Descriptive After having spent a productive, informative, and fun day in San Francisco with Janice, we feel a lot much knowledgeable about the scope and vision of our project. We had the unique opportunity of engaging firsthand with our project site and various stakeholders who shared their input about and experience with access to Golden Gate Park. Here is a descriptive itinerary of our day:
2. Next, we walked through Hayes Valley to the office of Parks Alliance, where we met with Steve Schweigerdt, the Development Associate for Parks Alliance. He gave us a detailed overview of the work that his organization does and the structure of their programs and outreach. The Parks Alliance is the result of a union of two other organizations: the Parks Trust, which had a philanthropic focus, and the Neighborhood Parks Council, which was a parks advocacy group. Parks Alliance combines qualities of both of these to be a steward for both policy and parks operation. We heard about lots of the initiatives Parks Alliance is involved with, such as Street Parks, Park Partners, Hidden Garden Steps, community gardens, the Playground Initiative, Pavement to Parks, and Green Connections. While Parks Alliance’s focus is not necessarily on park access and circulation, it was very helpful to hear about what a powerful parks advocate had to say about the current state of SF parks, and the conversation inspired us to think about creative ways we could partner with Parks Alliance to improve the stretches of the park around the blighted Lincoln Way entranceways. 3. After grabbing lunch in Hayes Valley, we picked up our rental bikes at Patricia’s Green and began our bike tour through the Wiggle. It was surprisingly easy to follow the route because of the green “sharrows,” but some of the steep downhill portions of the ride and a few major intersections, such as Octavia and Market, were navigational challenges. While we rode, we noted our levels of comfort depending on the provision of bike lanes and the amount of surrounding traffic. The area from the Panhandle to Golden Gate Park was especially tricky to maneuver. Lucky we had Janice with us or we would have been completely confused by the route! This goes to show how biking in SF is hardly intuitive. On our ride we met up with Ramon Solis, a former intern with SFBC who is still involved in the organization in some capacities. He rode with us for a while and we got to hear about his experience as an intern as well as a lifelong resident of the Sunset District. He explained how the demographics of Sunset are majority Asian and working-class families, and how he think political activism and a sense of community are largely lacking from the neighborhood. This may be a challenge for us as we try to engage more community members and potentially interview people who live on or near Lincoln Avenue.
Interpretive It is safe to say that biking in San Francisco is a difficult task: in today’s tour we became well aware of the task. We also were able to experience firsthand the problem our project is looking to address, the entrance ways, especially on Lincoln Ave. Some of Alex Cain’s major points include: 1. The crosswalks leading up to many entrance ways on Lincoln Ave. are extremely dangerous and have proven so with multiple bike/car related accidents. ● This is a major issue that we must look to address, these crosswalks serve as a main port into the park and are not properly highlighted to promote the safety of bikers and pedestrians alike. 2. The landing strips of sidewalk that accompany these crosswalks, in a lot of places, do not exist, and where they do are extremely small. This holds true to bus stops on Lincoln Ave. as well. ● This is an important issue to address because the average speed of the cars that pass is roughly 40-50mph, residents need a safe place to gather before attempting to cross the street in either direction. Also, if there were a back up of people, as Alex mentioned, there is not a safe place for a lot of people to stand, thus meaning either people are having to stand in the road or rush through the NARROW entrance ways. 3. Overall car and pedestrian awareness of how to cross the street and what to look for. ● Alex informed us that many cases of accidents have occurred simply because the people crossing the double sided street are not aware of how to do so. There is an island in the middle of Lincoln Ave that serves as a median between the lanes of traffic, most people are not aware of the fact that they must stop in the island to make sure the cars coming in the opposite direction do in fact see them. ● Janice pointed out to us that even though the cars on the side from which pedestrians are crossing notice someone is trying to cross and stop, the cars on the other side headed in the opposite direction are not looking at the pedestrian side of the street. Inside of the park bicycling can also become very difficult, as there are places in which there are no bike lanes, no crosswalks, narrow sidewalks, etc. A primary example Janice highlighted to us was the MLK entrance way did not actually provide a crosswalk for pedestrians inside of the park, to use a crosswalk, it required us to walk down to Lincoln Ave. and cross there. ● There is an obvious “flow” issue for both car traffic and pedestrian traffic that must be addressed in the park to make it a safer place for everyone. Overall, as a group today we were able to determine that the issue we need to address foremost are the entrances and crosswalks that span across Lincoln Ave. The entrances and platforms before entering the park are simply too small and poorly advertised, and the crosswalks are far too dangerous with little signage for such a large street and port into the park. Applicative
Visiting San Francisco today left us well prepared to work on outreach and devising a survey for affiliates of Golden Gate Park and both pedestrian and bicyclist advocacy groups in order to continue gathering information for ameliorating park access. Having met with Supervisor Tang in City Hall, Steve Schweigerdt at the Parks Alliance office, and Alex Cain at the intersection of 34th and Lincoln, we have a reinforced sense of the wealth of resources available to us and the vested interest citizens of San Francisco have in finding creative and effective solutions to the hazardous park entrances. Our first order of business for the week to follow is to compile a thorough list of the variety of programs mentioned by Janice, Supervisor Tang, and Steve in order to create targeted survey questions for organizers and members willing and available to speak to us over the course of the next two weeks. At Supervisor Tang’s recommendation, we will reach out to Walk SF to better understand the pedestrian experience at the Park entrances. Steve mentioned to us that Park Alliance helps fund over 100 neighborhood improvement projects, many of whom will prove resourceful in better understanding the needs and desires of constituents, and converting those interests into potential plans to which each may successfully contribute. Janice was magically able to pull together an incredibly thorough excursion into City Hall and Park Alliance, as well as through the city and the park, over the span of only two to three days. Planning another visit in two weeks will allow us to meet other relevant parties, as well as revisit and spend more time in Golden Gate Park. We will create a survey for pedestrian, cyclist, and vehicle operating visitors of the park who have gone through a variety of park entrances. Janice will forward a survey specifically for SFBC members in time for our visit to the SFBC office, so that we may have a more comprehensive impression of their daily or weekly experience along the nine-mile bike route to and through the park. Our day today also gave us a better grasp of our long-term goals and final deliverable. We have a wealth of notes, photos, and video material for next week’s midterm presentation, and will be able to compile it into a Google Earth Tour to (literally!) map out our progress thus far. With his permission, making use of Alex Cain’s 34th & Lincoln Facebook page posts and videos will also help communicate the urgency of the need for entrance improvements. Our project will be predominantly two-sided: the first part will be on-the-ground interviews and the second part will be creative design solutions along Lincoln Avenue. This will culminate in a multi-media presentation that showcases both the evidence of our interviews along with our alternative plans shown through maps. We believe that this approach showcases the comprehensive approach we’ve taken to our work and best integrates our various community partners to explain our final design concepts. - Amy, Laetitia, Eric Comments are closed.
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