The TJPA board's decision affirms that of the jury for theinternational design and development competition, which placedPelli-Hines proposal well ahead of the others. The jury gave thePelli-Hines proposal an average score of 90, saying it was superiorto the two other proposals in all respects, aesthetically,functionally and financially. The second-place proposal, fromSkidmore Owings & Merrill and Rockefeller Group DevelopmentCorp., garnered an average score of 72. The third-place proposal,from Richard Rogers Partnership, Forest City Enterprises andMacFarlane Partners, had an average score of 61.

Pelli-Hines' proposal calls for a 1.8-million-sf, 1,300-foottower alongside a new transit terminal topped by a public park. Twodefining components of the Pelli-Hines proposal are the price it isoffering to pay for the Tower property, which, at $350 million, ismore than double that of the other proposals; and the elevated5.4-acre park it designed atop the Transit Center Building,something the two other proposals do not include. In addition,Hines envisions the tower containing exclusively office space whiletwo other tower proposals had significant residential andhospitality components. Hines is projecting annual gross officerents at $83 per sf.

The redeveloped Transbay Transit Center will centralize theregion's transportation network by accommodating eighttransportation systems under one roof--AC Transit, Caltrain, MUNI,Golden Gate Transit, SamTrans, Greyhound, BART and the futureCalifornia High-Speed Rail, which will transport people between SanFrancisco and Los Angeles in less than three hours. The designpresentations represent one of the final stages of an eight-monthinternational competition to find a design with "aesthetic andfunctional excellence" and that provides "a sound economic returnto the TJPA."