Aquatic Park (Berkeley)
Aquatic Park is a public park in Berkeley, United States, located just east of the Eastshore Freeway between Ashby and University Avenues. The Works Progress Administration created the park in the 1930s with the nearby Berkeley Yacht Harbor, its centerpiece is an artificial mile-long lagoon, cut off from San Francisco Bay by the creation of a causeway for the Eastshore Highway, during the construction of the approaches to the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge in the 1930s. The lagoon still communicates with the Bay through culverts under the freeway; the east shoreline of the lagoon used to be the original shoreline of San Francisco Bay. Aquatic Park features picnic areas, "Dream Land for Kids"—a large children's playground, a pedestrian-bicycle path, a disc golf course; the lagoon is used by the Berkeley Paddling and Rowing Club year round, by the Berkeley Water Ski Club during the summer months. The lagoon is used by the nonprofit organization, Waterside Workshops, for their youth boating and sailing, boat rentals to the general public on weekends.
Waterside Workshops houses a community bikeshop at the intersection of Bolivar Drive and Bancroft Way. The Aquatic Park lagoon was a practice site for the University of California crew teams. Aquatic Park official page Aquatic Park cleans up, tackles brackish reputation Aquatic Park advocate wins conservation award Cruise Judgment: Berkeley takes tentative steps to limit public sex in Aquatic Park
Hyde Street Pier
The Hyde Street Pier, at 2905 Hyde Street, is a historic ferry pier located on the northern waterfront of San Francisco, amidst the tourist zone of Fisherman's Wharf. Prior to the opening of the Golden Gate Bridge and the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge, it was the principal automobile ferry terminal connecting San Francisco with Marin County by way of Sausalito to the north, the East Bay by way of Berkeley, it was designated part of U. S. Route 101 and U. S. Route 40; the ferries began operation by the Golden Gate Ferry Company. In early 1929, the Golden Gate Ferry Company merged with the competing auto ferry system of the Southern Pacific railroad, with ferry service to the Hyde Street Pier taken over by the new "Southern Pacific-Golden Gate Ferries, Ltd." starting on May 1, 1929. Today, the pier is part of the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park. Various historical ships are anchored to the pier, some available for self-guided or docent-led tours. Among the ships on display or in storage are the Balclutha, an 1886 square rigged sailing ship, as well as C.
A. Thayer, Alma, Eppleton Hall, over one hundred smaller craft. Photo of the Hyde Street Pier in the 1930s
Berkeley Pier
The Berkeley Pier is in Berkeley, California. When constructed in 1926, the pier extended 3.5 miles into San Francisco Bay from the end of University Avenue. Due to extensive filling of the bay and the creation of the Berkeley Marina, it presently extends only 2.5 miles. Since 1937, only the first 3,000 feet were maintained and open to the public until July 2015, when public access was closed due to safety concerns. In the mid-19th century, two private wharves were built along the Berkeley waterfront. One was located at the foot of Addison Street one block south of University Avenue and served the Standard Soap Company, a major regional soap-making factory; the other, the Jacobs and Heywood Wharf, was located several blocks north of University Avenue at the foot of Delaware Street, used as a general freight transshipment point. In 1909, the City built a municipal wharf at the foot of University Avenue; this pier was intended for a commuter ferry which never materialized, the pier was instead used for freight.
In 1925, the Golden Gate Ferry Company announced its plans to build a new ferry pier for its proposed automobile ferry service between Berkeley and San Francisco. The City of Berkeley agreed to a 50-year lease of the tidelands off the Berkeley waterfront for the construction of a new ferry pier. On January 25, 1926, the Golden Gate Ferry Company applied to the California State Railroad Commission for a certificate permitting it operate a ferry service between Berkeley and San Francisco. On July 7, 1926, the Golden Gate Ferry Company applied to the California State Railroad Commission for a certificate permitting it operate vessels on San Francisco Bay between Berkeley and San Francisco; the permit was granted. Starting in 1926, the Golden Gate Ferry Company began construction of the Berkeley Pier, it was built out from the foot of University Avenue, extending about 3.5 miles into the Bay. On June 16, 1927, auto ferry service began between the Berkeley Pier and the Hyde Street Pier in San Francisco, a pier shared with the Sausalito ferry.
