SFMTA Board Chair Tom Nolan (left), Supervisor Scott Wiener (center), Mayor Ed Lee, and SFMTA Director of Transportation Ed Reiskin at an SFPark press conference. Photo: Mayor's Press Office/Flickr

But whether San Francisco will live up to its promise as a leader in sustainable transportation in the coming years depends on the political will of city leaders like Mayor Ed Lee and SFMTA Director Ed Reiskin to make bold improvements to our streets. Lasting change will come from policies like extending parking meter hours, consolidating bus stops, implementing a strong pedestrian safety action plan, and the swift build-out of safer, more comfortable bikeways to increase bicycle ridership.

“San Francisco has indeed never been so poised to leap ahead and build on the successes of the past few years by committing to and vigorously pursuing a sound strategy that will get the city to its goal of 20 percent of trips by bicycle by 2020,” said San Francisco Bicycle Coalition (SFBC) Deputy Director Kit Hodge. “San Francisco loves bicycling and is more ready than ever to take even bigger steps forward, beginning right now with the implementation of the crosstown bike routes in our Connecting the City vision.”

This month, the SFMTA approved its 2013 – 2018 Strategic Plan [PDF], setting out to reduce car use from 62 percent of all trips to 50 percent. And San Francisco’s goal of reaching 20 percent trips by bike by 2020 is uniquely ambitious among American cities. But for the reality to match the rhetoric, change will have to happen faster.

To use the example of bikeways and complete streets, the agency’s current rate of delivery on protected bike lanes doesn’t seem sufficient to meet the city’s targets. The SFMTA has struggled so far to keep up with the bold ten-year plan envisioned by the SFBC in its Connecting the City campaign, which calls for 100 miles of bikeways by 2020. The city’s first parking-protected bikeway is only expected to begin construction this week after a year of delay, and fixing the crucial bicycling link on just three blocks of Fell and Oak Streets will have taken over a year and a half from conception to implementation. Planners on that project have said the time required is partly due to the search for new car parking spots to make up for the spaces the bikeways will replace.

Meanwhile, New York City has built about twenty miles of protected bikeways in recent years, and aims to build up to ten more in Manhattan by 2013. Traffic injuries to all users have dropped as much as 35 percent on streets with protected bikeways, and the reallocation of space from traffic to pedestrians in Midtown has produced even more impressive safety gains. Overall, the city’s pedestrian fatalities have declined by 40 percent since 2001. In Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel quickly installed the Kinzie Street bikeway last summer, and wants to build 100 miles — the same number envisioned by SFBC within the decade — before his first term is over.

San Francisco’s SFPark program, while highly successful, could extend to more neighborhoods and cover additional times of day when it is sorely needed. The program is perhaps the most visibly noted accomplishment by the ITDP, but it is being tested by a backlash as the SFMTA seeks to expand it into the neighborhoods around Mission Bay. Whether neighbors have valid criticisms of the agency’s outreach or they just don’t want to pay for parking, SFPark manager Jay Primus announced this week that the agency will postpone taking the expansion plan before the SFMTA Board of Directors. Meanwhile, Mayor Lee has backed down on extending meter hours that would allow SFPark to be used most effectively. Eyes are on city leaders and staff to see how willing they are to stay the course with a groundbreaking, progressive and effective program.

San Francisco has made some important advances in sustainable transportation. But to meet — and perhaps exceed — the expectations set by the ITDP’s award, Mayor Lee and other leaders must commit to the changes San Francisco needs to achieve safer, more livable streets.

Image: Great Streets Project

The 2011 Parklet Impact Study [PDF], released yesterday by the SF Great Streets Project, measures changes in pedestrian volumes and activity at three new parklets built last year. The study, which also includes pedestrian surveys and business surveys, calls to mind the public space analysis of pioneering urbanist William H. Whyte, who recorded usage patterns of New York City plazas in the 1970s.

Comparing sites on Valencia, Stockton (in North Beach), and Polk Streets before and after parklets were installed, the authors found higher rates of “stationary activities” at all three locations. None of the businesses reported a drop in customers due to the removal of curbside parking. Basically, the Great Streets Project has quantified how carving out new public spaces from parking spots makes for a more sociable city.

Here are the key findings listed in the report:

Average foot traffic on Stockton Street increased 44% from 304 to 438 people per hour after the parklet was installed. However, there was no significant change in foot traffic at the Valencia Street and Polk Street locations.

The number of people stopping to engage in stationary activities significantly increased at all three locations, especially on weekdays. The greatest increase was on Polk Street where the average nearly tripled from four to 11 people at any given time.

There was also an incremental increase in the number of bikes parked in each location.

The results of the pedestrian survey varied greatly by location. While perception of the area as a good place for socializing and fun increased on Valencia and Polk Streets increased, it decreased on Stockton Street. Perception of the area as a place that looks clean increased on Polk and Stockton Streets, but decreased on Valencia Street.

Although only one of the seven businesses that replied to the business survey observed that customer levels had increased after a parklet was installed, none had observed a decrease in their customer levels.

Five of the seven businesses observed that most of their customers are primarily from the surrounding neighborhood and arrive to their establishment by foot.

None of the businesses reported significant concerns about the parklet regarding loss of nearby street parking or other impacts on their business.

The bikeway runs alongside the end of the Central Freeway. Photos: Aaron Bialick

New markings are on the ground delineating the short two-way bikeway linking the Market and Octavia intersection to Valencia Street and the future site of the McCoppin Hub plaza.

SFMTA crews made the improvements two weeks ago, according to the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition. The pedestrian and bicycle shortcut has existed for years, but the new center line, bike markings, and signage should help increase its visibility and discourage blockage by parked vehicles.

The bi-directional bikeway is by my count the third to be marked in the city, after the Panhandle and Duboce Street.

The improvements also mark a step towards shaping the McCoppin Hub plaza, which is currently being designed. The project’s latest concept renderings show the bikeway slightly wider than it was in the first draft, and it now includes a public bike pump and an ample row of bike racks.

Construction on the plaza is expected to begin next summer. More pics after the break.

One of the latest concept renderings for the plaza. Image: Boor Bridges Architecture via Facebook

Where the bikeway will run through the McCoppin Hub plaza. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Photo: Aaron Bialick

Chris Duderstadt's rendering of a public plaza on display at Irving Street and 10th Avenue. Photo: Aaron Bialick

In the midst of the bustling Inner Sunset Street Fair on Sunday, a canvas on the corner of 10th Avenue and Irving Street re-imagined the street as an inviting, car-free public plaza.

This is just an idea — but it could happen if we wanted it to, read the text accompanying a photo-realistic rendering of a pedestrian plaza on Irving Street between 9th and 10th Avenues.

“I’ve been wanting to do this for about twenty years,” said designer Chris Duderstadt, who lives around the corner on 10th Avenue and has worked on engineering projects in Golden Gate Park. He introduced his vision to the neighborhood for the first time at Sunday’s street fair, the only regular opportunity for the community to use their streets as public spaces.

“Imagine this seven days a week,” said Duderstadt.

The rendering drew a rotating crowd, as groups spent several minutes at a time in front of the canvas discussing what the project could do for the neighborhood. The rest of the paper canvas was covered by written comments reflecting an overwhelmingly positive response.

Photo: Aaron Bialick

“We don’t have anything like this out here,” said Joe Chickos, owner of the block’s Blackthorn Tavern. “[Car] traffic is able to get around this one block easily. It’d help all the merchants on this block and raise everybody’s property value, as well, because it’d make it more of a stop-off destination than just a walk-by.”

The block of Irving between 9th and 10th typically feels more like a parking lot than a commercial street. Although many businesses line the sidewalks, few amenities attract people to linger. Residents can venture into the recreational open spaces of Golden Gate Park, but the plaza would provide a place to meet within the neighborhood itself.

The plaza concept met with an enthusiastic reception from District 5 Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi and neighborhood SFMTA Board member Joél Ramos, who both attended the fair.

“It looks like a place that I want to be all the time,” said Ramos. “Instead of feeling like the corridor stops at Ninth, it extends it.”

"Collision" performs at the street fair at Irving and 9th Ave. Photo: Aaron Bialick

“I think it’s a great idea,” said Mirkarimi, who noted that Sunday’s display is just the beginning of the kind of extensive community process needed for such a project. “Talking this through and having a very open but persistent conversation and getting all the feedback is exactly the best way at arriving at making it happen.”

Duderstadt pointed out that it would require a long-term sponsor on the Board of Supervisors to see it through. Mirkarimi’s supervisor term ends in 2012, and he is currently running for sheriff.

The neighborhood’s first parklet, located on 9th Avenue in front of Arizmendi Bakery, has seen no shortage of visitors since it opened last month. Parklets, said Mirkarimi, can serve as incubators for more expansive reclamations of public space.

“Once you get over the hump of establishing the idea,” he said, “where people can see it and experience it, it becomes less controversial.”

The parklet on 9th Avenue. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Photo: Aaron Bialick

Irving Street at the fair. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Kids play in what's normally a car parking space on 10th Avenue. Photo: Aaron Bialick

More comments on the plaza concept. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Landscape designer Walter Hood gives a walking tour of the promenade after today's ribbon-cutting ceremony and press conference. Photos: Bryan Goebel

San Francisco cut the ribbon on an innovative public space “in the heart of downtown” today that will greatly improve the pedestrian realm in the Union Square shopping district. Hundreds of people spilled into the two-block Powell Street Promenade on Powell between Ellis and Geary for the official grand opening.

“Two-thirds of the millions of annual visitors make their way down here to Union Square and that’s why it produces 10 percent of our sales tax revenue,” said Mayor Ed Lee. “They love coming here, and why not link the historic cable car stop on Market Street and make the experience of getting up here and the rest of the city a wonderful experience.”

Lee lauded the spirit of cooperation on the project between the various city departments and the Union Square Business Improvement District. He called automobile company Audi a “great corporate citizen” for providing the $890,000 it took to construct the promenade, which became an immediate magnet for passersby.

