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By Dennis Swanson

Safeway-Funded Residential Permit Parking Coming to Safeway/College Area by Dennis Swanson, Rockridge resident As part of the settlement negotiated with Safeway by three neighborhood groups, Safeway agreed to pay for the implementation and annual ...

There was no Safeway on College Avenue when I first came here as a little girl in 1942. The store then on that site was called Hagstrom’s. It was good then and it’s good now. I like Safeway; I just don’t like their future plans. Some Safeways in outside areas ...

The College Avenue Safeway store’s curving roofline will be a thing of the past when the market is replaced by a larger facility and a different parking layout. Revised draft plans will be presented at public meetings to be held in June. Photo: Don Kinkead Safeway t...

Safeway Rockridge Center Claremont Enrollment Soars Claremont Auction Gala from page 3 from page 5 from page 5 local shuttle. He admitted he would have preferred no drive-through window, but said Chase insisted. Since Chase has a long-term lease a...

Safeway representative Todd Paradis said he was willing to present other options to Safeway’s management if the group agreed on them, but said he was pessimistic that management would change its position. The major meeting topic again was size, an...

The Problem with Safeway’s Plans: Size, not Merely Design Editor: An e-mail dated February 12 and addressed to “Neighbors and Interested Parties” from Elizabeth Jewel of Safeway’s PR consulting firm outlined Safeway’s latest plans for the College at Claremont Safe...

By Stuart Flashman

by Stuart Flashman, RCPC chair It seemed at the beginning that it could be a promising meeting between Safeway representatives and community stakehold- ers, one that might resolve the design issues separating the two groups. Instead, the meet- ing foundered when Safeway representative Todd Paradis delivered Safeway’s bottom line: a 50,000 sq. ft. s...

Safeway store, at two open houses held June 23 and 25. The Rockridge Shop- ping Center, at the corner of Broadway and Pleasant Valley Avenue, is the biggest shopping center in North Oakland, serving not only Rockridge but also Tem- escal, Broadway...

By Michael Kan

More Safeway News: See the Land Use Committee report, page 4. RCPC Town Hall Meeting AGENDA July 2010 Note Date Change July 22, 2010, 7:30 p.m. Rockridge Branch Library 5366 College at Manila Community Room (Upstairs) ■ ■Rockridge Center Safeway Develo...

sioners had their say. After complimenting the speakers for exceptionally cogent and well-thought-out comments, the commission- ers, one after another, chastised Safeway for its unimaginative, suburban-style proposal. Commissioners echoed the speakers in asking for a more urban alternative proposal, and made it clear that major changes would be needed if Safeway expected to get Com- mission approval. It re...

alternatives. Several specifically referenced a study that the City itself had commissioned two years earlier for a commercial “node” at the Broadway and 51st Street intersection. After the speakers finished, the commis- Update: Safeway on College Proposal Editor’s Note: Much has been posted on local-issue blogs and on the Internet about Safeway’s Rockridge Center plans. Below are a few links to City documents, Safeway’s plans, and blog discussions, provided as a service ...

way-Pre-Application-Plans http://transbayblog. com/2009/06/30/more-pleasant-on-pleas- ant-valley/ ■ http://ouroakland.blogspot.com/2009/07/ blog-pulse-pleasant-valley-safeway.html ■ ht tp://w w w.abet teroakland.com/ new-broadway-safeway-eir-scoping-session- tonight/2009-07-15 Submitted by Concerned Neighbors of College Avenue Safeway The Planning Department does not expect to receive the proposed scope of the ...

College Avenue Safeway ■ ■ rebuild (6310 College Avenue at Claremont) There have now been two Safeway-spon- sored “stakeholder representative” meetings: the first on September 10 and the second on September 22. The stakeholders consist of RCPC, Claremont-Elmwood...

meeting left the issue unresolved, but the groups were emphatic that the Safeway appointees not be allowed to block the rest of the groups from reaching agreements. Each stakeholder group has presented its position. All of the groups felt the proposed size of the replacement structure was a paramount issue. Other big i...

