This year Hacienda celebrates its 40th anniversary and the many milestones it has reached over the years. Today, Hacienda’s success as Northern California’s largest mixed-use development may seem preordained. But in the early years of the development, very little seemed guaranteed–including its location in Pleasanton.

Note to our Readers: We are pleased to take this moment to share Hacienda's 40th Anniversary with the community. As we have looked back over the time that has elapsed since Hacienda's  beginning, we have found a great deal to reflect on and many great stories to tell. This feature will focus on Hacienda's early days. We hope you will come back next month to read the second part that will share more recent events.

A Mixed Beginning

In the late 1970s, commercial real estate developer Joe Callahan was eager to build on a history of successful business projects built in collaboration with the Prudential Insurance Company of America, the nation’s largest developer of real estate at the time. He and his partners, Mark Sweeny and Patrick O’Brien, did not set out to build the development in Pleasanton. But Pleasanton was eventually chosen, in part because the success of earlier projects had convinced Callahan that “commerce follows labor” and a strong talent pool would be key for a new business development to thrive.

"It was my belief that access to employees was going to become a major issue in the latter part of the twentieth century," Callahan told Hacienda writer George Walsh for a special anniversary article in 2002. "Caltrans and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission have these commute and travel time analyses they do for the community. We were looking in Northern Marin county in the North Bay and we were looking at parts of Redwood Shores and the 880 corridor in 1976 or 1977. I had worked on a deal with one of the semiconductor companies who were looking in the Tri-Valley area, which is how I got exposed to it."

As Walsh wrote, “Callahan and his partners picked a half a dozen locations in the Bay Area where they could assemble 500 or more acres and did commute time analysis to figure out which location had the best access to the largest number of employees and the ability to grow in the future. The intersection of highways 580 and 680 came out to be far and away the best location in the whole region because the average commute time to get to work anywhere in the Bay Area was around 30 minutes, which gave businesses access to from 35% to 40% of the total employed residents in the region within a reasonable commute time.”

The City of Pleasanton “was thrilled” when  Callahan, Sweeny, and O’Brien formed a team to bring a high-end business development to Northwest Pleasanton, according to Deb McKeehan, who was City Manager of Pleasanton from 1990 to 2005. “The City’s General Plan, developed in the 1950s, envisioned business and retail by the highways, now freeways 680 and 580, which created a natural barrier for residential development in the interior of our community and provided protection of our historic downtown.”

In June 1982, the City Council of Pleasanton unanimously voted to approve the 876-acre development, but not all residents were ready to accept the project as proposed. A group called Citizens for Balanced Growth filed a lawsuit in 1982 to halt construction. “In 1984, the same anti-Hacienda forces placed a referendum on the ballot in an attempt to overturn the City Council's approval of the project. Pleasanton voters overwhelmingly supported Hacienda and the project proceeded,” notes the Pleasanton Weekly.

Community Focus

Even before it opened for business, the principals behind Hacienda focused on supporting the community. After the development was allowed to proceed, for example,  the co-developers, as part of the project, began working to resolve water supply and flooding issues that affected many beyond the development’s borders.

"The city had no emergency water system to speak of," as Callahan explained to Walsh. "That huge tank up above Foothill at the Stoneridge intersection was the first major emergency water system in the city. Hopyard Road was a two-lane road that was under water every winter for part of the year. Part of the way we solved the swamp problem was by going downstream and fixing the Arroyo de la Laguna from a point about 1,500 feet north of where it goes under 680 down to the Bernal bridge. That's miles from the complex. But by fixing that drainage channel, we dropped the hydraulic grade line for the 100-year flood by four feet in the whole town."

These improvements and others that were part of the North Pleasanton Improvement District (NPID), which were largely funded by Hacienda properties, contributed significant community infrastructure designed to improve the quality of life for those living in Pleasanton. These improvements represented an enormous investment in the community; the Hacienda portion of NPID alone was in excess of $330 million in today’s dollars.

