Yehudi Gaffen at BMC Real Estate Conference

SAN DIEGO—The massive, mixed-use development project known as Seaport San Diego,taking place along Downtown San Diego's waterfront and Seaport Village has moved into its second evolution, Yehudi “Gaf” Gaffen, CEO of Gafcon Inc., told attendees at the BMC's 22nd Annual Real Estate Conference here Thursday. Gaffen addressed a full ballroom of attendees, offering a background of the project—spearheaded by the Port of San Diego—as well as an update on its progress and why it will benefit San Diego.

Gaffen explained that his staff was selected in 2016 to redevelop the area, expanding Seaport Village from 13 acres to 70 acres and including a wide variety of uses along the waterfront, including three classes of hotels, retail, a parking structure that can be converted once no longer needed into other uses, health-and-wellness area, an observation spire, educational and aquarium uses, a public beach, a park and a variety of open spaces intended to creating a true community feel that connects the city to the waterfront.

In fact, Gaffen said his firm won the Port's RFP because its program was solid and because its underpinnings involved building community. Since then, an active earthquake fault was discovered under the site, preventing development on a large swath of the site and moving it into its second phase of development. After also discovering lots of utilities running through the site, including sewage lines and naval sonar systems, Gafcon and its partners in the project began to look at some of the public spaces in cities all over the world that represent successful gathering areas.

Recommended For You

Want to continue reading?
Become a Free ALM Digital Reader.

Once you are an ALM Digital Member, you’ll receive:

  • Breaking commercial real estate news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
  • Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
  • Critical coverage of the property casualty insurance and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, PropertyCasualty360 and ThinkAdvisor
NOT FOR REPRINT

© 2025 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.

Carrie Rossenfeld

Carrie Rossenfeld is a reporter for the San Diego and Orange County markets on GlobeSt.com and a contributor to Real Estate Forum. She was a trade-magazine and newsletter editor in New York City before moving to Southern California to become a freelance writer and editor for magazines, books and websites. Rossenfeld has written extensively on topics including commercial real estate, running a medical practice, intellectual-property licensing and giftware. She has edited books about profiting from real estate and has ghostwritten a book about starting a home-based business.