Send this story Print this story

Adjust text size

City OKs $5.3 million for new adobe park
Historic site once home to Indians, Spanish, dairy farm

by Jeb Bing

The City Council Tuesday approved a proposed $5.3-million construction and restoration project that will create a 6-acre Alviso Adobe Community Park, to be located across from the Laguna Oaks community at 3461 Old Foothill Road.

The project, first discussed in 1995 and then detailed in the city's draft Master Plan report in May 2000, has seen continued delays both because of funding requirements and also planning changes. When completed late next year, the new park and historical site will offer a unique opportunity to learn more about the heritage of the city of Pleasanton.

"This community park would provide residents of Pleasanton a new millennium opportunity to learn first-hand about the Ohlone Native Americans, the Spanish-Mexicans and the 19th century dairy industry--legacies of the past," wrote Lydiksen Elementary School teacher David Hartman in a Pleasanton Weekly article in 2000.

Hartman, along with the Museum on Main and Jim Wolfe, director of Parks and Community Services, campaigned vigorously to save and restore the adobe, which is now a deteriorating building barely visible on a hillside overlooking Foothill Drive.

In its action Tuesday, the council awarded the restoration and construction project to JFC Construction of Martinez in the amount of $4,393,855. With other funds needed, the total will be $5,344,536.

JFC will be responsible for building the historically-themed 6-acre community park, including restoration of the adobe structure, reconstruction of the historic milking barn and fabrications and installation of the museum-style historic interpretive program that could be run by the Museum on Main.

Construction of the park's parking lot, entrance roadway and related features at the project's southern end will be completed by the developer of an eight-home subdivision on adjacent acreage with the associated costs to be paid by the city.

The site now consists of undeveloped parkland and the adobe, officially named the Francisco Alviso Adobe in the California Register of Historical Resources. It was one of the first adobes built in California. Part of the original Mission San Jose in the 18th century, the site was included in a land grant to 8,680 acres to Alviso.

Plans for the hillside park include replicating the early 20th century Meadowlark Dairy barn, a bunkhouse and an adobe brick-making area.

The new community park "will be a walk through three periods of our history," Wolfe said. "It will provide visitors with a look at the Indian, Early California and the dairy periods."

Actually, archaeological digs show that the site has been in use at least since the fourth millennium B.C., with the influx and occupation of the land by the predecessors of the Ohlone Indians.

Construction of the new and restored facilities is expected to get under way in July.