Brentwood

City, Contra Costa County

© McCormack's Guides

 

Zip Code: 94513

Bedroom town that only a few years ago was a farm community. Many farms still left on edge of town. Brentwood started the 1990s with 7,563 residents, hit 2000 with 23,302, an increase of over 200 percent, and by the latest count (2008) has 50,614 inhabitants. www.mccormacks.com

The city is still building and some foresee Brentwood growing to 80,000 residents. On the other hand, winds of anti-growth, drawing strength from traffic congestion, are blowing through the community.

School rankings straddle the 50th percentile, some higher, some lower. Children attend schools in the Brentwood Elementary District and move up to the Liberty High district, which up until 2005 had in Brentwood one regular high school, also called Liberty, scores in the 70th and 80th percentiles. See Schools.

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In 2005, the district opened in Brentwood a second high school, called Heritage. It started with freshman and sophomore classes and will add a class each year. The school has science and computer labs and in many classrooms a five-foot wide video screen for, among other things, Power Point presentations.

In 2003, the elementary district passed its third bond since 1990 to build and renovate schools. In 2005, another elementary was opened.

The high school district, which has a third school in Oakley, has passed three construction-renovation bonds. At the middle and high schools, the science and computer labs have been improved. www.mccormacks.com

In 2006, the high school district attempted another bond to help pay for another high school, scheduled to open in Brentwood about 2010. This time voters said no but the measure failed by only two percent. Another try may be made.

All the schools run an unusual calendar that goes two months off in summer with instruction starting about the first of August, 10-day break in October, 10 days in March, Christmas break, traditional holidays.

Los Medanos Community College has rented a store and turned it into a center that teaches a small number of courses. Having passed a bond, the college hopes to build a campus in town and offer many courses.

Zero homicides in 2005, four in 2004, two in 2003, zero between 2002 and 1998. Two homicides in 1997, zero in 1996. New police station opened in 2005. Brentwood has its own police department. See Crime.

Contra Costa developed from west to east. The west boomed during World War II and right after, the Central from the 1950s to about the 1990s. With the building of Highway 4 and the whittling down of Willow Pass, a bottleneck to the freeway, the East started to blossom as suburban communities in the 1970s. www.mccormacks.com

Located south and east of Antioch, reachable until recently by only a two-lane road, Brentwood was one of the last towns to be developed.

Brentwood incorporated itself as a city in 1948. When development came, the city had a municipal structure in place: public works, parks, police, post office, downtown, library, city hall. And it had control of its own planning.

As a result, it was able to bring coherence to the new development. Not 100 percent. Most of the new housing has gone up west of the downtown and inevitably this has weakened the core of the city, especially with the opening of the four-lane Highway 4 Bypass. This arterial is now pulling some of the shopping out of the downtown.

But even with the homes to the west, the downtown retains a good deal of shopping. Liberty High School sits next to the library, which is situated next to city hall. Several of the elementary schools are in the downtown or within a short walk. (The new high school is located in the new subdivisions, to the west of the downtown.)

The old downtown has a village square with a gazebo, a Masonic hall, small stores, antique shops, a few restaurants, a movie theater and leafy trees that shade the streets. The town library was recently expanded. www.mccormacks.com

Brentwood strikes many as a farm town that has tacked on suburbia. Which is to say, it has some rural, small-town charm. In the summer, the farmers open stands near their fields. Many people drive out to pick the fruit and pluck the corn. Town celebrates annual Cornfest.

Will the farms last? Will the small-town flavor be lost? The town certainly will continue to grow. But residents are trying to define an urban limit and keep the country atmosphere. Over 4,000 acres in the Brentwood area have been placed in park land (see following on Marsh).

The state tally in 2008 showed 17,309 residential units: 15,405 single homes, 527 single attached, 1,026 apartments, 351 mobiles.

Brentwood is close to miles of rivers and waterways: boating, fishing, water skiing, swimming. Mt. Diablo stands tall to the west, a delight to the eye. New tract homes and apartments sit beside orchards and bountiful fields — peaches, pears, nuts, apricots, tomatoes, cherries, eggs, corn, asparagus, almonds, walnuts, pistachios, black-eyed peas.

About 31 parks, including an expanded sports complex with 10 playing fields, museum, swimming pool, library, baseball, basketball, football, soccer. Spring to Life Festival. Community theater stages plays at Liberty High School, which has a modern performing arts center. Bowling alley. Skate park. Youth center. Also near the town is a cave with ancient paintings sacred to the Indians. Restricted access. The new stores include a TJ Maxx (mini department store). www.mccormacks.com

Good town for playmates. The 2000 census placed 35 percent of all residents under age 18, very high. For homecoming, football team and high-school students parade through downtown, an event that attracts thousands.

Home prices fall in the category of middle suburban but compared to many cities in Central Contra Costa, Brentwood's homes are “reasonably” priced (but many go for well over $700,000) and this is the major reason why the town is growing rapidly.

Several cities in Contra Costa, including Brentwood, are seeing their prices erode because many homes were built during the boom in sub prime loans. For home sellers, not good news. For buyers; lower prices.

Most housing runs to middle class or middle plus but one development, Apple Hill, is decidedly mansion class.

