Pavement to Parks

San Francisco was one of two cities this week to receive the Institute for Transportation and Development's prestigious 2012 Sustainable Transport Award. No doubt, the ITDP award was well-deserved for the SFMTA's successful implementation of the groundbreaking SFPark program, as well as the SF Planning Department's proliferation of parklets under its Pavement to Parks program. Those efforts have grabbed attention around the world.

Nearly two years after the first parklet arrived in San Francisco, a new study provides an empirical assessment of reclaiming parking spots for public space.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.