Mare Island - Restoration and Reuse

Restoration and Reuse

In 1993 Congress approved the findings of the Base Realignment and Closure report, leading to the closure of Mare Island Naval Shipyard. The shipyard had long been the economic engine of the city of Vallejo, having reached an employment peak of 40,000 workers during World War II, and even employing 10,000 workers after scaling back in 1988. When Congress ordered the base closure, the shipyard employed 5,800 workers.

The vision of rebuilding Mare Island as a vital place where people lived and worked was a key goal in the base conversion planning process undertaken by the city of Vallejo in the early 1990s.

Preservation of many of Mare Island’s 661 structures and other cultural resources was an additional factor in the planning process. As the oldest shipyard and naval facility on the West Coast, the shipyard earned a National Historic Landmark designation by the federal government in 1975. In 1979 California listed the entire naval base as a State Historical Landmark. In 1999 the city of Vallejo added Mare Island to the National Register of Historic Districts with 42 individual city landmarks.

Finally, as with any restoration of an industrial, brownfield landscape, both city and government agencies required environmental review, toxics removal, and soil mediation before any new development and reuse.

In 1998, Vallejo contracted with Lennar Mare Island LLC to develop the island’s 5,657 acres (22.89 km2) into a multi-use community. Lennar contracted the Sausalito-based SWA Group to provide a Master Development Plan for Vallejo, additional historical research and landscape architectural services.

The final land-use plan SWA submitted to Vallejo in 2005 divided Mare Island into 13 zones, including a university district, and industrial zone, historic core, and residential neighborhoods. In addition, 78% of the island was set aside for wildlife habitat and wetlands, parkland and open space, and dredge ponds.

SWA’s site plan began with the island’s grid of small, tree-lined streets and extended them so that they terminate in dramatic views of the bay and river and a new public waterfront. The historic core was repurposed as a new town center with retail, entertainment attractions, and additional, higher-density housing. Other improvements included a new grove of Canary Island Palm trees and London Plane trees along the G Street corridor, one of two entry points on the island. This feature enhances a visitor’s sense of arrival and frames the long view of Mt. Tamalpais across the San Pablo Bay.

In 2007 Lennar finished construction on three new residential neighborhoods. Farragut Village, with 277 new homes in a site layout and landscape pattern designed by SWA Group, was the first completed neighborhood. Additional neighborhoods include Coral Sea and Kirkland Isle II. When all construction is complete, Mare Island will have 1,400 homes and condos, plus 7,000,000 square feet (650,000 m2) of commercial, retail, entertainment, and industrial space.

Mare Island’s new residents petitioned Lennar Corp. and the city of Vallejo to drop the dredge ponds, whose role had been to collect silt, drainage, and stormwater from the Napa River and the Bay, and instead restore that acreage to wetlands. The city and the developer agreed, and in January 2006, the land use plan was amended to add the Mare Island Shoreline Heritage Preserve. An advisory board was appointed by the city to restore the 215-acre (0.87 km2) site into publicly accessible parkland.

Overall, the conversion and reuse of Mare Island will result in the 3,075 acres (12.44 km2) of protected tidal and nontidal wetlands providing wintering habitat for thousands of shorebirds and waterfowl. During the 2008 migrating season, thousands of people attended the three-day San Francisco Bay Flyway Festival in February on Mare Island. The event, which included an art show, exhibitors, and music, marked the annual return of more than a million shorebirds, ducks, geese, and hawks to the Bay Area.