Park Merced, San Francisco, California

Parkmerced is the second-largest single-owner neighborhood of apartment blocks west of the Mississippi River

Mississippi River

The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...

after Park La Brea in Los Angeles

Los Ángeles

Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

. It was a planned neighborhood

Neighborhood planning

In 1915, Robert E. Park and E. W. Burgess introduced the idea of "neighborhood" as an ecological concept with urban planning implications . Since then, many concepts and ideas of a neighborhood have emerged...

of high-rise apartment towers and low-rise garden apartments in southwestern San Francisco, California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

, for middle-income tenants. It contains 3,221 residences (after sale of five blocks to SFSU

San Francisco State University

San Francisco State University is a public university located in San Francisco, California. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers over 100 areas of study from nine academic colleges...

) and over 9,000 residents, and is one of four remaining privately-owned large scale garden apartment complexes in the United States. The complex is located south of San Francisco State University (SFSU)

San Francisco State University

, west of 19th Avenue

19th Avenue (San Francisco)

19th Avenue in San Francisco, California, is a five-mile long, eight-lane arterial thoroughfare that bisects the southwestern part of the city....

, and east of Lake Merced

Lake Merced

Lake Merced is a freshwater lake in the southwest corner of San Francisco. It is surrounded by three golf courses , as well as residential areas, Lowell High School, San Francisco State University, Fort Funston and the Pacific Ocean...

and the Harding Park Golf Club. The far western boundary of the neighborhood extends to Lake Merced Boulevard, and the neighborhood is popular with students and faculty at San Francisco State University because of its close proximity. The property was purchased in October 2005 for approximately $687,000,000 by a joint venture between Stellar Management and Rockpoint Group from a JP Morgan Chase and Carmel Partners joint venture entity.

Design and history

The apartment towers were designed by Leonard Schultze and Associates, the post-War successor firm to Schultze and Weaver

Schultze and Weaver

The architectural firm of Schultze and Weaver was established in New York City in 1921. The partners were Leonard Schultze and S. Fullerton Weaver.Leonard B. Schultze was born in Chicago, Illinois, on December 5, 1877...

, in partnership with prominent landscape architect Thomas Dolliver Church. The development was built by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company

Metropolitan Life Insurance Company

MetLife, Inc. is the holding corporation for the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, or MetLife, for short, and its affiliates. MetLife is among the largest global providers of insurance, annuities, and employee benefit programs, with 90 million customers in over 60 countries...

, after their success with the Parkchester development in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. Development started in the 1939, but was slowed due to World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. The first tenants moved into the Font Boulevard buildings in early 1944. The development was completed in the early 1950s and was a first home to many military families returning from the Second World War and the Korean War

Korean War

The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...

. Metropolitan Life has built similar apartment blocks in other large cities, including Park La Brea in Los Angeles

Los Ángeles

, Parkfairfax in Viginia, Parkchester in New York and Peter Cooper Village/Stuyvesant Town

Stuyvesant Town

Stuyvesant Town—Peter Cooper Village is a large private residential development on the East Side of the borough of Manhattan in New York City, and one of the most iconic and successful post-World War II private housing communities...

in Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

to name a few. Parkmerced’s unusual pie-shaped blocks were designed by its architect, Leonard Schultze, and shares many features with his Park La Brea design. Schultze worked closely with landscape architect Thomas Dolliver Church

Thomas Dolliver Church

Thomas Dolliver Church , called "Dolliver" by his family and "Tommy" by his friends, was a landscape architect.- Life :...

, who often collaborated with cutting-edge, Modern architects, to refine the plan for Parkmerced. Church developed a unifying concept for the landscaping of each individually designed and graded garden courtyard, the different street types, open spaces such as Robert Pender Park in Juan Bautista Circle [dedicated May 3, 2009], the Meadow and the recreation area, aided by office intern Robert Royston

Robert Royston

Robert N. Royston was one of America’s most distinguished landscape architects, based in the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. His design work and university teaching in the years following World War II helped define and establish the California modernism style in the...

.