Safeway’s proposal, changed many times in the past six years, will replace all of the current buildings and add 120,000 square feet to the shopping center’s present 185,000 sq. ft. of commercial space. It will significantly change circulation patt...

Safeway’s College Avenue Safeway Shopping Center Project at a public meeting July 26. RCPC’s attorney, Michael Graf, joined by Rockridge and neighboring Berkeley residents, objected to the project’s traffic, parking, air quality, toxics, and visua...

Safeway projects: the College/Claremont Safeway Shopping Center and the Rockridge Shopping Center rebuid/expansion project. There will be an update on the current status of the environmental review and approval processes for both projects, plus di...

Safeway Shopping Center project proposal (postponed from September 28 due to the Jewish High Holidays) had more than its share of fireworks, as well as a lot of nega- tive comments on Safeway’s project. Following a short introduction by Oak- land ...

Safeway come back with a project alternative that was 10,000 sq. ft. smaller. Safeway’s representatives stated emphatically that the company would NOT consider a smaller project option. Zayas-Mart suggested that the committee continue its discussi...

Safeway DEIR. Safeway will be presenting its plans for the Rockridge Shopping Center redesign at RCPC’s July Town Hall meeting. (See front page agenda announcement.) DEIR: June Town Hall from page 1 lege Avenue Safeway EIR due out some time this s...

The groups have sent letters to Safeway pointing out the violations, with copies to the City. Safeway has apparently ignored the letters. The City’s efforts to enforce the conditions of approval have gotten only grudging and partial compliance. It probably didn’t help that while...

...olicy regarding the preservation of retail use along College Avenue, send them to the committee at stuflash@aol.com, or mail to RCPC, 4123 Broadway, PMB 311, Oakland, 94611. Land Use Update by Stuart Flashman, RCPC Land Use Committee chair Safeway’s Planned Rockridge Center ■ ■College Avenue Safeway Project at College Claremont As reported in last month’s Rockridge News, Safeway violated its settlement agreement with RCPC and two other community groups by submitting its building per...

the agreement, and Safeway has now met with the groups and reviewed its intended changes. Some changes were considered acceptable, but several are problematic. At the meeting, Safeway and the groups discussed the changes, and how to bring the project closer to what ...

division, said Safeway’s lease with the owner of the project site prohibited residential development. Zylstra also said Safeway was looking at establishing holiday-season shuttle service to Rockridge and Macarthur BART stations. Safeway will also improve placeme...

By Rachel Grossman

Friday: 12 – 5:30 p.m. Sunday and Monday: CLOSED by Rachel Grossman The Safeway rebuilding project at Pleasant Valley and Broadway presents an opportunity to revitalize the southern part of Rockridge, connect it with nearby walkable areas such as Piedmont Avenue and Temescal, and serve as a gateway to the Broadway cor...

Store” model. That model calls for minimum 50,000 sq. ft. stores with departments, such as a full florist, deli, bakery, and butcher shop, that go well beyond a traditional super- market. Safeway wants its stores, regardless of location and local conditions, to each be the grocery equivalent of a Walmart “superstore.” Nor are Safeway’s Rockridge projects limited to larger supermar- kets. Each is part of an even bigger shopping cent...

David Zylstra of Safeway’s Property Development Centers (PDC) subsidiary had presented revised plans for the RRSC redesign at the RCPC board of directors June meeting, one week earlier. The rede- sign includes two story buildings with roof- top parking, relocation...

By Nancy McKay

by Nancy McKay Carpenters Union Local 152 demonstrated in front of the College Avenue Safeway store for about four days during the week of March 15-19. Union Field Representative Tim Lipscomb said the union expanded this demonstration to various Safeway locations around the Bay Area. Union carpenters distributing handbills in front...

comments. FANS grew out of the group of “stakeholders” that Safeway convened more than a year ago to discuss plans for replacing its Col- lege Avenue store. In addition to RCPC, the stakeholders included Concerned Neighbors of the College Avenue Safeway, the Rockridge Dis- trict Association (RDA), Berkeley...

