Alcopark parking garage - Oakland

The Alcopark parking garage, also known as Alco Park 165, is the big spiral (helical) structure at 165 - 13th Street, near the lake and main library in Chinatown. This distinguished building on the 13th Street architectural corridor is one of two Oakland parking garages owned and operated by the Alameda County General Services Agency (the other is the Oakland Parking Facility at 587 - 7th Street). It costs $1.50 per hour, $7 per day for the public and $6 per day if you have juror validation. It has nine levels overall, two of which are below ground, and has 744 spaces.

The oval, prestressed-concrete structure was built with a heliport on its top, an elliptical pad measuring about 180 by 100 feet. The San Francisco and Oakland Helicopter Airlines Company promised service to Sacramento from "the finest heliport in the world."¹ The heliport was the nation's first one built on the top of a building.

Photo by andrewalden

The structure was built in 1962-63, a late element inspired by the city's Lake Merritt Civic Center plan that accompanied construction of the Alameda County Administration Building next door. It cost the county approximately $2.5 million, of which $50,000 for the heliport was contributed by the Port of Oakland. The architects were two Berkeley firms, Van Bourg, Nakamura & Associates and Ratcliff & Ratcliff, who also designed the administration building. The block previously held the city's municipal court building. The "heligarage" was dedicated on November 26, 1963. ²

The views from the top are superb.

Here are its yelp reviews (they include details on parking here).