High-Rises Heading South

The 11-Story Peninsula Mandalay Set to Open in South San Francisco

With the ever-increasing cost of available land in San Francisco, Myers Development has found a strong market for vertical condominiums on the peninsula. The $33.5 million, 112-unit tower was a design/build project.

By Thomas York

	The post-tension, 11-story housing portion of the project sits atop a 5.5-level, poured-in-place parking garage (photo courtesy of Webcor Builders).

The explosion in residential high-rise construction in San Francisco is starting to move south.

San Mateo-based Webcor Builders is finishing up construction of the $33.5-million Peninsula Mandalay, located on the southeast slope of 1,314-ft.-high San Bruno Mountain in South San Francisco.

The project, which got under way in January 2003, will be finished this month.

Jack Myers, CEO of San Francisco-based Myers Development Co., the owner and developer, said the 16-story project is the first type 5 concrete high-rise to be constructed on the increasingly congested San Francisco Peninsula, but it won't be the last.

Type 5 concrete is used in corrosive conditions or when a building's foundation is near salt water such as San Francisco Bay. It has a high tolerance to salts and corrosive
properties that would normally destroy regular concrete during
prolonged exposure.

More on the Way?

"We're likely to see a growing interest among other developers after the success we've enjoyed in pursuing that type of residential property," said Myers, based on pre-sales of the units.

Since buildable land has become so expensive, future housing projects will most likely be vertical, as in the case of the Peninsula Mandalay.

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For example, Myers said his company is working with city officials to re-entitle what was designed to be a 635,000-sq.-ft. office tower next to the Peninsula Mandalay into a mixed-used development that would feature condos as well as high-end retail.

The Peninsula Mandalay has 112 residential for-sale units in 276,000 sq. ft. of space. The units vary in size from 800 to 1,700 sq. ft., and range in price from $450,000 for one-bedroom units to more than $900,000 for three-bedroom penthouse units.

The post-tension, 11-story housing portion of the project sits atop a 5.5-level, poured-in-place parking garage.

Alameda-based MBH Architects is the design architect, while San Francisco-based LDA Architects and San Francisco-based Middlebrook + Louie completed the construction and schematic drawings for the design-build project.

Major subcontractors included Menlo Park-based Critchfield Mechanical, San Mateo-based McClenahan Plumbing, the Oakland office of Allied Fire Protection and San Jose-based Rosendin Electric. The Northern California office of the Raymond Group did the drywall and exterior plaster while Oakland-based Architectural Glass & Aluminum did the curtain walls and punched windows.

Andreas Grechi, design director for MBH, said Peninsula Mandalay was designed to take advantage of the tremendous views of San Francisco International Airport and San Francisco Bay.

"The views are incredible from the ground floor up," he said. "And they don't change much as you go up."

Removing Rock

Dave Zarubin, project director for Webcor, said the biggest challenge was excavation of a site that required carving out a 100-ft.-deep pad into the mountain. The resulting "hole" was 55-ft. high at the south end facing the mountain, and "required the construction of a massive reinforced-concrete shoring wall," he said.

"It was all solid rock, and we used hoe ramming-a huge jackhammer on the end of the excavator-to get the rock out," Zarubin added. "It was quite an effort-we took out a lot of rock."