Christopher Buckley, AICP, longtime Alameda resident, city planner, preservationist, tree advocate, musician, and generous civic friend, died on May 12, 2026. He was 77.
[1]Born on March 30, 1949, Chris devoted much of his life to the care and preservation of Alameda and Oakland. He spent approximately 30 years with the City of Oakland Planning and Building Department before taking early retirement and continuing his work as a city planning consultant, where he specialized in historic preservation, urban design, zoning ordinances, and design guidelines.
Much of the charm of Alameda and Oakland bears the mark of Chris’s work. In Alameda, he was a founder, board member, Preservation Action Committee Chair, Preservation Awards Chair, Plaques Committee member, and elder statesman of the Alameda Architectural Preservation Society (AAPS). He served on the City of Alameda’s Historic Advisory Board, attended countless City Council meetings, and was a persistent advocate for preservation, trees, and thoughtful city planning. His own restored Victorian-era residence in Alameda’s Gold Coast reflected the same care for historic details that guided his public work.
Chris was also active in Oakland Heritage Alliance, Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, Trees for Oakland, and 100K Trees for Humanity. He served on the City of Alameda’s sustainability committee, Community Action for a Sustainable Alameda, and was known as a tireless, often quiet planter of trees. For decades, he bought large trees and helped rehome them in vacant street-tree wells and parks, believing that trees were essential to the beauty, history, and livability of Alameda and Oakland.
Friends remember Chris as brilliant, exacting, generous, and deeply cultured. He loved travel, architecture, photography, fine dining, music, piano, concerts, and opera. He gave freely of his counsel, resources, time, and expertise, helping friends, neighbors, organizations, and cities better understand what was worth preserving.
Chris was predeceased by his wife, Patricia Vanderberg, and by his friend Marina Carlson. He has no known surviving immediate family, but leaves a wide circle of friends, colleagues, neighbors, preservation partners, and civic organizations who will feel his absence deeply.
A funeral mass will be held Saturday, June 13, at 11 a.m. at St. Peter’s Anglican Parish, 6013 Lawton Avenue in Oakland. Chris will be buried next to his wife, Patricia, at Sunset View Cemetery in El Cerrito.
Memories may be shared at his Ever Loved memorial page [2]. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Alameda Architectural Preservation Society, Oakland Heritage Alliance, Trees for Oakland, 100K Trees for Humanity, Alameda Museum, or St. Peter’s Anglican Parish in honor of Chris’s lifelong commitment to preservation, trees, and the civic beauty of Alameda and Oakland.
Kay Weinstein is president of the Alameda Architectural Preservation Society.