Goodwill buys San Jose office building for $17 million

Goodwill of Silicon Valley has just purchased an empty building at 1600 Technology Drive in North San Jose near the airport. The shiny eight-story building is destined to become Goodwill's new headquarters.

They will also use the facilities for job training and employment opportunity services, including no-cost skills training to benefit the local community.

Goodwill got the deal of the century on the building. It was previously valued at $92.4 million in January of 2024. So they paid 81.6% less than the assessed value for the 198,000 SQFT building.

The purchase was made possible by a $10 million donation from MacKenzie Scott (Jeff Bezos' ex-wife). 

Goodwill plans to immediately start relocating administrative and operations staff to the new building. Any unutilized space will be shared with other local nonprofits.

Source: The Mercury News

Astera Labs relocating HQ to San Jose

The San Jose office market is still facing many challenges (Downtown San Jose just recently hit a 20 year vacancy high), so any news is good news. Astera Labs has just announced that they are moving to San Jose.

Astera focuses on providing purpose-built connectivity solutions for intelligent systems, primarily targeting AI and cloud infrastructure. They currently have around 400 employees around the world.

Their current headquarters is in Santa Clara at 2901 Tasman Drive. Their new headquarters will be at 2345, 2315, and 2343 North First Street in North San Jose. The new space will total 154,231 SQFT of office space, with an option to expand if needed.

The planned move is scheduled for the second quarter of this year.

Source: SVBJ

Nvidia will partner with San Jose on AI as well as expand office presence in our city

As a nice little Christmas present, one of the largest and fastest growing AI companies in the world has signed a MOU to partner with the city of San Jose and SJSU. 

Nvidia will work with San Jose State University to create school programs to prepare San Jose students to enter the workforce with AI skills. Nvidia already has AI training programs at every skill level, and they would provide these to educators along with a certification path.

The city of San Jose is also looking to Nvidia for help in streamlining regulatory approvals for AI initiatives. They will offer city facilities to support AI research and development. In return, Nvidia will provide some of it's training resources related to AI to San Jose.

By leaning into the future, this is an excellent strategy to ensure San Jose will stay at the forefront of tech in years to come.

However, there is more. The icing on the cake is that Nvidia has also leased 100,000 SQFT in North San Jose (300 Holger Way). This will bring more high-paying tech jobs and tax dollars to our city. Nvidia is on a roll right now with a market cap of $3.3 trillion (with a "T") and are finding themselves in desperate need for more office space. This is an area where San Jose can gladly help out.

Source: SVBJ, The Mercury News

Latest renderings for a massive North San Jose residential project

A major infill development at 211-281 River Oaks Parkway is starting to come into focus. The project would have 737 residential units broken down into 637 apartments and 100 townhomes. 132 of the units would be reserved for affordable housing. The market rate homes will range from 536 to 1,290 SQFT for apartments and 1,230 to 1,790 SQFT for the townhomes. Enough parking would be built to accommodate 891 cars and 345 bicycles.

The location is quite good, as it is right in the middle of the Golden Triangle with easy access to San Jose's tech jobs. It's also facing Crescent Village and it's popular crescent shaped park. Several great restaurants would be a short walk away--shout out to Laksana Thai and Curry Up Now.

The developer is expecting to start construction on the townhomes by November 2026 and the apartments in the middle of 2028.

Source: SF YIMBY

New Residential Project approved for 210 Baypointe Parkway in North San Jose

A much-needed residential community has been approved in North San Jose. The plans include 42 townhomes and over 290 apartments in a seven-story building. 17 units would be designated as affordable housing. 

Part of the project would include a public paseo connecting to Casa Verde Street and the ground-floor apartments and townhomes would line that paseo. Amenities include a work-from-home space, plazas, and bike rooms. 84 parking spaces would be built for the townhomes and 332 spaces for the apartments. There would also be 146 bike parking spaces.

The site of the project is on E. Tasman Dr., a couple blocks away Light Rail and near multiple tech campuses in North San Jose. On site right now is a one-story industrial building that is 40 years old on a total land area of 4.83 acres. 

Source: SF YIMBY

VTA's old campus will become housing

What will become of the old VTA office space when they move into the shiny blue tower at 488 South Almaden in Downtown San Jose? They currently have over 200,000 SQFT of space in North San Jose. It turns out that the 17-acre campus at 3331 North First Street will likely become housing. 

The VTA is not planning to sell the property after moving into it's new home. Instead they are planning to ground lease the land for transit-oriented development projects. VTA has not announced which developers they plan to work with.

The property could support up to 1,300 new homes and the location is in the Golden Triangle near thousands of San Jose tech companies. 

In order for this project to move forward, VTA will have to move into it's new home first. This isn't expected until 2026.

Source: SVBJ

New restaurant taking shape near Levi's Stadium

Levi's Stadium is going to attract tons of attention to Silicon Valley over the next couple years with events like the Super Bowl and World Cup. Unfortunately, there are very few food and hang out options walking distance to the stadium, which also creates a traffic nightmare as people have little reason to stick around after games and events. Clara's Junction appears to be the first compelling option, at least until Related's multi-billion dollar mixed used projects across the street gets going.

