Extra

Flash: Caltrans Nixs Ashby Bart Planning Grant

Tuesday May 30, 2006

The City of Berkeley will not get a Caltrans Community-based Transit Planning Grant to plan a large condo development for the west parking lot of the Ashby BART station. Winning cities were posted on the Caltrans web site late Friday afternoon, and Berkeley was not among them. 

 

The application, which referenced a 300-plus-unit project, was sponsored by Mayor Tom Bates and Councilmember Max Anderson and spearheaded by development specialist Ed Church, using the South Berkeley Neighborhood Development Corporation as the community agency sponsor. 

 

Neighbors and flea market vendors had greeted the proposal with reactions ranging from skepticism to hostility, which they communicated vigorously to the Caltrans decisonmakers. 

 

See next Friday’s Daily Planet Weekend Issue for further developments.