“This unique public private non-profit partnership creates a safe, green, forward thinking and contemporary space for everyone to enjoy,” Lee said in his prepared remarks.

Landscape designer and architect Walter Hood designed the eight six-foot wide parklets, which have been hailed as the marquee project of the city’s Pavement to Parks program.

Audi said the promenade “was inspired by the same philosophy of design and innovation that defines our approach to car making.” The company’s logo was clearly on display at today’s press event and its symbol emblazoned on the solar towers. No official advertising is allowed in the promenade, however.

Both Lee and Supervisor David Chiu gushed with praise for Audi. Chiu, who is car-free and gets around on an electric bicycle, even encouraged the automobile company to donate some new cars to the city.

“We could not do this without the generosity of an amazing car company and I do hope, some day, in addition to seeing the Audi symbols here as part of this parklet, that we see more Audis traveling throughout San Francisco, so feel free to donate a couple to the city if you like,” Chiu said.

“I’m still jazzed about that car that I still have in my mind that appeared in the Iron Man movie. The Audi 8, he just comes roaring in. I said, I want one of those if I ever get that kind of money,” Lee told the crowd.

"The Promenade prioritizes the needs of pedestrians, transit users and cyclists by creating an exciting public space in Union Square," said David Nadelmen of the Union Square Business Improvement District (at podium).

A large crowd assembled in the promenade on the west side of Powell to watch the press conference.

Supervisor David Chiu speaks to the crowd.

The Space

Aluminum ribbons are one of the promenade’s main features. The aluminum was fabricated into benches and tables that allow people to sit or stand while enjoying a cup of coffee, checking email or socializing. For tourists, the space provides “a comfortable place to plan.”

“We’ve taken over the parking lanes to design wider sidewalks for people to walk and take a breather,” Hood explained before giving a walking tour of the promenade. “People will be able to stroll, as well as sit, and even lie down.”

The promenade itself is “built in connecting modular segments on an ADA accessible, slip resistant aluminum and wood grating bolted to the street.” The free WiFi is connected to the solar panels along with LED lighting, which gives the aluminum platforms “a glow from the grating.”

“This idea of movement, this idea of materials, of technology, of sustainability, we tried to wrap it all up into one simple gesture,” Hood said. “We basically want to illuminate the beautiful aspects of design within the public realm.”

City officials said the promenade should also help calm traffic. Powell, famous for its cable car line, was clogged with cars at many points during today’s press conference, including a few Audis that shuttled some of the company’s executives and staff to the ceremony.

David Nadelman of the Union Square Business Improvement District said the promenade is widely supported by merchants. It will be kept clean and maintained by the Union Square BID.

Powell Street has some of the busiest pedestrian volumes in the country, just behind Times Square. Some 100,000 people will typically travel through the area on foot on the weekends. The promenade may one day lead to the pedestrianization of those two blocks of Powell, which are scheduled for a cable car overhaul and repaving in 2014.

Hood demonstrates the free WiFi. An Audi passed by right as I snapped the shot.

"You can stroll, as well as sit, and even lie down," said Hood, demonstrating the different uses of the space.

With all the restaurants and eateries in the vicinity, Hood said people can use this table to enjoy a cappuccino, for example.

"We wanted to introduce a material that created one sculptural effect," Hood said of the aluminum rails.

The promenade is being installed in former yellow zone parking lanes. Photos: Bryan Goebel

The Powell Street Promenade, billed as the marquee project of San Francisco’s Pavement to Parks program, is starting to take shape along two blocks of Powell Street near Union Square, and will be officially unveiled to the public in a ribbon-cutting ceremony with Mayor Ed Lee on Wednesday.

Crews, who plan to work through the weekend, erected temporary fences along the sidewalks on Powell Street between Ellis and Geary and posted signs that say, “We’re expanding the walkway to enhance your walking and shopping experience. Please be patient while the installation is taking place.”  The narrow, congested sidewalks on this section Powell Street are packed with high pedestrian volumes second only to Times Square. More than 100,000 pedestrians visit this stretch on an average weekend.

Since the Golden Wheel Award-winning “mega-parklet” project was announced late last year, the design has been improved to allow for more pedestrian circulation space. Gone is the idea in the original rendering of lining the edge with a wooden bench. Instead of mostly wood material, the six-foot wide promenade will feature street furniture comprised of twisted metal (see the rendering below the break). The parklets will also be lined with metal rails, and aluminum grates will serve as platforms, along with a few wooden ones for warmth.

Creeping figs and formium are among the ground-level greenery that will be planted in the parklets, which will offer free wifi and allow plenty of places for people to relax, eat and enjoy the area. The lighting will be powered by solar panels.

An artist's rendering of the project courtesy of the Great Streets Project.

We’re told that excited businesses have become strong advocates of the promenade, and have been very good about working together and rearranging their deliveries and schedules. As a compromise with businesses, including four hotels, the parklet platforms will be divided by two 50-foot loading bays in the center of each block.

The much-needed face lift could be a taste of what’s to come in 2014, when Powell Street is scheduled for a cable car overhaul and repaving. There’s long been talk of pedestrianizing that portion of Powell, similar to the block where the cable car turnaround is located between Ellis and Market Street.

As we’ve reported, the promenade is sponsored by the automobile company, Audi, but there will be no advertising allowed on the sight, and the only mention of Audi will be in the permanent plaques placed at the location. The total cost for construction of the project is about $890,000, all paid by Audi.

We’ll have more coverage next week.

The new parklet on Valencia Street in front of Four Barrel Coffee. Photo: Aaron Bialick

At least fourteen parklets now grace sidewalks around the city in a movement that has taken San Francisco by storm since the first one was created in March of last year. Three of the newest ones have sprouted up in front of Cafe Abir near Divisadero Street, Tony’s Pizza Napoletana next to Washington Square Park, and Four Barrel Coffee on Valencia Street, which has taken a unique design approach.

The construction of new parklets is just starting to catch up with the demand, notes an article on the Great Streets Project’s website. A study done in April found that 72 percent of people surveyed in the Mission, the Tenderloin, and North Beach where more parklets are planned “said that they would come to the area more or much more often if there were more public places to sit.”

In the Mission District, the new Four Barrel parklet provides a standing-only coffee bar area and hanging bicycle parking, features which are intended to have a “less heavier” but more permanent feeling than other parklets, said Four Barrel owner Jeremy Tooker.

“We wanted to add an improvement and beautification to the neighborhood with the Four Barrel aesthetic” with the wood matching that of the cafe, said Tooker.

Rather than being a place to lock up a bike and stay for hours, the arrangement is designed to encourage more short-term use, he said. More bike parking will be added in the center of the parklet for a total of fifteen dedicated spaces, although Tooker estimated it would probably be able to fit over twenty bikes.

Photo: Aaron Bialick

Photo: Aaron Bialick

Stools will also be provided in the future to discourage visitors from sitting on the standing-only bar, added Tooker.

On Fulton and Divisadero Streets, a parklet was also finished two weeks ago outside Cafe Abir just a couple blocks away from the city’s first one at Mojo Bicycle Cafe.

The new parklet on Fulton Street. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Photo: Aaron Bialick

And in North Beach, the neighborhood’s third parklet was also nearly complete today, except for some greening that’s being added. It fronts Tony’s Pizza Napoletana on Stockton and Union Streets just across the street from Washington Square Park.

Flickr photo: geekstinkbreath

Although North Beach has long been known for its abundance of private cafe seating on its skinny sidewalks compared to neighborhoods like the Mission and the Tenderloin, the Great Streets Project’s article notes that it still lacks places for non-patrons to sit and gather.

“Clearly, people enjoy gathering to relax or eat outside when seating is available,” the article states. “But private café seating only benefits patrons of those businesses, not the hundreds of people walking through the neighborhood who may like a place to rest and relax.”

'Deep's parklet under construction today on Valencia Street near 20th. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Amandeep Jawa (a.k.a. ‘Deep) might be recognized by many San Franciscans as the man who can turn any street into a party as he glides by on his music-booming “Trikeasaurus.” As an organizer of events that inject life into the street like the San Francisco Bike Party, he naturally jumped at the chance to create a beautiful social space outside his Valencia Street home with San Francisco’s first residential parklet.

“Valencia is not a great pedestrian street even though it’s a great public street,” said Jawa. “I wanted the front of my house to reflect the fact that people come and hang out there. In general, that’s a great thing, and that’s what Valencia’s all about. The parklet is a natural extension for that.”

Affectionately dubbed the “‘Deepistan National Parklet,” it will be the first in the city to front a home rather than a business. It’ll bring more breathing room, a social resting spot, and an abundance of plant life to a skinny sidewalk. With the help of Jawa’s friends and colleagues, its construction is well on its way to completion in time for the grand opening celebration this Sunday.

Jawa decided to create the parklet after he consulted with architect Jane Martin on beautifying the streetfront of his house. She suggested expanding the project by applying for the first round of parklet applications last fall. Jawa loved the idea, and Martin helped him design it.

'Deep rides down Valencia on his Trikeasaurus during Sunday Streets. Photo: Bryan Goebel

“I’ve been a very big fan of Park(ing) Day and parklets since the very first one, and I thought, ‘oh my god, that sounds fantastic’,” said Jawa. ”It also dovetails with a lot of my views and visions for how Valencia Street should be, so it was kind of a no-brainer.”

The parklet’s design will have a different approach than other parklets, explained Martin. Instead of a protective railing between the parklet and the roadway, it will have an opening in the center to keep it “porous to the bike lane.”

“A lot of these parklets put a railing to the ‘back’ but this really remains open,” she said. “For him, he can still get his bicycles and tricycles into the garage, but it’s much more flexible. It’s not a single-use, it’s a multi-use space.”

The deck will also extend into the sidewalk to “straddle” the curb cut ramp, resulting in “a bigger feeling that it’s a social space more perpendicular to the street as opposed to parallel with it,” said Martin. “It’s literally counter to traffic, which is really exciting to me.”