...oved by Vollman, a “Notice of Preparation” will be issued which will specify the date of the scoping hearing. Neighbors and community members will then be able to review the proposed scope and prepare comments for the public record and for Safeway’s response. If you have thoughts or questions about the project, e-mail safewayneighbors@sbcglobal.net. Safeway posts information at http://www.safewayoncollege. com/ — Editor’s Note: the links to these Web sites are provided for informati...

have not been updated in many years and don’t reflect the wider aisles or much broader array Safeway’s venerable presence at Claremont and College avenues is in line for major changes according to the company. Community comments will help guide the outcome. Photo: D. Kinkead of goods and services offered in the newer Safeway stores. Safew...

By Eric Lombardo

Safeway actually disbursing the funds, to Oakland’s City Council approving the proposed project). It is my goal to be transparent and communicative with our community as we make headway on what could eventually benefit us all. I’m hopeful we will ...

Safeway/College Update Interior of Safeway, looking out on College Avenue from where the checkstands will be. /Elisabeth Jewel from page 1 construction. Casual carpool may be shifted occasionally in the next six weeks on Claremont between Alcatra...

Safeway Hearing Date * * * C H A N G E D * * * Safeway/College Ave Project Appeal Hearing date now set for November 13. See details, page 3. Also: Sign petition by Nov 12; donate to legal fund. Inside: Photos from Rockridge Out and About and the R...

Safeway EIR Matching Grant Still Open: Page 3 On the east end of the Caldecott Tunnel, the mouth of the fourth bore begins to take shape. Traffic continues to flow west through the existing tunnel at left of photo. See full story and meeting detai...

Safeway project, we need your donations to help fund the experts who will assure that the project’s impacts on Rockridge are fully and fairly disclosed, discussed, and, where possible, mitigated. These experts will also help compare Safeway’s prop...

By Stuart Flashman

by Stuart Flashman, RCPC Land Use Committee co-chair Construction of the College Avenue Safeway project has recently slowed to a crawl due to several factors: coordinate scheduling with the utility providers – PG&E and East Bay MUD – who needed to install underground pipes and conduits before streets and sidewalks could be finished. ...

By Stuart Flashman

by Stuart Flashman, RCPC chair emeritus A scant five days ahead of the date when the City Council was to hear appeals challenging Planning Commission approval of the Safeway on College rebuilding project, three neighborhood groups reached a tentative settlement with Safeway over its plans for rebuilding the dated shopping center at College and Claremont avenues. The result of a 13-hour marathon mediation condu...

By Stuart Flashman

...e from a ramp farther north on College. Claremont Avenue will also have garage entry and exit points. Lowney Architects Planning Council (RCPC), Berkeleyans for Pedestrian Oriented Development (BPOD), and Friends and Neighbors of College ➧➧Safeway Accord, page 12 COMMUNITY On Jan 17 Coming in January 2013 RCPC Town Hall Agenda: January MEETING Report on Safeway Settlement Negotiations The negotiators who reached the settlement with Safeway on its College Avenue project will explain ...

... acknowledge any deficiencies in the draft analysis. At a three-hour Planning Commission hearing, Rockridge and Berkeley residents and business owners lambasted the EIR and the project, and pled for consideration of a reduced-size project. Safeway insisted it needed all the space it had asked for. The city’s planner, Peterson Vollman, recommended approval, and said he expected Berkeley would eventually Help Safeway/College Appeal; Donate to Legal Defense Fund Do you believe the prop...

A mailer from Safeway in Pleasanton shows representations of their design, with a link to an impressive Web site, but neither realistically portrays the scale of the multi- story store or auto traffic congestion. Safeway asks for our support before any indicati...

Four community alternatives to Safeway’s proposal have been sketched out and posted on RCPC’s website. As noted on the front page, the January RCPC Town Hall Meeting will include a presentation of the community design alternatives. Community support at ■ ■College Avenue Safeway...

By Stuart Flashman

by Stuart Flashman, RCPC chair Contributions to RCPC’s drive to match a grant for the cost of the Safeway on College EIR (Environmental Impact Review) have begun coming in. The pend- ing Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) on Safeway’s proposed 62,000 sq. ft. College Avenue shopping center project will look at the ways the City believes t...

