188 Hooper Street Site

The California College of the Arts proposed plan to raze three of the four warehouse style buildings it owns at the intersection of Hooper, Eighth, Carolina and Channel, and construct a modern five-story building, with up to 600 beds of student housing over 5,000 square feet of restaurant/retail space, 20,000 square feet of flexible workshop space and a garage for 60 cars, has received a preliminary thumbs up from Planning.

188 Hooper Street Massing

But there is a note:

“The Planning Department generally supports the ground floor design and façade expression, however, [it] prefers to see more active uses along Channel Street where the parking currently addresses the street.

188 Hooper Ground Floor Plan

One solution would be to put bicycle parking more along that area of the facade or wrap the retail around the corner. One challenge for the ground floor and streetscape improvements will be to have them contribute to the public sense of the neighborhood and not have them feel too privatized given the nature of the institutional relationship.”

The project is being designed by Stanley Saitowitz / Natoma Architects. The existing 184 Hooper Street building on the site, which serves as CCA’s Graduate Center, will remain in place. And if approved, the 188 Hooper Street development is expected to open mid-2019 with a budgeted 17 months to construct.

26 thoughts on “Plans for a 600-Bed Dorm Earn a Qualified Thumbs Up”
    1. 59′ and the Boosters would be all over it, claiming Manhattanization or some such.

      1. I’m sure the Boosters are already all over this, 57′ is probably 57′ too high for them.

  1. should be a nice complement to the “hooper innovation campus” on the other side of the CCA grad center, even if the graduate shed separates the two. I get the intention of wanting the street to feel public, though it would be nice to see some coherence between the CCA buildings (as well as the surrounding uses).

  2. So does the Planning Department intend to connect Channel to 7th? Right now it’s fenced off at both ends and effectively part of Recology’s lot.

  3. I believe the city gave that parcel to Recology in exchange for another property in Little Hollywood.

    1. Sort of; they only gave them a strip along one side of the right of way. It’s still a public street in theory, though you’d never know it.

  4. The homeless encampments there are out of control right now!
    Needles everywhere, bike chop shops. Its a criminals Disneyland.
    Hopefully all these new developments will clean this area up.

    1. There will never be a local solution to the homeless problem, it would have to happen at the state level at least, or preferably the national level. Otherwise, the incentives are perverse: incentive for the homeless to flock to SF, and incentive for the residents to push them out and make them someone else’s problem so that we don’t get stuck with the bill.

      1. National level – yes. Why do so few people truly understand this? It is never solvable locally, except with a few cosmetic band-aids.

        1. Because that would take some level of personal responsibility, a tiny level but that’s more than “move them somewhere else” requires.

        2. part of the problem is with the people that are homeless themselves, you can’t help people, if they don’t want to help themselves.

      2. The national homeless problem requires a national solution. The local problem of rampant illegal and unsavory behavior by homeless people can be solved locally. But apparently the leftists are just fine with these particular one-percenters being above the law.

        1. I actually agree with this statement, although I’m a moderate leftist myself. The rampant and nearly unpoliced bicycle chop shop “culture” is a huge property crime issue, as are the vehicular break ins. These ARE to a degree controllable by the City. I’m all for tons and tons of investment in homeless services, but I’m completely against turning a blind eye to illegal behavior.

          1. I’m sure that most vehicle breakins in SF are done by people with homes, but thanks for scapegoating the homeless.

            SFPD has quite a few issues of their own to fix as y’all may have heard in the news recently. Bicycle thefts are kinda low on the priorities when the police are gunning down citizens. Also, SF isn’t going to have a big impact on vehicle breakins without a large increase in spending. And it is a citywide issue, look at the problems on Twin Peaks. Can’t just patrol it in one area. The thieves have cars too.

            FWIW, these kind of low level property crimes tend to increase with income inequality.

          2. In other cities, they pursue organized crime. Here, we pretend it’s somehow related to income inequality.

          3. Bicycle theft is fairly low on my list of grievances when it comes to the homeless – or rather, the fact that they seem exempt from law enforcement. Drug abuse, drug dealing, violent and aggressive behavior, public urination and defecation are bigger issues. These are not friendly Disney cartoon hobos, many are mentally ill and some are convicted criminals and sex offenders. That is not scapegoating, that’s a FACT. And as such, they are a safety risk, so this is not just about their ever sprawling encampments being a goddamn nuisance.

            As a city in a country where there is no political will to solve the root cause of this problem, SF has to carry its share of the burden, but what’s going on now is insane, and it’s much worse than in other cities. There has to be a limit and as far as I’m concerned we’re well past it. Now let the barrage of sanctimonious, politically correct outrage and finger-pointing commence…

          4. BobN, as for “organized crime,” well, Shrimp Boy Chow was convicted of 162 counts including receiving stolen goods, though I don’t know if bicycles were among his loot. Maybe we could ask Leland Yee.

            And SFPD recently arrested three Oakland residents for possession of many valuables taken from car thefts in SF including one in the Sunset. There is a story about it on sfgate today. They don’t mention if the three are homeless, though they were arrested while in a home. From sfgate: “Some of the plundered items include a drone, two rifles, several pairs of jeans worth upwards of $200 each, a Tiffany & Co. dish, and power tools. Police are working to identify the owners of the more than 80 stolen items.”

            giadwfc, seems you’ve already provided more than enough sanctimony and outrage.

  5. None of the comments here address the very real problem of housing for students of institutions here in the city. It’s good to see this parcel being developed for student’s basic needs.

    CCA is not the Academy of Art in terms of RE holdings and does not have any housing near this campus, so it is great to see this being in the works.

  6. Its good that the school take responsibility for its attendees.

    Perhaps new businesses ought to take up the responsibly for new employees as well.

    1. Would that include all businesses, including Healthcare and Tourism? What about Government? Do we really want to head down the road of forcing businesses to house their employees? And what happens when you want to leave your job, do you need to give up your apartment too?

      For schools or other institutions for which a limited term residence is needed, this makes some sense. But for employment, it can create far more problems than it solves.

  7. Can we talk about the architecture? I really like the simple grey boxes that Saitowitz is playing with in order to capture the spirit of art student ennui.

    Jokes aside, I am proud of my alma mater for spearheading this effort for its future students and I’m looking forward to seeing how the design evolves.

    1. haha…I was looking for the first comment to confuse massing studies with designs. You obviously don’t….but I love the Saitowitz comment.

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