Benches will be included as extensions of the planters, and designed in a way that encourages shorter use of the space than typical parklets that front businesses. “It’s kind of a place to rest your butt, frankly,” said Martin. “It’s intentionally narrow to encourage people to stay for a short while but not to be there overnight.”

It will also have an emphasis on large, low-water plants, she said. “The big planters are really to balance the physical presence of the cars. I feel like a lot of the parklet prototypes we’ve seen out there are still very diminutive and the hulk of the car still dominates next to a lot of them, so I wanted to give something that was of the street scale.”

The parklet’s design concept was based on Jawa’s personality and vision for a Valencia Street that’s more inviting for people to spend time on, said Martin.

Jawa, a member of the SF Bicycle Coalition Board of Directors and president of the League of Conservation voters, said his active involvement in sustainable streets advocacy was born out of his love for Valencia Street and San Francisco, something that happened almost as soon as he arrived here.

“I just felt so lucky to be here and fell in love with it, and I think if you’re in love with something, you want to be involved with it,” said Jawa.

“He’s a very social person, and he’s very much into the cultural scene on Valencia Street and a big supporter of pedestrian and bicycle advocacy,” said Martin. “I feel that as sort of an extension of his personality and the way it fits with that building, the design is to create a social space in the front of the house as opposed to the back of the house. So, it sort of inverts the typical public/private scenario.”

Most of the parklets that continue to pop up around the city have so far been largely motivated by the benefits they bring to businesses, although some come from non-profits. Restaurants and cafes usually take on construction and maintenance duties but benefit by attracting more customers to their storefront.

“You can see the profit motive – and god bless ‘em, I’m glad those businesses are there,” said Jawa. “But I think if you talk to the business owners, they also get a greater sense of what Valencia could and should be like, and that’s why they’re on Valencia.”

Photo: Aaron Bialick

Andres Power of the SF Planning Department said the parklet program welcomes residential applications.

“The intent of the program is for parklets to be as widely used as possible,” he said. “The initial interest has primarily been from businesses, but the program is supportive of [residential parklets], and we’d like to see more of it.”

The requirements for residential parklets aren’t any stricter than for those fronting a business, said Power, granted they’re designed appropriately for the environmental context.

“In a residential area, cafe seating isn’t what you would necessarily want to see, but landscaping and beautification is,” he said. “As long as the design response is right, I think parklets can be a positive attribute to the neighborhood.”

Martin noted that while a business-fronting parklet only replaces “general street parking,” a residential one is “actually a more direct implication of the model because it means you yourself are giving up the parking because of the curb cut in front of the house.”

“For ‘Deep, that wasn’t difficult because he’s long since given up a car,” said Martin.

Indeed, with barely half of Mission District households using their required garages to store cars, the potential for more residential parklets seems enormous.

Still, Martin pointed out that they are a major expense for any property owner. Much of the funding for constructing parklets often comes from grants, and merchants typically expect to recoup their costs with the increase in customers, something residents can’t do.

But Jawa, a strong advocate of projects to widen sidewalks on Valencia, including the four blocks improved on the corridor last year, is certain the movement to continue pushing into the street will be successful.

“There are more parklets on Valencia than any place in the city. They’re just popping up like mad,” said Jawa. “But if you look at Valencia, it’s a great pedestrian street despite itself. People love walking and love biking there, but in terms of the street amenities, it’s kind of hostile to them. You can’t walk two people abreast.”

For now, as one more piece of the street is reclaimed outside Jawa’s door, he will have a little more room for the friends he invites over for sidewalk barbecues.

“I think all of these parklets speak to a greater vision for what Valencia should look like and what people want urban spaces to look like,” said Jawa.

“People want a certain kind of Valencia, and that’s not the Valencia that any of us have right now.”

Join ‘Deep and friends for the parklet’s grand opening and fundraiser benefiting Walk SF, Livable City, and the SF Bicycle Coalition this Sunday, June 26 from 2-6 pm at 937 Valencia Street (near 20th).

Photo: Aaron Bialick

One proposal for re-purposing Mason Street as a park between the new North Beach Branch Public Library and Joe DiMaggio Playground. Courtesy Leddy Maytum Stacy Architects

Nearly two years after San Francisco reclaimed a short block of Mason Street in North Beach as a trial plaza, the SF Board of Supervisors yesterday approved the environmental impact report for the planned expansion of the North Beach Public Library.

The unanimous vote came as a relief to the majority of neighbors and some city supervisors who were eager to see the project come to fruition after being stalled by a handful of opponents.

“The tortured path of this project is in many ways symbolic of the dysfunctionality in land use in San Francisco,” said Supervisor Scott Wiener. ”We have a highly popular, beautifully designed project to replace an outdated and inaccessible structure with a beautiful, usable and accessible new library; to create additional, much-needed open space in a densely populated neighborhood.”

“Any community would embrace and celebrate this project. Instead, a small group of opponents has stymied the broad community every step of the way,” he added.

The project involves creating a permanent open space on a 200-foot block of Mason Street that lies between the library’s current location and the triangle of land where it is expected to be moved. Doomsday traffic jam scenarios predicted by the persistent opponents were effectively debunked when traffic managers studied the impacts of the “closure” with a two-month long plaza trial in 2009.

“It not only helped to validate the analysis of the traffic impact, but really supported the notion that there was significant positive impact for the public for the increased open space,” said Ed Reiskin, the director of the Department of Public Works.

Wiener railed against attempts by the opponents to get the library nominated as a landmark, calling it a “disservice to historic preservation.”

“At some point, you come to the end of the road. We’re at the end of the road.”

Photo: Actual Cafe's temporary parklet on PARK(ing) Day 2010 could be a real parklet by PARK(ing) Day 2011.

Just over one year after San Francisco’s first parklet was installed outside Mojo Cafe, East Bay streets are conspicuously lacking these popular islands of livable public space. That’s about to change.

This week, Oakland is expected to take the first step toward bringing parklets to the sunny side of the Bay, convening a special cross-department city task force on Thursday. Its mission is to draft a new ordinance that would allow Oakland to permit parklets as a unique type of encroachment.

“We had a lot of staff members who all thought it was a great idea, and they got together to figure out how to do it,” explained Eric Angstadt, deputy director of Oakland’s Planning and Zoning Division.

Representatives of several departments were invited, including Building Services, Planning, Parks and Recreation, and Police, but the heavy lifting, according to Angstadt, will likely come from the Community and Economic Development (CEDA) and Public Works agencies.

The group’s leadership intends to present a draft ordinance to the City Council before the council’s summer recess at the end of July. The Oakland City Council requires at least two months to “agendize” items, a deadline that is less than three weeks away. Angstadt is optimistic that the staff’s personal interest in seeing parklets come to Oakland will motivate the process to keep a brisk pace.

“If all went well, there’s the possibility people could have them in for the late season, in late August and September, when we have that second wave of nice weather,” Angstadt continues. “If that doesn’t work out, there’s plenty of time to have it in place for next year.”

The primary obstacle to getting parklets approved in Oakland thus far has been determining the city department responsible for permitting parklets. Are parklets a design issue, falling under the purview of the Planning Department? Or is it a Public Works Agency matter, because parklets pertain to street space?

The choice of department jurisdiction will affect the participants in the final permitting process. If the ordinance falls under the Planning Department, it would be inserted into the zoning code. If the ordinance is put under Public Works, it would be part of the Streets and Sidewalk Use Regulations. Zoning requires the landlords to get involved, whereas an encroachment can deal exclusively with the tenant business.

Oakland’s task force is looking closely at San Francisco’s parklet approval process. In San Francisco, the Pavement to Parks program, run jointly by the Department of Public Works and the Planning Department, intermittently issues a request for proposals for new parklets. Business owners, with proof of neighborhood support, propose their designs and the P2P program issues permits to the most feasible projects. Business owners are responsible for constructing the parklets and meeting safety requirements.

The first question among many Oakland city staffers is how it should permit parklets in metered parking spaces. After all, it’s the busy neighborhoods with competing uses that have the most to gain from parklets.

San Francisco managed to avoid this issue in some installations by putting parklets in unmetered parking spaces or creating new, metered parking to mitigate the revenue loss. The Municipal Transportation Agency accepts the loss of parking revenue for parklets, acknowledging that the impact of eight parklets in San Francisco’s 389,000 parking spaces is minuscule.

Some businesses and neighbors who were initially skeptical and concerned about the loss of parking at the Mojo Cafe parklet changed their minds when the owner reported large increases in business and foot traffic, and neighbors began to clamor for similar improvements.  As Oakland decides how to balance the demand for these economic catalysts and streetscape improvements, the city will have the benefit of San Francisco’s positive experiences.

The parklet permit will hopefully be a departure from Oakland’s existing cache of permits, which only provide for the extension of private businesses into the public space. Andres Power, project manager of the San Francisco Pavement to Parks Program, advises that any new program consider these private improvements to the public space, but that the spaces remain firmly public.

“The policy driver is to provide public space, not cafe space,” explains Power. “If the parklet were to be private, that would be an uncompensated public degradation for the benefit of a private entity.”

Still smarting from an arduous 18-month minor encroachment process to put up sidewalk tables and chairs, Sal Bednarz of Actual Café is anxious to install a parklet and wants the task force to follow the San Francisco model. For Bednarz, September is not soon enough.

Bednarz, right, with volunteers constructing the portable parklet.

Inspired by PARK(ing) Day, Bednarz envisions filling an unattractive and an out of service AC Transit bus stop that abuts his cafe on Alcatraz Avenue with an amenity for the neighborhood and his customers to enjoy. Bednarz set out to build a portable parklet for special events to raise support for a more permanent structure.

After working with Bednarz on PARK(ing) Day, Walk Oakland Bike Oakland (WOBO) made the parklet permit one of its top goals for 2011, atrracting a small pool of talent hoping to contribute their skills to the cause.

