The naval weapons station is slated to be repurposed for more than 12,000 homes along with businesses, schools and sporting facilities.
Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
The Final Mission for a California Military Base: Become Housing
The US Navy shuttered the Concord Naval Weapons Station in 2008, but plans to redevelop it for climate-friendly homes and a park are moving slowly.
On an overcast February day, futuristic autonomous shuttles roll silently through deserted streets past decaying, abandoned buildings on the northern fringes of San Francisco Bay. The only signs of life are a phalanx of police officers and, in the distance, cattle roaming among hundreds of sod-covered concrete bunkers that stretch to the horizon.
Nearly two decades after the US Navy decommissioned the Concord Naval Weapons Station in California, the sprawling site more resembles the set of a post-apocalyptic movie than the residential community it’s slated to become. Before ground is broken on a single new home, bunkers, pipelines and other military infrastructure must be removed, and electricity, water and other utilities will have to be extended to an area a third the size of Manhattan. Efforts to secure a master developer for the project are dragging, though, and for now the former base is being used as a testing ground for self-driving electric vehicles and to train law enforcement personnel.