Oakland Tribune from Oakland, California • 20

SUNDAY MAY 25 2014 unhappy BART come up with a digital screen pro Ww ALAMEDA Landmarks undergo transformation LENS ON THE BAY PICTURE THE WEEK HOW TO REACH US MuiL Contact Denis Cuff at 925 943 8267 ollow him at BILL CROUCH STA ARCHIVES Delivery or billing questions Alameda County: 510 839 7323 Outside Alameda County: 800 755 7323 Argus only: 510 661 2626 The California Hotel was built in the 1920s on San Pablo Avenue near 37th Street The hotel was one of the first racially integrated full service hotels in the Bay Area It housed a ballroom 24 hour restaurant' lounge barber shop and hair salon Reach Peter Hegarty at 510 748 1654 or follow him at TwittercomPeter Hegarty Days Gone By appears on Sundays Contact Nilda Rego at nildarego comcastnet remont ArgusHayward Review Andrew McGallamcgatlbayareanew5gr0upcom 510 293 2464 Oakland Tribune Pamela Turntine pturntinebayareanewsgroupcom 510 208 6445 B4 BAY AREA NEWS GROUP 113 East Bay Metro Editor Katherine Ann Rowlands krowlandsbayareariewsgroupcom 925 943 8379 information and 10 percent BART sponsored mes sages The screens also can be used to beam emergency messages to riders Milo Hanke past presi dent of San rancisco Beautiful said the digital advertising will have a cor rosive effect on station atmosphere and pave the way for screens at other DAN HONDASTA Mat Mamoody and Peg Grant practice the Argentinian tango Thursday inside of the gazebo at Civic Park in Walnut Creek downtown San rancisco stations are known as bleak and fa he said the addition of this obtrusive Twittercomdeniscuff stay and not be turned away because of racial re strictions according to the history file The hotel was one of the first racially integrated full ser vice hotels in the Bay Area In addition to the ballroom there was a 24 hour restau rant a lounge barber shop and hair salon The East Bay Asian Lo cal Development Corp or EBALDC which acquired the aging landmark in has completed the renovations and there are now 137 studio one and two bedroom apart ments for low income families and people in need of supportive hous ing On site health care and supportive services are available for residents and behind the hotel is a 9000 square foot organic garden where residents help grow vegetables and raise chickens As a nonprofit afford able housing developer Voters will decide fate of property at Crown state beach By Peter Hegarty phegarty'a) bayareanewsgroupcom ALAMEDA Alam eda voters will decide whether the neighbor hood near the Crab Cove Visitor Center at Robert Crown' Memorial State Beach will be designated as open space after a cit group announced riday it had secured enough valid signatures to qualify a measure for the November ballot The riends of Crown Beach oppose a proposal to build homes on surplus federal property along McKay Avenue which leads into the center is so much community support for this park the Kathy Schum acher said in a state rrient energized each other and accom plished our task quickly I hope Alamedans will vote enthusiastically for this measure in the No vember More than 6000 people signed the petition which was reviewed by the Al ameda County Registrar of Voters About 4400 sig Riverboat kept its 1 date with disaster natures were needed to be valid for the for Expansion of Open Space at Crab to go before voters The Alameda City Council is expected to decide June 3 whether to adopt the ordinance with out sending it to the vot ers submit the initiative to the voters or request a report on the effect of the proposed initiative The East Bay Regional Park District wanted to acquire the four acre property near the beach but was outbid by devel oper Tim Lewis Com munities in a June 2001 auction hosted by the US General Services Admin istration Known as Neptune Pointe the neighborhood was one of several where the City Council adopted zoning changes in July 2012 to meet the af fordable housing and other residential needs The riends of Crown Beach said it will celebrate the successful signature drive with a party between 3 to 5 pm June 1 at the Ae olian Yacht Club near the Bay arm Island Bridge Radulovich said he was advertising your stations will become bleak and an Titan will install the digi tal screens on wall spaces now used as frames for ad vertising posters BART managers said a survey of 451 riders found that 65 percent liked the digital screen? installed in the pilot project this spring in the Montgomery station About 29 percent were neu tral and 5 percent like it Murray said she watched riders during the screen test at the Montgomery sta tion and they appear distracted Titan operates digital advertising screens on pub lic transit systems in Bos ton Chicago Philadelphia and the New Jersey Transit system the term light bulbs back then was tfee preferred term Today we associate the word with the automo bile brand but in Persian mythology the goddess of light is so known according to the history file Like the California Hotel the lofts building is faced with red brick The north facing portion of the complex suffered damage in the 1989 earthquake but it has since been repaired and seismically retrofitted Large windows throughout offer views of downtown the bay and the East Bay hills Tours of the Lampwork Lofts complex are available or more information go to wwwlampworkloftsoak landcom More information about the newly refurbished California Hotel is available atwwwebaldcorg Measure to create open space qualifies for November ballot sound The 7 2 board decision fnllnwpd a snirited dphatp on whether an extra $1 posal by asking riders what million a year in revenues they wanted Instead he is worth the distraction said BART relied on what the digital screens which have become common in many service stations grocery stores and other places think a million the advertising franchisee wanted Under the program the Titan screens on station walls will show 50 percent advertising 40 percent dollars is something to news weather sports and sneeze at saia kaki Di rector Gail Murray