Market Updates: Dining / Entertainment

The City of Oakland is nurturing existing valued dining and entertainment establishments downtown and attracting new ventures to make Downtown Oakland a destination for fine dining and entertainment.

Following Jack London Square’s success in creating the East Bay’s premiere entertainment destination, Old Oakland and Uptown have been discovered by entrepreneurs. With its charming Victorian architecture, broad sidewalks, and Oakland’s temperate climate, Old Oakland has the potential to become an attractive outdoor café quarter. Hip bars and restaurants like the Stork Club, Flora, Uptown Bar, Café Van Kleef, and Fat Cat Café have settled into the emerging Uptown area.

Jack London Square Partners envision a 1.8 million-square-foot, $400 million project composed of eight development sites. Phase I, redevelopment of an existing office/retail building at 66 Franklin has been completed. Phase II will include four mixed-use buildings. The first building of Phase II broke ground in October 2007 and will feature an open-air market featuring fresh produce, meat and fish stalls that will take up the first floor of the six-story building, with restaurants on the second floor, culinary businesses and a demonstration kitchen on the third and Class-A office space on the remaining floors. The other three buildings include a 31,200 square-foot retail and office building adjacent to Oakland’s ferry terminus, a 1,086-car parking garage and a 10,000 square-foot retail shops building adjacent to the existing Barnes and Noble store. Future phases of construction total another 500,000 square feet and include two additional midsize office and retail buildings. There will also be a joint venture with Joie de Vivre Hospitality to remodel and operate the Waterfront Plaza Hotel.

In addition to drawing from Oakland’s residents, downtown restaurants and entertainment venues have the 76,000 daytime workers as potential customers.

Downtown Oakland is one of the premiere cultural and entertainment hubs of the East Bay with the famed Paramount Theatre, the renowned, Yoshi’s World Class Jazz House, a nine-screen cinema in Jack London Square, and the waterfront experience of Jack London Square.

Downtown has the potential to support an additional 200,000 square feet of new eating and drinking outlets.

For assistance in selecting the ideal location for your entertainment business, please call 510.238.3853 or e-mail kwilliams@oaklandnet.com. Information on available sites can also be accessed at www.oaklandexplorer.com.