For the amount of public money spent, the city could have purchased the Hotel Whitcomb.
The department store, owned by Macy’s Inc., will close its flagship on Market Street at the end of March.
The James Beard Award winner launched his pioneering restaurant in 1995 and was slated to reopen it at the original location this summer.
Books Inc. “isn’t going anywhere,” the largest independent bookseller in the Bay Area said.