Bay Crossings Interview

The Ferry Building Guy

Chris Meany, Overseer of Ferry Building Renovation

No, but it was a very involved process because of the number of governmental agencies with jurisdiction - Port, BCDC, State Lands, National Park Service and others.

The process began with an environmental review undertaken by the Port. The Port then held a public competition involving an RFQ/RFP process based on developer’s qualifications, design concept, and financial bid.  Our team (including what is now known as Wilson/Equity Office, Primus, and Wilson/Meany as a joint venture developer) was selected out of four competitors.  Once selected, we negotiated lengthy development agreements with the Port, which were reviewed by SF Board of Supervisors.  Then our architectural designs were reviewed by relevant agencies including the Port, NPS and BCDC.

With our entitlements in hand we are now commencing construction.  Going forward our job will include completing construction on time and on budget while maintaining safe access to the Ferry Terminal.  During the summer of 2002 we will move tenants in and open the restored building.

Professionally, I have been in real estate development for sixteen years specializing in mixed use urban projects, often involving architecturally significant buildings.  Personally, I was raised in Pasadena, California and graduated from Georgetown University. I live in San Francisco

There are two very noteworthy highlights of the Ferry Building renovation - one architectural, the other programmatic. 

Architecturally, our work will restore the 660-foot long, 45 foot wide, skylit, Grand Nave of the Ferry Building which was destroyed in the 1950s.  This historically important space was the spine of the Ferry Building and was one of the most used transportation halls in the world.  When we are finished, the Nave will again be one of the most dramatic interior spaces in the Western United States. 

Programmatically, the ground floor of the Ferry Building will showcase the very best of food produced in the Bay Area.  Restaurants will be located at the four corners of the Ferry Building’s ground floor - on the bayside, the north and south corners will each be occupied by dramatic, large restaurants; on the city side, the north and south corners will each be occupied by smaller cafes with outdoor seating looking back at the very dramatic San Francisco downtown skyline.  The balance of the ground floor will be a market in the style of Peck in Milan, Pike Place in Seattle, and Harrod’s in London.  The Grand Nave will act as a street organizing the market which will be a collection of the best merchants in the Bay Area selling the highest quality, produced food, with an emphasis on food that is produced in an environmentally sustainable manner.  The heart of the market is four larger areas with special focus - our region’s spectacular produce will be sold in a dramatic arcade operated by CUESA (the foundation that runs the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market), a second arcade will feature a revolving offering of seasonally appropriate, artisan produced food products from the region (such as preserves, olive oils), a large market hall will offer meat, fish and poultry, a second market hall is dedicated to wine.  Smaller individual shops that will sell complementary products like cheese and chocolates will complement the four larger areas.  Finally, interspersed among the larger spaces along the Nave is a series of very small niches (each about 300 square feet) which will offer a vast assortment of really wonderful, unique food related items like specialty cooking utensils, cookbooks and the like.  Throughout all the retail shops will be opportunities to sit and eat food prepared from the market.

Together, the dynamic architectural space and world-class market should make the Ferry Building the worthy public centerpiece of the San Francisco waterfront.

Total costs will be in the range of $70 to 80 million

The Port has been preparing the Ferry Building for redevelopment for more than 10 years, so there were only three long-term tenancies that we had to resolve.  We are pleased that we achieved fair deals with each to relocate from the Ferry Building.  The World Trade Club will finish operations at the building on February 28, 2001.  Limbach & Limbach is in the final stages of moving out now, and Amtrak should be moved into the Agriculture Building within a month or so.

We believe that the San Francisco waterfront is quickly emerging as the most beautiful, exciting and dramatic City front in the Country.  Within a few years, we will all recognize that the waterfront is truly a defining aspect of the City and it will feature prominently in all of our social and recreational plans.  The Ferry Building will be the very public centerpiece of the waterfront.

The ground floor of the Ferry Building will be occupied by all food related merchants. 

The second and third floors of the Ferry Building offer approximately 170,000 square feet of premium quality office space with the most spectacular views in the City. 

The Ferry Building is on the National Register and historic preservation issues were central to much of our planning.  We have been involved with the renovation of a number of architecturally significant buildings and believe passionately in preserving our architectural resources through appropriate rehabilitation; importantly, safeguarding these resources also means insuring that these resources have a vital economic life. 

The City side of the Ferry Building will be cleared of a number of later day bad additions (like aluminum windows, air conditioners, etc.) and restored to its original appearance.  The Bayside of the Ferry Building has almost no surviving original fabric, and it will be replaced with a graceful modern facade that complements the historic parts of the building while recalling many original features.  The long lost Nave, once the most important interior space in the Building, will be recreated.

Our project has been thoroughly reviewed by both the State Office of Historic Preservation and the National Park Service.

A major redevelopment like the Ferry Building involves lots of people in lots of organizations.  The numbers begin small when the developers and architects and the key planners at the City agencies are planning the project.  As the project develops, the circle widens and reaches a peak during construction when literally hundreds of people are working on the project.

Who are the architects and chief planners?  Can you describe their aesthetic vision?

A very exciting element of the Ferry Building redevelopment is that a team of world class, but local, architects, engineers and planners, has designed it.  As a community we should acknowledge the incredible talent in our local design community and the great places that our local design community can produce for us to enjoy.  Cathy Simon of Simon Martin-Vegue Winkelstein Moris, the lead architect, led our team and she was assisted by by Jay Turnbull and his team at Page & Turnbull (historic preservation architects) and Baldauf Catton Von Eckartsberg (retail architects).  Plant Construction Company is the General Contractor.  The development team is lead by a joint venture of Wilson/Equity Office, Primus (formerly the Jefferson Company) and Wilson Meany.