Kids & Family

Pacific Pinball Museum May Move into Former Carnegie Library

The museum has signed a Letter of Intent with the City of Alameda to lease and restore the 1903 building on Santa Clara Avenue.

The Pacific Pinball Museum (PPA) has signed a Letter of Intent with the City of Alameda to lease and restore the former Carnegie Library at 2264 Santa Clara Ave., according to a press release from the museum.

City Manager John Russo put forth the offer to lease the Carnegie Library and the attached property for 30 years, the release says.

In return, the museum will be responsible for completing the restoration and bringing the Carnegie up to current building code requirements, it says. Projects will include redoing the electrical, plumbing and sewer systems as well as adding ADA accessibility, a HVAC system and fire sprinklers. 

"The PPM has been bringing people to Alameda for over 10 years and has established itself as a stable and imaginative non-profit," the press release quoted Alameda City Manager John Russo as saying.

"The prospect of having a pinball museum at the Carnegie is exciting and the City of Alameda looks forward to taking the next steps with PPM to make our common vision a reality."

Museum officials said they will need to raise $3.5 million over the next two years to finance the restoration and move.

The former library has been vacant since 1998, when it was declared seismically unfit.

A federally funded seismic retrofit was completed in 2001, but plans for interior renovation — and possible use of the structure to house the city's building and planning department — stalled.

The building, completed in 1903, was one of the first three libraries in California to be funded by Andrew Carnegie in 1899.

The Pacific Pinball Museum is currently located at 1510 Webster St. Museum officials say the present location only has enough space to display fewer than 100 of the nearly 1,000 pinball machines the museum has collected.

The Carnegie Library building will provide triple the display space of the present museum site and will also have room for community events and exhibits, the press release says.

The museum has been searching for a larger, permanent home for several years. 

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