The planning process was stuck in limbo once the Strategic Concept Plan was adopted — until 2005, when Supervisor Sophie Maxwell pushed for the initiation of a Visitacion Valley redevelopment survey area that was in turn established in June 2005. Community workshops continued through 2007, and the conceptual design for the redevelopment area evolved into the current form of the plan. June 2008 was a landmark timepoint for the redevelopment — for not only had the Redevelopment Agency completed a draft Environmental Impact Report, but Ingersoll Rand finally agreed to sell the Schlage Lock property to Universal Paragon for $450 million. Under the agreement, Universal Paragon assumed most of the $25 million costs for cleaning up the site, and Universal Paragon terminated a long-standing contamination lawsuit it had filed against Ingersoll Rand. Ultimate buildout of the redevelopment plan lies on the other side of this economic downturn and the costly cleanup of toxic contamination — but can we just say finally? A full decade after Schlage Lock operations ceased, the dream to redevelop this land revitalize Visitacion Valley moves closer to being realized. The Redevelopment Agency has now adopted environmental findings, approved the Design for Development, and approved the Redevelopment Plan. The next steps in the process will be to seek approval from the Board of Supervisors and the Mayor.

Aerial view of Schlage Lock site. Courtesy of S.F. Redevelopment Agency.

Schlage Lock plan area map. Courtesy of S.F. Redevelopment Agency.

The 46-acre Visitacion Valley Redevelopment Plan Area is divided into two zones: Zone 1, which is the main 20-acre Schlage Lock site (owned by Universal Paragon) under the purview of the Redevelopment Agency, and Zone 2, 26 acres consisting of adjacent segments of Bayshore and Leland Avenue. The plan may be the perfect embodiment of what one might hope to achieve with city planning. The site epitomizes transit-oriented development, bounded as it is on the north and west by the T-Third Muni Metro line on Bayshore, and on the east by the Caltrain tracks; the southern boundary is the San Mateo County line. Local trips along the Third Street corridor originate from Arleta and Sunnydale T-Third stations, which are both located on the border of the site. Bayshore Caltrain provides regional connections, and it will one day be refashioned into an intermodal when the T-Third is extended from its current Sunnydale terminus. As other redevelopment plans in this section of the city take shape, notably that planned for Hunters Point, Bayshore is poised to become an important southside hub if bus rapid transit is constructed via Geneva Avenue to connect Balboa Park to the Hunters Point Shipyard, which may also be a natural light rail link. In addition, the contaminated Schlage Lock site is a substantial barrier that separates Visitacion Valley from Little Hollywood. Filling in and developing this site would result in a through-extension of the street grid, strengthening connections to adjacent neighborhoods. It would also furnish a direct, apparent, and intuitive pedestrian and bicycle link from the Leland Avenue commercial strip to Bayshore Caltrain. Such a link is synergistic with the Better Streets plan to improve the Leland Avenue streetscape, which would be funded using the proceeds from the Visitacion Valley Community Facilities and Infrastructure Fee.

Leland Avenue streetscape. Courtesy of S.F. Planning Dept.

The redevelopment plan is rather ambitious, and the concept is a fine one, informed by a desire to generate local construction and retail jobs, and to revitalize the area with facade improvements and better marketing of the commercial district. Given the wealth of nearby transit, and the promise for creating a new hub and destination in the southeastern corner of the city, the plan may fall somewhat short in that it could be even denser. Zone 2, Leland Avenue and Bayshore — which contain almost 200,000 square feet devoted to retail and PDR (production, distribution, and repair) uses, but fewer than 200 residential units — make up the neighborhood’s commercial spine. The plan would emphasize this role through infill of underutilized parcels with 26,000 square feet of additional retail, and a modest increase of a few hundred housing units. The majority of the development is planned for Zone 1, on Universal Paragon’s property. The plan contemplates a one-acre Schlage Greenway lined with residences, in the spirit of the Hayes Green, along with three additional parks. The development plan for Zone 1 would add 1,250 new homes and 105,000 square feet of retail, with at least 25% affordable (as either stand-alone or inclusionary). Mixed-use buildings would be constructed along the extensions of Visitacion, Leland, and Sunnydale Avenues through the Schlage Lock site, and the site at the corner of Bayshore and Sunnydale (the southwest corner of the project) has been identified as a promising corner for a 40,000-50,000 square foot neighborhood grocer in the ground floor of another mixed-use building. The plan contemplates structures of 55 foot height limit in most parts of the plan area, and 65 feet at important gateway points. Only two parcels just west of the Caltrain tracks would support taller buildings (85 foot limit) that would act as visual cues. Lastly, the plan would retain an historic resource: an office building from the Schlage factory, to be reused as community space.

