Heron Bay / Marina Vista

Heron Bay in the south west corner of San Leandro is a mostly undeveloped area pushed up against the Bay. On its eastern end, however, it does have housing and a very active home owners association that actively lobbies to keep their members’ interests protected. This summer, for example, when a local wind power company, Halus Power Systems, wanted to erect a wind turbine on its property to demonstrate to prospective buyers, the Heron Bay Home Owners Associate made a stink, lobbying to delay the erection of the proposed turbine for fears of the noise and environmental factors.

I personally am rather ambivalent about this kind of NIMBIism. On the one hand, it shows that there is someone looking out for your interests if you happen to be one of the residents of Heron Bay. On the other hand, and I would tend to favor this view. If we can’t even display a single wind turbine near a housing development, what chance do we have against Climate Change.

This is especially ironic given that one of the impacts of climate change may very well be a rise in the sea levels that could very well have an effect on this very bay side community.

That said, there are really some pretty nice homes here. On the northeastern end of the neighborhood you get one of those planned communities where the streets are designed in such a way that cars slow down and where kids can play just outside. The homes—mostly dating from the late 90’s as far as I can tell—have a luxurious but homogenous look to them—lots of pastel stucco and red-tiled roofs (except in one part of the development where the tiles are grayish), high roofed front stoops and side view garages. These homes are appealing to families because they make excellent use of space and give you that suburban feeling of calm and protection.

Recently sold homes here have garnered between $410 K and $550 K—definitely high for San Leandro, but Heron Bay is not a typical San Leandro neighborhood. (There is one portion of the Heron Bay where homes are a bit smaller and feel a little bit more like Townhouses and prices drop accordingly to between $350 k to $400 K.)

As to the public schools serving Heron Bay, they are just so-so for the most part (although King Kipp High School is really strong). These are not terrible schools—they are actually sort of middling, which is often enough to drive people out to the burbs.

Crime is low here as well, with nothing much to report other than petty thefts and that sort of thing.

Oh yeah, and if you are into biking, the BayTrail runs right through the marshy wetlands that make up the western end of this area. It will take you north up along all of San Leandro and by Alameda. Its a great thing to do on the weekend to get exercise, etc. It is just over 5 miles long, ending in a slough.