Features

Hotel Task Force Completes Report; Final Meeting to Discuss Creek

By RICHARD BRENNEMAN
Friday April 23, 2004

The 25-member Berkeley Planning Commission task force charged with making recommendations about the proposed UC Berkeley hotel and museum complex holds its final meeting Tuesday. The meeting, which begins at 1 p.m., will be held in the second floor Sitka Spruce Room of the city Permit Service Center at 2120 Milvia St. 

Formed by the City Council under the auspices of the city’s General Plan, the task force is charged with making non-binding recommendations to guide the council in negotiations with the university over the proposed project. 

The massive project, which would reshape the city center, is projected for the two-block area bounded by Shattuck Avenue on the west, Center Street on the south, Oxford Street on the east and University Avenue on the north. 

The task force has held a series of meetings taking public input on the complex. 

During their last session two weeks ago, the panel reached decisions of all issues except the fate of Strawberry Creek along the block of Center Street between Shattuck and Oxford. Several environmental groups have called for closing Center to traffic and “daylighting” the creek, which now runs through an underground culvert pipe. The creek issue will be voted on at Tuesday’s meeting. 

Following Tuesday’s wrap-up, a drafting committee will prepare the final task force report for submission to the City Council.