Google Sightseeing takes you on tour of the world as seen from satellite, using the free Google Earth program, or Google Maps in your web browser. Each weekday your guides James and Alex present new weird and wonderful sights as suggested by readers.

The editors: James & Alex

Naval Air Station, Alameda

Sunday, 24th April 2005 by James

The runways are painted like a street at the former Naval Air Station at Alameda, CA to create a temporary freeway built for the big chase in The Matrix: Reloaded. There’s also some ground level shots of the freeways construction (scroll down to “behind the scenes”).

Matrix

Thanks: Dan Wood & Tim Smith

9 Responses to 'Naval Air Station, Alameda'

  1. 1. Jen says:

    And for those who like to shop secondhand or finding antiques- Antiques By The Bay is held at this location the first Sunday of every month. It’s a lot of fun to go to (if you’re into that kind of stuff) and at the very edge of the booths you can see the city.

  2. 2. caknuck says:

    I suppose you could add this to the Large Type category too, as they painted “NAS ALAMEDA” in huge print on one of the taxiways :)

  3. 3. trip says:

    Umm, that wasn’t for The Matrix:Reloaded, that was all done in Australia.

  4. 4. James says:

    trip,

    According to the [imbd][1] The movie was filmed in both Australia and the USA and [this page][2] states

    > The entire freeway chase was filmed on a stretch of freeway that was built from scratch on an old airplane runway at the former Alameda Naval Air Station in Alameda, Northern California.

    So there’s really not much doubt that this is where the scene was filmed!

    [1]: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0234215/locations
    [2]: http://www.norcalmovies.com/TheMatrixReloaded/FreewayChase/

  5. 5. Howiepea says:

    As well, this is the place where a lot of MythBusting takes place on Discovery Channel’s MythBusters.

  6. 6. Brandon says:

    Naval station in Alameda, CA? Isn’t that where they keep the “nuclear wessels”?

  7. 7. Johnnie says:

    Check out USS Hornet, too…

  8. 8. Kev says:

    Trip, the Matrix sequel chase scenes were filmed on this, it was the world’s biggest movie set ever at 1.25 miles long.

    I live in the Bay Area and was all over Alameda when they were filming, it was intense. I do have some stories, and had lots of fun one afternoon thanks to a real cool guy named Clay. (check imdb.)

    They also filmed on the streets of Oakland, which is close to Alameda. Australia was where they did the rest (though the CG effects company was in Alameda too).

  9. 9. xXx says:

    The size of that set is better viewed with Nasa World Wind:

    http://img289.echo.cx/img289/6031/matrixroad2xg.jpg

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