The new tracts are coming in as master planned with homeowner associations that pay for the upkeep of common grounds. These tracts usually feature small parks or playing fields and a variety of home designs, some with small porches.

Retirement community, gated, wraps around two golf courses. Utility lines buried in the new subdivisions. www.mccormacks.com

The new look vies with the old, and sometimes the old — the downtown — softens the dazzle of the new. In 2005, Brentwood opened a butcher’s shop and more restaurants — Thai, Japanese, Mexican, Chinese, barbecue. Tired of Starbucks? Brentwood now has a Peets. Giant bookstore and movie complex within drive of five minutes.

Hot in summer, cool in winter. But the heat is dry, rarely humid, the cool is rarely freezing — a Delta pattern. Winter fog. See Weather.

Traffic congestion is the main drawback. No matter how fast the roads are widened and the freeways improved, they probably will never keep up with the number of vehicles. But widening Highway 4 to four lanes all the way to Brentwood will make a big difference (with the 2006 passage of the state bond, this project might be expedited.)

The bypass road from Antioch (Lone Tree Way) through the east side of Brentwood has taken many vehicles off the old Highway 4.

South of Brentwood a large reservoir, called Los Vaqueros, opened in 1998. This forced the rerouting and improvement of Vasco Road, a shortcut to Livermore and Interstate 580. www.mccormacks.com

If you work in Livermore, Pleasanton or Dublin, the commute is not bad. If you work in Central Contra Costa, many a nerve will be twanged by Highway 4, often congested long before it reaches Antioch, nevermind Brentwood.

If you work in San Francisco, you're in for a commute that one way will often run 1.5 to 2 hours and get you home on tough nights about 7 p.m. BART will allow commuters to avoid the Bay Bridge, a mess. Tri Delta buses to Antioch and Pittsburg shopping centers, connection to BART stations. See Commute.

Sutter Delta Medical Center within a short drive. Kaiser Permanente has outpatient clinics in Antioch and is building a medical center there. John Muir Medical recently opened a medical center near the Highway 4 Bypass in Brentwood.

With the medical centers, the new stores, the movies and coffee shops and restaurants, the comforts and necessities of modern suburbia have settled in.

Chamber of commerce (925) 634-3344.

• In 2005, the city struck a deal with Comcast to provide modern cable service to town. Package includes free service (through fees paid by residents) to schools. Also three channels for use by town and to show local basketball, football, soccer, etc. www.mccormacks.com

• Highway 4 Bypass is being extended south. One casualty, a nine-hole golf course.

• E-rail in discussion. The Union Pacific runs tracks through town. The idea is to run a passenger train on these tracks over to the Pittsburg BART station and improve the commute. Check out the train noise.

• In 2006, city officials and residents began drawing up plans for a new city hall with a plaza, a community center and a library. The job, estimated to cost $28 million, may begin in 2008.

• Some farmers and residents are planting grapes and bottling their own vintages. Small vineyards are popping up around the county and there’s talk of making Contra Costa, in a small way, a wine region. The soil and weather apparently are well suited for wines.

• Dr. John Marsh was the first Yankee to settle in Contra Costa. He built a stone mansion, somewhat Gothic, on the outskirts of Brentwood. Marsh was known as hard working and adventuresome and influential because he wrote many letters to people back East describing California and encouraging them to come West. www.mccormacks.com

In 1856, Marsh was stabbed to death in Martinez by two men. A plaque marks the spot. Several histories describe the men as bandits or robbers but Marsh may have owed them money and this might have caused an argument. The incident also suggests a more complicated story.

The Spanish did not arrive in Northern California until 1769 and few in numbers did not settle in Contra Costa until well into the 1800s. When they moved inland, they pushed the Indian tribes off their ancestral grounds, setting off battles that lasted for decades. The Indians worked the rancheros and they stole cattle and they raided the rancheros. It was a time of great change, shifting allegiances and  violence.

Marsh, the pioneer and bandit (Indian) fighter, symbolizes the era. For a long time he was considered a hero and many still hold him in esteem. But he is inevitably associated with the destruction of the Indians — and this story is still playing out.

After years of effort, historical groups have won funding to restore the Marsh mansion as a state park.

Coincidentally, a landowner sought permission to develop 5,000 acres near the Marsh mansion. Many people protested and in the end the owner was allowed to develop 480 acres in exchange for donating 4,000 acres to a conservation group, which passed the land to the state for a park. www.mccormacks.com

The state connection is important because the state has funds to maintain and develop the park and the mansion.

In 2006, a builder preparing the 480 acres for homes discovered the skeletons of 500 Indians and jewelry, pottery and other artifacts. Brentwood about 7,000 years ago used to be an Indian village and it may have been one when the Spanish arrived.

The remains were removed but state archaeologists, sensitive to the importance of the site, turned down a request to build a road through the donated land. This road was to have been the main access to the community college campus, which Brentwood really wants. City and college officials are trying to work out a solution.

When the park and mansion are restored, the state intends to tell the story of the Indians.

• Among new arrivals: a Trader Joe’s and another McDonald’s but different from its predecessors: leather couches, flat-screen televisions, indoor jungle gym. www.mccormacks.com

City web site: www.ci.brentwood.ca.us