Daily Business Report-June 25, 2018
Rendering of the Chula Vista Bayfront hotel (Courtesy of the Port of San Diego)
Chula Vista Bayfront Project
begins in earnest this week
The Port of San Diego begins work Wednesday on the Chula Vista Bayfront project by starting the import of 210,000 cubic yards of soil to the site of the planned resort hotel and convention center. Another 60,000 cubic yards of soil will be imported to an adjacent site.
Port officials said the soil is needed to increase elevation and to accommodate for future potential sea level rise and to improve drainage.
Importing the soil is going to impact traffic, since it will require 200 to 400 truck trips per day. “The Port requests and appreciates patience from the public and businesses in the area during this important project,” it said in a statement.
Trucks will be transporting the soil to the bayfront between 7 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday and potentially some Saturdays during two time periods. The first time period is scheduled to begin June 27 and wrap up around July 20. The second is tentatively scheduled to begin on Aug. 7 and go through late September.
Crews are conducting demolition work just southeast of H Street and Marina Parkway, known as South Campus, a site formerly occupied by Rohr. The work primarily involves the removal of concrete foundation slabs and asphalt pads. Demolition began on June 4 and is anticipated to be completed around Aug. 8.
The Chula Vista Bayfront resort hotel and convention center will be constructed between H and G Streets west of Marina Parkway. It will be developed by RIDA Chula Vista LLC and operated by Gaylord Hotels, the large convention hotel brand of Marriott International. It will include 1,600 hotel rooms, 275,000 usable square feet of convention and meeting space and associated retail and resort-level amenities such as restaurant/bar/lounge facilities, recreational facilities, a spa, a pool with a lazy river, bike and boat rentals and more.
Construction on public infrastructure improvements associated with the hotel project could get underway as soon as 2019, which includes additional site preparation, building access roads and new public streets (portions of E, G and H Streets), providing utility services and building the new Harbor Park, according to Port officials.
The resort hotel and convention center is the centerpiece and catalyst project of the Chula Vista Bayfront Master Plan, a decade-long joint planning effort by the Port, the city of Chula Vista and a broad coalition of stakeholders.
“When complete, the public will enjoy more than 200 acres of parks, a shoreline promenade, walking trails, RV camping, shopping, dining and more,” Port officials said. “The master plan also establishes ecological buffers to protect wildlife habitat, species and other coastal resources.”
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Vertex Pharmaceuticals opens its new
research facility in Torrey Pines
BNBuilders, Alexandria Real Estate Equities Inc. and Vertex Pharmaceuticals celebrated the grand opening of Vertex’s new research facility in San Diego with a ribbon cutting ceremony on June 18. Located at 3215 Merryfield Row, Vertex’s new facility was developed by Alexandria Real Estate Equities, with the building shell designed by LPA and interiors designed by DGA.
Boston-based Vertex Pharmaceuticals is a biotech company focused on creating transformative medicines for people who have serious diseases. The company has had a research and development presence in San Diego for more than 15 years.
Vertex’s new building in Torrey Pines is at the heart of San Diego’s biotech community. The 170,000-square-foot facility is double the size of Vertex’s former space, and can accommodate 250 employees. Within the LEED Gold certified building, 70 percent of its space is dedicated to laboratory/research activities. The building is designed with interior walls of glass, allowing the laboratories and ongoing scientific research to be seen throughout the building. The site has a 1,500-square-foot Learning Lab for STEM education programs, a 4,000-square-foot Incubator Suite for external collaboration, and an air circulation system designed to bring in 100 percent outside air, the highest quality available. Also, in honor of the discoveries made by its San Diego research team, the building’s lobby features an art display of 12 cystic fibrosis protein strands. With each strand measuring 10 feet tall and 10 inches in diameter, the strands allow visitors to interact with the art display through tactile touch.
BNBuilders and Vertex used virtual reality during the design stage of the project to review the functionality of laboratory spaces.
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McCullough Landscape Architecture
CEO named to national marketing board
Catherine McCullough, president and CEO of McCullough Landscape Architecture, has been appointed to the national board of the Society for Marketing Professional Services as an at-large director. Her term is from Sept. 1, 2018, to Aug. 31, 2020.
A former president of the San Diego chapter of SMPS, McCullough said, “I am proud to represent not only the West Coast and San Diego in this national board position for SMPS, but our profession as well. I believe I am the only person from a landscape architecture firm on the board.”
McCullough also is a Certified Professional Services Marketer (CPSM), a designation from SMPS for those with achievement in strategic market planning, research, plan implementation, business development, and promotion.
Her role as an at-large director will encompass the contribution to the strategic vision of the Society while representing the interests of all members generally of the organization. She became eligible for the position once she had previously served as a chapter officer, most recently the San Diego chapter president in 2014, as well as held the designation of CPSM and maintained a longstanding membership.
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McCullough selected for National City
revitalization project
Malick Infill Development has selected McCullough Landscape Architecture to collaborate with their team along with the architectural firm Miller Hull to design a mixed-use development in the center of National City. The project is expected to bring a burst of new life to a once-vibrant part of San Diego.
This catalyst project, designed to help stimulate surrounding developments, will consist of 108 apartment units on seven levels with retail shopping, a co-work space and live/work lofts.
McCullough’s objectives are to activate the street scene and develop creative user-experiences on the podium deck and on the rooftop level. The street scene will be part of a larger city-developed street activation plan. The firm is planning cafe and pedestrian programming within the alleys along the front and sides of the building.
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North County Transit District completes
reduced fare program for students
On June 30, North County Transit District will complete a reduced fare program for students geared towards lowering carbon emissions in northern San Diego County. This program resulted in over 21,500 discounted NCTD passes being purchased by students at multiple schools in North County.
Funds for this program were made possible by the California Low Carbon Transit Operations Program (LCTOP). The program lowered the regularly priced $59 SPRINTER/BREEZE monthly pass by $25 per student; the final price of the pass varied based on additional discounts, including subsidies from some schools. The fare subsidy from LCTOP helped maintain SPRINTER ridership, as ridership was declining for BREEZE operations.
The purpose of the LCTOP is to lower carbon emissions in the state through various programs; it is funded from state carbon credit sales in the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. LCTOP allows agencies to rollover the funds they receive for up to three years. To help the region meet emission reduction goals, NCTD began saving LCTOP funds in 2017—estimated at over $1.5 million each year—for the purchase of five electric buses.
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Personnel Announcements
William Welch resigns as CEO of Trovagene Inc.
William Welch has resigned as CEO and director of Trovagene Inc. for personal reasons, the company announced. While the company conducts a search for a new CEO, the company’s chairman, Thomas Adams, has been appointed interim CEO. Trovagene is a clinical-stage oncology therapeutics company, developing targeted therapeutics for the treatment of hematologic and solid tumor cancers.
Adams has been the company’s chairman of the board since April 2009. From June 2005 through 2011, he served as a director of IRIS International Inc., a diagnostics company, and served as chief technology officer of IRIS since April 2006. Adams was the head of Iris Molecular Diagnostics from 2006 until November 2012 and served as the president of Iris Personalized Medicine. Adams served as chairman and CEO of Leucadia Technologies, a privately held medical-device company, from 1998 to April 2006, when Leucadia was acquired by IRIS. He founded Genta Inc., a publicly held biotechnology company in the field of antisense technology, and served as its CEO until 1997.
