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A new fitness facility planned for Vintage Hills Shopping Center will be accessible to members around the clock, using security systems including a dedicated 911 line and the option for exercising patrons to wear necklaces that send out distress signals.
“Where Anytime Fitness really stands out from the crowd is in their use of proprietary access software, security and surveillance technology,” said Jordan Boreman and Debra Casados in their application for a use permit. “The integration of these systems allows owners to operate safe and secure clubs with greatly reduced staffing needs.”
Boreman and Casados already own Anytime Fitness studios in Pleasanton, Livermore and San Ramon.
“From our experiences, we average about 10-15 members in the studio during peak operating hours,” they reported.
The Pleasanton Planning Commission approved the conditional use permit for the new Anytime Fitness at its Aug. 25 meeting, and the owners are planning improvements to the space in the Vintage Hills Shopping Center at the intersection of Bernal Avenue and Vineyard Avenue/Tawny Drive.
“We’re going to have a stretching room and an office, and the entire gym will be open outside of those two rooms and the bathrooms,” said fitness consultant Adam Chan, who was transferred from the San Ramon facility to work at Vintage Hills.
The facility will join 1,300 gyms worldwide in the 7-year-old Anytime Fitness franchise, headquartered in Hastings, Minn. The co-ed club specializes in its 24-hour access, affordable membership fees, quality exercise equipment and neighborhood locations, according to its website.
The Vintage Hills facility will have one employee on site from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. and 4-8 p.m. daily, as well as personal trainers, according to the city staff report. There will be no group fitness classes or locker rooms although there will be two restrooms. A small tanning room is also proposed.
Neighbors sent emails to the city supporting the project.
“I think it’s great to see new businesses move in,” Kurt Brockett wrote. “The center being empty is a real bummer and I hope by creating recurring customer traffic the facility will help draw other business such as a coffee shop and hopefully a grocery store in the large space.”
“I feel it will be a good addition to the center,” wrote Kenneth Blair, who said he has already joined the gym. “Anytime Fitness has no deliveries, no construction except the inside of the building. I am sure the majority of the people who join the club will be neighborhood people.”
Vintage Hills Shopping Center, despite the vacant 20,000-square-foot space that once was occupied by Romley’s market, is home to some thriving businesses. These include a hair cutting salon, a spa, a frozen yogurt shop, a laundry and dry cleaning shop, a jewelry store, a sushi restaurant, a dance studio, and a tae kwon do studio.
FINALLY that shopping center is filling up. I’ve lived in the area since 1996 and it is unbelievable that the place has sat largely empty all these years. How the owner has been able to afford that is beyond me. I’ve often thought a Trader Joes/Peets/Starbucks would have been a great draw as well, but nothing along those lines ever materialized. Hurray for the fitness center. I’ve joined!
Would love to see a Trader Joe’s in that space!!! They sell good quality and reasonably priced food, and they are small enough for that space.
Living in the south end of town, we don’t have many options for food-shopping other than Raley’s. Getting to Trader Joe’s can take a long time depending on traffic.
I am glad something is going in that shopping center and I hope the owners take care of the new facility better than they are taking care of the other one in Pleasanton. Right now MANY of the TV’s don’t work, there’s so much dust under machines that when you use them, you can feel dust in your throat. Many of the hand sanitizers are empty. It seems as if they just opened the gym and let it go without maintaining it. Calls to the headquarters do not help since the gyms are individually owned and operated. Get a commitment from them that they will maintain the gym before you sign the contract!
The contracts at least when I signed up were month to month with no enrollment fee so should be little risk to cancel if it doesn’t stay maintained.