The Trader Joe’s in Oakland’s Rockridge neighborhood could close for the construction of two senior housing towers at the site.
Dan Hernandez/S.F. Chronicle
Regarding “‘Hands off my Trader Joe’s’: Oakland neighborhood reels from plan to replace store with housing” (East Bay, SFChronicle.com, April 22): Contrary to what the spokesperson for developer Align Real Estate had the nerve to say, I think many “retirees and empty nesters” would be happy to own their homes and remain in the Rockridge neighborhood of Oakland.
Would retirees and empty nesters be guaranteed a unit in the proposed senior housing? And do they really want to be in the towers — one of which is proposed for 31 stories.
I also wonder why Trader Joe’s has to be torn down. Why can’t the developer design something that incorporates the store? Removing it takes away the neighborhood’s grocery store.
Article continues below this ad
I don’t live in Rockridge, but anyone familiar with the area knows it is predominantly one-story and two-story buildings. A couple of towers would be totally out of place.
A one-story Trader Joe’s store and its sprawling parking lot could become a pair of towers that would house a 415-unit senior living campus in Oakland’s Rockridge neighborhood.
SCB Architects
What big cities need
Regarding “‘Hands off my Trader Joe’s’: Oakland neighborhood reels from plan to replace store with housing” (East Bay, SFChronicle.com, April 22): The plan for two senior housing towers in Oakland’s Rockridge neighborhood is what the city, region and the state need.
Article continues below this ad
San Francisco Chronicle Logo
Make us a Preferred Source to get more of our news when you search.
Add Preferred Source
More people need to live in denser housing near public transit, jobs, medical facilities and shopping areas. With energy shortages and higher gas prices, the days of two-hour commutes to the distant suburbs are over, and the urban centers are back.
That means high-rise residential construction, as in downtown Berkeley, will be more the norm in other cities and vibrant neighborhoods like Rockridge.
Sceptics, like the woman in the story who said, “They’re trying to make it a big city, and we don’t want it,” should look at Oakland’s population: It’s about 440,000, which ranks it as roughly the 45th-largest city in the country.
Article continues below this ad
No comparison to Holocaust
Regarding Joel Pett’s political cartoon (Letters to the Editor, April 27): Comparing America’s immigration enforcement to the Holocaust is a historical error.
The Shoah was the industrialized extermination of 6 million Jews — the culmination of over 1,000 years of European antisemitism, made possible only by a totalitarian state with no independent courts, no free press and no democratic opposition.
Nazi Germany required the willing collaboration of occupied nations across Europe. None of those conditions exists today in the U.S.
The Trump administration’s immigration policies are harsh, and most Americans rightly find them cruel and un-American. But cruelty is not genocide. We still have federal judges blocking executive overreach, a free press documenting abuses and elections ahead. Our democracy is weakened but intact.
Article continues below this ad
Cheap Holocaust analogies don’t strengthen the case against these policies — they weaken it and dishonor those who perished in a darkness that had no such safeguards.
Ronald Albucher, San Francisco
Sunset Dunes underutilized
Regarding “S.F.’s Sunset Dunes celebrates a year of car-free fun amid push to reverse course” (San Francisco, SFChronicle.com, April 26): As a 25-year resident of the Sunset District, I understand that many people are enjoying Sunset Dunes park, but they enjoy it on the weekend.
If you go to the park during the middle of the week, few people are using it, and that is when commuters need to use it as a road. The most reasonable solution is to close it to traffic only on the weekends.
Article continues below this ad
Compromise is not a bad thing, especially in this case.
Adam Michels, San Francisco
Action louder than words
I don’t believe political rhetoric is what drove the suspect in the apparent assassination attempt on President Donald Trump; it was the actions of the Trump administration.
Guest opinions in Open Forum and Insight are produced by writers with expertise, personal experience or original insights on a subject of interest to our readers. Their views do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Chronicle editorial board, which is committed to providing a diversity of ideas to our readership.
Read more about our transparency and ethics policies
President Trump should tone down his own hateful rhetoric. The left is not fomenting violence simply by calling out the Trump administration or by protesting.
The Trump administration is using this event to blame the left and cause even more division between us all.