SAN FRANCISCO — Prominent developer Phil Tagami’s lawsuit against the city of Oakland over its ban on the shipping and transport of coal is headed to trial.

U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria on Wednesday ruled to move the case to a bench trial scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. on Jan. 16, according to online court records.

The judge’s decision came after a day of arguments in a San Francisco courtroom during which attorneys for Tagami and the city of Oakland each requested the judge rule in their favor without going to trial.

Tagami, who restored the historic Fox Theater and the Rotunda Building near City Hall, filed a federal lawsuit in December 2016, following the Oakland City Council’s vote to ban the shipment and storage of coal within the city. The council vote was directed at Tagami’s planned $250 million global logistics center on the Outer Harbor near the Port of Oakland, after word spread that the developer intended to ship coal through the center.

In a November 2017 court motion for summary judgement — a motion asking the judge to rule in favor of Tagami — his attorney Robert Feldman argued that the council’s resolution to ban coal amounted to a breach of contract. Tagami and the Oakland Bulk & Oversized Terminal LLC were granted a development agreement in 2013; the agreement did not mention coal. Feldman, who did not return a call for comment on Wednesday afternoon, also argued that federal commerce, interstate and shipping laws preempt the city from applying the ban on coal.

Attorney Kevin Siegel, who represented the city, argued in a December motion that under the 2013 development agreement, the city reserved the right to apply new laws to the agreement to “protect health and safety.” After Tagami’s plans to ship coal at the terminal became public, the city spent a year investigating potential environmental impacts in public hearings before council voted to ban coal.

“The city and third parties submitted extensive, substantial evidence showing that the storage and handling of coal and petcoke at the terminal would create substantially dangerous health and safety conditions,” Siegel wrote in court papers. “The conditions include both emission of fugitive coal dust” containing toxins and heavy metals “in a West Oakland community already disproportionately impacted by pollution.”

Tagami’s operation, if it moves forward, could be the biggest of its kind on the West Coast. The developer earlier stated trains would haul the coal from Utah to Oakland where it would be loaded onto ships. Tagami has said the ore is one of numerous commodities that would be shipped overseas.

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Phil Tagami unapologetic for former no coal promise Before Wednesday’s hearing, members of No Coal in Oakland held a rally outside the federal courthouse. In a news release, they said court filings show that Bowie Resource Partners, a coal company seeking to operate at the Oakland terminal, has poured $1.75 million to fund the suit against the city.

“No Coal in Oakland and allied groups support the City’s effort to defeat the developer in court and have vowed continued resistance to Bowie’s efforts to site a coal terminal in Oakland regardless of the outcome in court,” the group said in a release.