In December 1929, the Golden Gate Ferry Company and the competing auto ferry system of the Southern Pacific railroad decided to merge. They petitioned for the approval of the Railroad Commission. With the approval in hand, the new Southern Pacific-Golden Gate Ferries Ltd. was incorporated on February 18, 1929. On May 1, 1929, ferry service to San Francisco from the Berkeley Pier was taken over by the new company. At the beginning of service, before the merger with SP, four specially-built diesel ferry boats ran every 15 minutes between Berkeley and San Francisco via the pier: The Golden Bear, the Golden Poppy, the Golden State, the Golden Dawn, all painted yellow. Upon merging with the SP, the boats were all re-painted in the standard Southern Pacific maritime white. In August of 1928, radio station KTAB, associated with the Pickwick Broadcasting Corporation, began construction of its broadcasting facilities including a large antenna tower at the pier. Between 1926 and 1937, the Pier served as an integral part of the Lincoln Highway, subsequently U.
S. Route 40. A two-lane road ran the entire length to a ferry dock at the end of the pier; the ferry line shut down on October 1937, 11 months after the Bay Bridge opened to auto traffic. Upon the cessation of ferry service, the portion of the pier closest to shore was converted to recreational use fishing; the remaining portion of the pier was left to decay, is still visible, but inaccessible due to a barrier. There is a gap of about fifty feet at the end of the current pier to allow the passage of small boats. In 2007, proposals were considered to start a new ferry service using a terminal near the pier. In 2015, deterioration of the pier prompted its entrance to be fenced off. Ferries of San Francisco Bay Berkeley Marina and Pier Photograph of the ferry Golden Poppy Photograph of the ferry Kehloken the Golden State37.86283°N 122.3176°W / 37.86283.
Berkeley I-80 bridge
The Berkeley I-80 bridge known as the University Avenue pedestrian bridge and the Berkeley Marina overpass is a 15-foot -wide bridge spanning the Eastshore Freeway in Berkeley, California. It forms part of the San Francisco Bay Trail; the bridge was constructed to allow bicycles and wheelchair users access to the Berkeley Marina, Eastshore State Park, the city. In the city records, the bridge is referred to as the "City of Berkeley Eastshore Pedestrian Overcrossing"; the bridge has two lanes for bikes and a raised sidewalk and is wide enough to carry emergency vehicles. Crossing 14 lanes of traffic, the main span is 85 metres long and the elevated approaches total 100 metres in length. Opened on February 27, 2002, the bridge was built at a cost of $6.4 million. The new pathway created a route in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 between Berkeley and its Marina and waterfront park region. Prior to its construction, the only wheelchair accessible route was via an undercrossing 1 mile to the north.
Bicycles and pedestrians alternately use a path and stairwell that ran under and along the University Avenue freeway overpass. Since opening, the bridge has seen a much higher use than stairwell; the National Bicycle Greenway has used it since 2003 in its Oakland to Berkeley Mayors' Ride. Bridges portal California portal San Francisco Bay Area portal Berkeley Daily Planet, February 28, 2002 Consulting firm's web page Berkeley I-80 Pedestrian Overcrossing at Structurae Photos of the opening
Oakland International Airport
Oakland International Airport is an international airport in Oakland, United States. It is located 10 miles south of Downtown Oakland and across from San Francisco, situated on the other side of the San Francisco Bay, it is owned by the Port of Oakland and features passenger services to cities in the United States and Europe with additional cargo destinations in China and Japan. In 2018, 13,594,251 people traveled through OAK. Oakland is a focus city for Allegiant Air; as of August 2015 Southwest has 120 daily departures on peak-travel days of the week making it Southwest’s largest operation in California. Alaska Airlines combined with sister-carrier Horizon Air has been the second-busiest carrier at the airport through 2013. In January 2014, Delta overtook Alaska as the airport's No. 2 carrier. The city of Oakland looked into the construction of an airport starting in 1925. In 1927 the announcement of the Dole prize for a flight from California to Hawaii provided the incentive to purchase 680 acres in April 1927 for the airport.
