A downtown soccer stadium, convention center and new hotels and housing won’t be coming to downtown Concord anytime in the foreseeable future, and the coronavirus is one of the reasons.
According to the city, the Walnut Creek-based Hall Equities Group is declining to move forward with the project approved by the city council two years ago. The company and the city had an agreement to have exclusive negotiations to finance the project and determine its financial feasibility, but Hall Equities Group is now declining to take part.
The decision was first reported Wednesday by Bay City News.
“It’s unfortunate,” said John Montagh, Concord’s economic development manager. “But it’s understandable given the situation at hand and the realities of doing new developments in the market conditions that we’re in and the uncertainties that will continue.”
Mark Hall, the president and CEO of Hall Equities Group, told Bay City News the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the economic landscape, but that there were other factors that went into the decision, including the possible effects of Assembly Bill 1486. That bill, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in October, is designed to help make surplus public land usable for affordable housing.
“I’m not really sure what Concord wants to do,” Hall told BCN. “We spent a lot of money and good faith, but it didn’t work out. Even if we’d been on track (with the city) it would be a couple of years before breaking ground.”
Montagh also cited the timing of the project and told this newspaper the city still has hopes to develop more land in the downtown area, and that a future stadium is not permanently out of the question.
“The property downtown is an “A” location,” he said. “It’s next to BART, bus transit, offices, residential areas. Fundamentally, it’s a Grade A location, and I think we’ll see interest from other developers.”
The land is a long-vacant parcel near the police station and the Concord BART station that is bordered by Galindo Street on the west, Laguna Street on the south, Oak Street on the north and BART tracks and the BART parking lot to the east.
The Concord City Council approved by a 3-2 vote in May 2018 the “advanced exploration” of the downtown development, which would’ve included the soccer stadium, a convention center and at least one hotel.
Bay City News contributed to this story.