Emery Yards: Transforming Postindustrial Emeryville

BioMed Realty

Marcel Wilson, Lead Landscape Architect
Mike Witt, BKF, Civil Engineer
Peter Wen, Flad Architects, Architect

Emery Yards represents a paradigm shift for this small city with big urban design challenges and a post industrial history.  This ambitious urban design project transforms a mega block district into a pedestrian-oriented science campus that seamlessly integrates new land uses, public spaces, improved urban networks, and modern infrastructure. Faced with challenges of oversized blocks, high groundwater, abandoned stream culverts, and crowded subsurface utilities, the design team crafted an innovative solution that breaks down barriers, welcomes the community, and elevates urban ecological function.

Located within the lower elevations of the Temescal Creek watershed flowing to San Francisco Bay, the 75,000-square-foot project converts formerly impervious parking lots into a network of interconnected public spaces. The urban design approach strategically dismantles the site’s mega-block scale, creating permeable connections that contribute to the quality and character of Emeryville while establishing a critical missing link in the citywide greenway system.

Emery Yards represents a paradigm shift for this small city with big urban design challenges and a post industrial history.  This ambitious urban design project transforms a mega block district into a pedestrian-oriented science campus that seamlessly integrates new land uses, public spaces, improved urban networks, and modern infrastructure. Faced with challenges of oversized blocks, high groundwater, abandoned stream culverts, and crowded subsurface utilities, the design team crafted an innovative solution that breaks down barriers, welcomes the community, and elevates urban ecological function.

Site Context and Strategy
Located within the lower elevations of the Temescal Creek watershed flowing to San Francisco Bay, the 75,000-square-foot project converts formerly impervious parking lots into a network of interconnected public spaces. The urban design approach strategically dismantles the site’s mega-block scale, creating permeable connections that contribute to the quality and character of Emeryville while establishing a critical missing link in the citywide greenway system.

The project’s comprehensive approach addresses multiple urban challenges simultaneously:
Reconnecting fragmented urban fabric through pedestrian-priority pathways
Creating year-round outdoor gathering spaces for the community and diverse user groups
Establishing ecological corridors for urban wildlife and pollinators
Managing stormwater within challenging site constraints

Emery Yards exemplifies forward-thinking urban mobility design by prioritizing pedestrians and cyclists over vehicles. The project serves as a key node connecting Emeryville to regional bicycle infrastructure, while a network of pedestrian-priority shared streets creates a human-scaled campus environment.

Public Realm Activation
Two signature public spaces anchor the project’s first phase:
Horton Plaza makes the city work better by choreographing movement and mobility. This dynamic space connects existing infrastructure—bike lanes, streets, the greenway, and an existing pedestrian bridge—with new infrastructure including an 11-story parking garage, enhanced bike lanes, bike parking facilities, and transit connections for buses and shuttles. Artfully arranged planters with integrated seating define outdoor “rooms” accommodating gatherings of various sizes, providing much-needed public gathering areas in a rapidly densifying district.  A public art sculpture by Mildred Howard referencing African American currency and business ownership is prominently placed at the west side of the plaza and casts long thin shadows across the plaza in the afternoon setting sun.

Chiron Plaza forms the heart of the campus, breaking down the scale of surrounding buildings through a dynamic composition of seating areas, lush plantings, and an expansive tree canopy. Art installations by Anne Weber activate the space and celebrate the site’s cultural context.
Both plazas are strategically programmed with retail and amenities that ensure activation throughout the day and evening, creating vibrant destinations for both campus users and the broader community. Custom furnishings, meticulously crafted details, and enduring materials throughout these spaces convey a strong sense of quality and a commitment to exemplary city-making.

Embedding Ecological Infrastructure
Emery Yards demonstrates how urban landscapes can provide both high-performance ecological function and compelling human experience. The project’s comprehensive soil strategy replaced poor, compacted urban soils with new engineered profiles ranging from 18 inches to 4 feet deep. Each new tree receives a minimum of 600 cubic feet of rootable soil volume, ensuring long-term viability and maximizing ecosystem services including carbon sequestration, heat island reduction, and wildlife habitat.
The planting design employs native and climate-adapted species specifically selected to support pollinators and provide seeds and fruits for birds, creating an ecological stepping stone within the city’s greenway network. These plant communities will continually regenerate the soil matrix as organic material decays, creating a self-sustaining system that improves over time.