SAN JOSE — Buoyed by widening tech company interest in downtown San Jose, a group of city, business and community leaders have touted the potential of the meandering Guadalupe River to be transformed into a central park for the Bay Area’s largest city.

This week, the San Jose office of SPUR, a planning and urban research nonprofit group, kicked off what’s expected to be a wide-ranging quest to revive the Guadalupe River Park as a green gathering place and a river that can weave together multiple San Jose neighborhoods. The effort arrives amid active plans by tech giants such as Google and Adobe Systems to craft major downtown expansions.

“This is San Jose’s moment,” Mayor Sam Liccardo told the gathering in a speech that appeared designed to assure the group the city is coming into its own as an economic giant and tech hub. “In past years, San Jose all too often has been the bridesmaid and never the bride. But this is San Jose’s moment.”

Liccardo touted Google’s plans to create a transit-oriented community of offices, retail, residences and other amenities where 15,000 to 20,000 of the search giant’s employees could work. He also highlighted Adobe’s plans for a new office tower next to its existing three-building headquarters campus downtown, an effort the mayor believes could double the company’s presence in the city’s urban core.

“The potential is absolutely incredible,” said Teresa Alvarado, SPUR’s San Jose director. “The Guadalupe River Park is our great centralized gem. We can create a central green space for San Jose that can connect our neighborhoods.”

A revitalized Guadalupe River could become a unique component of San Jose’s economic renaissance, according to some at the meeting, which was attended by more than 100 people at Adobe’s headquarters next to the river.

“This is a great opportunity and it will require a visionary effort and a synergy of views to lead the charge,” said Bob Staedler, principal executive for Silicon Valley Synergy, a land use and planning consultancy.

The Guadalupe River project is expected to involve success stories about efforts to revitalize open spaces in urban centers throughout the nation. One of these accounts was part of SPUR’s kickoff event.

Adam Ganser, vice president for planning and design with Friends of the High Line, recounted his group’s efforts to revitalize a crumbling elevated train line that for decades was used to transport equipment and goods to serve a one-time manufacturing district in southwestern Manhattan.

Ganser said the High Line park now draws more visitors than famed tourist attractions such as the Empire State Building. He sees similar potential with Guadalupe River Park. Ganser said he stumbled across the parkland after he arrived in San Jose prior to his presentation to the SPUR gathering.

“Guadalupe would be an exciting project,” he said. “It was just sort of blind luck that led me to it when I went on a run. It’s a very quiet, restful environment.”

However, a major effort on multiple fronts will be needed to transform the Guadalupe River into what would effectively a long, twisting, narrow Central Park for San Jose.

“The one thing that runs through all of these revitalization open space projects around the country is a very big vision that everyone can get behind,” Ganser said. “People talk about Google and the other things in downtown San Jose. It feels like a lot of good change and opportunity is coming to San Jose. The Guadalupe River deserves to be put forward as a great asset.”