By Annette Floystrup

College Avenue Safeway Environmental Report Coming Soon: How to Make Your Comments Count The draft environmental impact report (DEIR) for Safeway’s College Avenue shopping center will be released shortly. Rockridge residents will then have 45 days to submit comm...

Land Use Update FANS to Pursue Reduced Scale for Safeway Project The city is expected to release the draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for a 45-day public review and comment period in June or July. The 61,000 sq. ft. project is proposed to replace the current 23,000 sq. ft. Safeway store a...

...d 94618, or by e-mail to chair@rockridge.org. The deadline for applications is February 15, 2010. After listening to comments from more than 20 speakers who asked that topics beyond traffic, air quality, and noise be studied in the EIR for Safeway’s proposed College Avenue Shopping Center, planning commissioners told staff to add… almost nothing. Proposed corner roof garden, College & Claremont: Web site, Lowney Architecture. Residents Flood Planning Commission with Concerns About C...

A Safeway Walk to Where? Picture yourself the size of the people shown in these drawings of Safeway’s proposed new College Avenue store. What might you see and feel as you walk around in the plan? It could be like the scenario at left. Enter the pas...

By Annette Floystrup

...y Annette Floystrup, RCPC boardmember The design and amenities of the building proposed to replace the current Safe- way supermarket at College and Claremont avenues were debated in another of a series of “stakeholder” meetings convened by Safeway to “harness the neighborhood’s creativity to generate ideas that Safeway can use in the new store design.” Stakeholders are representatives from the Rockridge Community Planning Council (RCPC), the Claremont Elmwood Neighbor- hood Associat...

com/codes/oakland/ Click on Title 17: Planning.) Concerned Neighbors of College Ave Safeway, represented by founders and Rockridge residents Susan Shawl and Nancy McKay, also made an introductory state- ment, noting their group’s concern about the proposed project’s design and troublesome traffic patterns it could introduce. Safe...

also said Safeway would try to put the plans up earlier if that was possible. The Rockridge Community Planning Council (RCPC), the Claremont Elmwood Neighborhood Association (CENA), and Oakland Councilwoman Jane Brunner will co-sponsor a public presentation...

By Dan Ferdelman

by Dan Ferdelman, RCPC Vice Chair I Former Safeway, t’s been nearly 20 years since the Safeway supermarket at 5354 Claremont Avenue closed its doors and left neighbors looking for another place to buy groceries. Since then, the public has rarely seen the inside of the old store. Passers-by...

By Stuart Flashman

by Stuart Flashman, committee chair College Avenue Safeway ■ ■ rebuild (6310 College at Claremont Avenue) A neighborhood group, Neighbors Concerned with Safeway/College, has formed to “bird-dog” this major project. Contact safewayneighbors@sbcglobal.net to get on their mailing list. Also, Safeway ...

Safeway Settlement Funds — UPDATE — by Matt Levy, RCPC Board Member I LETTERS TO THE EDITOR RCPC Affordable Housing Requires Subsidies Affordable Housing, Or Market Rate? M Ken Rich’s article in the June, 2021 Rockridge News, “Housing in Rockridge...

By Cindy Warner

Safeway but the store offers a wide variety of departments including a bakery. Starting include young adults taking their first jobs

By Cindy Warner

Safeway hires all ages. It’s a union job, 16 hours a week for clerks; 24 hours minimum for others. Employees get a 5 percent dis- count on groceries and 10 percent off Safe- way brands. Corporate hires the contractors who offer wine tasting.

By Dennis Swanson

➧➧Safeway on College, page 12

Safeway on College: Construction Redux

Safeway Center Should be More People Friendly, More Attractive Editor:

Safeway: College Avenue Frontage

Safeway, Community Groups Find Accord on College Ave Project

Safeway Preliminary Ground Floor and Parking Level Plans

Safeway, page 3 ➧➧ More ■ ■ Land Use Updates, page 3

Safeway’s Rockridge Center Plans Panned at Planning Commission Scoping Hearing

Safeway Trader Joe’s Ver Brugge Foods Vino! Yasai Market Sports, Luggage, Bikes and

Safeway Design Debated at Brainstorming Meeting

Safeway stakeholders meeting; given the short notice we ourselves got, I was happy we were able to get the information out at all.

