The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page.

Oakland City Center at night. The center piece of the City Center is There, by Roslyn Mazzilli.

Oakland City Center is an office and shopping complex in Downtown Oakland, California. It covers twelve city blocks, between Broadway and Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 14th Street abuts the northeast side of the complex and The Marriot Hotel, mentioned below, extends southwest to 10th Street. Image File history File links Nuvola_apps_important. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (3456x2304, 2524 KB) Summary Photographed by and copyright of (c) David Corby (User:Miskatonic, uploader) 2006 Oakland California City Center at night. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (3456x2304, 2524 KB) Summary Photographed by and copyright of (c) David Corby (User:Miskatonic, uploader) 2006 Oakland California City Center at night. ... An office is a room or other area in which people work, but may also denote a position within an organisation with specific duties attached to it (see officer, office-holder, official); the latter is in fact an earlier usage, office as place originally referring to the location of one... Shopping is the examination of goods and services with the intent to buy. ... Nickname: Oaktown, Biggity Biggity O, The Town Motto: Official website: www. ... City Blocks are a part of the fictional universe recounted in the Judge Dredd series that appears in the UK comic book 2000 AD. // Overview Also known as starscrapers or stratoscrapers (compare skyscraper), they are the most common form of mass-housing in Mega-City One, averaging a population of... Martin Luther King, Jr. ...

Eminent Domain Land Appropriation

City Center was a product of the urban redevelopment policies of the mid to late twentieth century. Multiple historic Victorian and some Art Deco buildings in the center of Downtown Oakland were appropriated by the city on behalf of influential private capitalist interests through the force of eminent domain law and crushed with wrecking balls to make way for an enclosed shopping mall, high-rise office buildings, a hotel, which extends southwest to 10th St, and a multi-level, above ground parking structure. In the draft Central District Plan, the Redevelopment Agency originally had an ambitious goal of flattening an astonishing 70 city blocks, however the grassroots objections of the large numbers of downtown neighborhood residents at that time and the Downtown Property Owner's Association sent the developers backpeddaling. They defensively scaled back their ambitious plans to only 12 blocks between 10th and 14th Streets on the west side of Broadway. In any event, longtime residents were earmarked as cannon fodder and summarily evicted from many apartment buildings and residential hotels for purported code enforcement reasons under an agressive, drummed-up plan called "Operation Padlock." Several long-established Pawnbroker businesses were booted and Oakland's Moulin Rouge Theatre was sadly destroyed. In his 2004 research paper titled Oakland: Dark Star in an Expending Universe, Dr. Richard A. Walker, Geography Professor at University of California, Berkeley, documented how the much-beloved delicatessen, Ratto's, which had been in business since around the turn of the century, was also threatened by demolition before citizen protest saved it. [1] In economics, a capitalist is someone who owns capital, presumably within the economic system of capitalism. ... Eminent domain (US), compulsory purchase (United Kingdom, New Zealand), compulsory acquisition (Australia) or expropriation (Canada, South Africa) in common law legal systems is the power of the state to expropriate private property without the owners consent. ... The Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota — the third-largest in the world. ... Modern pawnbroker storefront A pawnbroker is a person who offers loans to individuals who use their personal property as collateral. ... University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (also known as California, Cal, UCB, UC Berkeley, The University of California, or simply Berkeley) is a public, coeducational university situated east of the San Francisco Bay in Berkeley, California, overlooking the Golden Gate. ...

Design History

Providing stark architectural contrast, The Tribune Tower, at 13th and Frankilin, is reflected in one of the windows of a city center building.

After securing the aforementioned prime Downtown land, the developers opened the first office building at 14th and Broadway, on December 18, 1973. The first skyscraper, Clorox Building, opened next door in 1976. However, the developers halted their promised construction plans, and by the 1980s the mall still hadn't been built and most of the site was still a vacant lot leftover from the demolition. The project was redesigned with a smaller outdoor shopping complex and new federal office building replacing the mall. The complex now features a shrunken, narrow, faux restoration of the original street grid complete with three story, boxy, tiled buildings apparently designed to mimic the granduer of the original victorian buildings that were appropriated and destroyed by the developers. Virtually every Oakland old timer will tell you the old streets are absolutely unrecognizable. The new buildings were completed in 1990, including the retail complex, named City Square, and a building at 1111 Broadway, the new headquarters of American President Lines, which is now owned by an Asian based multi-national import/export company. Economic recovery of Downtown Oakland stalled after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and a recession in the early 1990s. Ever-expanding Government payrolls, federal and city, were not effected; the Ron Dellums Federal Building complex was completed in 1994, bringing even more daytime bureaucrats to spend their governenment paychecks on lunches at the struggling venue. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (3456x2304, 2996 KB) Summary Photographed by and copyright of (c) David Corby (User:Miskatonic, uploader) 2006 Tribune Building in reflection. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (3456x2304, 2996 KB) Summary Photographed by and copyright of (c) David Corby (User:Miskatonic, uploader) 2006 Tribune Building in reflection. ... The Tribune Tower at night, viewed from the Oakland City Center The Tribune Tower is a 305 ft (93 m), 21 story building located in Downtown Oakland, California. ... Clorox is the best-known brand of bleach in the U.S., whose near-century of success is the basis of Oakland, California-based Clorox Company (NYSE: CLX). ... American President Lines Ltd. ... The Loma Prieta earthquake occurred on October 17, 1989 in the greater San Francisco Bay Area in California at 5:04 pm local time and measured 7. ... A recession is usually defined in macroeconomics as a fall of a countrys real Gross Domestic Product in two or more successive quarters of a year. ... Dellums memoirs were published in 2000 Ronald Vernie Dellums (born November 24, 1935), U.S. Democratic Party politician, was a U.S. Representative from California from 1971 until 1999. ...

