The project to open a dog park in the district was initiated in 2005 by our former JLDA President and dog owner Wendy Tinsley. The plan was to use the area of grass by the water at Estuary Park (adjacent to Portobello). Wendy investigated the costs of fencing off the area and communicated with District 3 Councilmember Nancy Nadel to move the project forward at a City level.

Unfortunately this was at the same time that Signature Properties was moving its massive Oak to 9th project through City Hall, and including a large number residential units and parkland they promised to include a dog park. Consequently Nancy Nadel declined to push the dog park plans forward even though it would eventually be part of the park land re-landscaped as part of the Oak to Ninth project.

Now the Oak to 9th project is stalled for the foreseeable future and plans for parkland development are unknown. As of this moment there is no champion for this project in the community, but there is still a need, more so than ever with the number of residents and dogs in the area increasing daily, If you are a dog owner in the District and don't mind doing a bit of walking and talking at City Hall maybe you could help? A good way to start is contact JLDA or talk to Nancy at one of here monthly "coffee hours" meetings at World Ground, usually held on the last Saturday of the month (see our calendar for details).

Labels: projects

Attracting a grocery store to our district is probably the #1 asked for residential amenity. It is fine to live here, work here or even eat out here, but where do we go to shop? At present most people get in their cars and drive to Alameda, Berkeley or somewhere else in Oakland, instead of just walking down the street to a local store. The Sierra Deli provides some of the essentials and there are a few other places shown on our grocery shopping map where you pick up some other comestibles (if you want to drink you're in luck at Bev Mo!).

The good news so far is that thanks to community input during the planning phase of the Jack London Square redevelopment project, we were able to secure a promise - in writing! - that the bottom floor of the new parking garage by the Amtrak station (Site G) will contain "at least 20,000 square feet of neighborhood serving retail". This would be an ideal location for a small grocery store - centrally located for walk up traffic from residents, daytime workers, travelers, and with ample parking right there for drivers.

In the mean time JLDA is doing it's best to reach out to anyone who will listen or help and see what we can do to attract a grocery store to our district. If you think you can help in this project please contact us at info@JLDA.org

Labels: projects

The project is complete and the walking tour brochures are now available from World Ground Cafe (3rd and Jackson), Jack London Mail (248 3rd), and directly from Jack London District Association by emailing info@jlda.org

Labels: projects

May 15th, 2008: Enforcement of the new 4 hour zones began.

April, 2008: The City of Oakland sent out a notification letter to residential and commercial addresses in the Jack London District describing the new Area M Permit, along with an application form. Signs indicating the new 4 hour zones were placed on affected streets

March 24, 2007: After three City-mediated sessions, JLDA and the Chinatown Coalition have agreed on a revised boundary for the Mixed-Use District Permit Parking Program originally proposed in June 2006 [click here to see map with revised boundary]. At the request of the Chinatown Coalition, JLDA agreed to leave about 150 parking spaces on 5th Street unregulated and to prohibit permit parking on 2 blocks of 4th Street. In return the Coalition agreed to remove its opposition to JLDA's proposal. The following points were written down and signed by all parties to the negotiations:

1. Within 12 months, the Chinatown Coalition will come back with a parking management strategy for the unregulated parking spaces east of Broadway and south of 12th Street.
2. Both groups agree this is the proposal they will take back to "sell to"/present to their constituents [click here to see revised map].
3. Both groups agree this is the proposal that Staff will present to the Finance and Management Committee on April 24, with endorsements from both groups, and no opposition from either group at the Committee meeting.
4. This proposal will be reviewed in one year, for modifications if it is not working. In any event, the proposal sunsets in three years.

On April 24 the Finance Committee will decide whether staff should draft an ordinance consistent with JLDA's proposal and the revised map. If you are in favor of implementing the permit parking program proposed by JLDA, please let members of the Finance Committee know by sending an email to ISupportPermitParking@jlda.org.

October 24th 2006: The Finance Committee discussed the Interim Mixed-Use Permit Parking Program proposed by JLDA after hearing from several speakers supporting the proposal (none opposed). The Committee asked staff to return with analysis of an interim permit parking program that has a tighter budget than the one in the staff report with permits costing no more than $100 to $150 each, a program that limits the total number of permits sold to 600-1,000, and a program that limits businesses to no more than two or three permits per year. The proposed limits on business permits is of great concern to JLDA, which has teamed with the Oakland Commerce Corporation (OCC) to survey businesses in the Jack London District to determine what impacts such a limit might have. If you own a business of ANY size in the District, PLEASE complete the OCC survey form and return it as soon as possible. Initial deadline is 6:00 PM, Tuesday, Nov 7. However, late surveys will be tallied.

