woodward park Archives - Stop and Move

Roeding Park Destruction / Zoo Expansion Begins

On January 9, 2014February 19, 2018 By jamesinclair

A few weeks ago, I was in Roeding Park and noticed some serious work underway. This week, the Bee confirmed that it’s related to the zoo expansion, although the Friends of the Park filed one final lawsuit to halt the project today.

Here’s some of the background on why the expansion is bad for the park.

I also wrote about how the new entrance on Golden State would be bad for the neighborhood. Ironically, the lawsuit filed was because the county had to cancel those plans due to the High Speed Rail project. The entrances to the park will remain where they are today.

The work is taking place at the south end of the park, with a side road seeing heavy deconstruction. Pardon some of the blurriness, it was darker than the pictures let on. Click to read more!

Categories : UncategorizedTags : downtown Fresno Bee fulton mall office tower vacancies vacancy woodward parkLeave a comment

Downtown vacancy rate not so bad

On March 27, 2013February 19, 2018 By jamesinclair

Last week the Bee ran an interesting graphic showing office vacancies around the city. One would expect that with all the doom-and-gloom surrounding downtown, that the vacancies there would be much higher than elsewhere.

Surprisingly, that is not the case.

For the entire city:

The vacancy rate at the end of the year was 13.01% compared
to 13.03% at the end of 2011, the report said. That means about 2.7
million square feet of office space out of the 25 million square feet of
office space in the market, which includes government-owned offices, is
empty.

Downtown, the vacancy was 11.66% – or below the city average. East Shaw had the absolute worse vacancy rate, at 20.48%, with West Shaw not far behind.

It’s relevant to note that while the city wants to destroy the Fulton Mall to “bring back business”, the very auto-focused Shaw has the highest vacancies in the area, well above the pedestrian oriented downtown. It’s no surprise that Clovis got a grant to attempt to revitalize their portion of Shaw, and that the feedback given was to make the area friendlier to non-automobile users. Click to read more!

Categories : UncategorizedTags : audobon bluff eaton trail Eaton trail fresno parking parking lots river san joaquin river woodward park1 Comment

Should parking hold up trail development?

On February 12, 2013February 19, 2018 By jamesinclair

This Sunday, the Fresno Bee ran an excellent spread on the plans for the extension of the Eaton Trail in North Fresno. The article was somewhat familiar…about two years ago, I reported on the very same trail having not progressed even though planning had been ongoing for a decade. Even though two years have passed, nothing has happened.

Normally, you’d think the reason for the delays would be money. Not in this case. $30 million is sitting in the bank, waiting to be spent on river improvements, including the trail, bathrooms and canoe launches. If you want to know what the existing trail to the north looks like, I have a few photos here. Click to read more!

Categories : UncategorizedTags : 10-story mid-rise north fresno office river park tower woodward park3 Comments

Fresno to get a new 10-story building

On December 4, 2012February 19, 2018 By jamesinclair

The Fresno office market has been pretty dry for the past few years, but it looks like things are moving again, in a pretty big way. A developer has asked the planning council to allow a 10 story, 150 foot building in northeast Fresno. The site is currently zoned for 6 stories (98 feet). 150 feet is the maximum allowed in the city outside of the downtown core, and is the upper limit of what the city defines as a “mid-rise”.

The building (when eventually built, don’t expect shovels any time soon) will be in an office park, nearby another relatively tall (for Fresno!) building you’ve probably seen off 41. Click to read more!

Categories : UncategorizedTags : 180 expansion fresno aerial woodward park1 Comment

Aerial tour of Fresno

On September 6, 2011February 19, 2018 By jamesinclair

A few weeks ago, I flew in from San Francisco, and had a lovely window seat. Our plane did quite the tour of the Fresno region, and I’ve gone ahead and posted the pictures below, with commentary.

Yes, the windows were dirty, and the smog was ugly…but I think it’s still a nice tour.

The “extended” nature of the tour also helped.

You may enjoy this aerial tour with the Gyrocopter music from Pilotwings 64. It was what came into my head while writing this post.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh9dcrQAJcI

Here is the map of the first part of the tour. I was seated on the right side of the plane, so all the pictures are looking west and south, except for near landing. Click to read more!