Safeway Presents Revised Plans for College Avenue Store Rebuilding

Safeway Plans City of Oakland Planning and Zoning Division staff member Pete Vollman, the planner assigned to the project, explained the steps the City will follow to process the application. The initial submittal will include appli- cations for D...

Safeway Plans Major Rebuilding of Rockridge Stores

Safeway Site Tree Man gas line under it. The plants that had been growing for two years were destroyed. The garden had to be started all over again—and it was thanks to a half-dozen volunteers with John in the lead. from page 1 from page 5 sublett...

Safeway prove this calendar is already a popular item. It’s easy to getone: Clipand mail the order form on page 3

Frog Park and in tents along the Hwy. 24 freeway exit ad infinitum. Ms Floystrup’s article makes clear it won’t. n early April, RCPC sent Safeway/ Albertsons a letter telling them how we wish to use the $400,000 settle- ment fee to calm traffic along streets just west of the market. We recently received a formal response essentially denying our request, claiming that no traffic impa...

Of those I randomly interviewed at Safeway, most were positive although none happened to be Rockridge residents. Anne Janks, from another area of Oakland, told me enthusiastically, “It looks like a Whole Foods.” “I think it’s glorious,” Virginia Stough of Piedmont said. “I like it ...

...atives Budget Director Donna Hom; Interim Human Services Director Sara Bedford; an OPD senior official; Make Oakland Better Now boardmember Nicolas Heidorn; and program co-host Councilmember Dan Kalb. Back hoes and trenchers get to work as Safeway resumes construction on its College Avenue store project. The city halted construction until Safeway and RCPC and the other three neighborhood groups that negotiated design and construction terms reached agreement to discuss construction p...

By Stuart Flashman

Since then, things bogged down, with Safeway’s attorneys inserting provisions not agreed to and omitting things that were. Hopefully, the agreement will be finalized soon. Construction has been stalled until the negotiations are completed; it’s now going to be a race between Safeway’...

By Stuart Flashman

...staurant use permit had already been issued for this location some time in the past. Oakland’s zoning ordinance (unlike in most cities) makes use permits permanent, with no expiration date. Thus, Bica is being ■ ■Rockridge Shopping Center [Safeway] Broadway & Pleasant Valley When the local community groups and Safeway reached agreement over plans for the Rockridge Shopping Center redevelopment project, everyone assumed that the controversy was over. Now, a Sc e ni c Str e s et Suppo...

Planning Commission Unanimously Approves Safeway’s Rockridge Shopping Center Project In addition to attractive and interesting kitchens, homes on the Rockridge Kitchen Tour can offer visual bonuses to tour-goers, such as the vintage camper trailers displayed in this home’s yard, projects...

Project, Broadway and Pleasant Valley Avenue Safeway’s second Rockridge area project is to rebuild and enlarge this major shopping area, adding about 120,000 sq. ft. and including a larger (65,000 sq.ft.) Safeway. City planner Darin Ranelletti (238-3663; DRanelletti@oaklandnet.com) reports t...

...replaces a proposed central driveway. The "Rockridge" sign in each view remains a point of concern for neighborhood negotiators and former Councilmember Jane Brunner, who pushed for the settlement.  Architect’s drawing above shows the new Safeway store entrance, a stairway and elevator tower to rooftop parking and the store’s frontage in a street level view of College Avenue. View point is roughly from Red Hanger Cleaners. See additional views of the revised Safeway project, page 1...

By Stuart Flashman

Help Safeway/College Ave Appeal; Donate to Legal Defense Fund Do you believe the proposed Safeway project is just too big for beleaguered, two-lane College Avenue? Do you think it will overwhelm the neighborhood, threaten nearby small businesses, and/o...