A year ago, Chris and I got up late, watched the news and contemplated what to do about Farley’s Oakland and San Francisco. We’d worked furiously to adjust to a “to go” model in the face of a pandemic that was fast approaching like an ominous storm. We went to work on March 16 and…
The Central Waterfront Navigation Center (CWNC), located at the east end of 25th Street, closed for the past year, may reopen soon as COVID-19 vaccinations become more widespread. Last month, Mayor London Breed announced the availability of vaccines to those experiencing homelessness or living in congregate care facilities, such as homeless shelters. When the facility…
On April 12th, the San Francisco Unified School District will resume in-person instruction for students at facilities that’re in Phase 2a of the Return Safely Together Plan. Pupils and their families will have just six weeks of near normality before summer vacation. For many Phase 2a students it’ll be the first time they or their…
The warehouses on Cesar Chavez Street by Pier 80 aren’t much of a travel magnet in their current state, serving as Penske rental truck storage facilities, but if autonomous vehicle company Cruise has its way, they’ll be the site of a high-capacity electric vehicle (EV) charging facility by 2022. Earlier this year Cruise announced its…
Action Auto Care has offered car repair services on 17th and Vermont streets for 20 years. Owned by Robert Kim, who has worked in the neighborhood for a quarter-century, previously at another shop, Action boasts more than 400 five-star reviews on Yelp. Described by commentators as “thoughtful,” “friendly,” and “honest,” Kim is often an unexpected…
Last month, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art welcomed visitors with a free admission day to celebrate its second reopening since a shelter-in-place mandate was imposed a year previously. The first reopening, in October, required masks and physical distancing, but only lasted until December, when case-numbers spiked. This attempt is more cautious, with reduced…
After a contentious years-long debate over how best to renovate Esprit Park, the Dogpatch Neighborhood Association, supported by the Potrero Boosters, among others compromised on Plan W, selecting it from six redesign plans offered for the 1.8-acre open space. Plan W calls for two meadows, the south designated “family” – dog-free – the north an…
Struggling San Francisco businesses were allowed to partially reopen in late-January after nearly two months of being largely banned from operating, bringing a cautious optimism to fitness companies and restaurants plagued by more than a year of restrictions and associated lost income. Shortly after the state lifted a regional stay-at-home order implemented in early December, Mayor…
James Colgan was about to open his third James Colgan Hair Salon in Cow Hollow last March when the pandemic struck. A year later, he’s pared his business to just two chairs on 18th Street, a location above which he’s lived for the past 13 years. He was forced to close a 25-chair salon in…
Long-time Potrero Hill resident, Eugene Dickey, opened Third Rail Ebikes on Third and 24th streets last November. He’d first started mulling over the idea of launching a bicycle shop after experiencing firsthand the challenging nature of negotiating San Francisco’s steep slopes and confronting high price tags and poor customer service from existing electric bike vendors.…
In December, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) identified three possible developers to rebuild the Potrero Bus Yard: Potrero Mission Community Partners, Potrero Neighborhood Collective, and Potrero Yard Community Partners. The three competitors will submit their final proposals in July, with a winner chosen by the end of summer. The selected developer will construct…
Before COVID-19 hit, Alex Pavloff, a fourth generation Potrero Hill resident, threw large cookouts with his family on Connecticut Street, hosting upwards of 100 people. That stopped due to the pandemic, but Pavloff continued to feel the urge to feed his friends and family. Pavloff’s Farm to City Meat Service was born from that impulse.…
Proposition A, a bond measure passed by voters in November, includes $10 million to renovate Jackson Park. It’ll be the first time since 1947 that the commons will receive bond monies from the City, according to Friends of Jackson Park Executive Director Jude Deckenbach. According to Deckenbach, to remake one of the City’s oldest parks…
Community Housing Partnerships (CHP) and Bridge Housing Corporation broke ground last fall at Mission Bay South Block 9, also known as 410 China Basin. The 92,000 square foot, four-story structure featuring 141 modular affordable rental studios for formerly homeless individuals, along with on-site supportive services, is expected to welcome inhabitants as early as January 2022.…
As the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) prepares for the return of T-Third Street Muni Metro service, the agency plans to implement temporary emergency transit lanes in both directions over the Fourth Street Bridge this month. The idea, which drew a barrage of public comment from an estimated 60 attendees of a virtual community…
The excavator’s articulated yellow boom-arm rose slowly, hoisting the six-foot tall letter ‘n’ off the flatbed trailer into the air, a thick strap shackled to a threaded steel eyelet. The hole had been bored into the top of the concrete letter more than 40 years ago; it could no longer bear its own weight for…
The M.H. de Young Museum is likely to open to the public later this month, with a limited number of visitors able to tour the institution by purchasing tickets in advance for timed entry. In addition to the permanent collection, three special exhibitions are on view. Frida Kahlo: Appearances Can Be Deceiving, originally slated for…
Last fall Bridge Housing released 2020 Rebuild Potrero Impact Report, which reviews progress redeveloping the Potrero Annex-Terrace housing complex on Potrero Hill’s southside. The “Rebuild Potrero” project was launched in 2008 by the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development and Bridge Housing Corporation, a nonprofit headquartered in San Francisco. Bridge Housing operates twenty-one properties…
Last month’s election attracted the highest participation level in three-quarters of a century, with 86 percent of those eligible voting, compared to 87 percent in 1944. While San Francisco was a sea of blue, Potrero Hill, Dogpatch, and Mission Bay residents voted for Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and approved City measures by especially wide…
With roughly 13 million people, Rwanda has experienced just three COVID-19 deaths for every million persons, compared to 742 per million in the United States. The small East African country’s success in dampening novel coronavirus demise has principally been due to a compliant population’s willingness to submit to a comprehensive lockdown. Last April, at the…
San Francisco rents have dropped faster than any other major city in the country. According to Zumper’s October rent report, which analyzed data from more than one million listings nationwide, rents in the City have declined by 20 percent since last year. Zumper, which vends apartments and houses online, found that an average South-of-Market studio…
A group of volunteers is cultivating a garden that consists of plants native to the area, adapted to the soil above Serpentinite bedrock that’s prevalent along Vermont and 17th streets. The plot is being nurtured through a collaboration between the Potrero Gateway Project (PGP), California Native Plant Society – Yerba Buena Chapter, landscape architecture firm…
During normal times Potrero Hill resident, Paul Kleyman, could often be found sipping coffee at Farley’s, contemplating what to post next on his aging-focused blog, Generations Beat Online. A 40-year Hill resident, after Kleyman graduated from the University of Minnesota with a degree in journalism he was certain of one thing: he wasn’t going…