 where I lived.

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I'd be interested. We toured the units recently and they were, if anything, even grimmer than I remembered. Would be interested to see what they did with Blackwell. Thanks for the offer.

CaliforniaEternal said:

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For anyone that is interested, I can post pictures of the mostly-finished rooms inside the new Blackwell Hall dorm at Bancroft and Dana in a couple weeks. From what I've heard, they made the rooms pretty compact to maximize the number of beds in the building. I can't wait to see how the rooms there compare to Unit 1 where I lived.

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Please do!

oskirules said:

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Since we recently heard the site for the new UC Hotel will probably used for student housing, I presume these pictures of the hotel design will now be scrapped.

http://www.weisbachad.com/hotel/

This was planned on the corner of Oxford and University Ave.

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Ridiculously ugly and utilitarian design. It's funny how USC and UCLA managed to incorporate their classic campus architecture in their new respective student housing and conference center, but we are stuck with the generic.


USC University Village


UCLA Luskin Conference Center

Luskin looks like a conference center hotel in a business park in literally any part of America. It just happens to use red brick. If it had an Extended Stay America sign out front, and I told you it was in Cincinnati, you wouldn't think twice about it.

Personally, I'm glad we're not doing the whole fake Ivy architecture thing by trying to recreate something that wasn't there. Though it's entirely predictable that USC would.

Here are a sampling of new buildings at Harvard, Stanford. They look like everything Cal has been building since Li Ka Shing.

If that were on campus I could see the argument against the design. I'm guessing the university sees it as adjacent.

Red brick isn't a Cal thing. Looks like the civic center for a city of around 400k built in the late 90s/00s.

That corner is such a small plot of land, the architect also had a height limitation to deal with in order to come up with a design that would meet UC's requirements for # of beds. Personally, I think they should use the land across the street where University Hall is located for the hotel/conference center. They can move all the admin people to Oakland.

If Cal's proposed hotel design had a large sign running down the side that read STANDARD or a giant metallic one that read DREAM HOTEL, it (design and all) would be the hippest new hotel in the bay and the design would be heralded as sleek and minimalist.

socaliganbear said:

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Luskin looks like a conference center in a business park in literally any part of America. It just happens to use red brick.

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Imagine the surprise in Westwood that red brick and sandstone just happened to echo the history of the campus and create a sense of place.





On the generic scale, I'll take this:



over that:



any day of the week, and twice on Sundays.

socaliganbear said:

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Where is the building in the picture above? It looks a lot like the new Berkeley Way West on Shattuck Ave.

Another Bear said:

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If that were on campus I could see the argument against the design. I'm guessing the university sees it as adjacent.

Red brick isn't a Cal thing. Looks like the civic center for a city of around 400k built in the late 90s/00s.

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The school's "downtown" campus is all super modern. The bio sciences building, the giant new building next to it, the new BAM. This would actually fit in nicely.

oskirules said:

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socaliganbear said:

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Where is the building in the picture above? It looks a lot like the new Berkeley Way West on Shattuck Ave.

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Yep, it's a new building at Harvard. And yes, it looks like our new building lol.

Sensing a theme.... And it's cool.

socaliganbear said:

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oskirules said:

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socaliganbear said:

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Where is the building in the picture above? It looks a lot like the new Berkeley Way West on Shattuck Ave.

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Yep, it's a new building at Harvard. And yes, it looks like our new building lol.

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Holy smokes, it's a different architect, but they're the same guys who designed the Maximino Martinez Commons student housing on Channing.

https://behnisch.com/work/filter:chronological

oskirules said:

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socaliganbear said:

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oskirules said:

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socaliganbear said:

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Where is the building in the picture above? It looks a lot like the new Berkeley Way West on Shattuck Ave.

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Yep, it's a new building at Harvard. And yes, it looks like our new building lol.

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Holy smokes, it's a different architect, but they're the same guys who designed the Maximino Martinez Commons student housing on Channing.

https://behnisch.com/work/filter:chronological

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Maximo Martinez is a great example. A very cool building that isn't trying to recreate Harvard Square. I like that we're building and designing like the urban campus we are.

Here's my other alma mater's new campus. LOVE that they're not bothering to copy the historic quad.
http://manhattanville.columbia.edu/

socaliganbear said:

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Sensing a theme.... And it's cool.

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A little of that imagination and design would go a long way with the new dorms at the corner.

socaliganbear said:

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If you know Stanley Saitowitz (the lead architect) then this design makes sense. He does a lot of high end minimalist buildings with clean lines, white walls, glass etc. I don't like how it activates the sidewalk on Oxford, but overall, I like it.

Anyhow, will be interesting to see what happens with the site now.

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Sorry man. But to me "minimalist architecture"
means "I don't have to try to be creative in any way. Just put up a big box. You know something that a 6-year old can draw."
Lest we forget: much of that generic 50's architecture the begat the "man in the grey flannel suit" look started with a desire to have very "clean lines" in the building architecture.