With the complete redevelopment of San Francisco’s Pier 70 having been formally approved in October, and the ground for the 28-acre project slated to broken early this year, the detailed plans for over 6 acres of parks and open spaces along Pier 70’s shoreline will be presented to the Pier 70 Design Review Committee next week.

As designed by James Corner Filed Operations, the shoreline plans are grouped into three distinct areas: a Waterfront Terrace, Slipways Waterfront and Waterfront Promenade.

The Waterfront Terrace runs along the northern 503-foot-long section of the project site’s shoreline, and consists of a 4926-square-foot public lawn, a 1971-square-foot picnic and seating area which would contain space for commercial food and beverage vendors (“Picnic Grove”), a deck and viewing pavilion oriented to the ship repair dry-dock, a 6-foot-wide shoreline path, and the 16- to 20-foot-wide Bay Trail.

The Slipways Waterfront runs along the central 278-foot-long section of the project site’s shoreline. The Slipways Waterfront is part of the larger “Slipways Commons” open space area which begins at the shoreline and continues west—beyond the 100-foot shoreline band—to Maryland Street. The Slipways Waterfront and Commons include a 8,467-square-foot lawn (“Central Lawn”), hardscaped gathering and event spaces, art installations, a viewing pavilion (“Craneway Pavilion”), and the 16- to 20-foot-wide Bay Trail.

The Waterfront Promenade runs along the southern 516-foot-long section of the project site’s shoreline, and consists of a café terrace with areas reserved for both public and commercial (private) use, picnic and seating areas (“Chaise and Picnic Lounges”), historic craneway structures that provide opportunities for fishing, gathering and Bay viewing, a deck and viewing pavilion (the “22nd Street Pavilion”) an 8-foot-wide path running parallel to a riprap revetment, and the 16- to 20-foot-wide Bay Trail. A drop-off area for vehicles is provided at the terminus of 22nd Street.

Along with the inland Commons and Market Square, the open spaces are slated to play host to “art exhibitions, theater performances, cultural events, outdoor fairs, festivals and markets, outdoor film screenings, evening night markets, food events, street fairs, and lecture services,” including up to four events a year with expected audiences of up to 5,000 people.

In terms of planning for expected sea level rise, while the lowest lying buildings within the Pier 70 development, Bay Trail and adjacent open spaces would be built at an elevation of approximately 15.5 feet. And as such, the area “would not be inundated during a 100-year flood event at 2050,” assuming a sea level rise of 12 to 24 inches, but it would be “susceptible to occasional inundation assuming a higher sea level rise projection of 66 inches (with total water levels at 17.5 feet during a 100-year storm event).”

But at a proposed elevation of 11.4 feet, the lower-level pedestrian path directly on the shoreline, to the east of the Bay Trail and new open space areas, “would be subject to inundation and storm action within the life of the project” but designed to provide public access to the water over the next 25-30 years, after which it would serve as “an area within which shoreline protective works or other adaptive management techniques could be implemented.”

We’ll keep you posted and plugged-in.