San Jose City Hall Block Party on Thursday, Oct 17th

Dozens of businesses around City Hall will be participating in the last Downtown San Jose block party for 2024. This is an up and coming area that is starting to get a lot of traction. Rollati, one of my favorite Downtown restaurants, is located in this district as well as the new and unique Paleta Planeta.

The event will feature live music, tons of food, over 100 local makers & artists, tours of new businesses, and activities for the whole family. Ground zero will be right in front of San Jose City Hall.

The event runs from 5pm to 9pm and there is free parking for 90min in city-owned garages or free parking all night on metered spaces after 6pm.You can also easily take Light Rail to the Santa Clara Station and walk two blocks.

San Jose Fry's Electronics will become a tech hub

The beloved Fry's Electronics on Brokaw road finally has a new destiny. Super Micro Computer, which is headquartered in San Jose, wants to build a 333,400 SQFT manufacturing and tech center in its place. This would be part of a future tech hub replacing the Fry's store and office building.

Fortunately, they would keep the Mayan facade from Fry's and somehow incorporate it into the project. The total project could encompass a couple million SQFT, but it could be years or decades before that comes to fruition.

Source: The Mercury News

Cisco is consolidating San Jose offices at Santana Row

After acquiring Splunk in 2024, Cisco is now working on consolidating office space. While the company has 30 buildings across its North San Jose campus, you could argue that their flagship building is sitting at the end of Santana Row. 

Cisco is planning to close four buildings at 3750 Zanker Road and 260, 300, and 350 East Tasman Drive and moving those lucky employees to the former Splunk headquarters at the Row in mid October.

The space--which I'm assuming was already pretty nice to begin with--is also undergoing a renovation. The best way to encourage people to head back into the office is to make the office an amenity. The location will certainly help here.

Source: SVBJ

Porsche is setting up shop at Santana Row

Santana Row made history as the very first location for a Tesla Store. It disrupted the entire auto market with a direct-to-consumer model and a buying experience similar to an Apple Store--perhaps because the person responsible for Apple Stores was behind the initial Tesla Store concept. Several auto makers followed suit including Lucid and Polestar which have similar stores across the street in Valley Fair. The Santana Row Tesla Store has also become so popular that it significantly expanded it's original square footage into a neighboring retail pad a few years ago. 

Now traditional automakers are getting in on the action. Porsche is opening their very first Porsche NOW concept at Santana Row.

The store will enable visitors to interact with the Porsche brand in a lounge-like environment and tinker with one of Porsche's electrified models such as the Taycan or Macan Electric. This would make sense given San Jose is the largest market for electric vehicles per capita of any large city in the US.

The Porsche NOW store is located near Hotel Valencia at 355 Santana Row and had their soft opening last week.

Source: SVBJ

African American Cultural Center with housing proposed in San Jose

The African American Cultural Center is being proposed at 2001 The Alameda, right before San Jose turns into Santa Clara as you head away from Downtown San Jose. The project raised $3 million in funds August last year and another $4.1 million in federal funding this March. In total they have already raised $30 million.

The center is designed to serve as a hub for education, music, theater, dance, science, athletics, and business. The building itself will have meeting halls, banquet facilities, youth development facilities, a library, museum gallery, senior and youth programs, child care, a theatre, and even some retail.

Now there is also a major housing component to this project as well. EAH Housing is planning to build about 150 units, 135 of which would be affordable. 12 to 15 of the units would be for-sale condos. EAH Housing is a nonprofit that has already developed 107 properties and 8,700 residential units.

There is no ETA as a bit more fundraising needs to be completed, but this looks like a great mixed-use project for San Jose.

Source: SiliconValley.com

Mosaic Festival today at History Park San Jose

The Mosaic Festival celebrates the diverse cultures in our own neighborhoods. The purpose of the event is to welcome and honor everyone's unique history while also creating a vision of our shared future. There will be music, dancing, vendors, food, and activities.

The event is free and open to all ages. It takes place from 10am to 6pm today at History Park San Jose.

7th Annual Little Italy San Jose Italian Festival

The Little Italy San Jose Italian Festival is back this Sunday, October 6th. This is an action packed event going from 11am to 7pm, with an afterparty at the Italian Cellar Speakeasy from 7pm to 11pm.

The festival includes one of the largest Italian car shows in the United States, tons of authentic Italian cuisine, wine tasting, nonstop live music, arts & crafts, children's activities, and tours of the brand new Italian Museum (San Jose's first new museum in ages).

For more information, head over here.

Blossom Hill housing project moves forward

A parking lot at the Blossom Hill VTA station is getting one step closer to becoming a 328 home project. The six-story building will have 239 market-rate homes and 14,000 SQFT of retail on the ground floor. A five-story building across the street will have 89 affordable housing units. The project would also create a new transit plaza for South San Jose VTA riders and a walking/biking trail along Canoas Creek.

While the project was approved in 2022, not a lot has happened. The affordable housing component just received a $5.5 million boost from the government.

In a best-case scenario, the affordable housing piece will start construction in the summer of 2025 with the market rate portion to follow.

Source: SVBJ