Urban designers Amit Price Patel, Amanda Loper, and Ian Dunn sketched a site plan. Bednarz contacted the Place for Sustainable Living, a hub for eco-art and community resiliencys, which provided tools and workspace. Volunteers from WOBO, the East Bay Bicycle Coalition, and the neighborhood contributed sweat equity to reclaimed lumber purchased from the Reuse People Store in East Oakland, while Actual Café served coffee and sandwiches.

“We know our neighborhood and city will benefit from parklet construction,” writes Bednarz. “We hope that Mayor Quan or the councilmembers will see what we’re doing and pave the way for us and other businesses like ours – it seems like a no-brainer.”

Oakland’s first semi-official parklet will debut at the Bike Away From Work Party in Old Oakland on Thursday evening, before a visit to its hopeful home on Alcatraz during a “Parklet Love In” at Actual Café Sunday afternoon. Once the city starts issuing permits, the portable parklet could earn the right to sit in the bus stop more permanently.

Other business owners are waiting to see how and when a permit process develops. Without an official process from the City of Oakland, some business owners conducted some frustrating research on their own.

Svea Lin Soll, owner of the Swarm Gallery near Jack London Square, read about parklets online, but grew discouraged as she calculated it would cost over $20,000 to hire art and design activist collective Rebar Group to build one outside her gallery.

Power rejected the notion that undertaking a parklet must be so costly, supporting the approach taken by Actual Café. He said some merchants are reaching out to neighbors for design and construction help.

“I’ve heard anecdotally that some people are leveraging their connections with the architect on the block, or the friend of a friend that’s a metallurgist. That definitely helps defray the cost.”

Newly inspired by the city’s new task force, Soll mused how Oakland’s inevitable parklets will differ from San Francisco’s, like the city itself: “The Oakland aesthetic is very much found objects and gathering stuff from industrial areas. It’s a peer and equal to San Francisco, but just different. Oakland is more grassroots.”

Indeed, it might have taken over a year of San Francisco’s example, but thanks to a proof of concept across the Bay, Oakland residents may be able to enjoy their streets a little bit more before the end of this year.

Photo: Myleen Hollero/Orange Photography

City planners often get very little public recognition for the work they do, and can sometimes take the heat on a project if it doesn’t prove politically popular. In the case of San Francisco’s revolutionary Pavement to Parks program, the early resistance to reclaiming public space from cars to create convivial spaces for people has gradually subsided and parklets are now in heavy demand. None of it would have been possible without the hard work and determination of Andres Power, an urban designer for the San Francisco Planning Department.

As the manager of the P2P program, Power has spent tireless hours managing the city’s initial plaza and parklet projects and moving them through the vast city bureaucracy. He deals regularly with merchants, neighbors and community groups. He’s worn a hardhat on many a Saturday and is the guy who gets called at midnight if something goes wrong.  Power’s unwavering dedication, even in the face of fierce opposition, has made him one of the unsung heroes of San Francisco’s livable streets movement.

Along with some of his colleagues at the Planning Department, Power is working from within to change the dysfunctional and old-school culture of city government with an eye to then transform our streets. The Pavement to Parks program is now catching the attention of cities all over the U.S. Last week, San Francisco issued a new request for parklet proposals, which means they’ll be spreading to even more neighborhoods.

Power was born in San Francisco and grew up in the East Bay city of Albany. I sat down with him recently to find out more about his interest in urban planning, and his involvement in the Pavement to Parks program.

Bryan Goebel: What sparked your interest in city planning?

Andres Power: I’ve always loved cities. Being in a place that’s dynamic and changing and exciting has always been something that has intrigued me. I’ve tried to think back and to figure out what my motivators were and I think I just landed in the right place, to be honest. I had some great professors in undergrad at Brown University that really were forward and progressive thinking and inspired me. Then, after undergraduate, I went and worked in New York at the Department of Housing and Preservation doing economic development for the city and it was just an amazing place to be. It was so crazy and frantic, such a huge and complicated bureaucracy, but still, individual people could make amazing changes.

Photo: Myleen Hollero/Orange Photography

BG: So this was in your early 20s? You must have graduated from college early then?

AP: I graduated from Brown when I was 20. I was young for my age because I skipped a grade early on. So yes, I graduated early and worked for New York for, I guess, three and a half years. It was a really fun place to be, and I moved my way up through the system there and I was actually working in the Section Eight program. It was tangential to my interest but it was a fascinating work with a lot of smart people and it just really cemented my love for cities. It was so satisfying knowing that as a bureaucrat, I could make positive change for people.

BG:  Yeah, and I imagine living in New York deepened and inspired your interest in urban planning.

AP: Absolutely. There’s no question about it. At that time it was right after 911, so it was early 2002. The offices were four blocks from the World Trade Center so it was an interesting place to be, for sure, and the focus was really on emergency management type stuff, at first, and then things calmed down, and it was much more about starting to think about the future, and looking at the long-terms goals of the city. The notion of working for an entity that is thinking about what the future’s going to be in 20-25 years, and doing things in the short-term, to move us in that direction is incredibly satisfying. That’s what I do here now. It’s really about seeing what we want this city to look like, how we want it to function, how we want it to be for the next generation and working on the immediate steps to make improvements that move us in that direction.

BG: So you spent three and a half years in New York City, and then went to grad school at MIT for two years?

AP: Two years, yes.  MIT was an interesting place for sure. The urban studies program was somewhat isolated from the rest of the university but was still a crazy place. The buildings were all connected underground by these tunnels and there’d gatherings sometimes on the weekend in the tunnels where people would all dress up in Star Trek attire. So, a lot of the stereotypes that you would think of for MIT, definitely a lot of that happened there. It’s also a great place to be. People were really smart, really motivated and undoubtedly the program really cemented the notion that this is really what it was that intrigued me.

BG: So after MIT what happened?

AP: Getting a job anywhere in government takes a lot of time so the beginning of my last semester, in January or so, there was a posting for jobs here in San Francisco. I applied and actually got called back sooner than I’d anticipated, came out here over spring break, had an interview, had a second interview and was hired as an entry level urban designer for the San Francisco Planning Department.

BG: What exactly were you hired to do?

AP: The first thing I did was to come up with a streetscape plan for San Jose Avenue. It was a good first stab at doing this type of work and getting to learn the dynamics and the politics here. I remember going out with then Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval in his personal car. He took me down and showed me what he thought needed improvement. It was great, understanding the craziness and how the system in the city works, and how the public realm is managed by so many different agencies and entities. It was an eye-opening experience. Then from there I started doing a lot of graphics type stuff and early plan development for the Rincon Hill streetscape plan and the Better Streets Plan.

Photo: Myleen Hollero/Orange Photography

BG: So how did Pavements to Parks get started? It all pretty much began with the 17th Street plaza, right?

AP: Yes. I’d been working with Adam Varat on content development for the Better Streets Plan for a couple of years at that point, and in that plan there was a lot of discussion about temporary uses of the right of way. What that meant wasn’t fully fleshed out but the idea was to be playful with the public realm and to think about uses that perhaps changed over time. Being creative in how we use a parking lane, for example, was particularly exciting to me. Then, New York City Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Kahn came and met with the different department directors and basically challenged the city to do something. She came and presented the work that she was doing to DPW Director Ed Reiskin, my director, John Rahim, and [SFMTA Chief] Nat Ford and the representatives of the Mayor’s Office and said, ‘This is what we’re doing in New York,’ which was a challenge to do something similar over here.

So, in response to that challenge, all the different departments submitted a list of possible projects based on culling the archives of community plans and public efforts. So that project, the Castro 17th project, was one that had been advanced by a couple of agencies. With DPW and MTA we moved it forward. This was around the same time that the Upper Market Streetscape Plan was being worked on and it talked a lot about making improvements to that intersection. So, it just sort of all came together, and [City Design Group Manager] David Alumbaugh felt very strongly that we should start off with something bold, making the subsequent projects easier by comparison. It was a smart move to make. As small as it is, the Plaza location was as complicated as one can be, with the streetcar going right through and cars coming from just about every direction. But we knew that the users were there, and that the community was generally on board with it. At the same time Public Architecture came to the city and was offering its services to help with a public space project.

“I think in my mind the most beneficial change is really pushing the city family to be okay with experimentation.”

Change is always hard. Beyond the actual projects that the Pavement to Parks program has installed, I think in my mind the most beneficial change is really pushing the city family to be okay with experimentation. At Castro, how a trial plaza could come together was incredibly challenging for the bureaucracy to wrap its collective head around. So the proposal languished. Getting approvals was incredibly difficult. But finally, with some colleagues we thought, ‘we’re just going to get this done, this is ridiculous,’ and we got it done. Once the project was installed some department heads came together with the Mayor’s Office to talk about what we learned and what the next steps were. Basically, what came out of that meeting was that we needed someone who would be empowered to just make things happen and someone who ultimately would be responsible for delivering the projects. So, they put me in charge and that’s how the program came to be.

Power with architect Jane Martin constructing the Guerrero Park plaza. Photo: Jamison Wieser

BG: What do you see as some of your biggest challenges now?

AP: Amongst the city family, I think generally speaking that there is alignment with what it is that we’re doing, but not everyone necessarily agrees 100 percent, or is as gung-ho about this work as I am. It’s incredibly difficult to get people to just say, ‘this is how we’re going to make it happen.’ The culture has been changing and it’s gotten much better, at least in a relative sense over the last number of years, but the culture’s always been, ‘no, you can’t do it and this is why.’ It’s never been, ‘This is what you want to do, let’s figure out how we’re going to make it happen.’ And as for design, it’s always been the common denominator that gets implemented. Everyone has to weigh in. Muni weighs in, the traffic engineer weighs in, the utilities weight in, the street sweeper weighs in. Then once you’ve resolved all of their individual concerns, you have your end product. That’s how things have been done historically, but at the end of the day that end product doesn’t necessarily advance the city’s collective goals. The most challenging piece is getting the projects through a system that is not geared to making these kinds of things happen in an easy way.

