Earlier this summer, speculation swirled that SoMa's 41-year-old tennis club, Bay Club SF Tennis, could be razed in favor of an office or residential tower after its space at 645 Fifth St. was sold to Alexandria Real Estate Equities. A Preliminary Project Assessment (PPA) application, submitted to the Planning Department last week, now indicates that those plans could be moving forward, and while tennis will still be part of the new building's offerings, the planned number of courts will be greatly curtailed.
Indoor courts at Bay Club SF Tennis. (Photo: Talia G./Yelp)
According to the PPA, Alexandria plans to demolish the existing warehouse and construct a five-story, 65-foot mixed-use office complex with 368,550 square feet of office space, a 25,000-square-foot fitness club (open to the public), and 5,500 square feet of retail space. The site, referred to as 88 Bluxome, would feature four outdoor tennis courts along Fifth Street and a mid-block pedestrian walkway linking neighborhood parks already proposed for Brannan and Bluxome streets.
Image: Alexandria Real Estate Equities
Bay Club, which has 10 gym and tennis campuses across Northern and Southern California, is actively involved in the planning process for the new building. "The Bay Club is proactively participating in the potential development of the 645 Fifth Street location, including the addition of recreation facilities that incorporate fitness and tennis into the project for the SoMa neighborhood," Matthew Stevens, the company's president and CEO, told us.
But the new location's four tennis courts may not be enough to quell opposition from Bay Club’s devoted tennis players, who successfully thwarted plans to build 500 condos on the lot back in 2008. The existing warehouse, which has served as a tennis club since 1974, offers 24 indoor and outdoor courts. The Chronicle notes that the club is home to 60 teams, and players have already begun mobilizing opposition via a Facebook group.
But with height limits for this parcel and many others in the area set to be raised when the city's Central SoMa Plan is approved next year, redevelopment may be inevitable.
88 Bluxome is just one of many projects seeking to redevelop SoMa lots into taller office and residential buildings. Right across the street, Tishman Speyer is working on plans to construct two 11-story office towers. Around the corner at Brannan and Sixth, Kilroy Realty Corp. hopes to demolish the existing Flower Mart for office space and a new warehouse for the flower vendors.
A display of succulents at the Flower Mart. (Photo: San Francisco Flower Mart/Facebook)
Over at Fourth and Bryant, Trumark Urban has submitted plans to raze the Shell Station for a nine-story office building. And not far away, at Fifth and Mission, Forest City's 5M Project—which aims to turn four acres of land into mixed-use office and residential space—received the green light from the Planning and Rec and Parks Commissions last week, and could receive final approval from the Board of Supervisors by the end of this year.
We'll keep you updated on the Bay Club's future as the possible new building moves through the planning process, as well as other new development that sprouts up around the neighborhood.