Courtesy of S.F. Redevelopment Agency.

If you read the two previous posts about this past election, you probably noticed one rather glaring omission from the discussion: the two San Francisco measures that were actually about city planning, Propositions F and G concerning the massive redevelopment of the Hunters Point Shipyard and Candlestick Point. Unfortunately, after writing those other two election posts, there was no time to write a post about Hunters Point as well. But one thing is pretty certain: there will be opportunity in the future to discuss the landmark redevelopment of this area of the City. As you have likely already heard, 62% of San Franciscans voted “No” on the 50% affordable housing mandate in Prop F, while an almost equal number of San Franciscans voted “Yes” on Prop G, signalizing a desire to move forward with the cleaning up and redevelopment of this Superfund site. (Link to SF Election Results, scroll down to the bottom for city measures.)

Very little of the content of either Prop F or Prop G should have appeared on the ballot at all, particularly because this redevelopment project is so massive, complex, and still quite early in the process despite the fact that discussions have been ongoing for the past several years. The highly politicized Prop F vs. Prop G battle essentially became yet another example of San Francisco political theater at its finest: Daly v. Newsom, Progressives vs. “Progressives,” and any other iteration you can think of. As has been repeatedly raised by Prop F supporters, Prop G, as it pertains to the plan of the developer Lennar Corp., is not legally binding — it is filled with words like “encourage” and “should,” rather than “shall.” But then again, it could not be legally binding. The potential environmental impacts of cleaning up and redeveloping this area must be documented, and changes to the current plan will have to be made in response to the findings of the EIR when that document has been prepared. In addition, the plan is centered on the construction of a new 49ers stadium, but it is anything but a certainty that the team will remain in San Francisco. (The plan is not dependent on the stadium, and can be redrawn without it; the plan merely encourages retention of the 49ers “as a source of civic pride.”) The only binding part of Prop G — and really, the only part that should have appeared on the ballot at all — was the statements repealing Propositions D and F in 1997, in which voters approved the bonds and zoning that would have facilitated the construction of a new stadium and shopping center. Last month, Lennar did agree to a deal to increase affordability from an encouraged 25% affordable to a legally binding one-third affordable if Prop G were to pass, putting the Shipyard roughly in line with 55 Laguna and the Transbay redevelopment area in terms of affordable housing levels. The Chron reported about the deal, but at the time that article was published, Lennar and the San Francisco Labor Council had not formally agreed to the deal, and I think that was the last we heard of this in the mainstream media.

The inclusion of vague details about the plan, combined with local distrust of Lennar (not only in response to the asbestos scandal from last year and Lennar’s own in-house troubles, but also the “false promise” of rental housing on Parcel A) spurred Prop F’s momentum. As for the plan itself: it does bring much-needed homes, jobs and open space to an economically depressed neighborhood and an environmentally hazardous site, but given that this is one of the last major plots of land in San Francisco that remains unaccounted for, we can do even better. A strong argument can be made for higher levels of affordability on City land, although the exact amount to include is a determination best honed through hearings at the Board of Supervisors, rather than mandated by a ballot box initiative, where feel-good emotions and politically charged rhetoric tend to sweep aside logic and serious analysis. A lightly-used stadium is a poor use of scarce urban space — the parking is also a poor use, even with turf — and the land that has been set aside for the stadium and its associated parking would be better utilized if it housed a still greater density of residents and jobs, provided that the right transit infrastructure is put in place to accommodate the extra people. A spur/loop off the T-Third light rail line could connect the site to downtown, the Bayview commercial core along Third Street, the growing job center at Mission Bay, and the future Caltrain/Muni Metro joint hub at Bayshore Station. The current plan is rather geared towards automobiles, improving circulation access for vehicles, but it has a less firm grasp of how transit should link the redevelopment area to nearby districts to ensure that we do not simply add thousands of housing units inhabited by drivers who pile onto Highway 101. The layout of the neighborhood and its transportation flow should be designed so that transit is the natural and most attractive mode of travel, despite the somewhat isolated location, and despite the presence of a freeway near to at least the southern Candlestick portion of the redevelopment area. This was a guiding principle of the Market-Octavia Plan, and it is a principle that should guide any large-scale rezoning or redevelopment plan. The tools that can be used to plan a dense, truly livable and transit-oriented neighborhood at Hunters Point are well-established, and while lip service has been given to these concepts, the commitment to build in this way is not quite there. It remains now to coax the plan into fulfilling this vision.