In December of 1996, the original developer sold Oakland City Center, including the development rights to the remaining leveled parcels, to the Shorenstein Company. The Shorenstein operation promoted plans for four high-rise office buildings, and the accompanying construction jobs and tax revenue, for the remaining four razed lots. They instead delivered only a meager hard investment and built only one these buildings, 555 City Center, which was completed in 2002, just in time for a commercial real estate market downturn. In a clever capital liquidation scheme, the Shorenstein Company auctioned the development rights for one of the lots back to the City of Oakland, which in turn sold it to the Olson Company, which is trying to build market rate condominiums. The Shorenstein Company now desires to build market rate condominiums on one of the two remaining bulldozed parcels. The Shorenstein Company, LLC, is one of the United States largest and oldest privately owned real estate firms, owning interests in, or managing, some 20 million square feet (2,000,000 m²) of office space. ... A condominium is a form of housing tenure. ...

Neighborhood Perceptions

Despite having an open air design feel reflecting the sight lines and symetry of former streets which appear closed to vehicular traffic, and despite the appearance of it being connected to the rest of the downtown area, City Center is seen by many Oakland residents as an island of private property originally acquired through the dominance of eminent domain law. To others, it represents a positive development marking a new phase of the growth of Downtown Oakland's commercial real estate market. Despite its open air design, the complex is under the exclusive custody and control of the massive and powerful Shorenstein Company, a privately held real estate development empire headquartered over in San Francisco. Contracted private security firm rental cops in undersized blue blazers vigilantly police the area to expel Oakland's own version of the Dalit (outcaste), the "untouchable" homeless, mentally ill, and local high school students. Pedestrian permission to pass through the mall is subject to the revocation of the owner as specicified in section 1008 of the California Civil Code. Despite the mall being a place of significant weekday public accomodation and interaction, the Freedom of Speech and Assembly clauses of the First Amendment are at best subject to a grey area hodgepoge of case law holdings at the City Center mall. In recent years, picketing and political protets at this mall without permission of the owners or their representatives have been subject to walkie talkie chatter and corresponding tresspassing calls to the Police. Eminent domain (US), compulsory purchase (United Kingdom, New Zealand), compulsory acquisition (Australia) or expropriation (Canada, South Africa) in common law legal systems is the power of the state to expropriate private property without the owners consent. ... The Shorenstein Company, LLC, is one of the United States largest and oldest privately owned real estate firms, owning interests in, or managing, some 20 million square feet (2,000,000 m²) of office space. ... Real estate is a legal term that encompasses land along with anything permanently affixed to the land, such as buildings. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... In South Asias caste system, a Dalit — formerly called untouchable — is a person outside the four castes, and considered below them. ... The examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view. ... The first ten Amendments to the U.S. Constitution make up the Bill of Rights. ... Case law (precedential law) is the body of judge-made law and legal decisions that interprets prior case law, statutes and other legal authority -- including doctrinal writings by legal scholars such as the Corpus Juris Secundum, Halsburys Laws of England or the doctinal writings found in the Recueil Dalloz... Employees of the BBC form a picket line during a strike in May 2005. ...