What used to be a Carl's Jr. will become a 18,000 SQFT indoor/outdoor social space complete with a restaurant and over 20 beers on tap. Clara's Junction will also have craft cocktails, lawn games, fire pits, a pit BBQ and a taco truck.

The project couldn't come a moment too soon. In addition to games and events, 4,500 residential units are being built in the immediate area. There is tremendous opportunity to build some great restaurants both here and in North San Jose a couple blocks away.

Source: SFGATE

1,472 new homes headed to Seely Avenue in North San Jose

There are only a few empty lots left for development in North San Jose, one one of those is at Montague Expressway and Seely Avenue right along the Coyote Creek. The land currently has farmland and orchards, which somehow have survived over the decades right in the middle of Silicon Valley.

The proposal on the table today would add 1,472 residential units and retail between three developers: Hanover Company, Pacific Companies, and SummerHill Homes. The total project would be a whopping 2.3 million SQFT, with 1.7 million SQFT for housing, half a million SQFT for parking, and 16,120 SQFT for retail. 

Most of the housing would be 1,140 market-rate apartments which would wrap around a new public park. 178 units would be affordable housing and 154 units would be townhomes. Of the apartments, 159 would be studios, 737 are one-bedrooms, 368 are two-bedrooms, and 54 are three-bedrooms. Parking would support 1,967 cars and 944 bicycles.

Construction would last about four years from the initial groundbreaking, for which there is no ETA yet.

Source: SF YIMBY

San Jose's Archer Aviation is partnering with Southwest Airlines to build air taxi network

Archer Aviation is making a number of headlines lately. They just announced plans to build a network of five different air taxi locations across the Bay Area. Now they are announcing a partnership with Southwest Airlines to collaborate on integrating air taxis into California airports.

Southwest is California's largest airline and has operations at 14 different airports across the state. They are the largest operator at San Jose International Airport, which appears to be one of the five air taxi locations that Archer is planning.

The vision is that Southwest customers could do door-to-door trips between places like Napa or Santa Monica that do not have commercial airports within a few hours. You'd go from your Southwest flight to an air taxi that would take you to your destination in 10-15min.

Archer Aviation is headquartered at 190 W. Tasman Drive in North San Jose.

Source: Silicon Valley Business Journal

Yelp ranks a San Jose Indian restaurant as #2 in the United States

Yelp has put out it's very first ranking of the best Indian restaurants in the US, and the second one on the list is none other than Kadhai Kitchen in North San Jose. It actually started out as a food truck and is a small hole in the wall shop that serves a short menu of vegetarian options. 

I ordered almost the entire menu today on Doordash and was really impressed. In fact, I forgot it was vegetarian. Their specialties are pavs, kind of like Indian sliders using homemade buns stuffed with a potato fritter and a variety of sauces. Many people say it's as good as what you can get in Mumbai.

I ordered Pav Bhaji and Ragda Pattice along with Thums Up (an Indian soda similar to Coke that is now ironically owned by Coke). They also had a corn cutlet which is a corn and potato croquette that my wife and I loved. Their eggless date & walnut cake and a mango lassie were a great way to finish the meal. It wasn't expensive or overly spicy, and the flavors were outstanding. I think it's a perfect option for a quick meal or snack and you can't go wrong with anything on the menu. I'm already looking forward to ordering again--or better yet going in person.

Only two Indian restaurants in California made the list, which is surprising to me. Kadhai Kitchen did San Jose proud!

Kadhai Kitchen is located at 2678 Cropley Avenue and is open from 4:30pm to 9pm Tues-Fri and 4pm to 8:30pm on Sat-Sun.

Source: The Mercury News

Microsoft planning massive data center in North San Jose

Microsoft want to build two five-story data centers near the corner of Component Drive and Orchard Parkway in North San Jose. Microsoft originally paid $78.7 million for the land in 2021 and has been sitting on it ever since. With the rise of ChatGPT (which Microsoft has a big stake in), the need for data centers will skyrocket.

Part of the project would also include a water storage tank, pump building with chemical treatments for that water storage, and a new PG&E electrical substation.

The 30+ acre data center project would be right next door to a mixed-use village in North San Jose consisting of offices, hotels, and retail. That project, which is being led by LBA Realty, could clock in at 1.28 million SQFT. Today I also noticed that Apple is leasing some buildings in the area right before you turn onto Highway 87. It could be an interesting area in a few years.

Source: East Bay Times

Six-story office building to be replaced with townhomes

Over 100 homes could replace an office building in North San Jose, but there is a twist. The proposed project at 2107 North First St. would include 105 townhomes right next to the headquarters of PayPal and several other tech companies in the golden triangle of North San Jose. It has easy access to VTA Light Rail and in general is in a prime location.

Ready for the twist? In order to make room for those townhomes, a perfectly good 6-story office building would be torn down. While I understand the need to convert more office space to housing in order to balance supply and demand of each real estate use, this seems like a step backwards. Silicon Valley townhomes are typically three stories and in some rare cases four stories. 

If they are tearing down a whole office building, why not go with high-density housing? This site could easily support high-rises taller than Downtown San Jose. Townhomes do not seem like the best use for this land.

