Picnic by the lake with Senator Dave Cortese - Sep 30th at Hellyer County Park in South San Jose

Sen. Dave Cortese is hosting an inaugural "Picnic by the Lake" multicultural festival and resource fair in South San Jose. Everyone is welcome. Firefighters will be grilling up beef and veggie burgers for visitors, and unlike many things in life they will be completely free. There will also be a pumpkin patch filled with free pumpkins (while supplies last) and raffle prizes.

For the kids, there will be inflatables, face painting, and rock climbing. Entertainment includes performances from Folklorico Nacional Mexicano, Viet Steps dancers, and others.

Attendees can also get free flu shots and COVID vaccines. Up to 100 resource booths will also be there as well to promote other city resources.

The event will be Saturday, September 30th from 10am to 3pm at the scenic Hellyer County Park.

Source: San Jose Spotlight

380 North 1st apartment project moves forward in North San Jose

A seven-story apartment project at 380 North 1st street is moving forward to environmental review. The proposal is an infill project that will replace a two-story commercial building at the edge of Downtown San Jose (5 minute walk to St. James Park).

The apartment building will have 118 homes, 18 of which will be designated as affordable units. There will be 74 parking spaces at the ground level using a car stacking system that will stack up to three cars on top of one another. There will also be parking for 30 bicycles and a bike cafe. An amenity deck is situated on the third floor and a clubroom with a balcony on the sixth floor.

Overall it's a significant upgrade from what was there before and is close to both Light Rail and transit lines (Buses 72 and 73 stop across the street).

Source: SF YIMBY

Reimagining of Oakridge Mall in South San Jose as suburban village with two high-rises

There has been a lot of discussion around Santana Row on X recently, but other concepts similar to it have been in the works for a long time in the San Jose metro.

The architect behind a new apartment project (380 N. 1st Street, more on that tomorrow) also created an interesting concept for Westfield. Imagine what Oakridge mall's gigantic parking lot could be turned into. The renders below look very similar to a slightly small Santana Row that is directly attached to the mall.

The concept has two high-rises and several mid-rise buildings with 1,500 apartments, a hotel, 250,000 SQFT of office space, 25,000 SQFT of new retail space. Macy's would be turned into an industrial innovation center with maker spaces for artists.

It would be interesting to see Oakridge as a mixed-use destination. This would certainly give South San Jose a stronger sense of place as no high-rise projects exist there today. There are a few mixed-use proposals such as this one, but nothing of this scale.

Right now it is just a concept, but given Valley Fair's immense success in their last expansion, perhaps this is something that could see the light of day.

Source: Silicon Valley Joe from Skyscraper City

TikTok has close to 1,000 San Jose job openings with generous salaries

Silicon Valley's demise has been greatly exaggerated. Despite migration to Austin and other cities, the San Jose metro still has the highest proportion of tech jobs and the best salaries for tech in the US. The unemployment rate is near an all-time low and tech companies are beginning to ramp up hiring again post-pandemic.

TikTok's US headquarters are located in San Jose at 1199 Coleman Ave (also known as the Coleman Highline). They have a whopping 987 job openings. That's probably because they are hiring everywhere, right? Nope. Their San Jose openings make up 23% of all of their job openings globally. TikTok has access to far less expensive workers anywhere besides here, but they are continuing to aggressively hire in San Jose.

Examples of job opening are: 

• Senior machine learning engineers with a base salary of $187,040 to $280,000
• Lead graphics software engineer with a base salary of $187,040 to $358,000
• Lead machine learning engineer with a base salary of $210,000 to $358,000

Those are base salary ranges without bonuses, incentives, restricted stock units, or benefits. A top performer could earn double that range. Also, those aren't even managerial positions. 

If you're just starting out, don't worry they also have internships available at $45/hr.

TikTok is also hiring 178 people in Mountain View and 18 in San Francisco. So again, even within the Bay Area they are focused on the Capital of Silicon Valley.

Source: SVBJ

Photo by Abhishek Monangi

Photo by Abhishek Monangi

Photo by Abhishek Monangi

Viva CalleSJ: Calle >> Matsuri (San Jose's Japantown, Kelley Park, and Tamien Park)

Viva CalleSJ is back for it's 3rd event of the year! Miles of city streets will be completely shut down to let people walk, run, dance, bike, unicycle, skateboard, or hoverboard down the streets of San Jose. 

