A Negotiated Landscape by Jasper Rubin

Author:Jasper Rubin [Rubin, Jasper]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Nonfiction, Social & Cultural Studies, Political Science, Politics, City Planning & Urban Development, History, Americas, United States
ISBN: 9780822981442
Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press
Published: 2016-04-24T04:00:00+00:00

Nevertheless, what finally sank the project was that it ran into a recessionary period, not the first time or the last that a project would be jeopardized by the time it took to wend its way through the planning process. To make things worse, the port commission approved the proposal for development at nearby Pier 39. The Chronicle reported that “the award to Simmons was the ‘last straw’ for the Hines Associates.”39 According to Hines, because Simmons’ project was partly a retail and entertainment development, it would compete directly with similar components of their own project. All of these things would add up to unappealing circumstances for any firm; it was too much for Hines, which subsequently pulled out of the deal. Not one to give up easily, in 1975, at the end of his term, Mayor Alioto convinced Hines to give the project a second chance, but Simmons’ Pier 39 was moving determinedly forward, and the initial issues remained. The project was dead by March 1976, but efforts to do something at Hyde Street Pier and Pier 45 would continue for fifteen years.

The port temporarily gave up hope that commercial and housing development could proceed at least on part of Pier 45 and so, in 1979 it instead solicited bids to develop fishing-related facilities and a “fisheries center.” The port received no responses. Concluding that the fishing industry could not be supported without some commercial venture, the port resuscitated the idea of building condominiums on the pier. With plan in hand the port was able to generate interest in development at Pier 45, which included housing. After several years of work, and in the midst of discussions over a potential housing development, the rug was pulled out from under the port. In 1984, in discussions with the SLC, the city was informed that housing on Pier 45 was not a permissible use pursuant to the doctrine of public trust, even though BCDC had deemed it acceptable. The SLC’s declaration was something of a surprise to local officials, although the potential for the public trust to become an issue had loomed for years. In a piece on the newest condo-less hotel-based proposal, the Chronicle’s Alan Temko reported that even port director Eugene Gartland could not explain why the state’s decision had not been anticipated.40 Given that the attorney general had made a significant finding regarding trust uses in 1982, it is surprising that the city was caught off guard.

What had occurred was an unexpected reassertion of state power not through the legislative process but through legal interpretations and judicial intervention. In 1982, the attention of the California Attorney General’s office was drawn to a controversial development proposed by the Port of Los Angeles/Long Beach and its developer partner, Wrather Port Properties, Ltd. The southern California agency and its developers were pushing a scheme reminiscent of the kind San Francisco had been forced to abandon. Their intention was to fill sixty acres of tideland to support 2.5 million square feet of office space.

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