Northbrae, Berkeley, California

The Northbrae Tunnel, also referred to as the Solano Avenue Tunnel, was built as a commuter electric railroad tunnel in the northern part of Berkeley, California, and was later converted to street use. In 1910 the Southern Pacific Railroad (SP) was electrifying its steam-engine drawn ferry-train line (to San Francisco) from Oakland Pier via Shattuck Avenue to Vine Street in Berkeley and extending it north along the base of the Berkeley Hills to newly developing neighborhoods of Berkeley at Northbrae and Thousand Oaks. The route chosen was Henry Street and Sutter Street to its intersection with Hopkins. At this point a ridge carrying Marin and Los Angeles Avenues blocked the way. After investigating (1) a route around the ridge and (2) a cut through the ridge with bridges over it, it was decided to use the route of the cut but make it a tunnel instead, under Marin and Los Angeles Avenues just west of their intersection with The (Marin) Circle. The cut-and-cover method of tunnel construction was used. The tunnel curved to the west so that the railroad could continue through to the intersection of Solano Avenue and The Alameda and then to Thousand Oaks station at Solano and Colusa Avenues.The line also required a level grade across the lower canyon of Codornices Creek. To accomplish this, a temporary wooden trestle was built along Henry Street with tracks for the construction trains which was subsequently filled in with material excavated from the tunnel cut. A steel bridge was emplaced at Eunice Street. allowing auto traffic to pass under the tracks. The railroad was completed in 1911 and inspection trains were run at the end of that year, with service beginning January 1, 1912. The SP ferry-train service was changed to bridge-train service operated by its subsidiary, Interurban Electric Railway (IER) across the San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge in December, 1939. The IER ended service July 26, 1941, but the tracks in Berkeley were made available to the Key System, which extended service to Hopkins and Sutter Streets (the stop formerly called Northbrae) beginning August 6, 1941. Service was extended through the tunnel to a new terminal at Solano Avenue and The Alameda on December 6, 1942. All bridge-train service ended on April 20, 1958.A paved roadway was installed in the tunnel by the City of Berkeley, and was opened to traffic on December 15, 1962, extending Solano Avenue through the tunnel to connect with Sutter Street.

Indian Rock Park is a 1.18-acre (4,800 m2) public park at 950 Indian Rock Avenue in the city of Berkeley, California, on the slope of the Berkeley Hills. It is located in the northeast part of the city, about two blocks north of the Arlington/Marin Circle, and straddles Indian Rock Avenue. The central feature of the park is a large rock outcropping on the west side of Indian Rock Ave. The larger portion of the park, on the opposite side of the street, has several much smaller rock outcroppings, grass fields, and a small barbecue and picnic area. The rock is composed of Northbrae rhyolite.

John Hinkel Park is an urban park located in the North Berkeley neighborhood of Berkeley, California, U.S.. It has been listed by the city as a Berkeley Landmark since April 2, 2001, and it contains a historical plaque since 2003.

The Donald and Helen Olsen House, in Berkeley, California, was built in 1954.It is a Modernist, International-style house designed by architect Donald Olsen. Olsen is a native of Minnesota who studied under Walter Gropius at Harvard and established an architecture practice in Berkeley in 1953.The house is situated on a slope in the North Berkeley Hills near John Hinkel Park. The structure's main floor was built above ground level to maximize the site's views of San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge. However, the view has been obscured over the years by the growth of mature trees on the property. The National Park Service described the house's style as follows: "The house's design is specifically the International style popularized in Europe by architects Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, and Le Corbusier. The Olsen House displays the geometries, ethos, strict formalism and rigor that embody this utopian style." The house also includes a mural by artist Claire Falkenstein. The building was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places on October 1, 2010. The listing was announced as the featured listing in the National Park Service's weekly list of October 8, 2010. In its write-up, the Park Service called Olsen "an important mid-20th-century Bay Area architect."

Berkeley Art Center (BAC) is a nonprofit arts organization, community art space, and gallery founded in 1967 and located at 1275 Walnut Street in Live Oak Park, Berkeley, California.

The Edible Schoolyard (ESY) is a 1-acre (4,000 m2) garden and kitchen program at the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School, a public middle school in Berkeley, California. The Edible Schoolyard was established in 1995 by chef and author Alice Waters and is supported by the Edible Schoolyard Project, a non-profit founded by Waters in 1995 in celebration of the 25th anniversary of her famed Berkeley, California restaurant, Chez Panisse. At the Edible Schoolyard, students participate in planting, harvesting and preparing fresh food as part of their school day, and as a means to reinforce lessons of math, science, culture, history; and to make the connections between food, health and the environment.

