Parks | Streetsblog San Francisco

Posts from the "Parks" Category

Thursday, April 16, 2009 28 Comments

Cars Invade Golden Gate Park, Inner Sunset as Institutions Reopen

Photo by Bryan Goebel

The Music Concourse in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park is living proof of that ancient maxim dating back to the movie Field of Dreams: if you build it, they will come.

In this case, however, it isn’t the spectators to a baseball diamond in an Iowa cornfield, but people traveling in their cars through the Inner Sunset and along MLK Jr. Drive to an 800-car garage below the concourse with two entrances, one in the south near 9th Avenue, Lincoln Way, and MLK Jr. Drive and one in the north near 10th Avenue and Fulton. The ultimate destinations of many of the occupants are the California Academy of Sciences and the de Young Museum, which sit on either side of a manicured, European-style bowl that is the concourse. Both attractions have been rebuilt in recent years and seem to be drawing vastly increased numbers of visitors.

“Today is an example of the potential for what could happen when King Tut comes,” Inner Sunset resident and public parks watchdog Chris Duderstadt said Wednesday.

Make no mistake – he wasn’t referring to hordes of people escaping tax collectors by hiding in the park. Instead, he was referring to academy patrons who descend on the concourse en masse on the third Wednesday of every month. That’s when the academy waives the $25 entry fee. Starting June 27th, the de Young will be showcasing the finery of Egyptian boy king, Tutankhamun, and then, suggests Duderstadt, traffic congestion could start to resemble what it was around Woodstock four decades ago – but every day of the summer, not just the third Wednesdays, and certainly not just for one, long bacchanalian weekend.

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Tuesday, April 14, 2009 9 Comments

Eyes On The Street: Potrero Median Fence Is Partially Built

by Bryan Goebel

Photos by Matthew Roth

A five-foot tall median fence that some advocates fear will actually make the area more dangerous for pedestrians is now being installed on Potrero Avenue between 25th Street and Cesar Chavez. As my colleague Matthew Roth has reported, DPW and MTA are erecting the fence to to prevent people from making "illegal and unsafe crossings" in the middle of the block between Rolph Playground and Potrero del Sol Park. Some neighbors and advocates pointed out the city reopened the park, which has become wildly popular, without any consideration for pedestrians who want to cross back and forth. The fence idea was initiated after the Mayor noticed people were crossing in the middle of the block.

After protests from advocates about the lack of a community process (the fence was planned to go up without any public input or outreach), a meeting was held March 25th. At that time, the Planning Department presented a conceptual design for a permanent mid-block ped-activated signal, crosswalk, and pedestrian refuge, which garnered strong support from advocates. The signal and crosswalk would cost between $150,000 to $300,000.

For now, the fence will be completed and remain up until the agencies can agree on a long-term solution, backed with funding. In an email, Fran Taylor of CC Puede said she still very concerned:

I think it will encourage people to cross at the most dangerous point, at the southern end of the fence close to the offramp onto Potrero, where cars will be traveling fastest and have the least time to see someone and slow down. I also think agile young people can jump it, but while they’re stuck on the median, now they’ll have only half the space on either side of the fence that they did before The meeting did produce some near-consensus that a broader solution involving traffic calming should follow what everyone seemed to recognize was a stopgap measure.

She added, "I hope no one gets hurt because of this fence, but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone does."

Monday, April 6, 2009 10 Comments

What’s in a Neighborhood

by Matthew Roth

A Sunday Stroll on International Boulevard, Flickr photo by madpai

How would you define the boundaries of your neighborhood? Is it the streets that describe it? Is it the people who live in it, a cultural or demographic group that you belong to, or that excludes you? Do you think your neighbors would describe your neighborhood the same way you do?

I live on Mission Street, a few blocks south of Cesar Chavez, on the side of the street that the Post Office includes in its Bernal Heights boundary. If I tell people I live in Bernal Heights, most assume I'm up on Cortland Street in the commercial center of Bernal Heights, a fifteen minute walk. If I say Mission, they assume the area north of Cesar Chavez between 24th Street and 14th Street, a 10 to 20 minute walk. No one knows what I mean if I say Precita Valley. Inevitably, I just say I live across the street from the bar El Rio and most people know exactly where I am.

Berkeley landscape architecture graduate student Robert Lemon was recently awarded the Landscape Architecture Foundation's Dangermond Fellowship to examine questions of neighborhood identity in the Oakland districts of Fruitvale, West Oakland, and Chinatown. He's hoping the information he gathers will inform city planners and politicians not only about how members of a community define themselves, but ways the city can improve the neighborhood according to those geographic and cultural identities.

Mapping Oakland is based on previous experience Lemon had as a planner in Columbus, Ohio, and research he did for a Berkeley class on the relocation of the I-880 in West Oakland after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake destroyed a section of it.

Lemon has completed most of the survey work he intends to collect and is now filtering through the data for patterns, which he expects will vary by demographic and cultural subsets. Lemon and a Berkeley counterpart will create GIS maps to give a visual representation to the dynamics of those neighborhoods. He explained that three respondents will have three different perspectives on the boundaries of a neighborhood and, using GIS, he will map the errors of disagreement among all respondents. If a block within a neighborhood is repeatedly excluded from the boundaries, he wants to know which that is and why it is defined the way it is.

Thursday, April 2, 2009 8 Comments

News From New York: The ABC’s of Trial Plazas and Complete Streets

by Matthew Roth

The trial plaza at Madison Square

When we wrote about the trial pedestrian plaza on 17th Street and Market Street that DPW expects to start this May, the story generated numerous doubts about how the city would create a successful public space out of a busy street abutting a gas station.