Calle >> Matsuri features three activity hubs which are festivals-within-a-festival that highlight the local area. This time the activity hubs will be at Japantown, Kelley Park, and Tamien Park. You can expect live music, vendors, food, activities, bike parking, and good times at all of the hubs. In between the activity hubs you will still find all sorts of interesting stops, hydration stations, and stores. Watch the video below to get a feel for the event if you've never done one.

As an added bonus, Happy Hollow Park and Zoo will be providing free admission for anyone participating in the Viva CalleSJ. This is the first time I remember this happening, so it's worth taking advantage of--especially if you're going with your family.

The event takes place on Sunday, September 10th from 10am to 3pm (streets are closed until 4pm). There is no beginning or end and the traffic flows in both directions. It's completely free and you can use the handy map below to locate the routes and festivities. For more info, head over here.

San Jose housing project upsized in "Uptown"

The site of the former Century 24 domed movie theater at 741 South Winchester Blvd. is destined to become an affordable housing project. The developers SyRes Properties LLC is increasing the number of units to 264 in a seven-story residential building.

The project would have 35 studios, 113 one-bedroom apartments, and 116 two-bedroom apartments. 20% of the units units would be considered affordable, which allow the complex to qualify as a housing development for very low, low, or moderate-income households. This designation allows the developer to apply for a "builder's remedy" which not only accelerates the project through city planning but enables to builder to add more units to the project.

The project would also include a community room, a 3rd floor outdoor space, a gym, and co-working spaces for residents. However, the biggest draw might be that is is just blocks away from Santana Row and other development projects around the Winchester Mystery House.

Source: The Merc

Rollati Ristorante - New 7,000 SQFT flagship restaurant coming to Downtown San Jose

There has been some debate lately on the state of Downtown San Jose. A viral video has been circulating around showing all the empty storefronts throughout Downtown, but it glossed over not only areas that are very active today but failed to point out the exciting new projects coming to our city's core. Rollati is definitely one of those projects.

The Silicon Valley Business Journal snagged an exclusive about the new restaurant. If you have a subscription you can access it here. Below are my notes.

Rollati Ristoranti is coming from the same team behind Left Bank Brasserie, LB Steak, Meso Modern Mediterranean and Camper in Menlo Park. It will be one of the anchor tenants on the ground floor of the Miro apartment towers across from City Hall. The restaurant is 7,000 SQFT large (massive) and will seat up to 189 people between an indoor dining room, bar and lounge, private dining rooms, a retail cafe, and outdoor space. A large outdoor dining area will be on both sides of the restaurant and accommodate up to 52 people.

The "retail cafe" definitely piqued my interest when I read the article. This will be a market that sells pastas, house-made sauces, and some prepared items like meatballs. It's catered towards the residents upstairs and Downtown workers that might want to quickly grab some items to take home.

The CEO of the company behind the restaurant described the menu as a "love letter to Italian-American cuisine" and stated that "a modern American-Italian restaurant hasn't been done in the caliber we're hoping." Bring it on I say!

Two sides of the restaurant space will have floor to ceiling windows to let in a lot of natural light and the vibe is going to be modern yet nostalgic.

The grand opening is slated for some time in September and dinner hours will be 5pm-9pm Sunday through Thursday and 5pm to 10pm on Friday and Saturday. For near real-time photos and additional info as it becomes available, follow The San Jose Blog on X.

Source: SVBJ

San Jose's secret video game vault in Downtown San Jose

Downtown San Jose already has several great venues for gamers. You have the epic-sized Guildhouse and LvL Uproar Brewery in SoFA, Miniboss for arcades and pinball, and San Pedro Social. However, did you know there is a treasure trove of video game nostalgia in a basement at 124 East Santa Clara Street?

Below a nondescript IT repair shop is Gameshop Downstairs. Here you can find classic games, vintage consoles, and all sorts of memorabilia from the many decades video games have been around now. If you're looking for Pokémon trading cards, yes they have those too.

As games are increasingly going digital, it's nice to know there is still a place where you can find a physical piece of gaming history. The N64 was my favorite console of all time and you can still buy cartridges here instead of dealing with eBay or garage sales. If you love games, I'd highly recommend swinging by next time you're in the area. Full address and hours below:

Gameshop Downstairs

124 E Santa Clara St, #B

Monday 10:00 am - 6:00 pm

Tuesday 10:00 am - 6:00 pm

Wednesday Closed

Thursday 10:00 am - 6:00 pm

Friday 10:00 am - 6:00 pm

Saturday 11:00 am - 5:00 pm

Sunday Closed

Source: Monterey Herald