Email from those who live and work near the new Safeway-anchored strip mall at the corner of College and Claremont, astride the Oakland-Berkeley border, has been burning up the figurative wires this last week. I call it a strip mall because the Safeway corporation has snuck in some number of new retail store fronts on a corner which formerly housed a useful neighborhood-serving supermarket and gas station. New tenants are rumored to be competitors for the previously thriving locally owned businesses on the west side of College: a cafe with fancy coffees, a florist and others.
Competition or not, the Safeway project has so far proved to be a disaster for the local merchants. To make room for the new stores, Safeway has moved the parking lot up to the roof. The ramp which provides access on and off College discharges a steady stream of cars into an already-crowded block.
This project was originally flacked to the neighborhood by Safeway’s contracted fixing firm AJE Partners, headed by former Assemblymember Dion Aroner (previously the administrator for Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates when he formerly held down that job, which was subsequently occupied by his wife Loni Hancock, who preceded him as Mayor of Berkeley, and then… but you get the idea.) The point person on the Safeway expansion is partner Elisabeth Jewel, a sweet-talking lady whose job it was to make sure that it happened regardless of opposition.
One example of what how what was promised didn’t materialize: the small businesses on the west side believe they were told that autos exiting the roof would only be allowed to turn right, not left, so that they would not block access to the parking which these stores depend on.
Nope. Left turns are happening there every day, and it’s, as predicted, a mess.
But that’s bupkes as compared to the latest manifestation of the eternal-seeming construction mess, which peaked earlier this week.
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