Where Grand Street meets Shoreline Drive, a chain-link fence surrounds concrete footings and plumbing pipes. The restroom meant to sit on them is somewhere else, in an East Bay Regional Park District equipment yard. Just north of the fence, the street runs smooth. The repaving and the two-way bikeway on the east side were finished in fall 2025.
Grand Street is changing in segments, from the shoreline up. The street work has been the faster part. The next segment is Otis Drive to Encinal Avenue, the blocks Gold Coast residents use every day, and construction is expected to start in spring 2027. The design approved for those blocks keeps far more curbside parking than the earlier plan would have.
The fenced corner at Shoreline and Grand
The Crown Beach restroom project began with an estimate of about $268,000. By November 21, 2025, a Park District document put the cost at $824,848, as the Alameda Post reported in its June 30, 2026 account of the project.
According to that report, the Park District ended its contract with the original builder on December 18, 2025. It then turned to the company that had issued the project's performance bond. On May 20, 2026, the bonding company sent over a bid from a different contractor to finish the job for $347,388. The Park District declined it a week later, saying the agreement would waive the district's rights and wouldn't cover damages already accrued. On June 4, 2026, the district declared the bonding company in default and said it would go ahead and complete the contract itself.
No installation date has been announced. The Park District board's agendas for September 15, October 6 and October 20, 2026 included no action on the restroom. The district's adopted capital budget lists "Robert Crown Beach — Renovate Restroom Facilities" in the construction stage, with a total of $2,289,000. That budget line may cover a broader scope than the single prefab building, so it doesn't match the Post's cost figure one for one.
For now, anyone walking down Grand to the water still gets the fence, the footings and the empty pad.
Shoreline to Otis, finished last fall
The first segment shows what the rest of Grand Street is likely to look like. The City of Alameda's Grand Street Safety Improvements and Pavement Resurfacing project completed Shoreline Drive to Otis Drive in fall 2025. The work included:
- A raised two-way bikeway on the east side of the street, separated from car traffic
- Full-width repaving
- Street lighting improvements
- Traffic signal changes at Grand and Otis
- Restriping with better corner visibility and new crosswalks
That bikeway is the start of a longer line. The City's 2023 staff report describes a continuous two-way bikeway along all of Grand. It would connect the existing two-way path on Shore Line Drive to the Cross Alameda Trail bikeway on Clement Avenue. Today it stops at Otis.
The 11 feet coming to the Gold Coast blocks
North of Otis, Grand is a 48-foot street from curb to curb. Under the raised two-way bikeway concept the City Council approved in 2023, the east curb moves 11 feet into the roadway. That leaves a 37-foot street with a raised bikeway on the east side, at sidewalk height. The 2023 staff report points out that many residential streets in Alameda are 36 feet wide.
Grand would end up about as wide as the side streets around it, and it would keep both travel lanes. The report says none of the options reduce the street's car capacity. It also says the existing landscape strip and street trees would border the bikeway along its inside edge. Parking would stay against the curb instead of floating beside a bike buffer.
Parking is the clearest difference. The design the Council had approved before this one would have kept the curbs where they are. It would have painted one-way bike lanes on both sides and moved parking from side to side, block by block. The City's parking analysis for Otis to Clement counts the Otis-to-Encinal stretch like this:
| Grand Street, Otis to Encinal | On-street spaces | Spaces lost | Share lost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Existing, 60 west side and 64 east side | 124 | 0 | 0% |
| Earlier one-way bike lane design | 50 | 74 | 60% |
| Raised two-way bikeway, 5-foot sight triangles | 120 | 4 | 3% |
| Raised two-way bikeway, 10-foot sight triangles | 105 | 19 | 15% |
The range in the bottom two rows comes from the red curb next to driveways. Under the current concept, almost every lost space is a short stretch of red paint that gives drivers pulling in or out a clear view of bikes coming from both directions. Whether the final plans use 5-foot or 10-foot sight triangles is a design detail. The City says Phase 2 design is still underway. On a block with closely spaced driveways, that one choice decides most of what changes along the curb.
Where crossing Grand changes
The 2023 report also sets out pedestrian changes for the whole corridor. It calls for new striping, high-visibility crosswalks, red curb at intersections for better sightlines, and shorter crossing distances than the street has now. Three crossings get Rectangular Rapid Flash Beacons, the push-button flashing lights near school routes:
- The mid-block crossing at Wood School, in the segment south of Otis
- Grand Street at San Jose Avenue
- Grand Street at San Antonio Avenue
The report adds that more beacons could be considered north of Encinal. Drivers will notice the signals too. The cost estimates for the two-way bikeway include signal changes that give people biking and walking their own phase. The report says this cuts conflicts but can add some delay for drivers.
The spring 2027 start, and the money behind the next segment
The schedule has moved before. The 2023 report expected construction on this segment to begin in 2025. The City's project page now says construction is anticipated to begin in spring 2027.
There are signs the 2027 date is in the budget. A July 21, 2026 City Council paving item said leftover pavement-management funds could go to future paving projects, including Grand Street Phase 2, which it listed as anticipated for 2027. That item awarded a contract for a different project, not this one.
The City is already planning the segment after that. A September 1, 2026 City Council item asked the Council to approve five grant applications to the Alameda County Transportation Commission, totaling $5.03 million. One of them is for Grand Street Phase 3, north of Encinal. That request is $1,405,000 for design, with a proposed $470,000 local match, and a decision is expected in May 2027. If the grant comes through, Grand would be under construction on the Gold Coast blocks while the blocks to the north are in design. Meanwhile the beach end would be waiting on the same fenced restroom pad.
As the Otis-to-Encinal plans become final, the City's Grand Street project page is where the sight-triangle choice and the start date will show up first.
Curbs, parking and crosswalks on the Gold Coast blocks of Grand are about to change. If you're thinking about how construction next spring might affect your plans, at home or on the market, the Andrea Ruport Team is happy to talk it through with you. Let's Make It Happen.