Last August signs were erected on Wisconsin Street that indicated parking would be prohibited for four days, with a permit reference to Yerba Buena Engineering. Residents were irritated by disruption of their regular parking patterns, but it appeared to be for a good cause: installation of speed bumps.
The first week came and went without any construction. New no-parking signs were issued for the following week. The extended parking disturbance added to the ongoing stress of owning a car in a city with high incidences of car break ins, catalytic converter thefts, damage from accidents, and expensive parking tickets.
The City has increasingly deployed bumps to slow otherwise speeding cars. Vehicles regularly blast through the stop sign at Wisconsin and Madera streets. At least one resident had their car smashed into by someone flying down the street, on a road where kids often walk from Starr King Elementary School to the Potrero Recreation Center for afterschool programs and sports.
According to a San Francisco Fire Department Station 37 firefighter, channels in the speed humps allow emergency vehicles to move quickly over them due to the fire engine’s wheelbase.
Yerba Buena Engineering is one of four approved vendors that install speed bumps under contract with the San Francisco Department of Public Works. The contractors are given a “task order for a master contract” with a set price over a six-month period. If all goes well, the contract is extended. According to Miguel Galarza, Yerba Buena’s owner, Permit #23 EXC-02613 authorized 136 bumps be fitted for $1,709,792, or $12,572 per bump.
Mr. Galaraza said the Potrero Hill humps were requested by Supervisor Shaman Walton’s office. He indicated that construction delays can be caused by several factors. For example, DPW relies on a single asphalt plant which can sometimes go offline. No asphalt, no hump. Weather is also a variable. Rainy days aren’t good for these types of jobs. Summer rain was the most likely reason for the postponement. And, occasionally, someone tears down or alters the no parking signs, or cars can’t be towed if there’s an error in the placards. This may have caused an interruption in one workday, in which only half a hump was built because there was a vehicle in the way.
“The traffic calming recently installed on the 800 and 900 blocks of Wisconsin Street is in direct response to an application submitted by one or more residents in May 2020, as part of the FY20-21 Residential Application-Based Traffic Calming Program cycle,” Natalie Gee, Walton’s chief of staff wrote in an email. “We collected data on these blocks that confirmed the presence of speeding, developed a design proposal that was vetted with the SFFD before being considered at an Engineering Public Hearing on 9/2/2022, and the final recommended design was approved by the City Traffic Engineer for implementation.”
Residents are generally pleased with the results, which have slowed speeders, increasing pet and child safety. The new humps on the 900 block will have a side benefit of making it much harder for kids to ride recycling cans down the street.
Terrence Jones has lived on Wisconsin Street for almost 30 years.