Metlife owned and carefully maintained the property until the early 1970s, when it sold it to Leona Helmsley

Leona Helmsley

Leona Mindy Roberts Helmsley was an American businesswoman and real estate entrepreneur. She was a flamboyant personality and had a reputation for tyrannical behavior that earned her the nickname Queen of Mean...

and the property began to deteriorate. There were a succession of owners and management companies beginning in the late 1990s. The commercial areas of the development were sold off to investors, and other parts sold to the California State University

California State University

The California State University is a public university system in the state of California. It is one of three public higher education systems in the state, the other two being the University of California system and the California Community College system. It is incorporated as The Trustees of the...

system. As of 2008, 116 of the original 150 acre (0.607029 km²) are owned and maintained by a single investor, who purchased the property for $700 million and has committed $110 million in upgrades. During the early 2000s the property was marketed as The Villas Parkmerced, however, as of 2009, signage and advertisements have returned to the original Parkmerced name.

Transportation

Bus service through Parkmerced primarily is provided by the San Francisco Municipal Railway

San Francisco Municipal Railway

The San Francisco Municipal Railway is the public transit system for the city and county of San Francisco, California. In 2006, it served with an operating budget of about $700 million...

17 Parkmerced route. Additionally, the 18, 28, 28L and 29 bus routes, as well as the Muni Metro

Muni Metro

Muni Metro is a light rail system serving San Francisco, California, operated by the San Francisco Municipal Railway , a division of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency...

M Ocean View light-rail line, operate along nearby 19th Avenue, and 18 46th Avenue bus line runs on Lake Merced Boulevard.

Ongoing construction and development plans

Parkmerced is in the middle of reconstruction. Current projects include replacing old elevators, remodeling entrances to the towers, applying wooden window frames and miscellaneous detailing to the garden townhomes, modifying landscaping, providing new mailbox units, as well as painting the outsides of all the buildings through 2009. Parkmerced recently acquired their own Saturday morning Farmer's Market, which takes place on the western meadow of the neighborhood. (As of at least August 15, 2011, this farmer's market has moved to Serramonte Center in Daly City.)

Along with aesthetic changes being made to the public spaces in the neighborhood, vacant garden and tower apartments are also seeing heavy renovations. These include new stainless steel appliances, granite marble counter tops, laminate flooring, and wooden cabinets. An emphasis by the development team is on the sustainability.

The owners and managers of the various parts of Parkmerced recently proposed a major redevelopment

Redevelopment

Redevelopment is any new construction on a site that has pre-existing uses.-Description:Variations on redevelopment include:* Urban infill on vacant parcels that have no existing activity but were previously developed, especially on Brownfield land, such as the redevelopment of an industrial site...

, which would involve phased demolishing of the deteriorating garden apartments in favor of higher density replacements, and reconfiguring some streets. In May of 2011, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted 6-5 to approve this redevelopment plan, including the replacement of virtually all of the low-rise garden apartment units with new mid-rise structures. In addition, the plan calls for preserving the rent-controlled status of tenants who are relocated, and it also involves construction of several hundred new units, some of which will be rentals, while others will be made available for sale.

The updated plan for Parkmerced is developed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill

Skidmore, Owings and Merrill

Skidmore, Owings and Merrill LLP is an American architectural and engineering firm that was formed in Chicago in 1936 by Louis Skidmore and Nathaniel Owings; in 1939 they were joined by John O. Merrill. They opened their first branch in New York City, New York in 1937. SOM is one of the largest...

Criticism

The complex was the subject of significant controversy over the policies of a previous owner regarding rent control and deceptive pricing. Apartments were alleged to have been offered at low prices because of a significant discount offered at lease signing. Upon expiration of the initial lease, rents could be raised by the maximum percentage allowed under San Francisco rent control laws, but calculating from the initial, not discounted, rent, leading in some cases to rental increases of 28%. The complex was sued in a class action lawusit that was settled out of court. The current owners Parkmerced Investors, LLC, were not sued over this issue.

"leasing specials" at parkmerced is secret code for 2nd tier targeted eviction. The first tier being the low income and section 8 families that have lived at the property since it opened.

That's right, targeted evictions. Yesterday, Wednesday, November 16th, 200 families (elderly couples, children, pets, and young people alike) were evicted from the Parkmerced residences. They were targeted for having paying lower rates, and not having the resources to defend themselves legally.

If you or your family has been treated unfairly by Stellar Management, please try and contact the Eviction Defense Coalition to see what your options are.

External links

Parkmerced Vision Plan Project Page SOM.com

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