In these walkable, transit-oriented communities, the quarter-hour standard refers to the time it takes residents to get where they want to go and do just about anything, including including working, shopping and entertainment.
Two of the East Bay’s biggest megaprojects poised to move forward in 2025 aim for a 15-minute lifestyle.
Livermore planning officials last month approved another element of the plan specific to the city’s Isabel neighborhood, a patchwork of developments on 1,100 acres of mostly public land that will surround a new light rail station which has not yet been built.
At its Dec. 17 meeting, the city Planning Commission approved Cornerstone, a 253-unit housing development located at the corner of Collier Canyon Road and Constitution Drive.
Pacific Companies, based in Eagle, Idaho, plans to build 143 for-sale condominiums, six of which will be offered to low- or extremely low-income renters, and 108 affordable rental units priced toward the same groups. The campus will include 21 three-story residential buildings, one five-story apartment building and two parks.
If approved by the City Council, Cornerstone will be part of the Isabel Plan, which was adopted in 2020 and envisions a new walkable neighborhood of more than 4,000 new housing units, as well as ground-level commercial and flex space -floor for gymnasiums, daycares and cafes.
The first phase of the Isabel plan, approved last year for the southwest area of Portola and Isabel avenues, will include 1,299 multifamily units, including 363 units designated as affordable. The Isabel plan is centered around the future Valley Link rail station, which will be located in the middle of I-580 east of Isabel Avenue.
About 15 miles northwest of Livermore in San Ramon, Sunset Development filed an application with the city last month to redevelop the 92-acre site that was the former headquarters of oil giant Chevron, which sold the site at Sunset in 2022 for $175 million.
Sunset has submitted plans to replace the Chevron Park office campus, at 6001 Bollinger Canyon Road, with a mixed-use residential neighborhood, known as The Orchards, which will include 2,510 new homes and 125,000 square feet of retail space.
Sunset owns the 585-acre Bishop Ranch master-planned development encompassing the Chevron site. In 1978, Sunset Development purchased a former peach orchard adjacent to Interstate 680 and transformed it into a 10 million square foot office park with more than 500 corporate clients.
Sunset plans to convert Bishop Ranch into a $5 billion walkable mixed-use downtown for San Ramon over the next decade, eventually including up to 10,000 housing units, 1,000 of which will be designated affordable .
The plan for The Orchards will be built in three phases. The first phase will be the Orchards neighborhood, a low-density community of 426 housing units distributed in a mix of townhomes and single-family homes along a network of streets, alleys and pocket parks.
This will be followed by a mixed-use district comprising residential communities with commercial, entertainment and retail uses at ground level. A multifamily district will include communities developed into apartments and condos, as well as senior and affordable housing.
The three neighborhoods of The Orchards will be connected by parks and 15 acres of open space.
“Bishop Ranch is embarking on an exciting transformation from a traditional office campus to a dynamic mixed-use development that perfectly aligns with the evolving needs of our community,” Sunset Development said in a statement.
“Our vision is to create a global destination offering a remarkable lifestyle in 15 minutes, eliminating the hassle of long commutes and offering a seamless blend of convenience and luxury,” the company said.