Solicitation & Transaction Management for the Salesforce Transit Center

The Transbay Joint Powers Authority successfully procured a facility management and programming partner for the $2.26 billion Salesforce Transit Center.

CHALLENGE

The Transbay Joint Powers Authority was established to design, build, operate, and maintain the world-class Salesforce Transit Center in downtown San Francisco. Intent on maintaining its compact team and clear focus on transit, the Authority sought a private-sector partner to manage the facility’s 90,000 square feet of commercial and retail space, rooftop park, robust public art program, and significant digital advertising assets.
 
The Authority’s leadership engaged HR&A to identify the appropriate public-private partnership structure and solicitation process that would attract the right partner for this iconic piece of American infrastructure.

Solution

Working closely with the Authority’s leadership, the team defined a set of principles for a public-private partnership structure that would enable the Authority to maintain ownership of the transit center, generate an economic return, retain oversight of center operations, minimize risk associated with operations and maintenance of the non-transit program, and most importantly – provide a world class experience for the 50,000 daily riders, workers, and shoppers who will visit the transit center.
 
With these principles in place, HR&A drafted and released a solicitation, and marketed the opportunity to local and national real estate development, facilities, open space, and digital media management firms. The team guided the Authority’s evaluation committee through the respondent review, interview, and selection of the preferred asset management team.
 
To ensure the agreement terms incentivized performance and a timely ramp-up to stabilization of operations, HR&A worked with the Authority’s legal counsel through negotiations.
 

IMPACT

After attracting a number of strong proposals and selecting a preferred asset manager, the Transbay Joint Powers Authority executed an asset management agreement meeting all of its criteria with an interdisciplinary team led by Lincoln Property Company.