Golden Gate Fields could soon turn into a public park

“Golden Gate Fields offers a truly generational opportunity to reimagine a world-class bayside park for the Bay Area,” Guillermo Rodriguez, the trust’s California state director, wrote in a statement Tuesday. “With the East Bay Regional Park District and a wide range of public and community partners, we have the chance to expand shoreline access, restore vital ecosystems, and create a place where hundreds of thousands of residents can connect with the outdoors.”

Trust for Public Land Director of Government Affairs Juan Altamirano wrote in an email that the nonprofit has agreed to buy the property for $175 million, and has until the end of the year to exercise the option.

The East Bay Regional Park District will put $20 million toward the purchase, using money that was earmarked for the site in a 2008 bond measure, according to Director Elizabeth Echols, who represents Berkeley and Albany.

The site is owned by the Stronach Group, a Canadian firm that owns three other horse racing tracks.

Altamirano said the Trust for Public Land, which has acquired more than 5 million acres of land across the country for parks and other public uses, plans to seek both public funding and private philanthropy to make the purchase. The San Jose Mercury News reported Tuesday that the acquisition could receive funding through a bond measure California voters approved in 2024 for projects to address impacts from climate change, and that the Stronach Group has agreed to demolish the grandstands, stables and other structures that stand on the property now as part of the deal.

If the trust completes the purchase and transfers the site to the park district, Echols told Berkeleyside, the system would then launch a public process to determine what to build at the new park. Altamirano said a project of this size typically takes five years to open to the public.

“We are very eager to get input from everyone in the community about what they’re looking for in this area,” Echols said. “It’s also an opportunity for us to restore the land to a more natural state, to help protect the shoreline as well as coastal residential communities that are going to be hit by the impacts of climate change.”

At this early stage, she said, it’s not yet clear how much it will cost to create the park, what kind of environmental remediation the land might require or how the district would pay for the project.

The trust’s press release announcing the deal Tuesday included statements cheering the acquisition from a long list of public officials and environmental advocates, ranging from the mayors of both cities to officials with the Sierra Club and Audubon Society.

“Transforming Golden Gate Fields from an underused site of a bygone era into a vibrant public waterfront park is exactly the kind of forward-thinking redevelopment our communities deserve — one that reflects our values, meets today’s needs, and creates lasting public benefit for generations to come,” Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, who represents Berkeley and Albany, wrote in the statement.

Decades of debate over Golden Gate Fields’ future

If the sale is completed, it would culminate a long campaign to create a park that takes advantage of the shoreline and sweeping bay views at Golden Gate Fields, which was the last full-time horse racing track in Northern California when it closed.

“We have had this in our sights for several decades,” Echols said.

As the sport’s popularity waned, developers and some public officials have eyed the track as ripe for commercial or housing projects. Los Angeles shopping mall magnate Rick Caruso sought to build a retail center on the site two decades ago; Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory later considered it as a location for a new lab campus.

But those visions faced stiff resistance, and never came to fruition. Zoning codes in both Berkeley and Albany place tight limits on the property, prohibiting anyone from building new housing there and allowing only limited commercial uses. Albany residents in 1990 adopted a measure requiring that any changes to its zoning be subject to voter approval.

The border between the two cities runs just south of Golden Gate Fields’ racing oval, putting the bulk of the property in Albany and about 40 acres, including the former stables and housing for track workers, in Berkeley.

Robert Cheasty, a former Albany mayor and longtime advocate for creating an open space at the park, wrote in a statement that the acquisition would fill a gap in the 8.5-mile-long McLaughlin Eastshore State Park system that extends from the foot of the Bay Bridge to the Brooks Island Regional Preserve off the Richmond waterfront.

“This crowning achievement is a major milestone for our shoreline,” Cheasty said.

This story was originally published by Berkeleyside and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.