Posted on 01/30/2007 9:50:06 PM PST by MinorityRepublican
SAN FRANCISCO The construction is everywhere in San Francisco, as one high-rise after another has been approved by the city, and about to be built.
Chronicle Writer Marshall Kilduff has covered the city since growth was a dirty word.
"20 years ago, 30 years ago when you had these high-rise fights, you had a much more homogenous town. Little neighborhoods, people who remembered things, landmarks were always under the gun," Kilduff recalled.
CBS 5 asked if the skyscrapers would have been approved 20 years ago.
"Never," Kilduff said. "We had 5, 6 ballot fights. Not (each of them) won. But the general direction was smaller, more contained, less development…and now all that's sort of going away.'
In fact, on Tuesday, five of the world's leading architectural firms came to Fort Mason, to pitch their ideas for a new Transbay Terminal and high-rise.
New trains and buses would shoot in-and-out of the Terminal's First and Mission location, with a skyscraper above it. The building would stand taller than the Transamerica Pyramid.
Across the street, another skyscraper is being proposed. At 1,200 feet, it would be the 3rd tallest building in the United States.
Dean Macris, the city's long-time planning chief, says people want to live and work downtown.
CBS 5 asked Macris if this is the "Manhattanization" of San Francisco.
"Yes and no," Macris replied. "We're not talking about hundreds of towers, we're talking about a selective number of towers. So that if manage it correctly we're not going to be Manhattan."
But not everyone loves the changing skyline. Calvin Welch has been a housing activist for 30 years.
"Well I think, I think you get close to talking about the loss of a civic soul, of a connection between people and a place. And…once you change that, you change everything in a city," Welch said. "And I don't think people quite understand that. But cities are about places, and people's relationship to those places. And once you start putting 2,000 foot high buildings that you ask people to live in, you are totally transforming your relationship to one another, and to the place."
As for the Transbay Terminal Project, the City of San Francisco will pick a finalist over the next few weeks.
By the time all this building is over, it's going to be a very different looking city, whether we like it or not.
Yuck.
Just pass a bill to require that all building lobbies include the smell of stale urine. San Francisco literally reeks.
prekatrina syndrome...
build your city on a natural disaster waiting to
happen......give it up, S.F.....I would hate
to be in SF if an earthquake hit...
So ... we rebuild New Orleans again in a big bowl and San Fran puts up more things to fall down during the next big quake. Don't worry, though, the Federal taxpayer will foot the repair bill as the local pols yell long and loud so no one realizes their complicity.
Funny, once you start encouraging, subsidizing, and celebrating violent homeless bums, you also are totally transforming your relationship to one another, and to the place.
Sow --> Reap
Will these be for communal living, to house revolutionary committees on how to impeach Bush, libraries dedicated to Marx, Study halls for LSD and other spiritual enhancements?
AND you get to blame it on the President....if it's a Replublican.
Ha-ha! It's just not urine, I've seen homeless people crapping in the doorways in downtown SF. The better businesses hose it down every morning.
Down near the waterfront where the building boom is going on, there's a problem with antiquated sewage systems. I worked for many years at One Market, a set of high-rise towers at the Bay waterfront. The new Transbay Terminal is a couple blocks from there. Often-times the area reeks of sewage, as it backs up underground in pipes alongside the piers. Every new skyscraper adds hundreds if not thousands of workers who add extra flushes into the mix. The City is aware of the problem and is constantly monitoring sewers in order to clear backups, but is hard pressed to keep up. The good news is that you can fart and no" no notices.
SF is a beutiful city. Its just the leftist capital of the US that makes is suck so hard.
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