The driver of this aging Volvo either managed to parallel park with amazing aplomb, or managed to get stuck through the poor practice of at least one other driver.
Click to expand:
You should always leave room for others to get out, of course.
Consider San Jose, California. Just think about it. El Pueblo de San José de Guadalupe is the Thanksgiving capital of the Bay Area. Why? Because the place where The Fun Never Stops is just loaded with turkey.
Does your area have huge wild turkeys strutting around inside the city limits? Enough said.
Click to enlarge.
You’ve heard of ephemeral vernal pools, but San Francisco has its own version - autumnal lakes of water that rise up after heavy rain sometimes. Let’s call this one Lake Ashbury.
The cover on this legally parked bike certainly earned it’s keep the other night, battling waves of water 10 feet high.
Click to expand:
Such is the plight of those who park motocycles on the mean streets of San Francisco.
Well it was on the Laughing Squid, so everybody knew about the 2008 Illegal Soapbox Derby atop San Francisco’s Bernal Hill. Not to be confused with the recent Red Bull event in Dolores Park last month, the illegal (possibly lacking a permit, and insurance, and…) Bernal Heights soap box derby has pleased one and all for years.
But then word came from from Mission Mission that that Recreation and Parks Rangers and San Francisco Police Department officers would be on hand to shut this mother down.
And so it was.
This racer had to back his rig away from last year’s starting gate, later closed altogether, under orders of an RPD Ranger:
Things were no different at the bottom of the hill, with these SFPD officers giving the bad news to organizers:
Genial sergeant Miller arrived to discuss matters with an organizer and respected neighborhood poobah Todd “First Class” Lappin, but any subsequent soapbox derbying on the hill was disorganized and fleeting:
So there you have it, no soap box today, at least at Bernal Heights Park there wasn’t.
See you next year?
North of Mission Bay and South of Market is where you’ll find the houseboats of Mission Creek.
You can look at them and ponder their future while exploring the new Mission Creek Park. The residents here have a lot to adjust to what with all the new visitors, and the new condo buildings, and the new UCSF Mission Bay complex.
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Here’s the problem our Presidio Trust faces - they’re caught between two factions:
1. The where’s our fabulous museum already? crowd; and
2. The normal assortment of obstructionists who crop up whenever anybody tries to do anything in this town.
Primarily. There’s other folks as well of course, like those who object to a lodge in a national park and those who have ownership interests in nearby movie theatres and therefore want the historic Main Post Theatre to remain closed. It’s a real furball.
Anywho all this fussing takes time, so you the public will get another shot. The long version is below. Read the short version here, courtesty of reliable Marisa Lagos at SFGate.
Is this a craps table or a model of a possible future greened-up Main Post? The Presidio Trust’s Chandler McCoy shows a tour group from the American Institute of Architects San Francisco how he’ll Save the Presidio from the obstructionists. Click to roll the bones:
As promised, here’s the latest. The big thing is yet another public comment opportunity on October 14th, 2008 at 6:30 PM. It will be at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre in the Marina, so you’ll have no fear of getting ticketed by the Park Police.
See you there!
“Presidio of San Francisco (September 2, 2008) — The community has another month to share their comments on proposals to revitalize the Presidio’s Main Post as a center for history, art, and culture and as a place that welcomes the public. The Presidio Trust announced today that it has extended the comment period on its Draft Main Post Update and Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (DSEIS) to October 20. The extra time gives the Trust, other historic preservation organizations, and the community an additional opportunity to consider how the birthplace of San Francisco can be commemorated alongside new amenities for visitors to the national park.
“People care passionately about the Presidio. We’ve already received approximately 1,000 comments, and 1,500 people attended our Main Post walking tours this summer,” said Craig Middleton, executive director of the PresidioTrust, the federal agency charged with preserving and protecting the military post turned national park. “We’re fortunate to haveproposals on the table that would be the envy of many communities, but there are issues we need to resolve. We are excited about what the future of the Presidio’s most historic area could be and we hope to build enthusiasm in the community as well.”
“In June, the Presidio Trust released its draft updated plan for the Main Post and Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement, outlining ideas for sharing the Presidio’s history and establishing new ways to use and enjoy the center of the park. The Main Post encompasses 120 acres and more than 1.28 million square feet of building space. Cornerstone ideas include: establishing a Heritage and Archaeology Center in the Officers’ Club at the site of the original fort; creating the park’s first lodge; and rehabilitating and expanding the long-closed Presidio Theatre. The proposal that has received the most attention is for a contemporary art museum housing Donald and Doris Fisher’s renowned collection of works from the 20th and 21st centuries. The museum would be a new cultural anchor for the national park. A proposal to transform the Main Parade Ground, a 7-acre parking lot, into a new public open space was decided last summer.