The 7,020-foot-long runway was the longest in the world at the time, was built in just 21 days to meet the Dole race start. The airport was dedicated by Charles Lindbergh September 17. In its early days, because of its long runway enabling safe takeoff rolls for fuel-heavy aircraft, Oakland was the departing point of several historic flights, including Charles Kingsford Smith's historic US-Australia flight in 1928, Amelia Earhart's final flight in 1937. Earhart departed from this airport when she made her final, ill-fated voyage, intending to return there after circumnavigating the globe. Boeing Air Transport began scheduled flights to Oakland in December 1927, it was joined by Trans World Airlines in 1932. In 1929, Boeing opened the Boeing School of Aeronautics on the field, which expanded in 1939 as part of the Civilian Pilot Training Program. Thousands of pilots and mechanics were trained before the facility was changed into the United Air Lines training center in 1945. In 1943, the U. S. Armed Forces temporarily opened Naval Air Station Oakland.
It was transformed into an airlift base for military flights to the Pacific islands, ordering all scheduled service to move to San Francisco International Airport. After the war, airlines returned to Oakland; the airport's first Jet Age airline terminal was designed by John Carl Warnecke & Associates and opened in 1962, part of a $20 million expansion on bay fill that included the 10,000-foot runway 11/29. The May 1963 OAG showed 15 airline flights arriving in Oakland each day, including nine from San Francisco. During the Vietnam War, World Airways shuttled thousands of military passengers through Oakland to their bases in Southeast Asia, an international arrivals facility was built, allowing the airport to handle international flights for the first time. World Airways had broken ground on the World Airways Maintenance Center at Oakland International Airport; the maintenance hangar could store four Boeing 747's. It opened in May 1973. After the war Oakland's traffic slumped, but airline deregulation prompted several low-fare carriers to begin flights.
This increase prompted the airport to build a $16.3 million second terminal, the Lionel J. Wilson Terminal 2, with seven gates for PSA and AirCal service. In 1987 an Air France Concorde visited Oakland to provide supersonic two-hour flights to the Pacific halfway to Hawaii and back to Oakland. FedEx Express opened a cargo base at OAK in 1988, now one of the busiest air freight terminals in the United States. In the 1990s, Southwest Airlines opened a crew base in Oakland, expanded its flights to become the airport's dominant passenger carrier; the airport has international arrival facilities, including U. S. Customs and Border Protection officials. Mexicana Airlines flew between cities in Mexico for many years. In the past Corsairfly flew Orly Airport to OAK to Papeete, Martinair flew to Schiphol Airport and CityBird flew to Brussels Airport in Brussels. United Airlines vacated its 300,000 sq ft Oakland Maintenance Center in May 2003 and transferred work to its base across the bay at San Francisco International Airport.
Oakland International Airport began a $300 million expansion and renovation project in 2004, including adding five gates in Terminal 2. The new concourse opened in fall 2006, was opened by spring 2007, a new baggage claim in Terminal 2 opened in summer 2006; the former Terminal 2 baggage claim has been replaced by a renovated and expanded security screening area. As part of this program, airport roadways and parking lots were renovated by the end of 2008. In 2008 Oakland saw a series of cutbacks due to high fuel costs and airline bankruptcies, more than other Bay Area airports. In just a few days, Oakland's numerous non-stops to Hawaii were eliminated following the liquidation of ATA Airlines and Aloha Airlines, although Hawaiian Airlines started a daily flight to Honolulu a month later. Skybus Airlines stopped flying to Columbus, OH when it ended operations on April 5. American Airlines and Continental Airlines both dropped Oakland on September 3, United Airlines ended service to Los Angeles on November 2, TACA ended service to San Salvador on September 1.
