

San Francisco General Plan: Urban Design Element - brudgers
http://www.sf-planning.org/ftp/General_Plan/I5_Urban_Design.htm

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jacobolus
Some comments:

* Transit, while better than all but a few US cities, is still pitiful by world city standards. Many areas of the city are inaccessible by faster transit than buses, and the buses are incredibly slow. Transit connecting to areas outside SF are even worse. The Caltrain is a tragic joke of a commuter rail line.

* Vast areas of the city, especially the whole western half and most of the southern areas are zoned for sparse residential, and don’t allow even moderately dense construction, or a reasonable density of commercial use (e.g. shops/restaurants) mixed in with the housing. Because the same areas are the ones least accessible by transit, there is substantial land spent on cars and streets in those areas, and residents there are stuck as (mostly car) commuters. Overall, a huge waste of space in light of the housing shortage throughout the Bay Area. Fortunately there are also plenty of neighborhoods zoned in a more mixed and somewhat denser way, which are better (but also have commensurately higher housing prices/rents).

* Traffic lanes are wider than necessary on many streets, many streets have more lanes than necessary, and there is an absurd overabundance of street parking. Streets are engineered to encourage faster driving than the posted speed limits: On some residential streets with posted 25 mph limits, the median traffic speed is >45 mph, especially at night.

* The road system is pretty bad for pedestrians (though again much better than most US cities), with too many traffic signals all on relatively slow cycles, and streets and intersections designed for cars first with pedestrians as an afterthought. As mentioned in the previous point, many streets are wider than necessary. Roads are very dangerous for cyclists, with few separated bike lines and many poorly designed intersections.

* There are too few public spaces directly facing and open to the street where people might sit and hang out. What spaces there are need more people walking nearby, better seating, and better/more street food and entertainment.

* At night, almost all streets are much much brighter than necessary, probably about an order of magnitude too bright. On many streets it’s possible to read a book by the street lights, and light pollution in general renders the night sky all but invisible even on clear nights.

* Most areas would benefit from more trees.

On the flip-side, at least this awful plan from the 40s/50s to cover the whole
city in freeways never came to fruition:
[http://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet/detail/RUMSEY~8~1~25...](http://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet/detail/RUMSEY~8~1~258970~5522255)
; many US cities weren’t so lucky, e.g.
[http://iqc.ou.edu/2015/01/21/60yrsnortheast/](http://iqc.ou.edu/2015/01/21/60yrsnortheast/)

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angersock
_At night, almost all streets are much much brighter than necessary, probably
about an order of magnitude too bright._

I've heard complaints about the Tenderloin, but being too well lit I don't
think has ever been one of them.

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simoncion
I live in the TL, and have for many years. It could be 50->75% as bright and
still feel as safe.

Except for a few streets in the nicer parts of the TL, it's quite bright
enough to read a book on any sidewalk in the middle of the night.

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grimmdude
Good to see documentation of what I'm sure most SF residents would agree
should be protected.

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raldi
Coincidentially, these happen to be the exact same people who are insulated
from the housing crisis.