BG: What about the occasional opposition that arises from merchants, or neighbors, like what happened in Noe Valley?

AP: Not every project is going to work and I think it’s great, ultimately, that people speak up for what they believe. I may not necessarily agree with that position, and I may know their arguments are technically incorrect, but at the same time, I think it’s perfectly legitimate for people to not want something and I think that’s just part of the way things are in a heterogeneous community. Generally speaking, most people want urban public spaces, most people want open space, most people want amenities, most people want bicycle infrastructure, most people want storm water improvements. So, it’s not convincing people of the merits of that per se. A lot of it has to do with disagreements between one neighbor and another so these kinds of projects can become the polarizing element for that. I have no problem with this reality, and it’s why cities ultimately are fun places to work in. It’s not like working in the suburbs where you have a much more homogenous perspective on things.

“The culture’s always been, ‘no, you can’t do it and this is why.’ It’s never been, ‘This is what you want to do, let’s figure out how we’re going to make it happen.’ “

BG: I was walking on Dolores Street recently and had an encounter with a woman who was walking her dog and was just furious the city had removed a parking space in front of her house to install a crosswalk. There’s a ‘war on drivers,’ she exclaimed.  In your role as a planner, and this is a difficult question, but how do we win the hearts and minds of people like that who don’t feel like they want to give up any space for cars?

AP: It’s not an easy answer. If we knew the answer to that, then we’d be golden. I think there’s a couple of things at play. In large part our work is about education and we’re not always good at that. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not the best. I think generally the city family’s not very good at it, but really what we ought to be doing, as people who are paid to be thinking about the future, is tailoring our messaging in an understandable way and to be able to explain why it is we’re doing the things that we’re doing. So, I think a lot of it is education. Some people may just fundamentally disagree with your position and that’s okay. But many people, when you have an informed and rational discussion about the merits of an effort, can ultimately become your best supporters. But specifically when trade offs involve a car, I think unfortunately people can become very passionate about it.

BG: Emotions can get in the way.

AP: It’s very emotional, yes, and so to a certain extent you have to do your very best to educate, and to be that facilitator and explain what it is that you’re doing, and why you’re doing it, and what the benefits are for each person because ultimately it’s not just about taking away something from one person, and giving it to another. It’s about advancing our collective benefit. I think any type of change can be difficult for people, but at the same time, I do believe that delivering good projects and being able to show, for example, the lady with her dog, that benefit to her as she’s trying to cross the street. There really is an immediate benefit to her. She’s probably much less likely to get hit by a speeding car. Her dog is less likely to get run over because of that improvement that was made.  So, it wasn’t just about taking a parking space away, it was about making her condition better. I think the city is not the best at making this understood, although we’re constantly working to improve our communication.

Enjoying a light moment in the Castro plaza while shooting a Streetfilm. From left, Power, City Design Group Manager David Alumbaugh and filmmaker Paul Jaffe. Photo: Bryan Goebel

BG: Where do you see the Pavements to Parks program going?

AP: That’s a good question. The Pavements to Parks program has been really focused as of late on getting the parklets up and running. I think we’ve done that. I think we’ve created a model that is sustainable for the long term. We’ve done a lot of work, with great help from the Department of Public Works, the MTA and the SF Great Streets Project, to come up with the mechanisms to evaluate these projects and facilitate them because at the end of the day we want to be encouraging this. We want the city structure to be set up in such a way that it’s incentivizing and not making it difficult to make public improvements.  So, with that under our belt, to a certain extent the question now becomes, what’s next? Are there going to be more plazas? Are we going to be doing some other design typology perhaps that we haven’t even thought about yet? I think the answer to that ought to be yes. Aside from the physical projects that Pavement to Parks has produced, which I think are great things, one of the amazing contributions it’s provided is showing that experimentation is a good thing, and how it can produce good stuff. The vehicle of Pavement to Parks, this interagency cooperation, can apply to anything. Theoretically, it could apply to innovative treatments of a bike lane, or whatever it is we want to try. The structure of Pavement to Parks is such that the actual physical improvement can be anything, but the process to get it on the ground is really about what Pavements to Parks provides, and it’s an expedited process. I think it’s a great example of what happens when people come together saying, ‘We want to get this done, how are we going to make it happen,’ as opposed to figuring out a way why you can’t.

I think the streets of our city ought to be designed for the kind of use that provides the most benefit to the most people, both at the local level, and ultimately on a global level because what is sustainable in the long term is a city that encourages and gives priority to people who want to walk and who want to move around in a way that doesn’t produce an externality on somebody else. Unfortunately, for the last 50 years, it’s been the opposite. We have been prioritizing the mode of transport that provides the most externalities on people, and so I think a long-term vision for the city is one in which the fabric really is about the best common good. I think for me what that means is a place where driving is a last option. I think we’ve got a long way to go to get there, while, at the same time, I do feel like there will always be the need for a vehicle. I have to remember to say that because I do believe it. I think whether it’s a solar powered car or whatever it is, ultimately there is a need for transport of kids and goods but as a primary transportation mode, I think that there isn’t room for that in the city.

BG: What advice would you have for other cities looking to do parklets and plazas and repurpose space for people?

AP: Start with the location, either for a plaza or a parklet, that you know will be successful. One that has a strong on the ground partner who is vested in helping ensure that the space is successful. This is absolutely key as the success of the first installation sets the groundwork for many more. Also, don’t expect to create a program first. Start with a great project that people will be excited about and the the program will follow. Get authority from the very top – you’ll need it – so that you can push through the inevitable red tape. Also, have an answer to the inevitable questions that will come up. “Putting a parklet in will make the cross section of the street too narrow for a fire truck.” Remind the reviewer that a parklet is no wider than a parked car.  If it’s okay that a car is parked there, why can’t people sit there too. Celebrate the first project. From there, the next installations become easier.

A 24th Street parklet in Noe Valley. Flickr photo: throgers

“I’ve loved the parklet concept since I first heard about it and saw the one at Mojo on Divisadero as it was being built,” said Mclean, who would love to see parklets outside both Magnolia Pub and The Alembic Bar. “They seem like something that can become a real community asset and add energy and vitality to a neighborhood’s sidewalk culture.”

The flocks of cafes, restaurants and community organizations eager to liven up their street space with an attractive new parklet are getting another shot at applying for a permit. The SF Planning Department’s Pavement to Parks program has issued its second Request for Proposals (RFP) [pdf] and is accepting applications for the next six weeks. With over forty businesses having already expressed interest, demand is just as high as it was in the first round.

Parklets provide businesses and non-profit organizations a way to help enliven a neighborhood’s public realm by expanding crowded sidewalks for seating, greenery, bike parking, and other creative uses. Many have already become community gathering spots and neighborhoods are clamoring for more.

“It seems like a natural fit to place some of them in front of businesses that people already gather or congregate at,” added Mclean.

Last fall’s RFP period drew 39 applicants, with 27 permits issued, although about eight are still on hold or have been withdrawn for various reasons, said Project Manager Andres Power.

Many of the approved parklets are moving through the planning process, and some are already sprouting up.

In the Tenderloin, two planned parklets could provide public space for the neighborhood as Boeddeker Park is closed for renovation, thanks to the Trust for Public Land’s Parks for People program.

“We thought it would be a real loss to the neighborhood to have one of the only open spaces in the Tenderloin closed for 16 months,” said Parks for People project associate Trudy Garber. “The Community Benefit District also wanted to have a second one a couple blocks away in front of an apartment building where a lot of neighborhood kids hang out because it’s important for them to create stewardship and have this amenity.”

The Tenderloin parklets will feature community-oriented design elements [pdf] such as a boardwalk area stenciled with art by residents, hollow concrete seating and table fixtures “arranged in a geometry that provides a variety of space,” and mobile wheelbarrows designed by a community artist that will provide greenery during the day. The permits have been approved, and construction is expected in 2012.

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Design elements for a planned Tenderloin parklet. Image: The Trust for Public Land

The new RFP does include a few minor changes, including a two-week extension of the application period and a $450 savings available for spots without parking meters due to a reduced need for labor and materials, said Power. The number of permits approved for this period will also be limited to 25, although they try to accept any proposal that meets all the criteria.

Measures were also added to reinforce the parklets’ strict designation as a public space following concerns about their use as a private space for restaurant customers.

Restaurant and cafe owners will need to sign an explicit agreement saying they will not provide table service in the parklet, and the seating must look different than existing sidewalk furniture. The amendments stem from what Power described as a miscommunication with the owner of Squat and Gobble, who had initially offered table service to customers sitting in the parklet now fronting the restaurant.

With parklet applicants taking the initiative to design structures around building community, the core motivation for most seems to transcend the simple economic benefits.

“It seems like a natural fit to place some of them in front of businesses that people already gather or congregate at,” said Mclean. “We really try to serve the community at both places and, to me, this just presents another avenue for us to work with and contribute to our neighborhood.”

The Rebar crew assembles the parklet. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Within a span of just a few hours, a new parklet has transformed a part of Columbus Avenue in North Beach. Fronting Caffe Roma, it’s the second project to bring some breathing room to choked sidewalks on a section where cafe and restaurant life fill one of the city’s densest and most historic neighborhoods.

“Somebody called it our own little Via Veneto,” said Tony Roma, the owner of Caffe Roma. “If you’re familiar with Via Veneto in Rome, it’s open to the cafes and people sit down outside in the sun and drink their spritz.”

“So if we’re gonna get a warm weekend, here’s the place to do it.”

The parklet, designed and installed by the art and architecture collective Rebar Group, features a section of tables and chairs for the public to relax, eat and drink, while greenery in the rest of the area is intended to have more of a “park” feel, said Roma.

Søren Schaumburg Jensen, a Rebar Group intern and landscape architecture student from Copenhagen, Denmark, assisted with the project. “I really like the module concept of parklets,” he said. “It can be temporary, and you can exchange modules if you want to and move them.”

