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Tough to see the Tri-Valley losing another leisure activity staple at the end of this month when Danville Bowl will turn off the lights on the lanes after one final night of rolling the rock.
It’s more than just the impact on bowlers in the San Ramon Valley, who will now have to travel to existing alleys in Dublin or Livermore or the new Pinstripes in downtown Walnut Creek to get their fix of strikes and spares.
The closure represents yet another recreation opportunity gone from the area, somewhere close by that teenagers, families, couples, seniors and singles alike could go for a little fun.
That’s how I ended up with memories made at Danville Bowl. Growing up in Benicia in the mid-2000s (as is still the case there today), if my friends and I wanted to do an activity together, we had to go to Vallejo or across the bridge into Contra Costa County. Our hometown didn’t really have anything to offer us to get out of the house on a Saturday evening or weeknights in the summer.
Bowling was one of the group activities in the rotation – as my best man joked in his speech at my wedding, “we probably bowled more than a normal teenager should have.”
We would just go to the alley with the best deal on games (or beers, as became a key factor in our late college years) on the given day or night.
Danville Bowl was on the list now and then, standing out in part because of the incredible innovation back then that they had cameras at the end of the lanes that would show choppy black-and-white replays of the strike – or gutter ball, as the case may be. Kentwig Lanes (Vallejo) and Diablo Lanes (Concord) from those days are also closed; Clayton Valley Bowl is still open.
So now if you’re a kid in the San Ramon Valley who wants your party at a bowling alley or some high schoolers who want a night out with friends, you’ve got to hop in the car and drive one to three towns away.
Same if the movie you want to see is sold out or not playing at THE LOT in City Center Bishop Ranch, ever since Regal Crow Canyon and Century Blackhawk Plaza shuttered in recent years. As we reported recently, it remains unclear when Apple Cinemas will take over the latter — and although remodeling is ongoing, Apple is still vaguely “coming soon” after missing its original 2024 goal.
Pleasanton teens can relate … those who want time away from their screens, anyway. Families and residents in general too. Want to see a movie in a real live theater? Drive over to Dublin or Livermore. The cinema proposed for Stoneridge Shopping Center back in 2019 seems like a pipe dream probably lost to the pandemic.
We also know Golden Skate in San Ramon is closing some time soon, with the property owner getting city approval to redevelop with housing. We have a cover story retrospective on the roller rink in the works.
We want to dig into a feature on Tommy T’s Comedy Club too, a property that is on the so-called “housing opportunity sites” list for the city of Pleasanton’s current Housing Element. I’m unaware of any development plans having been submitted to date.
The Housing Element site lists are good to keep an eye out for. That’s how the Danville community had to know the ball could drop on the bowling alley on Boone Court at some point in the next several years.
Folks in Pleasanton are also watching the Alameda County Fairgrounds more closely these days, for any sort of redevelopment potential, now that horse racing has been canceled for all of 2025 – and quite possibly forever, although I did see an online petition circulating among the last-ditch efforts to save races at the historic track.
Pay attention to the future of the actual horse track and the golf course is my recommendation. Advancing a coordinated plan after the racing industry exits a county fairgrounds is imperative. Trust me.
The Solano County Fairgrounds continues to waste away, one of those depressing reminders of what was in Vallejo. I learned to play golf on the nine-hole executive course in the middle of the race track, knocking the ball around “The Horse Course” starting at 5 years old.
Horse racing waned there as my childhood went on, and then eventually stopped when I was in college. The golf course stayed open for a few years, surrounded by the decaying skeleton of the racing industry, before succumbing itself in 2014.
Overtaken by weeds, the former horse track and golf course have been an idle eyesore along the freeway for more than a decade.
Land-use changes, more often for the better than for the worse. But more importantly (and as tough as it is), it’s a fact of life that’s best to get used to.
Looking just across the street from the Vallejo fairgrounds and the desolate remains of my once-beloved “Horse Course” you can see the Six Flags Discovery Kingdom theme park – an expanded reimagining of the Marine World Africa USA attraction located on that property in my youth. And before that? It was the old Lake Chabot course, where my dad and his brother played golf with my grandpa growing up.
Golf course properties hold a lot of redevelopment potential, a cloud hanging over us links lovers in the Bay Area on a regular basis. I have a collection of pencils from closed courses at home that seems to grow every year.
The Tri-Valley right now can see the spectrum of promise to panic that comes with converting a golf course.
It’s great to watch Livermore city officials and community members be thoughtful and intentional about the future of the old Springtown golf course property, especially with trying to include leisure activity substitutes there.
Even if the debates are heated, driving an authentic conversation forward is vital.
Nothing is worse than seeing a former golf course property just sitting there, overgrowing and aimless, for years and years – ask any commuter who drives through the Sunol Valley on a daily basis.
Editor’s note: Jeremy Walsh is the editorial director for the Embarcadero Media Foundation’s East Bay Division. His “What a Week” column is a recurring feature in the Pleasanton Weekly, Livermore Vine and DanvilleSanRamon.com.