The new public improvements driven by Hacienda were important contributions to the City of Pleasanton but they were far from the only ones. Commonly, American cities are responsible for the maintenance of public resources such as roads and lighting, even those within commercial developments. Hacienda, in contrast, agreed not only to improve the development site but also to maintain those improvements essentially in perpetuity. That was a welcome commitment after Pleasanton and other California cities had lost access to revenues from property taxes in the wake of Proposition 13 passing. Over the years, this agreement between Hacienda and Pleasanton has saved the city more than 50 million in today’s dollars as Hacienda continues to maintain the development and its improvements at no cost to the community.

Hacienda reached a number of milestones during its first 20 years. The AT&T Western Regional Headquarters moved to Hacienda in 1983 and occupied nearly 600,000 square feet of buildings by January of 1984. That same year, Hewlett Packard broke ground for a new building, the Hacienda Transportation Service was created, Hacienda hosted its first annual Soccer City Run, and the development completed the flood control improvements. The following year, Hewlett Packard moved into its new facility and the Sheraton-Pleasanton Inn and Velvet Turtle restaurant opened.

In 1986, AT&T broke ground on facilities of 1.1 million square feet, Hacienda first hosted what would become an annual food drive, Hacienda West opened, and Courtyard by Marriott held its grand opening. In 1987, Hacienda Motors opened and the Hacienda Child Development Center received a national award. In 1988, the new AT&T Center opened, Hacienda sponsored its first art and wine event, and the project that some had initially challenged was named as one of the world's best business developments.

Over its history, Hacienda has consistently matched business accomplishments with projects designed to support the community. In 1990, for example, several new service businesses opened in Hacienda, construction began on a post office within the development, and Hacienda sponsored an event that raised funds for the Pleasanton Unified School District. That was also the year McKeehan became City Manager, and she was delighted by the quality of the development that had taken shape by then. “As constructed, Hacienda was state-of-the-art and allowed for the inclusion of underground cable and fiber optics as development occurred.”

Originally planned as a commercial-only development, a drop in the strength of the office market created an opportunity for an unexpected shift in Hacienda’s trajectory. Hacienda successfully worked with the City of Pleasanton to have several parcels within its borders converted and rezoned to residential use. Signature Properties went on to develop hundreds of homes at the development.

These early projects, along with others built over the years, successfully transitioned Hacienda into a truly integrated, mixed-use, transit-oriented development. By 1997, tenants and residents could take advantage of the BART station in Hacienda that had been built on land sold by the development to the transit agency.

The decision to depart from the original master plan by expanding the type of uses within Hacienda was originally met with some skepticism. But business tenants, new residents, and city officials quickly agreed that broadening the types of uses within Hacienda helped the project stay relevant and attractive. The transition allowed the development to support the city’s talent pool with housing and, in turn, its business owners, corporate tenants, and retailers as well.

In light of this major anniversary, “I extend my congratulations to Hacienda’s management and property owners,” says City of Pleasanton City Manager Gerry Beaudin. “Hacienda is recognized as a premier business center for more than six-hundred thirty companies, making it a major economic engine in our community and the region. In addition to its  significant business presence, Hacienda has been instrumental in helping the city identify and implement diverse housing options to meet local and regional housing needs. The partnership between Hacienda and the City of Pleasanton continues to be a key factor in making our city the dynamic place it is today.”

“It’s hard to believe that Hacienda turns forty this year,” notes former City Manager McKeehan. “We owe Callahan, Sweeny, and O’Brien for helping to put Pleasanton on the map as a desirable place to live, work, and play.”

For more information about the history of Hacienda, please visit www.hacienda.org/location/project-overview/description/history, www.hacienda.org/news-events/hacienda-online/network/2002/august/august-haciendas-20th-anniversary, and www.hacienda.org/news-events/hacienda-online/network/2007/july/july-executive-profile-joe-callahan.