October 20th 2006: The Mixed-use district parking proposal put forward by the transportation and parking advisory committee of JLDA will be discussed at the October 24th Concurrent Meeting of the Oakland Redevelopment Agency Joint Powers Financing Authority and Finance and Management Committee. The meeting starts at 2pm in Hearing Room 1 at City Hall, the agenda is here and staff report is here.

September 11th 2006: The JLDA Parking and Transportation Advisory Committee has produced a white paper describing the proposed parking permit plan for the Jack London District. Also see the map of the proposed district. June 2006: A new proposal for a mixed-use district permit parking program has been submitted to our District 3 city council representative, Nancy Nadel. The cover letter, proposal, a map and photos of current parking conditions in the district are all available online.

September 24th 2003: Jack London District Community Meeting sponsored by Vice-Mayor Nancy Nadel.

September 2003: Plan presented to City staff and council members

August 2003: Consultant review of plan by Dowling Associates, Inc.

Labels: parking, projects

Towards the end of 2005 the Jack London District Association carried out a survey of district residents, business owners and other interested persons with two goals. Firstly to help it define benefits and fees for a paid JLDA supporter program, and secondly to find out the major issues that people in the district are concerned about.

At the January 2006 Board of Directors meeting based on the survey feedback, a supporter program was voted on and approved. Details of this program will be available soon (early February) on our supporter page along with instructions on how to contribute. Details will also be announced on our announcements mailing list and published by Jack London News.

JLDA is also in the process of defining several advisory committees to take on the major issues that were raised by survey respondents. In the mean time we are pleased to share with you the details of the survey regarding issues in the district.

How the survey was completed

Our survey had total of 57 respondents - 33 used our online form to respond, and 24 completed a printed form. Because the survey was anonymous with only voluntary identification of the respondent there may have been some duplication between online and offline responses. However for the purposes of these results they are all treated as unique.

In section 3 of the survey we asked respondents to lists up to five issues that they would like JLDA to be involved with. No examples of issues were given therefore all answers were complete free form and based on the opinion of the respondent. Some people only listed on issue, some five different issues, and some the same issue five times over. It was decided to count each issue only once and sort the issues raised into representative categories where possible.

Issues summary

Issue	Responses	Percentage
Parking	20	35%
Crime & Safety	17	30%
Growth & Development Planning	17	30%
Community Building & Events	12	21%
Attracting & Promoting Businesses	8	14%
Trash	8	14%
Construction Problems	8	14%
Street Noise Problems	7	12%
Representation for the neighborhood	5	9%
Historic Preservation	4	7%
Road safety	4	7%
Neighborhood Improvement and Beautification	4	7%
Promoting JLD externally	4	7%
General neighborhood coordination	3	5%
Traffic congestion	3	5%
Disaster preparedness	3	5%
Park improvement	2	4%
Transportation	2	4%
Faciliating communication	2	4%
Neighborhood issue reporting	1	2%
Grocery store	1	2%
Vagrancy	1	2%
Environment	1	2%
JLDA Promotion	1	2%
Improvement of Broadway corridor	1	2%

Clearly there are several main issues that a large percentage of residents are concerned about enough to name with no prompting. Had these issues been enumerated we might have seen even more responses for them. Also looking at most of the issues raised by just a few or only one respondent, most of them are easily recategorized into a broaded group. Based on this the following breakdown is offered:

Issue	Responses	Percentage
Parking and Transportation	36	67%
Growth and Development Coordination	26	48%
Crime and Safety	21	39%
Neighborhood Improvement, Beautification and Preservation	20	37%
Community Building and Social Activities	16	22%
District Representation and Promotion	12	22%
Business Development and Promotion	8	15%

Note that in neither table do the percentages add up to 100%. The percentage column gives the percentage of all respondents who raised that issues as something JLDA should be involved in. Because people listed multiple issues the total is not expected to add up to 100%.

Other feedback

The survey also contained a section for respondents to give us free form feedback. Because the survey was effectively anonymous we are not sharing those comments verbatim here. However all the comments have been read and will be used to aid us in future planning of JLDA's direction.

Thank you!

The Board of Directors would like to extend its thanks to all those who took time to fill out the survey. The results were extremely helpful and will give us a good foundation for future growth of the organization and of course, effective representation of the Jack London District.

Labels: projects