Source: The Mercury News

New renders for affordable housing in Alviso/North San Jose

Next to the Topgolf towards the very north of San Jose are plans for multiple projects. One of the more significant ones involves 780 apartments sitting on top of 16,200 SQFT of retail. The apartments would be split into eight buildings up to seven-stories tall.

The design isn't glamourous, but if it helps keep the prices reasonable I'm all for it. We definitely need more housing in this area which is near the bulk of Silicon Valley tech jobs.  

Source: SF YIMBY

San Jose will get $12.7 million to build 200 tiny homes

San Jose is acquiring state funding to purchase 200 tiny homes to house a portion of our homeless population. San Jose qualified for the funding due to its record of actually building interim housing instead of just talking about it. So far San Jose has built 499 small homes and plans for 784 more beds.

San Jose already has a site selected for the new homes in North San Jose near VTA operations. The project will be named the Cerone Interim Housing Community and it is expected to open next year.

Source: Patch

New housing development proposed in North San Jose

250 apartments are being eyed in North San Jose at North First Street between Charcot and East Brokaw. Currently there is a 122,500 SQFT six-story office building on the site. It's not clear if this is an office conversion or they are planning to tear down and replace the building. Given the size of the building there already, my bet is on an office-to-housing conversion.

Source: The Mercury News

Updated photos of the tallest buildings in Santa Clara

Santa Clara is growing up. The Tasman East area at the border with North San Jose and Alviso is going to have several new mixed-use residential towers go live well before Super Bowl 60. Gillynova from Skyscraper City has a ton of new photos of the development in the area.

These are the first residential high-rises in Santa Clara (besides a SCU dorm) and feature surprising amenities like rooftop pools. The towers are 238 and 219 feet tall. There is also a new midrise housing building which you can see below.

There are plans for even more towers in the future courtesy of Related Co, who also wants to build hotels, offices, and an entertainment complex right in front of Levi's Stadium.

Source: gillynova from Skyscraper City

804 new home proposed in Alviso next to San Jose's Topgolf

There are several large parcels in Alviso earmarked for major development, the first of which became Silicon Valley's first Topgolf. Another that was supposed to be an entertainment and retail center has transitioned to become a future data center. Now a parcel that was originally going to be a hotel is pivoting to homes, and quite a large number of them.

Genesis Commercial Capital wants to build 804 new homes on a 3.2 acre site on North First Street right next to the Topgolf--see map below. They are utilizing the state's builder's remedy to expedite and streamline the approval process (the same builder's remedy that is also sometimes weaponized to downsize previously approved projects).

At least 20% of the homes will have to be earmarked as affordable housing. Currently there is no target ETA, but given how badly San Jose needs housing I think it will be a quick approval and more in the hands of the developer on how soon they want to move dirt and get the project up and running.

Source: SVBJ

110 townhomes proposed in North San Jose at existing office site

As the office market struggles to recover, project after project has been pivoting to housing. The latest proposal is coming from SummerHill Homes and would involve replacing a two-story office building with 110 townhomes on a 5.1-acre site at 90 East Tasman Drive. 

This is a great location in the middle of the tech world's "Golden Triangle." It's in front of a VTA Light Rail stop and is a few stations away from either Levi's Stadium to the west or Milpitas BART and The Great Mall to the east.

While townhomes in many ways would certainly be an improvement over the current 1980s era office buildings at the current site, it's still a far cry from what Santa Clara is doing off of Tasman just over 1 mile away. That site is also 5-acres, but instead of townhomes it features a 23-story apartment building with 509 apartment and 191 senior housing units in a secondary tower. That is literally seven times the density of the San Jose proposal (see below).

The land here is extremely valuable. It would make sense to move a bit beyond townhomes at this point in North San Jose, especially with such great access to existing transit networks. 

Source: The Mercury News, TheRegistry

Three county offices relocated to North San Jose

A former Cisco office off Tasman in North San Jose will now provide a variety of Santa Clara County services in North San Jose. These include the Assessor's Office, the Department of Tax and Collections, and the Clerk-Recorder's Office.

These services used to be at 70 W. Hedding Street and 8523 North First Street and could be inconvenient when it comes to parking (which was mostly metered). It could also be a long walk from parking to the County offices, which are next to Courthouses and the San Jose Main Jail. On the other hand, the new offices have plentiful free and convenient parking yet are also still close to VTA bus routes and VTA Light Rail.

The new campus also has a special surprise for couples that are getting married--a brand new indoor and outdoor wedding chapel!

Source: SVBJ

Green energy startup opening 50,000 SQFT factory in San Jose to turn bricks into batteries

A battery can be a lot of different things. One form I didn't expect was a brick. Antora Energy found a way to store heat inside of carbon blocks and then storing them while the brick stays at temperatures of 1,500 degrees Celsius or higher. When energy is needed, the system can leverage that heat for industrial uses or convert the heat back to electricity.

The 50,000 SQFT manufacturing facility will be built in North San Jose and should be completed in 2024. The first brick batteries are also expected to be manufactured and delivered to customers in 2024.

Source: BayAreaINNO