“I think Copenhagen could learn a lot from taking up parking spaces and extending the sidewalk like this,” he added, to the surprise of project manager Noah Brezel and myself.

Although other parklets being installed in the city originated from last fall’s open application period, Caffe Roma’s is the last in a series of the initial trial projects that began last March, said Andres Power of the SF Planning Department. The cafe has also featured a temporary parklet on PARK(ing) Day, demonstrating a flexible parking spot.

Other parklets are expected to sprout up in the coming weeks in front of Four Barrel Coffee on Valencia and 15th Streets and Cafe Abir on Fulton and Divisadero. Power said the Planning Department is expected to issue a new request for proposals this week. A high number of applications is expected as interest throughout the city remains high.

Project manager Noah Brezel and crew, with Jensen on the right. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Caffe Roma owner Tony Roma. Photo: Aaron Bialick

Image rendering by architect Jack Verdon via The Gubbins Experiment

The Inner Sunset could see its first parklet on Ninth Avenue in front of Arizmendi Bakery, introducing a new public space to its vibrant restaurant district, after dozens of neighbors and merchants showed up in support of the project at an SF Department of Public Works hearing today.

“People are hungry for gathering spaces,” said Inner Sunset Park Neighbors Board Member Adam Greenfield, who is helping to spearhead the project.

The street addition would be similar to several parklets already installed throughout the city that have reclaimed public space occupied by private vehicles and provided a welcoming place for people to sit, eat, socialize, and park their bicycles.

Merchants widely supported the project, which would be an attractive feature for new customers. The first parklet, installed in front of Mojo Bicycle Cafe on Divisadero Street, brought a 34 percent increase in pedestrian traffic during weekday afternoons, according to Liza Pratt of the Great Streets Project.

Speakers praised the parklet’s potential to add greenery, increase public safety by adding more “eyes on the street,” and open up an already crowded gathering spot for the community.

“The parklet is restoring the street to public use,” said WalkSF Executive Director Elizabeth Stampe. “The parking of private cars, which the land is used for right now, is actually a private use.”

Jack Verdon, a neighbor and architect who designed the parklet pro bono, said the design focuses on relieving congestion on the narrow sidewalk. Changes to address concerns about the security of bicycle parking in the current design are still in the works, he said.

Greenfield presented a petition with 964 resident signatures and 36 nearby businesses supporting the parklet, making the consensus quite clear despite the appearance of four opposing speakers who, at times, showed little regard for the hearing’s speaking rules.

Their main objections seemed to revolve around the parklet’s perceived potential to block emergency vehicle access, although the space is already occupied by parked cars and the SFMTA and Planning Department have approved the project.

The parklet is one of several in the approval process as part of the city’s revolutionary Pavement to Parks program, which aims to activate underutilized street space.

An official decision on the Arizmendi parklet is expected to be announced in a few weeks.

The conceptual design for the Powell Street Promenade. The final design will be determined by the city. Image: RHAA

Mayor Gavin Newsom has announced the city’s latest Pavement to Parks project, a two-block pedestrian promenade [pdf] on Powell Street between Ellis and Geary near Union Square that will provide sorely needed public space for one of San Francisco’s most crowded commercial districts. In a heavy dose of irony, the car-free space will be financed by an automobile company, Audi of America, who approached the city about six weeks ago.

“Through an innovative public-private partnership, we are creating a vibrant, new green public space in the heart of our city, despite limited resources and a difficult economic climate,” Mayor Newsom said in a statement. “I applaud Audi for their generous financial support and for partnering with the City and the Union Square BID.”

The promenade was billed as the marquee of P2P projects in 2011 with “other smaller projects being planned for neighborhoods throughout the city.” It will cost about $750,000 — all paid for by Audi — and is expected to be completed in April. The money will be paid to the Union Square Business Improvement District, which will oversee and maintain the space.

“The Union Square BID is excited to be the project sponsor. With construction for the Central Subway on Stockton Street right around the corner, Audi’s gift couldn’t have come at a better time.  We are anxious to begin work and committed to the on-going maintenance of the new promenade,” James C. Flood, the president of the Union Square BID, said in the press release.

Image: RHAA

The agreement with Audi was carefully handled, according to sources, and there will be no advertising. The only mention of the auto company will be on the promenade’s plaque. Audi approached the city and said it was looking to finance public space projects in San Francisco, New York and Chicago. Other P2P projects have mostly been financed through in-kind and capital donations, although some city grants were tapped.

“I can guarantee you this would not have happened without them (Audi) stepping up to the plate,” said Linda Mjellem of the Union Square BID.

The congested sidewalks on the section of Powell Street where the promenade will be installed are packed with upwards of 100,000 pedestrians on an average weekend. The area has some of the highest pedestrian volumes in the country, comparable to sections of Broadway in New York. A study conducted by the transportation design firm, Fehr and Peers, showed that 85 percent of all trips that pass through the intersection of Powell and Ellis Street are on foot.

The city conducted a three-day pilot last year, removing parking spaces that are mostly used for loading, allowing pedestrians to experience more walking space on the street. City officials admitted that pilot, which was conducted on a rainy weekend using only barricades, was not really a good example of re-purposing the street but it turned out to be a success nonetheless. Merchants became supportive of the idea and the pilot showed reduced travel times for cable cars along the popular Powell-Mason line because there were no cars or trucks pulling in and out of parking spaces.

Andres Power, the Pavement to Parks manager, told Streetsblog commercial loading will be shifted to Ellis Street, and deliveries will be hand-carted to their destinations. He said several community meetings were held on the conceptual design, which was done pro-bono by the firm Royston, Hanamoto, Alley and Abey (RHAA) and BAR Architects.

“We worked very closely with all the businesses to determine what their needs for drop-off, unloading and loading were,” Manuala King, a landscape architect at RHAA, explained. “That’s why the walkway is not continuous. It’s broken into segments with a central loading zone in each block.”

According to the press release: “The Powell Street Promenade will provide extra space for people to walk, sit at a table or on a bench, chat with a friend, or just watch as thousands of people pass by. Wood, stone, and metal trim will provide a rich visual quality to the space, softened by landscaping and pedestrian-scale lighting.”

Power said all the elements that clutter the existing sidewalk — tables, chairs, parking meters — would be removed to make them function better with an improved through capacity.

A spokesperson for Audi, Loren Angelo, called the company’s interest in the project “creative capitalism,” acknowledging the irony of an automobile manufacturer sponsoring a project that reduces vehicular traffic. He said it was a way for Audi to “give back to the community” and “reduce the level of automobile traffic” by featuring a project that demonstrates Audi’s “leading-edge design.”

Make no mistake, though, Audi’s interest in the project extends beyond philanthropy.

“We want people to understand what the product stands for, and doing something like this, making a progressive, bold statement in that market, helps gain that recognition for a broader group of consumers rather than just the design class that has tended to be attracted to the brand in the past,” he said.

Power said the city will ultimately determine the final design of the promenade. He said the community has been talking for years about extending the plaza-like treatment on Powell Street between Market (where the cable car turn around is) and Ellis all the way up to Geary Street and he hopes this P2P project will further that idea.

“In my mind, this project starts to advance that discussion and will allow people to evaluate that in a lot of ways, to really make Powell Street more of a destination in itself as opposed to a place that you just walk through.”

This temporary park done for PARK(ing) Day in front of Ritual Roasters is an example of how a permanent parklet could enliven the street. Photo: Bryan Goebel

An enthusiastic audience of supporters who lamented the lack of public space in their neighborhoods attended a San Francisco Department of Public Works (SFDPW) hearing at City Hall this morning on proposed parklets in front Ritual Coffee Roasters on Valencia Street and farm:table coffee on Post Street. Supporters of the parklets testified that converting a few parking spots into vibrant spaces for people will enliven their streets and benefit their neighborhoods.

Eileen Hassi, the owner of Ritual, told the hearing officer that she has been trying to establish a park in front of her business at 1026 Valencia Street since it first opened in 2005. She said Ritual has been a strong supporter and participant in PARK(ing) Day and that the only complaints she’s heard from neighbors are that there are too many people on the sidewalks and that bicycles often clutter the area.

“Personally, I think these are good problems to have and the parklet is a great solution to both of these problems,” said Hassi, who added that many neighbors who aren’t Ritual customers have enjoyed the transformation of the parking spaces on PARK(ing) Day and would benefit from a permanent parklet because it would be public space. In addition, on-street bicycle parking would be added.

“I’m not a customer but they have been an excellent neighbor,” said Amandeep Jawa, a resident in the neighborhood and livable streets advocate. “Fundamentally, the problem on Valencia is not successful businesses. The problem on Valencia is that we have very narrow sidewalks and Valencia Street is a pedestrian street in spite of itself.”

Nearly 20 people showed up at the hearing to support the Ritual parklet and not one person spoke out against it. The Great Streets Project, and other supporters, sent letters and emails from neighbors and businesses to SFDPW that far outweighed the few letters opposing it.

A parklet will soon grace the front of farm:table on Post Street. Photo: Luke Stewart

A number of people also showed up to testify in support of a proposed parklet [pdf] in front of farm:table on Post Street between Leavenworth and Jones, a dense neighborhood where a majority of residents do not own cars. A coffee shop with chairs and tables on the sidewalk has fronted the building at 754 Post Street since 1989, according to Jonathan Lowell, who manages the property and supports the installation of the parklet.

Lowell explained that it’s a place “where neighbors have gathered for the past 20 plus years” but “the streets themselves serve the motoring public.” Indeed, Post Street is a one-way arterial along with many other streets in the neighborhood that have seen a number of crashes over the years involving drivers and pedestrians.

“Pedestrian conditions are far from optimal. There was a fatal collision a couple of blocks away and we believe we should do as much as possible to improve conditions in the area. We believe this parklet will be a major improvement,” Elizabeth Stampe, the executive director of Walk San Francisco, told the hearing officer.