“The Trust is exploring the challenging historic preservation issues with the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, the State Historic Preservation Office, and the National Park Service, including how new construction and additions to historic buildings could successfully be carried out on the Main Post. Issues to be considered include the design and location of the proposed museum. This process, governed by Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, was also followed when the Letterman Digital Arts Center was being considered to replace the decommissioned Letterman Hospital in 2001. The Section 106 consultation meetings began last November and will continue later this month. Other organizations participating in the consultation are:
• National Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP)
• Presidio Historical Association (PHA)
• Sierra Club (SC)
• Descendents of the Portola and Anza Expedition (DAPE)
• National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA)
• San Francisco Architectural Heritage (SFAH)
• People for a Golden Gate National Recreation Area (PGGNRA)
• Neighborhood Associations for Planning at the Presidio (NAPP)
• Cow Hollow Association (CHA)
• Laurel Heights Improvement Association (LHIA)
“The proponents for the three major projects (the contemporary art museum, the lodge, and the Presidio Theater) will also participate in the consultation.
“The Presidio Trust has scheduled a second public board of directors meeting to take comments on the proposals. The meeting will be held on Tuesday, October 14, at 6:30 pm, at the Palace of Fine Arts theatre, 3301 Lyon Street. More than 700 people attended the first public hearing held on July 14.
“Input received during the public comment period and the feedback from the Section 106 historic preservation process will be used by the Trust board to make its final decision, expected towards the end of the year.
“The Presidio Trust is also hosting three workshops to provide additional opportunities to the public to discuss the Draft Main Post Plan and Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement. The workshops will also provide a forum to discuss further the kinds of activities that the public would like to see in the Main Post in the future.
Thursday, September 25, 6:30 to 8:30 pm, Presidio Officers’ Club, 50 Moraga Avenue
Sunday, September 28, 2 to 4 pm, Presidio Officers’ Club, 50 Moraga Avenue
Thursday, October 2, 6:30 to 8:30 pm, Golden Gate Club, 135 Fisher Loop
“The draft plan, Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement, and other documents are available at www.presidio.gov.
“Comments are welcomed through October 20 at mainpost@presidiotrust.gov.
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Leave out the fiction, Nimbies
The fact is, your friction
Will only be worn by persistence.
Leave out conditions,
Courageous convictions
Will drag the dream into existence.
(Or “set their sights,” it works either way.) Some feel there’s a big dilemma over San Francisco’s Dolores Park, but really now, you NIMBYs, what were you thinking when you moved in there?
Please consider the silent majority, 419 of whom whom give DP a five star rating. And don’t get the impression that only a park ranger can do something about crime. If you see a real crime going on, the SFPD is prepared to head on in there and deal with it - you don’t have to wait for a Ranger to show up.
If you want to be a help, try to deal with specific issues as opposed to sounding like you’re upset at people enjoying themselves.
Another dreaded sunny day at Parque de Dolores. The horror:
Click to enlarge and get a better view of all that crime going on.
They tried to warn us about the fog, but only some of us listened. The rest of us went down the waterfront only to be confronted with this:
You see, it should look more like this, from 2007. This year’s fireworks got above the fog, but only once in a while. It’s almost as if the Bay Area should celebrate Anti-Fourth of July instead.
See you (through the fog) next year!
Well, at least for this particularly oddly-shaped piece of real estate on Main Street near Folsom, the answer is this many:
“Last in, last out.” Click to expand.
It might be a pain to park here, under the shadow of the new Infinity San Francisco towers, but at least you won’t get the boot, or get into a chain reaction accident, or get all messy. Of course, if you work for San Francisco Honda, then just park wherever - the sidewalk, for example.
Lastly, DO NOT PAY THIS MAN!
Now you’re all set.
You can see the culprit reflected in this car’s windshield - it’s a sap-filled Eucalyptus globulus (aka Tasmanian Blue Gum, Southern Blue Gum or Blue Gum Eucalyptus) just waiting to rain down on your vehicle.
Of course a garage around in the area of Golden Gate Park or it’s Panhandle could run you something like $10 per day. Maybe you’d feel a little gumminess is a small price to pay for free parking?
Your choice.