Pedestrian Infrastructure

When the plaza at 17th and Market Streets opened up last May, city officials promised more Pavement to Parks projects in short order. Yesterday, there was physical evidence at the sites of two new planned plazas that the city is making good on its commitment.

When an automobile strikes a pedestrian or bicyclist, the impact often extends far beyond the parties directly involved. For anyone who witnesses a crash, or stumbles upon the aftermath, the effect is deeply jarring. It can be hard to pass by the same intersection again without reliving the event. Worse yet, injury crashes are so common in San Francisco, most never receive much press attention, and it can be tough to determine whether a crash victim will fully recover, or even survive.

The Valencia Streetscape Improvement Project will bring major enhancements to Valencia Street that will benefit all of its users. To get there though, bicyclists and businesses will have to weather a nine-month storm of construction, which began three weeks ago. At a press conference today at ArtZone 461 Gallery, Supervisor Chris Daly and the DPW's Alex Murillo vowed to do everything possible to help make the process less painful, and business owners sought to remind residents that they will remain open throughout, even if work crews are right outside their door. 

Details are still trickling in about last Tuesday's hit-and-run crash near the intersection of Van Ness Avenue and California Street that left a 31-year-old San Francisco woman in the hospital with life-threatening injuries, but a visit to the intersection revealed plenty of hazards to pedestrians that could easily result in future injuries.

Construction begins this week on a nine-month project that could periodically disrupt Valencia Street's bike lanes. The result, residents hope, will be a greatly improved streetscape for pedestrians and bicyclists.

When Mayor Gavin Newsom dedicated the first of three Pavement to Parks plazas at 17th and Market streets, he promised to push forward with the next two trial plazas in short order, including one at the intersection of Guerrero Street and San Jose Avenue, one of the more precarious corners in the city, where traffic speeds down Guerrero after exiting I-280, the footprint of the now-abandoned Mission Freeway. For community residents like Gillian Gillett, who has been fighting to make the neighborhood more pedestrian friendly and less sick with dangerous traffic for years, the news was thrilling.

San Francisco's livable streets advocates have a chance to participate in a public forum tomorrow with Enrique Peñalosa, who, as mayor of traffic-clogged Bogotá, Colombia, implemented a s⁞weeping set of improvements to transit and the pedestrian realm.

In early April, Caltrans contractors replaced the sidewalk curb ramps along Park Presidio, but left without ensuring a smooth transition between the clean, new curb ramps and the road pavement.  Instead, they filled in the spaces between the curb ramps and the roads with bumpy, uneven black asphalt – or they left unfilled gaps. While a minor difference in grade may not appear to be a problem for most pedestrians, it is a major burden for visually and mobility impaired users trying to access bus stops along Park Presidio and its cross streets. At the least it's an unacceptably sloppy job, though the new curb ramps could be in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Ingleside Station's new captain, David Lazar, has renewed stings on motorists who fail to yield to pedestrians at intersections and crosswalks in his precinct, a popular practice among neighborhood residents that hasn't been employed since a previous captain left years ago, according to witnesses of the sting.