Attachment 6
Project Location, Existing Conditions & History
Eight parcels comprise the 1.2 acre-project site that is located at the northwest intersection of Davis Street and E. 14th Street in the center of Downtown San Leandro. The site is regionally and locally accessible via State Route (SR) 185 (E. 14th Street) and SR 112 (Davis Street), both of which are under the jurisdiction of Caltrans. The project site is approximately 0.4-miles northeast of the San Leandro BART station, and is on the BRT line, which has stops directly adjacent to the site.
Surrounding land uses include an adjacent gas station and single-family residences approximately 150 feet to the north (across Dan Niemi Way and San Leandro Creek); a restaurant and commercial offices across Dan Niemi Way to the west; and the Washington Plaza shopping center to the south. A five-story mixed-use development (known as CentroCallan) is under construction east of the project site, across E. 14th Street.
The project site is referred to as “Town Hall Square” because it was the site of the original San Leandro Town Hall, which was damaged by an earthquake and demolished in the late 1800s.
There are now two vacant commercial buildings and a surface parking lot on the property, which are proposed for demolition. The buildings (1145 and 1199 E. 14th Street) were built in 1935 and 1966 respectively and have a combined floor area of approximately 18,000 square feet.
The property owner assembled eight total parcels to facilitate the proposed development, including six parcels purchased from the City of San Leandro in 2022 that were assembled by the City and former Redevelopment Agency with the goal of creating an impactful project in the Downtown. The property owner, Beam Development LLC (Beam) was selected through a competitive RFP process and a Purchase and Sale Agreement (PSA) was approved by the City Council in 2017.
Beam’s initial proposal was for a mixed-use development that included retail spaces on the ground floor, however, based on current market and economic feasibility analysis for the project, Beam has modified the project to a multi-family residential development. On July 18, 2022, the City Council approved an amendment to the PSA, which recognized that the current project proposal was for a multi-family development without a retail component and noted that final approval of the concept would be subject to the City’s standard entitlements process. The amendment also found that “the key goals and objectives of redeveloping an underutilized, urban infill site at a prominent corner in the City’s downtown with a vibrant, high-quality housing development and the concomitant activation of the Property and vicinity for pedestrians (particularly along E. 14th Street and Davis Street) would continue to be achieved” with the allresidential proposal.