Where To View The Bay Bridge Lights In San Leandro

Keep this to yourself.

You can still reserve a table at Horatio's or El Torito in the San Leandro Marina to enjoy dinner while watching tonight's debut of "The Bay Lights," a glittering array of 25,000 LED lights created by artist Leo Villareal.

The lights will be turned on at about 9 p.m. Many bayfront restaurants are sold out in anticipation of the event.

"We have had to turn down hundreds of people," Duane Stinson, general manager at Sinbad's Seafood Restaurant in San Francisco told Bay City News.

But as of 2 pm Tuesday tables were available at Horatio's (351-5556) and El Torito (351-8825).

If you want to make a night of it, the Marina Inn (895-1311) has a few rooms with bay views available for $149 to $159.

If you can't get a table or room, bring your lawn chair, a beverage and snack, and a blanket and umbrella, and park in the Marina until 10 pm when police shut the area down for the night. 

Rain is in the forecast in various parts of the bay tonight but with any luck it will stay away until after the light sculpture is unveiled.

The lights will remain on for two years. They will not be visible to drivers on the  Bay Bridge.

The LEDs were mounted over the past several months on the vertical cables of the western span and will be on for about seven hours each night.

The $8 million project is being privately funded but is still about $2 million short of that amount.

Donate online at www.thebaylights.org.

The site also contains recommendations for where to view the lights and a link to a live webcast of tonight's ceremony.

What do you think of the idea? Will you take part in the spectacle?