Mayor Marilyn Ezzy Ashcraft and City Council will be taking part in site tour of the proposed Clement Avenue/Tilden Way project area Wednesday, March 15 at noon. The tour will begin at the intersection of Fernside Boulevard and Tilden Way. The tour is open to the public and Alameda city staff and the consultant team is urging residents to participate.

The project will create bikeways, walkways, a road diet, westbound Clement Avenue extension, open space, stormwater gardens, bus stop improvements, a dog park — the Alameda Recreation and Parks Department will conduct a separate community planning process to design and program the future park space — and a roundabout at the Blanding/Tilden/Fernside intersection.

The project will also extend the Cross Alameda Trail. The abandoned railroad right-of-way at Clement Avenue and Tilden Way will be reconstructed to extend the Cross Alameda Trail between Broadway and the Miller-Sweeney/Fruitvale Bridge. Lastly, the project will improve truck and bus routes in the area.

The project will also connect to the city’s Clement Avenue Complete Street project at Broadway and Clement and to the City of Oakland’s planned and funded Fruitvale Avenue improvement project, Fruitvale Alive. This will create a bicycle “freeway” between Alameda Point and Fruitvale BART.

The main goals of the project are to increase safety in the area, improve mobility for all roadway users and improve bicycle and pedestrian access. According to the city staff report, Blanding Avenue, Clement Avenue and Park Street are high-injury corridors and the Blanding/Tilden/Fernside intersection is a high crash intersection. There have been 21 injury crashes in this corridor between 2011 and 2020 with pedestrians and bicyclists accounting for 38 percent of total injury crashes but just 9 percent of the study area trips, according to a staff study.

In 2017, the Alameda County Transportation Commission (ACTC) awarded a grant to the City of Alameda for $8.4 million to implement the Clement Avenue/Tilden Way project. This project is funded by Measure BB, Alameda County’s transportation sales tax. The Clement/Tilden project is estimated to cost approximately $10 million, according to the city staff report. Costs include right-of-way acquisition, which is completed, planning and design, hazardous materials remediation, and construction. The $8.4 million from ACTC requires a $1.5 million local match.

Currently, the project is in the design phase. The city hired Kittelson & Associates, Inc., an Oakland-based organization that provides transportation engineering, planning, and research services to government agencies, municipalities, and private organizations, as consultants on the design review of the project. The city also received design input from multiple public entities including Alameda County staff, AC Transit, Alameda Housing Authority, BART Bicycle Task Force, San Francisco Bay Conservation, Bike Walk Alameda, and more. In 2022, city staff held multiple public workshops, open houses, and surveys to receive resident feedback. In one online survey, more than 50 percent of respondents said they were dissatisfied with safety around the Clement Avenue/Tilden Way project area.

At its January meeting, the City of Alameda Transportation Commission unanimously endorsed the Clement/Tilden concept with an amendment to include future proofing with communications/conduit infrastructure.

City Council was to vote at its March 7 meeting whether to authorize an amendment to the existing consultant contract with Kittelson & Associates, Inc. to enable work to begin on detailed project design in preparation for construction and acquisition of necessary permits and approvals from state agencies. The council postponed the vote until the March 21 meeting to allow for more community participation including the site tour.

If approved, construction could begin in 2024 and be completed in 2025, according to the project report.