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The newest snag in the running battle over the relocation of the Berkeley Adult School comes from the state, which had turned thumbs down on school district plans to keep traffic out of residential streets surrounding the old Franklin School. 

The Berkeley Unified School District Plans had called for creating a new parking lot with an entrance on San Pablo Avenue, which would have kept traffic away from nearby streets. 

The only problem with the idea—which would keep the majority of traffic out of the immediate neighborhood—is that the California Department of Transportation (CalTrans) has already shot it down. 

Because San Pablo is technically a state highway, CalTrans must approve any new parking lot that would access it. Despite the initial thumbs down from the state agency, Berkeley Adult School principal Margaret Kirkpatrick remains hopeful that a compromise will be worked out to permit it. 

Kirkpatrick says CalTrans’ refusal is only a preliminary letter stating that will not grant permission. “We hadn’t made an official request so I think that status is a little up in the air,” says Kirkpatrick.  

Under the district’s plan, a grass field would be removed to make way for the parking lot. To obscure neighbors’ views of the lot, tall trees and landscaping would be added along the site’s edges where currently there is an ivy-covered fence. A sound wall would also be added to protect residents in a housing development along the school’s south side from noise. A play structure may also be spared so that neighborhood children could use it. 

The lot, on the west side of the building, would accommodate 170 to 180 cars. The district would build another lot in the back of the building along Curtis Street that would fit another 20 to 30 cars. The school’s current University Avenue site has about 200 spaces.  

According to Kirkpatrick, alternative plans that CalTrans doesn’t have to approve call for an entrance into the west lot from Virginia Street to the north of campus and an exit onto Francisco to the south. Because Francisco is a narrow street, a third plan calls for an entrance and exit only onto Virginia. 

Neighbors who vehemently opposed the move and are still considering a lawsuit to stop it prefer that access to the lot be from San Pablo. “An entrance and exit on San Pablo would be better than not having one,” says Phyllis Orrick, who lives in the neighborhood and has lobbied the school board against the adult school’s move. 

But Dietmar Lorenz, an architect who works with DSA Architects across the street from the school on Virginia, says the district’s proposal was flawed from the start. 

“When we saw the plan alarm bells went off,” said Lorenz who has worked with neighborhood activists on alternative plans for the site. Lorenz says the district blew it by calling for only a San Pablo entrance and exit without the Francisco or Virginia street access points. Because 50 percent of the traffic would flow through the San Pablo opening, Lorenz feels that CalTrans had no choice but to say no because it would put too much traffic onto San Pablo.  

Whether the San Pablo entrance is realized or not, Kirkpatrick hopes to make the west side of the campus facing the busy thoroughfare the building’s main entrance. 

“We want the students to want to park in this lot,” says Kirkpatrick. “It will be easier for students to park in the lot and go into the rooms than it would be to park and walk a block.” 

The main entrance to the building is currently on the Virginia Street side of the building, and Kirkpatrick says the district wants to make it an exit from the building by fixing the doors so they only open from the inside out.  

The Franklin site, a former elementary school that’s been vacant for a year, will also have an elevator installed near the stairwell to provide access for disabled students—a requirement of the Americans with Disabilities Act  

To address concerns of neighbors about increased traffic at the site, Kirkpatrick surveyed the commute habits of 764 of her students. She found that 40 percent took their own personal car, 22 percent took the bus, 14 percent walked, seven percent took BART, seven percent biked and four percent car-pooled or were dropped off by other drivers. One percent were unaccounted for. 

Kirkpatrick estimates 700 to 900 students attend the school. A district report indicates 1200 vehicular trips a day will be made to the Franklin site once it opens in time for the 2004-2005 school year.  

Kirkpatrick notes that even though weeknight classes run till 9:30 p.m. “our students don’t hang around. Within ten minutes of class the building is closed and all of the lots are empty,” says Kirkpatrick. “It’s not like there’s an ongoing night problem.”  

Still, Kirkpatrick acknowledges neighbors concerns about the new adult school campus are legitimate.  

“Change is difficult. The unknown is difficult,” says Kirkpatrick.