Eureka and SHN staff to visit national forum on developing rail yards

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
By Wendy Butler October 25th 2006

There have been numerous community meetings and many passionate podiums for people in favor of and against a Eureka rail yard’s development.

A national forum to be held this week might provide the city of Eureka an opportunity to hear what out-of-area developers and environmental consultants think about Security National’s proposed Marina Center.

Eureka Community Development Department Director Kevin Hamblin said he looks forward to hearing what comments might be made about Marina Center, but not just that.

“This is a nationwide conference that specializes in converting old rail yards,” he said. “We need to understand that we’re not in a vacuum on this. If we can learn from some of the obstacles they have had, I think that that’s something we should avail ourselves of.”

What Hamblin is referring to is the Center For Creative Land Recycling’s “Next Stop: Redeveloping Surplus Rail Sites in Arizona, California and Nevada.” It will be held at The Four Seasons Hotel in Las Vegas.

The event begins with a reception today with Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, and then an all-day workshop on Thursday.

CCLR is a nonprofit organization that is “focused on creating sustainable communities by identifying and implementing responsible patterns of land use and development,” its Web site (www.cclr.org) states.

Workshop presenters include developers, funders, attorneys and environmental consultants. Among the rail-yard redevelopments that will be highlighted are Downtown Las Vegas’ Union Park, one of the largest urban infill projects in the country, as well as Downtown Sacramento Rail Yard, Truckee Rail Yard, Yuma Riverfront Project, the Marina Center, Central Station in Oakland and numerous park and greenway projects.

Security National purchased Union Pacific Railroad Co.’s Eureka Rail Yard or “Balloon Track” on Sept. 28. But Marina Center is a long way from being realized.

Not only does the City Council have to vote to approve a zoning change for the property from “public” to “commercial,” SN has inherited the responsibility for cleaning the parcel’s contaminants and was recently informed by Humboldt Baykeeper that it will soon be named as an additional responsible party in the Baykeeper’s current federal Clean Water Act and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act lawsuit against UP.

SN Senior Vice President Brian Morrissey will be presenting the Marina Center at the Thursday workshop. Security National Senior Associate in Leasing and Operations. Randy Gans will also be in attendance.

“I’d like to see kind of how they’re handling this on other rail yards,” Gans said. “(There are) opportunities to develop on former rail yards or industrial sites that (have) these same type of development hurdles.”

Morrissey was in UP railroad real estate development from 1994-2004.

“Originally I represented the seller, the railroad in their efforts to sell rail yards, and now I represent Marina Center,” he said. “I think I can provide the attendees both perspectives — the buyer and the seller perspective.”

Morrissey said that the 238-acre Sacramento Rail Yard has much in common with the Balloon Track.

“Almost no rail yard has that basic infrastructure that most sites have,” he said.

From sewers to roads to water to storm drains, all of these represent what a typical rail yard is lacking and what a developer needs to find a way to put in place, Morrissey said.

And contamination is a commonality, he said, that a developer inherits.

Franz Lowman, senior hydrogeologist environmental services, SHN Consulting Engineers & Geologists Inc., will attend. He has also served as a Marina Center environmental consultant.

He said he wants to attend “to learn more about what different communities are doing to revitalize their rail yards,” he said.

“We’re always looking for new ideas on how to deal with ‘brownfields,’ in general, and rail yards are becoming a more important part of different communities,” he said. “If we can get some general information that helps with the process here, we’ll be all the better.”

Along with Hamblin, Eureka Community Development Department Senior Planner Sidnie Olson will attend.

She said that her goal is “professional development and ongoing education.”

“It will certainly give me additional knowledge, I hope, on ‘brownfields,’ but it’s something that’s applicable to all of the industrial areas in the city that are brownfields; it’s not just one property,” she said.

(Security National owns The Eureka Reporter.)

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