The speeches would have been much more effective had the opening ceremony happened before the official start of operations. Unfortunately, the T had already been running full time for a week by that point, and the disaster that unfolded during that first week and in the subsequent weeks cast an aura of uncertainty over Nancy Pelosi’s and Willie Brown’s assured optimism. It quickly became clear that Muni required substantial time to work out the bugs and get used to the new burden of running an additional rail line — despite the fact that they had been testing the T for months before the official opening. Many runs were missed due to lack of train operators, and headways on the T were far longer than what was promised. Other Muni Metro lines started running only a portion of their routes (for example, the N-Judah was turning around at 19th Avenue, two miles short of its actual terminus at Ocean Beach, thus abandoning any passengers traveling west of 19th) so that trains could be diverted to fill in the gaps. The presence of an additional line in the Market Street subway — as well as the T’s awkward turnaround at Castro Station — led to waves of delay in the whole Muni Metro system. It was all too reminiscent of the 1998 meltdown.

Fast-forwarding a few months to right now: although T service is still not as consistent as it should be, through operation of the K and T lines (essentially creating one really long line, the “KT,” running between Balboa Park and Sunnydale), along with a few other changes, has more-or-less helped to return the Market Street tunnel to a state of normalcy. But there are still issues to be ironed out. Meanwhile, Bayview district residents have protested, calling to dismantle the T and reinstate the 15-Third bus that formerly ran on the southern portion of the T’s route. Such an action would be an impossibility, tantamount to an admission that the $648 million spent on the rail line were wasted.

The rocky start to T-Third operation offers the obvious explanation for why Bayview residents were clamoring for the return of their old 15-Third bus. But on the north side of Market Street, between Polk and Van Ness, a memorial exhibit to the 15-Third takes a more poignant, personal approach:

The display is part of a series of public transit art exhibits put up by the San Francisco Arts Commission Public Art Program. The 15-Third exhibit, done in 2007 by Helena Keeffe, is centered around Vawanda, an employee of Muni for eighteen years, and driver on the 15 line:

The quotes scattered around the art piece are Vawanda’s, reflecting on her time with the 15-Third and its riders:

I will truly miss the 15 Third — for its excitement, adventure, laughter and roller coaster ride. I appreciated the diversity of the people and I learned a little something from all of them. Their uplifting spirits made work enjoyable.

Vawanda also speaks of both change and constancy along the route:

I’ve known this line for a long time. I rode the 15 as a kid with my grandmother when I was little. A lot of things on 3rd Street have changed but you still got Sam Jordan’s, Finley Mortuary, Kennedy Liquor, Golden Eagle Liquor and the Bayview Opera House. Those places have been around a long time. We used to get on at 3rd and Thomas to go to Market Street. That was in the late 50′s early 60′s. I never dreamed I would be driving this bus one day.

It seems that for Vawanda, her transit route was more than just a way to get from point A to point B; it was an integral part of daily life, both as a child and as an adult. Perhaps as a driver, this connection is deeper, but should it be much different for riders? Any manner of life experiences, both bad and good, can occur in transit, with the bus offering a sort of background stage for those events to play out. We riders may not think about the connection as explicitly as Vawanda did, but I think it’s there nonetheless.

The mixture between change and constancy that Vawanda alludes to will become an increasingly prevalent characteristic of the Bayview district in future years — indeed, of all the 3rd Street corridor neighborhoods. That the T-Third will bring in all manner of development to 3rd Street seems inevitable, helping to usher in a new era in which underutilized industrial parcels along 3rd Street transform into transit-oriented housing and more vibrant mixed use neighborhoods. A Bayview redevelopment agency has been set up to facilitate this process in a more systematic way. Given the city’s history of 1950′s redevelopment projects in the Western Addition, residents of the Bayview are perhaps justifiably worried about the word “redevelopment” now being attached to their neighborhood. We’ve learned a lot about planning since then, though, so I am not so much worried about the mistakes of the Western Addition being repeated in the Bayview. However, the 3rd Street neighborhoods are sure to change, and worries over the dreaded “G” word — gentrification, of course — will no doubt lead to many struggles over the next several years. In time, we will come to a better understanding of how the Bayview can evolve into a safer, more vibrant neighborhood that nonetheless does not turn its back on the past.

The future of the Bayview is a topic for another day. Of course, the retiring of the 15 bus cannot indicate any exact changes, only that change is bound to occur sooner or later. Hopefully, the potential of the 3rd Street corridor will be realized in a way that is at once respectful and visionary. For now, though, I’ll just be happy if the T runs remotely on time.