It Works: Bike Parking In Town

Lest you think everything is irrevocably broken in our faire city, Oakland does have its act together about bike parking – and the rules and locations make sense for our commercial districts.

As a prime example, here’s a map showing rack locations currently installed or planned for Montclair Village. If you think there should be additional locations, then pass your requests to the Oakland administrators.

Bike Racks, Bike Racks

Oakland’s bike parking regulations have changed with the times. When individual parking meters were replaced by parking kiosks last year, most of the bike parking evaporated. The city left two meter poles behind on each city block, to accommodate bike parking on a temporary basis.

This year, Oakland Public Works began installing bike racks around eight commercial districts. These “inverted U” racks can’t be missed, and you see them around Montclair now. Public Works is supposed to complete their planned installations soon, though we haven’t confirmed city-wide progress.

If shopkeepers want to attract bicycle traffic, they may apply for racks near their businesses. For the past ten years, the CityRacks program has installed bike racks around the city. This program seems straightforward, but we’re not clear how they decide the winning locations.

Bike-Friendly Aspirations

Props to all the city bicycle advocates, who work tireless to make Oakland as bike-friendly as possible. The big fish here is Walk Oakland Bike Oakland, which works through a large agenda related to bike routes, public transportation and generally getting folks off their duffs.

We have a few things in our favor when it comes to bicycling, starting with that climate we all take for granted. Oaklanders also live in a two-wheeler culture, ranging from scraper bikes to sleeker models. Yet we can only aspire to bike-first lives like Amsterdammers and their brethren.

Unfortunately many Oaklanders make long daily commutes to the office, and literally scatter to the four winds in their gas-guzzlers (guilty as charged). Yet when we are home, at least we can jump on our two-wheelers and head to the village – and park with ease.

More info: Neighborhood Bicycle Parking Plan – Bicycle Parking Regulations – Bicycle Parking Ordinance – Oakland Bicycle Parking Info – Oakland Bicycle and Pedestrian Facilities Program – Walk Oakland Bike Oakland Site – WOBO Newsletters – East Bay Bicycle Coalition Site – EBBC Newsletters

Everything’s Coming Up Roses

Maybe spring has arrived for the local economy, after all. At least some April numbers seem to bode well for our local real estate market…if they are for real.

Rather than waiting for official reports, which can take months, we just played around with some Zillow numbers. During the past few weeks, there has been a sharp turnaround in housing values. See for yourself, by clicking and inserting your address here.

Zillow - Mid-April

We live in the ever-so-humble Merriewood area, where the price estimates shot up. The same uptick is clear throughout our 94611 zip code too. Equally important, this turnaround may be playing out for the entire City of Oakland.

Today in Montclair sees these graphs and starts singing “Everything’s Coming Up Roses.” Maybe we should be more circumspect, since it’s hard to assess the factors driving the turnaround. Still, we wanted to sharing sunny news amidst all the recession gloom.

Canaries Flying Around Our Home Values

In the 94611 zip code, the real estate market is still alive – but there might be both healthy and sickly canaries flying around this coal mine.

Home prices have begun decreasing again, through mid-February. The 94611 median values were $718,918, reflecting a 15 percent decline over last year. By contrast, Oakland’s values were $332,688 and dropped 34 percent. While the hills performed better, that’s nothing worth gloating about!

City Data - 946111

Here’s what a bubble and post-bubble look like, in these 2003- 2008 trends. Clearly the prices dropped at a faster pace than inventory in our zip. Prices hit rock bottom by the fourth quarter of 2007, and increased $100k by 2008 year-end. Inventory started to disappear as a lagging indicator, with 50 percent fewer homes sold in the same time period. Yes, we’re still in transition now.

RealtyTrac - 946111

Foreclosures are everywhere. To make this feel quite real, look at the map depicting pre-foreclosure, bank-owned, resale and auction properties reported by the bad-news bears, RealtyTrac. We’re seeing a visual story of single homes scattered equally across the hills, in all prices ranges.

Foreclosures - 94611

Foreclosures are trending higher, and much higher than Oakland and Alameda County rates. This is a surprise, since we were sitting pretty between December and October. When you examine the foreclosure rates reported today versus December, however, we’re still swinging upwards. Maybe it took longer for available rainy-day funds to dry up?

We’ll continue to watch the local economic levers, like you. We’re pretty sure the 94611 market will stay tamped down and there won’t be any flood of homes for sale. But there were two ailing canaries recently: slightly lower home prices and higher foreclosures. Maybe these birds will continue to live, after all.