Thousand Oaks is a neighborhood of Berkeley in Alameda County, California. Located at the base of the Berkeley Hills, it lies at an elevation of 239 feet (73 m).The principal shopping area is Solano Avenue, along the southern edge of the neighborhood. There are also two smaller clusters of shops on the northern edge of Thousand Oaks, across the county line in Kensington on Arlington Avenue and on Colusa Avenue. The neighborhood is primarily residential, mostly consisting of single-family houses built in the early 20th century, sometimes with In-law apartments, as well as a handful of apartment buildings. When the neighboring city of Albany was incorporated in 1908, its borders were drawn to exclude the area north of Solano Avenue and east of Curtis Street that would become the Thousand Oaks area, then the site of a refugee camp that had formed after the 1906 earthquake. Its residents were employed in the construction of the surrounding subdivisions and were likely to vote against incorporation as a separate city. The neighborhood was first subdivided in 1909 and 1917 after a failed proposal to move the state capital to Berkeley, in which the area would have become a large public park near the capitol building. Originally an unincorporated area north of Berkeley, it was built as a commuter suburb at the northern terminus of three interurban rail lines. It includes the Thousand Oaks Knoll, a rocky extension of the Berkeley hills in the northeastern part of the neighborhood. Several large rock outcroppings in the eastern edge of the neighborhood were turned into public parks, or incorporated into private yards.

The John Hopkins Spring Estate is a large estate in Berkeley, California. The associated Spring Mansion was built in the 1910s by East Bay developer John Hopkins Spring and designed by architect John Hudson Thomas. It later became the site of a school founded by educator Cora Lenore Williams. It has been a City of Berkeley Landmark since 2000.

The Cragmont area of Berkeley is a residential district located in the northeastern section of the city, occupying most of the hill area north of Codornices Creek. It lies at an elevation of 755 feet (230 m). The Cragmont area was mostly grassland with oak and bay laurel trees in the canyons until the beginnings of the American era. The area was named for the various rock outcroppings which occur throughout the district. It was first developed as grazing land in the late 19th century. When a one-mile (1.6 km) exclusion zone for the sale of liquor was imposed with respect to the campus of the University of California, a local farmer opened up a saloon at what is now the corner of Spruce Street and Marin Avenue. Today, there are no commercial areas in the district. In the early 20th century, a streetcar line operated by the Key System was opened up along Euclid Avenue to Hilgard Street near the University campus. It was soon extended up Euclid as far as Regal Road, one block south of Marin Avenue. The area was immediately put up for sale for residential development. Many homes in the Cragmont area command an outstanding view of San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate. On the other hand, houses are closely spaced and there are many trees, posing a very high fire hazard during episodes of warm, dry and windy weather. There are also a number of active slides, and the Hayward Fault, a major branch of the San Andreas Fault, cuts right through the district, roughly along the alignment of (from south to north) La Loma-Euclid-Spruce streets.

Garfield Intermediate School, also for sometime the Garfield Junior High School, now the Berkeley Jewish Community Center, East Bay is a historical building in Berkeley, California. The Garfield Intermediate School was built in 1915. The one-story Garfield Intermediate School building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 14, 1982. The Garfield Intermediate School was designed by architect Ernest Coxhead in a Mission Revival architecture. The City of Berkeley built five schools in 1915, Garfield Intermediate School was one of the five. The school has enclosed class room courtyards, a 400-seat auditorium, french windows. Due to the courtyards and large french window, thee school was called a California outdoor school.

The Gourmet Ghetto was a colloquial name for the business district of the North Berkeley neighborhood in the city of Berkeley, California, known as the birthplace of California cuisine. Other developments that can be traced to this neighborhood include specialty coffee, the farm-to-table and local food movements, the rise to popularity in the U.S. of chocolate truffles and baguettes, the popularization of the premium restaurant designed around an open kitchen, and the California pizza made with local produce. After coalescing in the mid-1970s as a culinary destination, the neighborhood received its "Gourmet Ghetto" nickname in the late 1970s from comedian Darryl Henriques. Early, founding influences were Peet's Coffee, Chez Panisse and the Cheese Board Collective. Alice Medrich began her chain of Cocolat chocolate stores there. The neighborhood, anchored by Alice Waters' Chez Panisse, became the center of farm-to-table food sourcing, using selected locally grown produce, especially naturally and sustainably grown—preferably organic—ingredients. Waters and a loosely organized left-leaning coterie of friends and colleagues actively promoted the idea of socially conscious eating. Many former staff at Chez Panisse have gone on to start their own restaurants, bakeries, and food shops in the wider San Francisco Bay Area.

The Cheese Board Collective in Berkeley, California, comprises two worker-owned and -operated businesses: a cheese shop/bakery commonly referred to as "The Cheese Board", and a pizzeria known as "Cheese Board Pizza". Along with Peet's Coffee, the Cheese Board is known for its role in starting the North Shattuck neighborhood of Berkeley on its way to becoming famous as a culinary destination: the "Gourmet Ghetto". The Cheese Board brought a European focus on cheeses but also emphasized locally produced cheeses, a novel concept in the 1970s. The Cheese Board was closely connected with the restaurant Chez Panisse, helping to supply ingredients for the birth of California cuisine. The bakery brought the French baguette into vogue for Berkeley consumers, and helped spark a revolution in artisan bread.The Cheese Board is located at 1504 Shattuck Avenue and Cheese Board Pizza is located two doors down the street at 1512 Shattuck Avenue. In 2003, the Cheese Board Collective put together a cookbook, The Cheese Board: Collective Works.