New air traffic control tower A groundbreaking ceremony for a new control tower took place October 15, 2010. A grant awarded to the Federal A
World War II
World War II known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. The vast majority of the world's countries—including all the great powers—eventually formed two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. A state of total war emerged, directly involving more than 100 million people from over 30 countries; the major participants threw their entire economic and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. World War II was the deadliest conflict in human history, marked by 50 to 85 million fatalities, most of whom were civilians in the Soviet Union and China, it included massacres, the genocide of the Holocaust, strategic bombing, premeditated death from starvation and disease, the only use of nuclear weapons in war. Japan, which aimed to dominate Asia and the Pacific, was at war with China by 1937, though neither side had declared war on the other. World War II is said to have begun on 1 September 1939, with the invasion of Poland by Germany and subsequent declarations of war on Germany by France and the United Kingdom.
From late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Finland and the Baltic states. Following the onset of campaigns in North Africa and East Africa, the fall of France in mid 1940, the war continued between the European Axis powers and the British Empire. War in the Balkans, the aerial Battle of Britain, the Blitz, the long Battle of the Atlantic followed. On 22 June 1941, the European Axis powers launched an invasion of the Soviet Union, opening the largest land theatre of war in history; this Eastern Front trapped most crucially the German Wehrmacht, into a war of attrition. In December 1941, Japan launched a surprise attack on the United States as well as European colonies in the Pacific. Following an immediate U. S. declaration of war against Japan, supported by one from Great Britain, the European Axis powers declared war on the U.
S. in solidarity with their Japanese ally. Rapid Japanese conquests over much of the Western Pacific ensued, perceived by many in Asia as liberation from Western dominance and resulting in the support of several armies from defeated territories; the Axis advance in the Pacific halted in 1942. Key setbacks in 1943, which included a series of German defeats on the Eastern Front, the Allied invasions of Sicily and Italy, Allied victories in the Pacific, cost the Axis its initiative and forced it into strategic retreat on all fronts. In 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained its territorial losses and turned toward Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in Central China, South China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy and captured key Western Pacific islands; the war in Europe concluded with an invasion of Germany by the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, culminating in the capture of Berlin by Soviet troops, the suicide of Adolf Hitler and the German unconditional surrender on 8 May 1945.
Following the Potsdam Declaration by the Allies on 26 July 1945 and the refusal of Japan to surrender under its terms, the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 and 9 August respectively. With an invasion of the Japanese archipelago imminent, the possibility of additional atomic bombings, the Soviet entry into the war against Japan and its invasion of Manchuria, Japan announced its intention to surrender on 15 August 1945, cementing total victory in Asia for the Allies. Tribunals were set up by fiat by the Allies and war crimes trials were conducted in the wake of the war both against the Germans and the Japanese. World War II changed the political social structure of the globe; the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The Soviet Union and United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the nearly half-century long Cold War. In the wake of European devastation, the influence of its great powers waned, triggering the decolonisation of Africa and Asia.
Most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic expansion. Political integration in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities and create a common identity; the start of the war in Europe is held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred and the two wars merged in 1941; this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935; the British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the fo
Interstate 80 in California
Interstate 80 is a major east–west route of the Interstate Highway System, running between the U. S. states of New Jersey. The highway has its western terminus in San Francisco. From there it heads east across the Bay Bridge to Oakland, where it turns north and crosses the Carquinez Bridge before turning back northeast through the Sacramento Valley. I-80 traverses the Sierra Nevada, cresting at Donner Summit, before crossing into the state of Nevada within the Truckee River Canyon; the speed limit is at most 65 miles per hour along the entire route instead of the state's maximum of 70 mph and most of the route is in either urban areas or mountainous terrain. I-80 has portions designated as Alan S. Hart Freeway. Throughout California, I-80 was built along the corridor of U. S. Route 40 replacing this designation entirely; the prior US 40 corridor itself was built along several historic corridors in California, notably the California Trail and Lincoln Highway. The route has changed from the original plans in San Francisco due to freeway revolts canceling segments of the planned alignment.
