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June 17, 2008
By
Katherine Tam
West
County Times
Article Launched: 06/21/2008
04:13:25 PM PDT
The old Ford Assembly Plant on Richmond's waterfront survived
the end of its car-assembling years, a major earthquake, water
damage, vandals and multiple proposals for its demolition to
witness a rebirth that has now captured national acclaim.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation has awarded the
building one of 15 National Preservation Honor Awards. Winners
will be lauded at a conference Oct. 23.
The building, now called Ford Point, is one of Richmond's
historic gems and is part of the Rosie the Riveter/World War
II Home front National Historic Park. Workers in the 1930s
assembled cars there and routed them to dealers in Northern
California and Hawaii. In 1942, the plant switched to assembling
thousands of jeeps, tanks and other military vehicles as part
of the World War II home front effort.
The plant closed in 1956 and was partially used for storage.
But the magnitude 6.9 Loma Prieta earthquake severely damaged
the building in 1989, shattering windows and toppling the brick
parapet on the roof, according to Steve Duran, the city's community
and economic development director.
The sprawling 517,000-square-foot building sat vacant. Rain
fell through broken skylights and windows, and pooled on the
floor.
Local historians refused to let it languish, even as others
proposed demolishing the building entirely. Councilman Tom
Butt's company, Interactive Resources, successfully nominated
the building for the National Register of Historic Places to
help ward off attempts to raze it.
In the push to corral millions for the restoration, then-Mayor
Rosemary Corbin journeyed to Washington, D.C., to meet with
the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
"They were only going to give us less than $1 million," Corbin
said. "We had to prove it was damaged in the quake and needed
the money. They made us jump through hoops, but we got it."
Intense lobbying won $14 million from FEMA and another $4.5
million from the federal department of Housing and Urban Development.
City officials put in more than $16 million in redevelopment
money and partnered with Orton Development to complete the
work. In 2003, the city sold the building to Orton for $5.4
million.
New tenants began moving in last year for the first time since
Loma Prieta. More than 90 percent of the building is leased
to a half-dozen tenants, including SunPower, Mountain Hardwear,
Vetrazzo and Title Nine.
Renovation continues on site. The 40,000-square-foot craneway
with waterfront views of San Francisco is being transformed
into a restaurant, banquet hall and concert venue that is scheduled
to open as early as August, said James Madsen, Orton's craneway
project manager.
In addition, a visitors center for Rosie the Riveter/World
War II Home front National Historic Park will be housed in
part of the craneway, city officials said.
Had it been demolished, the Ford building would have been
difficult if not impossible to rebuild in the same footprint,
because newer coastline laws would have prohibited such construction,
Corbin said.
"It's a major structure that is significant historically and
a linchpin for economic development for that whole area," Corbin
said.
Reach Katherine Tam at 510-262-2787 or ktam@bayareanewsgroup.com. |