of Wal nut Creek She and other direc tors said BART can use the money on many things1 including maintaining and cleaning train cars BART directors Tom Radulovich of San ran cisco and Robert Raburn of Oakland voted no saving the advertising can be dis stations tracting and BAK 1 nas little control over the content not getting enough money to justify the Raburn said Works actory (built in 1919) on Campbell Street between 16 th and 18th streets is now Lampwork Lofts The four stoiy masonry structure has been converted into 92 units of market rate rental housing with studio one bedroom and two bedroom options available Madison Park inancial Corp the developers of the project went through the landmark1 certification process with the National Park Ser vice to take advantage of the ederal Historic Tax Credits to help finance the rehabilitation The California Hotel built in the 1920s on San Pablo Avenue near 37th Street enjoyed its heyday during the post World War '0 II era when jazz and blues greats such as Billie Holi day James Brown Mahalia Jackson andSly Stone performed in its ornate ballroom African Ameri If you wanted to get to Sacra niento from San rancisco in 1864 a the most com fortable way to 1 1 do it was to take a paddle wheel steamer It had all the amenities of a 1 good hotel You could get a fine meal a good drink or a haircut The steamer Washoe advertised its price as 50 cents for a deck ticket 1 and a dollar for a well fur nished cabin But on Sept 5 1864 taking the Washoe was a bad idea The riverboat 6 months old had a his tory of leaking boilers and getting into collisions with other riverboats especially the steamer Capt George Wash ington Kidd owner of the Washoe started as a cabin boy on the Missis sippi working his way up to steward and then to clerk in 10 years In 1849 he came to California and and then went into the banking business He decided to challenge the near monopoly of Sacra mento riverboat traffic held by the California SteamNavigation Co He sold shares and called his company the California Navigation and Improve ment Co He contracted a San rancisco firm to build the Washoe with extra big boilers These leaked so badly however that the US inspector for the Port of San rancisco said the 'Washoe could be operated only at 118 pounds of pres sure not the 150 that Kidd had hoped for The boilers were repaired repeatedly The competition on the river was fierce The engineer DJM Anderson was heard saying he would beat the steamer Chrysopolis if he had to operate at 180 or 200 pounds of steam At 9:30 pm Sept 5 a faulty 11 boiler on the Washoe ex ploded Passen gers and crew members many horribly scalded were thrown into the river The Chrysopolis which had passed the Washoeand was about 4 miles ahead of it continued toward Sacramento its crew and passengers un aware of the explosion The Antelope which had left San rancisco an hour and a half after the 1 Washoe came upon the 1 scene close to midnight Rescue operations began and the Antelope reached Sacramento at 4:30 am the living passen gers injured or uninjured who could be found were brought to the city The scene on board (the Antelope) was such as has rarely been witnessed on the Pacific Coast The floor of the cabin and a portion of the deck were covered with the dead and reported the Alta California day The Vernon House was turned into a temporary hospital All the doctors who could be found came to care for the injured Of the 176 passengers and 29 crew members 54 were killed 19 were seriously injured 23 had minor injuries and 67 were reported missing About a month later the coroner jury blamed the disaster on the two engineers: Anderson who died in the disaster and the second engineer William Phil lips Kidd raised the Washoe and sold it that October to the Oakland erry and Railroad Co since the mid 'i' ufacturing and distributing EBALDC has rehabilitated'' light bulbs for General other properties through Electric Today we use out Oakland as well as along the San Pablo Avenue corridor several of their past projects havev: been with older buildings The hotel designed by noted local architect Clay Burrell (1880 1958) stands six stories on a corner lot facing north toward nearby Emeryville its Spanish Mission inspired twin tow ers of brick and terra cotta and its famous 10 foot high rooftop sign was visible from miles in all directions In the pre freeway era it was considered to be the gateway to downtown Oakland for motorists com ing from the north In the 1960s Interstate 580 was built next to it a fact that contributed to its decline and ultimate closure ac cording to history files Meanwhile the Mazda Lamp Works facility was for many decades a major Oakland employer man NILDA REGO DAYS GONE BY Two major landmarks from past have 1 recently undergone resto ration and rehabilitationw and are ready for their next chapters Both buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places and are lo cated in West Oakland The complexes provide new housing options: one offers market rate rent als and the other has low income affordable units The for mer Mazda cans could come meet Lamp (built in Agency expects to reap $1 million a year vote is 7 2 "By Denis Cuff dcuff'p bayareanewsgroup com OAKLAND BART train stations will enter the age of digital screen adver tising despite complaints it may distract or annoy some riders After testing one screen at a station this spring the" BART board decided on a is split vote Thursday to allow operation of 18 digital ad vertising and news screens t'" at the busy Embarcadero Montgomery and Powell stations in San rancisco BART expects over time to reap about $1 million a year in advertising reve from the screens to be by Titan Outdoor advertising fran Ehisee The screens will have video and text but no ANN ALEE ALLEN LANDMARKS CRITICS EAR DISTRACTION Digital ads at ART stations A A 's' 'rimTinrrTirwifimMm nr ffrriiniiir7ijim wrriirrTirTr 1 Tjy LIT AM 13 1 1 UnlmMijiT 'LT a 4 raU i in MMHalT S3 jCSJW 1W A 11' Ai LENS ON THE BAY PICTURE THE WEEK HOW TO REACH US.