Tower will change look of S.J. skyline
Park Habitat is one of several projects planned by development alliance
SAN JOSE >>
A development venture is sketching out a game plan to launch its first major projects, including an office tower adorned with gardens, that would greatly reshape the skyline of downtown San Jose.
Park Habitat is slated to be the first brand-new development brought to downtown San Jose by a real estate venture of global developer Westbank and local developer Gary Dillabough, who heads up real estate firm Urban Community.
This project would follow the upcoming renovation by Westbank and Dillabough of the historic Bank of Italy tower in downtown
San Jose. The Bank of Italy tower is slated to include a potentially eyecatching staircase that is designed to wend its way along the exterior of the highrise at 12 S. First St.
The Bank of Italy renovation is expected to begin within weeks and the staircase construction should get underway in a few months, said
Andrew Jacobson, head of development for Westbank’s San Jose initiative.
The brand-new office tower, Park Habitat, would total 1.2 million square feet and replace the aging Parkside Hall with offices, ground-floor retail and public spaces
The final step in the project’s approval process is the city’s administrative review of the proposed Park Habitat development. That review is likely to occur in August, Jacobson estimated.
Park Habitat would sprout — in a literal and figurative sense — next to The Tech Interactive and would feature a cutting edge concept for the workplace environment: an office in a park.
The new office tower would notably feature a series of gardens that would crown the rooftop and nestle into terraces at multiple sections of the building.
“We see this as something new not only for downtown San Jose but for Silicon Valley as a whole,” Jacobson said. “Park Habitat is creating a new idea of how people can work.”
Westbank and Urban Community believe a dichotomy exists in Silicon Valley. The region is the birthplace of countless world-changing technologies, including many breakthroughs in computers, phones, search engines, chips, graphic interfaces, communications, networks, medical devices, and life sciences.
Yet in contrast, a great many — maybe even most — tech engineers who create cutting-edge devices and services labor away in utilitarian office buildings adjacent to vast parking lots or hulking garages.
“The typical workplace functionality has been focused on inboarding campuses where everybody gets in a car or on a corporate bus, then sits in traffic and arrives at a one- or two-story building,” Jacboson said.
Park Habitat is meant to be a green-conscious and urban-oriented alternative to the modern suburban tech park.
“We hope for a sustainable solution, a net-zero energy use offering,” Jacobson said. “We want to build Park Habitat in a city where people want to live and want to walk to work. People can go to a restaurant, walk in a park, or have a drink after work. We want to do that in the most inspiring way.”
The new highrise would contain a “green lung” of environmentally friendly and health-oriented gardens in an open area inside the tower that would rise from the ground floor to the roof, according to concepts and narratives released by Westbank.
“Park Habitat is an example of how buildings can be designed when the developer has the will to employ the latest in green development,” said Bob Staedler, principal executive with Silicon Valley Synergy, a landuse consultancy.
Once the city provides final approval for the development, Westbank will then work on obtaining and activating building permits to break ground on Park Habitat.
In the wake of the coronavirus outbreak, Westbank hopes to bring forth with Park Habitat an example of new approaches for people to work in a healthy and green setting.
“The pandemic accelerated a focus on how do you want to live and how do you want to work,” Jacobson said. “How do you get people in the office. We are hoping to be a catalyst for these new ways to work.”