Board of Supervisors President David Chiu, who represents the area, sent a letter of support [pdf] and also pointed out that the existing pedestrian amenities in the neighborhood are scarce.

The proposed layout for the Post Street parklet. Image: Luke Stewart

“Perhaps because of the great need for the space and the public benefits that the parklet would provide, the parklet design for 754 Post Street has generated a very positive response from the surrounding neighborhood and local businesses,” Chiu wrote. “In a dense mixed-use neighborhood such as this one, providing a safe space for neighbors to gather is a vital function of the public realm — a function that the existing conditions on this block do not adequately address.”

The owners of farm:table said the parklet’s street furniture would be present during business hours from 7am-4pm and the owners of the building would take responsibility for being the stewards of the space. They stressed that it wouldn’t have the feel that it was part of farm:table, but would be public space designed for anyone to use.

An SFDPW representative said the letters of support for the project overshadowed those opposed to it by a 4-to-1 ratio. The only two people who testified against the parklet, both residents of the building, complained about the difficulty of parking in the neighborhood.

“We do have a park three blocks down,” one of the opponents testified. “It’s called Union Square.”

A decision on whether to grant permits for both of the parklets is expected in about two weeks. The earliest they could be installed is sometime in late January. The two proposed parklets were among 23 parklet projects recently selected by SFDPW as part of the city’s Pavement to Parks program.

Installation of the track that the builder will use to attach the pavers. Photos: Matthew Roth

Construction of the two newest parklets in San Francisco began today with the installation of a sidewalk extension on 24th Street between Sanchez Street and Vicksburg Street, with another to follow shortly on 24th near Noe Street.

The new spaces were designed by Riyad Ghannam, who designed and built the first parklet in the city in front of the Mojo Bicycle Cafe on Divisadero street. The parklets will replace a total of four parking spaces and cost $37,000, the entirety of which came from Mayor Gavin Newsom’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development as part of their commercial revitalization budget. The Noe Valley Association, which represents merchants in the area, is the permit holder and will oversee the maintenance of the facilities.

Learning from the Mojo parklet, the Planning Department’s Andres Power said they will be using pre-cast concrete pavers for the decking surface and steel planters, instead of wood and fiberglass at Mojo.

Referring to the public outreach process in Noe Valley, where a vociferous group opposed closing Noe Street to create a trial plaza, Power struck a diplomatic tone and said the parklets provided some of the public space amenities without the controversy. “It was definitely a challenging public outreach process in Noe Valley. The vast majority of people who participated in the process came to consensus that there was a desire for public amenities,” said Power. “We wanted to be building community, not dividing people.”

Though Power was kind in his characterization of the process, the anti-plaza crowd got downright vicious, as demonstrated in this near Tea-Party reaction to proposals to close a street. What doesn’t appear on the video is the after effect, where several in the audience infected with The Rage charged the stage trying to bite Andres, which led to a full-scale quarantine of Noe Valley for a week.

We jest. To Streetsblog’s knowledge, there were no flesh-eating septuagenarians at the meeting. If only we could get this kind of fervor around a transit assessment district to raise money for Muni!

H/T – Jeff Wood

Several months ago, this was an under-utilized swath of asphalt that often saw drivers stunting, doing donuts or speeding through the neighborhood. Photos: Matthew Roth

Community groups, city staff and elected officials celebrated the opening of the final Pavement to Parks plaza this weekend, a new 7,500 square foot space that months before was a wide asphalt expanse notorious for speeding traffic and more than a few drivers doing donuts amid smoking tires and revved engines.

City Attorney Dennis Herrera hailed Naples Green, a square in the Excelsior on Naples Street between Geneva Avenue and Rolph Street, as a “testament about what happens when community and government work together.”

Herrera invoked the history of the plaza, which in 1915 was turned into a temporary park to celebrate the Pan-Pacific Exposition and herald San Francisco’s recovery from the 1906 earthquake.  “This park is a testament also to what it means for San Francisco values and community history,” said Herrera. “I can’t think of anything better to commemorate what San Francisco is all about–a phoenix, a city rising and being everything that it can be–than the reestablishment of this park and bringing green space to this wonderful neighborhood.”

For years a group of merchants had been working through the Outer Mission Merchants and Residents Association (OMMRA) to improve the former slab of asphalt, first succeeding to get traffic calming and medians to slow speeds and reduce stunting, then finally convincing District 11 Supervisor John Avalos to cobble funding together through the city budget process and separate agency coffers. In all, the project cost $150,000, much of it coming from the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), which controls the streets and runs Muni, the San Francicco Public Utilities Commission, the Department of Public Works (SFDPW) and a $10,000 grant from the Wells Fargo Foundation.

Avalos applauded the community and OMMRA for their steadfast commitment to transforming the space, referring to the frequent donuts and reckless driving that occurred there previously. “This is a community that has seen too much grass, too much greenery, paved over, so to reverse that in such a magnificent way, in such a large way is really great to see,” he said. “We know we’re going to have more people using the space, that will be an inhibition to the kinds of activities that were going on here before.”

A mural with Jerry Rice, Willy Mays and numerous other icons, including the old pergola constructed during the 1915 Pan-Pacific Exposition.

In addition to a plaza with trees and seating, which was not installed at the press conference but should be this week, the community groups and merchants were proud of a giant new mural painted on the side of the Cordova Market facing Naples Green. The mural depicts numerous sports heroes, with two large pictures of Jerry Rice of the San Francisco 49ers and Willy Mays of the San Francisco Giants, as well as the current World Series Champion Giants team, replete with fearsome beards.

Aslam Ali, the owner of Cordova Market who made his wall available for the mural, was shocked by how quickly muralist Max Erhrman and the San Francisco Clean City Coalition had transformed his blank wall into a beautiful piece of art. “The people who did this mural, unbelievable. I cannot believe this was done in four or five days,” said Ali, who recently purchased the store with his son. “We’re trying to clean up this neighborhood and this mural is part of it. We’re going to turn this store around and serve the neighborhood.”

A photo of Naples Piazza from 1915, built for the Pan-Pacific Exposition. Source: SF Planning Dept.

Most of the organizing for the project came from OMMRA, which formed 13 years ago to coordinate improvements to the neighborhood. In the process, OMRRA was happy to discover the unique history of the space. OMMRA’s Steve Currier noted the similarity to the first Naples Piazza, which was also built as a temporary installation, though he was proud they had secured enough funding to make it semi-permanent. The community will likely continue seeking grants to add to the plaza in the future.

“It was said this week that it took the San Francisco Giants 52 years to bring the World Series to San Francisco. It’s taken us 90 years to get this park back,” said Currier. After joking that DPW Director Ed Reiskin should be appointed interim mayor once Gavin Newsom moves to Sacramento in January, Curier thanked the merchants and the community for embracing the project. “This was a collaborative effort with our community, our merchants. There was tremendous support from our merchants,” said Courier.

In addition to reflecting on the history of the space, Courrier was excited for the calming effect the park would have on the neighborhood. “We wanted a quiet space. To put in this space and when the plants and trees get bigger, it will quiet the neighborhood.”

Supervisor John Avalos, at the lectern, hands out commendations to the people who designed the park and mural.

Jane Martin, who also designed the San Jose/Guerrero Pavement to Parks Plaza, contributed to the design of the space. Martin said the orientation of the space, essentially a long rectangle with a slight grade and streets around it, made it difficult to create programmed activities for kids, which she had initially hoped to do.

“I tried to make it like a maze, so that there is a lot of exploring, some of the sectional property of the street, try to maintain that rather than creating a flat space,” explained Martin, who said the plaza would be a sight to behold in a year to eighteen months, when the bushes and trees had grown. “The angles are to get rid of the street grid. It’s to give you a place to meander.”

Though the Naples Green project marks the final official Pavement to Parks endeavor, DPW’s Reiskin said the agency would continue to look for more projects like this and seek innovative ways to fund them. “Twenty five percent of the area of San Francisco is covered with our public rights of way, which means mostly asphalt and concrete and it was largely built just to convey vehicles, for people to pass through. What we’re here today seeing is just one more transformation of public space, giving it back to the community. It’s part of a transformation of our public realm.”

The DPW and the San Francisco Planning Department will focus in the coming months primarily on the implementation of the more than 40 parklet applications they received in response to their request for proposals in September. Reiskin credited Mayor Newsom for institutionalizing the commitment to reclaiming under-utilized streetspace to create open space, and vowed the city would continue after Newsom moves on.

“We still have a lot of under-utilized hardscape in the city that was built for cars that we want to give back to people,” said Reiskin. “We don’t have funds available for a lot of them, but a lot of these started without funds and once you have a good idea and once you have a strong community behind it, you’ve got a plan, sometimes the money comes.”

Ironically, when I went to take photos of Naples Green under construction on October 4th, I got to see a yahoo doing donuts first hand.

Hopefully images like this will be a thing of the past.

The parklet in front of Mojo Bicycle Cafe. Photo: Matthew Roth

In a city with an appetite for experimentation, San Francisco’s parklets are particularly fascinating. What began as a guerrilla arts intervention meant to demonstrate the need for more public open space has now become a fully permitted procedure for extending sidewalks into the street and has the small business community, which routinely opposes removing parking or charging more for it, aflutter with interest.

During the 5th annual Park(ing) Day in September this year, the Planning Department announced it had opened a request for proposals (RFP) period seeking applications from interested parties who wanted to re-purpose the parking in front of their buildings to build and manage parklets.

The RFP encouraged community benefit districts, businesses and non-profits to submit preliminary designs for parklets, which would be reviewed by a select committee representing various departments in the city, including the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), which manages parking and runs Muni and the Department of Public Works (DPW).

Applicants were encouraged to view parklets as sidewalk furniture meant to enhance public space. From the RFP: “Parklets are intended to provide space for people to sit, relax and enjoy the city around them, especially where narrow sidewalks would otherwise preclude such activities. They are intended to be seen as pieces of street furniture, providing aesthetic enhancements to the overall streetscape.”