As commenter Josh said, "This truly is a ridiculous idea! Why would anyone want to "enjoy" a small patch of cemented area that's filled with salvage yard leftovers while inhaling unhealthy fumes from not only the cars on the busy streets that surround the designated area but by the gas station?"

Though we can't make guarantees on a pilot project that hasn't been built, we thought we'd highlight some of New York City's temporary plazas and street treatments as best practice analogs, knowing our DPW and MTA are also looking to the Big Crabapple for inspiration.

DPW Director Ed Reiskin explained to Streetsblog by email that his goal is to keep expenses low. "As for cost, it should be minimal, since materials cost should be close to zero," he said. "There will be some labor cost to us and MTA to put up signs, transport and place materials, and install any pavement treatments and cuts."

In New York, even the "salvage yard leftovers" have become very nice public amenities.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009 9 Comments

Mayor Newsom, Caltrans Announce Plans to Remove Portions of I-280

by Matthew Roth

A controlled explosion from the filming of the TV series "Trauma," on a closed portion of I-280

Mayor Gavin Newsom yesterday announced one of his most ambitious plans for re-shaping San Francisco, telling reporters at a press conference with Caltrans Director Will Kemption and Caltrain Director Michael Scanlan that the city would move forward with plans to tear down sections of I-280 through San Francisco.

"As we saw this weekend with the filming of the new TV series 'Trauma,' we can close a section of 280 and it doesn't back up all the way to San Bruno," said Mayor Newsom. "I'm committed to actively looking for projects where we can transform our streets into public open space, especially in neighborhoods that have so little of it. Show me another project that gives back more space to our great city than this."

Mayor Newsom painted a grand vision of a ribbon park in the footprint of the current freeway and said the city would rezone much of the area for residential development, much of which would be affordable housing, he claimed. "Think Rock Creek Park for the next century," said Mayor Newsom. "If New York City can convert an old rail line through Manhattan into the Highline Park, surely we can transform our outdated infrastructure into green space."

Caltrans' Kempton said that the agency had considered various freeways that underperformed their transportation function after the successful removal of segments of the Embarcadero Freeway and Central Freeway to Market Street, but said that they weren't seriously thinking about this section of I-280 until Mayor Newsom approached Governor Schwarzenegger late last year.

"We've understood that it was possible to make changes to further segments of the Embarcadero Freeway," said Kempton, "but we didn't see it as a priority until Mayor Newsom made it so. Now, we're only committing to study it, but we know the Obama administration is looking for innovative transportation projects, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are unspent federal stimulus funds from other states that we can apply for in six months, a year from now."

"Highway de-construction can be just as shovel-ready as highway re-construction," said Kempton.

Wednesday, March 25, 2009 51 Comments

17th Street Closure Will Be First NYC-style Plaza in San Francisco

by Matthew Roth

The future site of a pedestrian plaza at 17th and Market Streets

Don't look now, but NYC DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan's magic may have rubbed off on DPW Director Ed Reiskin, to San Francisco's benefit. Reiskin has been leading a multi-agency effort to close a small portion of 17th Street where it meets Market Street to vehicle traffic and convert the space into a trial pedestrian plaza, which he hopes to see operational by May.

The historic trolley that loads at the proposed location will still operate in the area, but the DPW will put out planters and other moderately heavy stone elements that will serve as seating and tables, much like Gansevoort Plaza in New York City.

"As we’ve seen what folks in New York City have done in terms of taking excess asphalt and returning it to people, to more diverse uses, we're inspired," said Reiskin. "The approach we’re taking here is to try it. If it’s great, it will be great. If not, we’ll take it out."

Reiskin has been coordinating the effort with the MTA, the Planning Department, Supervisor Bevan Dufty, the Castro Street Community Betterment District (CBD), and the Mayor's Director of Greening, Astrid Haryati. Public Architecture, a private firm, is working pro bono to create the design for the new public space.

MTA Executive Director Nat Ford was very upbeat. "We're really excited about this. We’ve been trying to identify locations around the city to make these quick improvements that help us to green the city and make it more pleasurable for pedestrians or workers who want to have their lunch outside in public space."

Tuesday, March 24, 2009 11 Comments

Streetfilms: A Proposed Urban Park in Historic North Beach

by Bryan Goebel

"What destroys the poetry of a city? Automobiles destroy it, and they destroy more than the poetry."

--Lawrence Ferlinghetti

One of San Francisco's cherished literary icons -- poet, painter and City Lights publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti -- is celebrating his 90th birthday today, and I thought it would be fitting to bring you his vision for transforming a small block of Vallejo Street in historic North Beach into what would be called the Piazza Saint Francis.

Ferlinghetti founded the Piazza Saint Francis Foundation and is working with the Planning Department's City Design Group, Caffe Trieste and many others, including attorney and former supervisor Angela Alioto and film director Francis Ford Coppola (who worked on "The Godfather" screenplay at Trieste), to create an Italian-style piazza, with inscriptions on the paving stones from up to 30 or 40 authors, mostly poets.

North Beach is an ideal place to do this, not just because of its Italian flare. The neighborhood consistently shows some of the highest pedestrian counts in the city, yet lacks a lot of usable public space. It does feature Grant Street, though, one of San Francisco's most pedestrian-friendly streets, which runs through the heart of Chinatown, across Columbus, and into North Beach alongside Trieste, and Washington Square Park.

The biggest obstacle to realizing the project is the estimated $3.5 million price tag. The city can't afford to do it, so private funds will need to be raised to make it happen. "We urgently need money to make it go forward," said Ferlinghetti.