GENERAL DESCRIPTION

Marina Square Shopping Center is located on 15 acres of land located at the southeast corner of I-880 and Marina Blvd in the City of San Leandro. The site of the former surplused Pacific High School, the land was acquired by Mr. Jon Reynolds of Reynolds & Brown in 1993 from the San Leandro Unified School District. Construction of the 163,000-square foot off-price shopping center was completed in 1993. This special mix of promotional retail tenants includes a 42,000 square foot Nordstrom Rack, a 18,000 square foot Office Max, a 10,000 square foot Old Navy, a 25,000 square foot Marshalls, and such stores as Talbots, Eddie Bauer, and Mikasa. Working at the direction of Mr. Jon Reynolds, Chairman, Mr. Dan Gray was director of leasing and public relations and assisted with entitlements. Mr. Peter Reynolds assisted with land acquisition and was responsible for construction of the shopping center improvements.

PUBLIC ENTITY CONTACT

Mr. John Jermanis, City Manager, City of San Leandro
(510) 577-3358

DISCUSSION

Reynolds & Brown was the third developer to contract for the option rights to develop the property. The first two were unable to deal successfully with the neighborhood associations and the School District, or to make the economics of the project work. Mr. Gray was responsible for coordinating and resolving the development issues of 26 local neighborhood associations and homowners groups. When sold in 1995, Marina Square commanded one of the highest per square foot sales prices for a promotional shopping center in the county, because of the high quality of design and construction execution, and because of its monopoly tenant mix. Drawing both a neighborhood and a regional customer from a 30-mile trade righ, Marina Square generated the highest per square foot gross sales volumes of any promotional soft goods center in the East Bay, with one retail anchor nearing $1000/square foot.

SIGNIFICANT ACHIEVEMENTS

A mitigated negative declaration, zoning change, extensive design review approvals, and the use of Measure B one-half-cent sales tax funds for off-site street construction to widen Marina Blvd. and improve the CalTrans off-ramp. An unsubordinated ground lease with CalTrans was also executed by Mr. Gray and Mr. Reynolds for an assebled portion of the site necessary to increase parking (the increased parking was required as a result of the overwhelming success of the center) and to develop the Mikasa building on the out-pad.