Despite the long list of requirements and costs that can be in the tens of thousands of dollars, when the RFP closed at the end of October, city planners who had expected between 20 and 25 applications were pleasantly surprised when they received 42. According to the Planning Department’s Andres Power, the project manager who guided the process of formalizing temporary parklets and plazas through Pavement to Parks, the strong interest from the public was impressive, especially given how little publicity the city had done.

“Up until now, there’s been three projects on the ground and those have materialized quite a bit of interest,” said Power. “It clearly demonstrates there is a lot of latent demand for this.”

Kit Hodge, the director of the Great Streets Project, which has coordinated outreach to merchants with the city, agreed with Power that the demand for parklets was already strong and would become stronger as more of them are constructed.

“San Francisco should be lauded for embracing this experiment and to be open to move from simple experiment to more wider-spread projects and institutionalizing the process in the city,” said Hodge, who noted the public private partnership for enhancing and creating public spaces was not unique to San Francisco, but had a unique history here because of its Park(ing) Day origins. Hodge said the process of outreaching to businesses, which she and her interns had done for months, was building important connections with businesses that might not otherwise consider the use of the parking spaces in front of their buildings for anything but parking.

“One of the appealing things about this is that it’s not a top-down initiative. It doesn’t take a huge amount of public resources to do the projects. It’s finding a way to leverage outside resources and interest to make this happen,” she said.

She also argued that the most important determination of success or failure for the spaces would result from how well they were managed. Hodge referenced famous public spaces in New York City, such as Bryant Park and the newly pedestrianized portions of Broadway in Times Square, suggesting that much of the success of those spaces came from the stewardship of the business improvement districts that maintain them.

“We need to continue to work with organizations that have that management capability,” she said. “Great spaces are 80 percent management, 20 percent design.”

With the transition to a formal permitting process and the completion of various parklets and temporary plazas throughout the city, the Pavement to Parks trials have technically been completed, though Power said the city will remain an active partner in encouraging private parties to build parklets and it will assure the quality construction and monitor them as they are used. Just like any other revocable permit, say for sidewalk dining, if the permit applicant fails to fulfill their duties under the permit, the project can be modified or shut down.

A parklet must abide by various specifications, including size and location. The parklet must be not be at street corners and should be on streets with parallel parking and speed limits at 25 miles per hour or below. The parklet manager must maintain public access at all times, have numerous safety requirements and must not extend more than 6 feet from the curb. It can replace yellow or blue zones so long as there are adjacent parking spaces where those zones can be relocated and they can be in white and green zones as long as the party initially requesting those zones agrees to re-purpose them.

Applicants are required to take out $1 million in liability insurance, naming the City and County of San Francisco as additional insured. Applicants will have to pay for the construction of the parklets and will be required to maintain them, including the storage of any movable tables and chairs that might be used in the space.

Power said only five of the applications would be disqualified outright due to failure to meet core specifications, though he said the city would work with the applicants to improve their project should the city open another RFP. Another six projects were deficient in some manner, so the city was working to improve those applications to move forward with them. For the remaining 31 projects, the DPW will post fliers on the streets around the proposed locations seeking public feedback. If there is a complaint sometime in that period, the DPW will hold a public hearing, after which Director Ed Reiskin will make the final determination on whether or not the applicant can proceed. For those projects without opposition, design and construction can begin imminently.

While Power acknowledged the city expected some of the applicants wouldn’t be able to find the money needed for construction, he was confident most of the projects would be built after approval. According to Power, most of the applications came from businesses, with good distribution throughout the city. As would be expected, many submissions came from the Mission and North Beach, where two parklets have already been installed by Rebar, but Power was also happy to get five applications from The Sunset, four from the Tenderloin and one from Dogpatch. Power was surprised there were no applications in the Richmond or the Southeast neighborhoods and said the city would specifically target outreach there for the next round.

For Rebar’s Blaine Merker, the transformation of an art project into a formal permitting procedure that significantly transforms public space was exciting. He applauded Power and other city planners who had worked to facilitate the process. He also hoped the city would learn from the temporary measures that came from experimentation in a downturn economy to build more permanent public spaces in unusual places  when the budget is more flush.

“It’s very exciting that the city of San Francisco has stepped up to the creative challenge of codifying what started with Park(ing) day,” said Merker. He also said he hoped the city would find a way to support applicants in the future who might not be able to afford the initial capital outlay for constructing a parklet but would be excellent stewards of them.

“When the burden to create public space is shifted from the public to the private sector, it introduces the bottom line equation for merchants. How much is this going to increase my business, how long is it going to take me to pay it off. For smaller merchants, I can imagine this will create a problem,” said Merker. “Perhaps the city could come up with a fund to help merchants who can’t afford a large investment to specifically invest in the public realm and not just amenities that benefit their business as they look to the bottom line.”

Merker also argued that parklets shouldn’t be a stand-in for good public spaces, but a lesson in creating quality aesthetic improvements to the streetscape during lean economic times.

“When we as a city can’t afford to do much in the way of capital investments, this is a good time to experiment with temporary, light infrastructure,” he said. “I hope when things pick up and we can afford to spend more on infrastructure, we can take the lessons we’re learning now to build world class public spaces.”

Eco-People proposal for current parking lot at 17th and Folsom.

Get ready to peek into a possible future for San Francisco parks.

This evening and next week, the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department will lead a tour of four properties being considered for purchase and transformation into parkland. The locations being considered are at 17th and Folsom; Palou and Phelps in the shadow of 280; on Third Street just down from the sewage treatment plant; and 24th Street near Church.

The tour meets tonight at 6pm at 17th and Folsom, then continues to 24th Street at 7pm. It continues next Wednesday at Palou and Phelps at 6pm, and moves to Third Street at 7pm. The public is invited to learn more about the location and the acquisition process. If Rec & Parks decides to move forward with the purchases, there will be many more meetings and opportunities for the public to provide input.

If approved, the parks would comprise crucial new green space as part of a long-overdue reinvestment in the eastern neighborhoods. It’s thanks to the city’s popular Open Space Fund that the acquisitions are under consideration. The voter-approved fund sets aside about $2 million per year to acquire parks and natural areas.

Opportunities to acquire land can be hard to come by in San Francisco, but thanks to a slower real estate market and an excess of earmarked funding, the city has a window of opportunity.

The parcel at 17th and Folsom, currently a parking lot, has received particular attention. There are few pedestrian amenities in the neighborhood, which is dominated by warehouses. On a typical day, there are few signs of life on area sidewalks.

Mission Creek Commons proposal.

The two-year old Eastern Neighborhoods Area Plans placed a high priority on the development of public space in the area. In particular, the plan establishes a policy to “retrofit existing parking and paved areas to minimize negative impacts on microclimate and allow for storm water infiltration.”

As a result, the Planning Department has proposed three options for the space. The “Revolution” concept would feature a stage, amphitheater classroom, and large lawn. The “Mission Creek Commons” concept would feature a central meeting place, surrounded by biological elements like bioswales and espaliered fruit trees. And the “Eco-People” concept would boast interactive features like a bike-powered carousel, community garden, and elements that interpret the nearly-vanished Mission Creek.

“That’s the site that’s had the most design consideration so far,” said Karen Mauney-Brokdek, Rec & Park’s Deputy Director for Planning. Whether any of the parks are actually acquired is up to the Rec and Parks Commission and public feedback, she added.

The 24th Street location has an unusual history — and, should it be purchased by the city, has an unusual future in store. Currently a parking lot for a church, it’s the longtime home of the Noe Valley Farmer’s Market. When it was revealed that the parking lot is up for sale, Noe Valley residents rallied to preserve the space as a neighborhood commons.

They found more assistance than they could have hoped for.

“They didn’t want to see the land get sold and developed into condos if that’s not what the neighborhood needed,” said Neighborhood Parks Council Executive Director Meredith Thomas.

Although there are several parks nearby, they tend to be small, uphill, and isolated from main pedestrian thoroughfares. The lot on 24th represented an opportunity to create a popular gathering space — one that will hopefully cause less heartache than the rejected Pavement to Parks project.

“The Neighborhood Parks Council acts as a technical advisor to stakeholders that want to collaborate with Rec and Park,” said Thomas. Her organization became a fiscal sponsor for the project, and connected neighbors with The 1% Project, an initiative wherein local architects give one percent of their billable hours to pro bono causes. Architects CMG, known for their public space projects, stepped up to begin design work on the potential park.

An innovative funding plan has been proposed for the park, should it reach fruition: rather than being managed and maintained exclusively by the city, operations may be handed over to the Noe Valley Community Benefit District, which is funded by city grants and fees assessed on local businesses. Although the park would be owned by the city, the CBD could take care of day-to-day tasks like trash and security. The exact terms of the agreement have not yet been worked out.

Once neighbors reached consensus that the land should be permanently preserved as a town square, Thomas explained, stakeholders decided that it should be publicly owned. “The residents have stepped up and said that the city can acquire it,” she said, summarizing the neighborhood’s position as, “we will raise all the money to renovate this site based on the design that the community wants, and we will pay for its ongoing maintenance.”

She compared it to Union Square, where a CBD maintains land owned by Rec and Park. There, special events like a skating rink still need to be approved through a public process; and disruptions like Central Subway construction will be considered by the Board of Supervisors.

Costs for developing the property depend on CMG’s eventual design, and on neighborhood fundraising. The city estimates that the property is worth $3 to 4 million, and planners hope to raise $500,000 for construction and several years of maintenance costs.

The private funding is a new model, according to Thomas. “We want this to be a model for any community in San Francisco,” she said. “We may get there through individual donors … but this process, this private piece of funding could also come through grants, investments from local businesses. Different communities have different ways to access private funding.”

She added, “it’s not realistic to expect the city to identify, acquire, renovate, and maintain more parkland, given their finances right now.”