I-980: Freeway to Neighborhood
Graduate urban design project proposing removal of an underutilized freeway
There have been many calls for the removal of the I-980 freeway between 20th St and 8th St in downtown Oakland. This vastly underutilized piece of automobile infrastructure occupies 46 acres with the potential to provide not only a dramatic increase in housing supply, but also to reconnect a historically disinvested West Oakland with the city's core through a high quality pedestrian network and human scale public realm. The sunken elevation will reduce the cost of underground parking and the extension of a second Transbay Tube with a new BART stop reinforcing the energy of this new neighborhood.
This is a vision of a reconnected Oakland.
This was a graduate student project at UC Berkeley CED, Urban Design Studio with Dr. Peter Bosselmann.
Project Statistics:
- 46 Acres
- 2,051 New Apartments
- 354 New Townhomes
- 68,000 sq ft Retail
- 2 New BART Stations
- 3.3 Total FAR
Design Precedents:
- Fra Gade til By, Odense, Denmark
- Amagertorv, Copenhagen
- Quebec City
- Beekman Plaza
- Dewey Square, Boston
- Borneo Sporenburg, Amsterdam
- Dutch Woonerf
- Acorn Street