In Sacramento, the freeway was re-routed around the city after plans to upgrade the original grandfathered route through the city to Interstate highway standards were cancelled. I-80 is recognized as the Dwight D. Eisenhower Highway in the western United States and a Blue Star Memorial Highway for its entire length. In California, it follows the original corridor of the Lincoln Highway from Sacramento to Reno. I-80 is part of the California Freeway and Expressway System, is part of the National Highway System, a network of highways that are considered essential to the country's economy and mobility by the Federal Highway Administration. I-80 is known as the Dutch Flat and Donner Lake Wagon Road from Emigrant Gap to Donner Lake. According to the California Street and Highways code, most maps, local signs, I-80 begins at the intersection with U. S. Route 101 in San Francisco. However, federal logs place the western terminus of I-80 at the western approach to the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge, at the location of the Fremont Street off-ramp.
The two logs disagree as to whether the first 1.20 miles of the signed Interstate, known as the San Francisco Skyway or Bayshore Viaduct, are part of the Interstate Highway System, although it is shown as I-80 on most maps of San Francisco. The Eastshore Freeway is a segment of Interstates 80 and 580 along the northeast shoreline of San Francisco Bay in northern California, it begins at the Carquinez Bridge and ends at the MacArthur Maze interchange just east of the eastern end of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge. Interstate 580 joins the Eastshore Freeway at an interchange known locally as the "Hoffman Split" in Albany; the section of the Eastshore Freeway between the MacArthur Maze and the 580 split between Albany is a wrong-way concurrency where the northbound direction is signed as I-80 East and I-580 West, while the southbound direction is signed as westbound I-80 and eastbound I-580. This segment suffers from severe traffic congestion during rush hour due to the merger of three freeways at the MacArthur Maze.
The Eastshore Freeway was created in the mid 1950s by re-engineering the Eastshore Highway, a thoroughfare constructed in the 1930s as one of the approaches to the Bay Bridge and designated as part of U. S. Route 40; the Eastshore Highway began in El Cerrito at an intersection with San Pablo Avenue at Hill Street between Potrero Avenue and Cutting Blvd. Adjacent to the location today of the El Cerrito Del Norte station of BART, it was not a freeway in that access was at intersections with adjoining streets rather than by ramps. The Eastshore Highway ran from El Cerrito to the Bay Bridge along the same routing as today's freeway, although it was much narrower. A causeway was constructed for this purpose by filling in part of the mudflats along the bayshore. In the stretch from University to Ashby Avenues in Berkeley, this resulted in the creation of an artificial lagoon, developed by the Works Progress Administration in the late 1930s as "Aquatic Park"; the frontage road along the east side of today's Eastshore Freeway between Buchanan Street in Albany and Hearst Avenue in Berkeley retains the name "Eastshore Highway".
The terminal segment of the old Eastshore Highway in El Cerrito between Potrero and San Pablo Avenues is today named "Eastshore Boulevard". The name "Eastshore Freeway" was applied to what is today known as the "Nimitz Freeway" upon its construction in 1947; this freeway was dedicated in 1958 to Admiral Nimitz, so for a few years in the 1950s prior, the Eastshore Freeway stretched the entire length of the east shore of San Francisco Bay. Until the late 1960s, the Eastshore Freeway was designated as part of State Route 17 together with the Nimitz Freeway; this section of I-80 has a top speed of 65 mph, unlike California's top speed limit of 70 mph, common in rural freeways. I-80 is a six- to eight-lane freeway with carpool lanes in Fairfield from exit 39A to exit 47. I-80 has changed routing in the Sacramento area; the freeway runs on a northern bypass of the city, the Beltline Freeway, designated I-880. The I-80 routing alignment was moved from a route through Sacramento, now U. S. Route 50 and I-80 Business, after the proposed I-80 replacement of the North Sacramento Freeway was can
