Development

Bicycle and pedestrian trails will improve with recent $10.2 million grant

Representatives John Garamendi, Barbara Lee and George Miller, along with East Bay Regional Park District Officials, will be at the Oakland Airport/Coliseum BART Station today at noon to celebrate a recent grant to improve bicycle and pedestrian trails in the Bay Area. Last week, the US Department of Transportation awarded the Park District with $10.2 million.  The grant will allow for the closure of critical gaps along pedestrian and bicycle trails and the construction of new trails.  The goal is…

Why is BART so noisy?

We now turn to that age-old question: Why is BART so noisy?

It turns out there are specific reasons for the noise and BART officials know what they are. BART officials also say, however, that studies actually rank BART as one of the quietest public transportation systems in the country.

BART Airport Connector breaks ground in Oakland

After more than two decades of debate and a recent sprint for the final bits of funding, on Wednesday a group of local, state, and federal officials broke ground to mark the start of construction on BART’s long-awaited Oakland Airport Connector. A dozen local political officials donned hardhats and gathered around a mound of dirt tidily piled in a corner of the station’s parking lot; in unison, they sank the golden blades of their ceremonial shovels into the earth.

Illegal dumpers contributing to West Oakland street waste

West Oakland residents, business owners and city leaders openly refer to their neighborhood as the city dump. Although the mounds of trash may not be as prevalent as it once was thirty years ago, illegal dumping is still a large problem. Every year, Waste Management, the city’s waste removal company, continues to haul away tons of trash from streets and sidewalks. Although the city has a law that fines dumpers $1,000, it’s difficult to enforce.

Superintendent takes tough questions at teacher meeting

Superintendent Tony Smith got personal while talking reform and student performance expectations Tuesday at the Oakland Unified School District’s Region 1 Teacher’s Dialogue. The meeting, which was the third in a series of teacher outreach meetings being held this month, brought roughly 25 teachers to North Oakland’s Sankofa Academy. The dialogues are supposed to give teachers a chance to understand the administration’s vision and talk directly to the superintendent.

‘BART Week’ offers prizes to increase transit traffic

In an effort to increase its drooping ridership, BART has declared this week “Try BART Week.” All week, the transit district will be giving away free prizes including BART passes, airline tickets, and ice cream parties to a few lucky BART customers. Over the course of the week, BART will be awarding 1,300 prizes, collectively worth over $60,000

Free prizes galore during “Try BART Week”

For East Bay residents who don’t already ride BART, today may be the day to start. In a bid to win back the riders it has lost during the slumping economy of the last several years, BART has declared this week “Try BART Week,” and is offering a wide array of valuable prizes to lure riders to their trains—starting right here in Oakland.

Slammed by permit requirements, Oakland arts space 21 Grand fights for life

The signature teal color of an old-school iMac stood out among a hodgepodge of items. There was a Sierra Nevada box filled with torn packaging envelopes, complete with stamps and postmarked dates. The one-man crew of 21 Grand—a downtown Oakland gallery and performance space—was purging everything that had accumulated in storage for the last decade, but the venue’s “emergency rummage sale” a couple of weeks ago wasn’t just an effort to collect a few bucks. It was to make the month’s rent.