The project has come under criticism in recent years by a new crowd of younger Oakland trasnsplants for not having any restaurants open past early evening, and also for not having any night spots for occupying such strategic downtown land at Oaklands urban center. A stroll through City Center on a Saturday, or Sunday afternoon, or any night of any week for that matter, will quickly reveal what appears to some as a ghost-town of blowing newspapers and pigeon duty. Others see the evening tranquility of the complex as a symbol of downtown Oakland traditionally being more of a job center than a residential enclave. The photo of city center at night featured above, taken by Bay Area photographer David Corby, is an accurate portrait of the complex at nightfall. In fact, that is mostly the way the facility looks at night, any night. By Monday morning, the bathroom floor tiles of the vicinity are freshly hosed down for the sensibilities of the office workers, a maintence habit that many have speculated will become an achilles heel for the owners after a premises liability tort following a slip and fall on the wet tiles, or a trip and fall on a garden hose. In other ways, City Center has become the butt of other jokes about both of its escalators up and down from the adjacent BART subway station which have been out of service for over a year as of February 2006, and a Large, sculpture-sized neon sign at the entrance to the BART station which has been partially burnt out since at least Mid 2005. To many Oaklanders and Downtown Workers at the complex alike, there is a definite, visible perception that the Shorenstein Company is beginning to let the complex fall into a state of disrepair and neglect. Accordingly, some speculate that the owners may desire to re-develop the land where the outdoor mall is once again, with taller buildings. Indeed there has been a significant appreciation gallop in downtown Oakland real estate. In theory, the land is underutilized from a re-developer's prospective. In the common law, a tort is a civil wrong, other than a breach of contract, for which the law provides a remedy. ... Slip and Fall Slip and Fall is short-hand for any legal claim or case based on a person slipping (or tripping) and falling. ... BART (in full, San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District) is a rapid transit electric train service that serves parts of the San Francisco Bay Area, including the cities of San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, Fremont, and Walnut Creek. ...

Gentrified Demographic

The client base of its shopping and restaurants are stereotyped as a gentrified mix downtown office workers and city and federal bureaucrats who are seen as returning to the safety and comfort of San Francisco and other commuter bedroom communities as the sun sets on Oakland. However, others would beg to differ saying an increasing numbers of these workers are choosing to reside in lofts, condos, and apartments around parts of downtown Oakland. Many such residential units have been built downtown in recent years, a legacy of current Mayor Jerry Brown's "10K initiative" to bring 10,000 new residents downtown. This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ... Commuters waiting for the morning train in Maplewood, New Jersey A bedroom community, dormitory town, or commuter town is a town or city that is primarily residential in character, with most of its residents commuting to a nearby town or city to earn their livelihood. ... Oakland is the name of several places in the United States of America: Oakland, Alabama Oakland, California (The best-known city with this name) Oakland, Florida Oakland, Maine Oakland, Maryland Oakland, Michigan Oakland, Missouri Oakland, Nebraska Oakland, New Jersey Oakland, Oklahoma Oakland, Oregon Oakland, Pennsylvania Oakland, Rhode Island Oakland, Tennessee... Edmund Gerald Jerry Brown, Jr. ...

An expensive hourly paking garage is conveniently located beneath the mall, (and beneath the water table) for its patrons. The close proximity of the parking garage is a convenient comfort for some of these patrons who will tell you they prefer not to walk through the unknowns of the surrounding neighborhoods. The mall features an upscale fitness and racquet club with limited evening hours and expensive monthly dues and initiation fees. It also features an array of "smoothie" shops, espresso bars, and eateries featuring "wraps"(burritos) and other refreshing treats. In short, it is a world away from the nit and grit of the endangered species list a few blocks to the east, namely the resident hotels and apartments, the bus stops, barber shops, shine stands, news stands, and working class bars, patronized by a colorful and eclectic mix of downtown residents. A partially consumed strawberry/banana smoothie A smoothie is a cold beverage that is made by mixing fruit and milk and juice and sometimes ice in a blender. ... This article is about a coffee beverage. ...

See also

• Oakland City Center/12th Street BART station
• Old Oakland

Oakland City Center/12th Street is an underground Bay Area Rapid Transit station located at 12th Street and Broadway next to the Oakland City Center in downtown Oakland. ... Typical buildings in the vicinity of 9th and Washington Streets. ...

References

1. Dr. Richard A. Walker, Professor of Geography, University of California at Berkeley "Oakland: Dark Star in an Expanding Universe"
2. Attoe, Wayne; Donn Logan (1994). “Catalysts in Action” American Urban Architecture:Catalysts in the Design of Cities, p. 102-105, Berkeley: University of California Press. URL accessed 2006-02-19.
3. Levine, Daniel, "Shorenstein expands real estate empire", San Francisco Business Times, December 20, 1996. URL accessed on 2006-02-19.
4. Laura Impellizzeri and Douglas Robson, "Building Oakland: Shorenstein Co. making moves to reshape skyline with four new downtown highrises", San Francisco Business Times, August 27, 1999. URL accessed on 2006-02-19.
5. Burt, Cecily, "Condo complex slated for City Center", Oakland Tribune, July 4, 2005. URL accessed on 2006-02-19.

2006 (MMVI) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... February 19 is the 50th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 2006 (MMVI) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... February 19 is the 50th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 2006 (MMVI) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... February 19 is the 50th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 2006 (MMVI) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... February 19 is the 50th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ...

External links

• Oakland City Center - official commercial site for the property
• Panorama shot of the Oakland City Center