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SPUR 2007 ANNUAL REPORT
PROGRAM UPDATES:
SPUR's Top Policy Goals for 2008
This article appears in the April 2008 issue of Urbanist
Community Planning
SPUR is committed to helping San Francisco grow and change while remaining true to the qualities that make this a beautiful and livable city.
While there has always been a strong representation among advocates for advancing equity and preservation goals, there are fewer among us who foreground environmental sustainability as a main objective of good planning. This means adding jobs and housing along the city’s major transit corridors; balancing the great need for exactions on new development with the realities of financial feasibility of infill development (so the City doesn’t end up repelling investment from the very places where it should be encouraged); and making the connection between adding density in San Francisco and reducing sprawl in the Central Valley.
The Eastern Neighborhoods
A large swath of San Francisco encompassing the South of Market area, the Mission District, Showplace Square, Potrero Hill and the Central Waterfront – the “Eastern Neighborhoods” are the focus of a major rezoning effort that has been ongoing for the past 10 years. Throughout 2007, SPUR provided input on all aspects of planning — land use, transportation, building heights, economic development, affordable housing, urban design and development fees. Our chief goal is for the rezoning effort to maximize the connection between new development and the city’s existing rail transit. With the help of Lydia Tan, chair of SPUR’s housing committee and Advisory Council Member Steve Vettel, we’ll continue to push for a stronger connection between transportation and land use in 2008.
Download SPUR’s memo on the Eastern Neighborhoods at www.spur.org/misc_docs/spuren13008.pdf.
Transit-oriented development for Fourth and King
Will San Francisco be bold enough to create a new walkable neighborhood where Caltrain meets the Central Subway? Last July, SPUR posed this question in a major “think-piece” on the rail yards at Fourth and King streets. With guidance from Board Members Chris Meany and Ellen Lou, we examined the possibility of building on the air rights over the rail yards and makes recommendations for the creation of a transit-first neighborhood.
Read SPUR’s think-piece on Fourth and King at www.spur.org/documents/070701_article_01.shtm.
The home stretch for the Market-Octavia Plan
The Market-Octavia Plan increases the density of housing and jobs along the Market Street corridor while protecting — in the words of the plan — the “fragile virtues” of the area’s fine-grained residential neighborhoods. In 2007, the plan went before the Planning Commission several times before advancing to the Land Use Committee at the Board of Supervisors. After some wrangling over fees in the plan area – some advocates wanted to increase development fees to twice what a recent study deemed financially feasible — we seem to have come to a compromise last month. Let’s hope that now – after more than eight years in the pipeline – this thoughtful and well-vetted plan will get the final go-ahead!
Check out the latest version of the Market-Octavia Plan at www.sfgov.org/site/planning_index.asp?id=66778.
SPUR study trip to Seattle
Our 2007 study trip to the Emerald City was a smashing success. Former San Franciscan Marshall Foster helped coordinate the trip, which included meetings with top level officials in planning, economic development, sustainable infrastructure and transportation, as well as visits to some of Seattle’s recent HOPE VI developments and the new waterfront sculpture park. We summarized our findings in September’s Urbanist and are looking forward to next month’s tour of Toronto.
Check out our 2007 study trip report “Learning from Seattle,” at www.spur.org/newsletters/0907Urbanist.pdf.
Saving the Waterfront
Sensitive and sensible development along the waterfront could vastly increase both open space and public access to the Bay, while contributing to the economic vitality of the city and producing a world-class waterfront. Thanks to SPUR Board Member Teresa Rea and Advisory Committee Chair Mike Wilmar, 2007 brought some major accomplishments in planning for a revitalization of the city’s waterfront. In August, we published “Hard Choices at the Port of San Francicso?” – a SPUR policy paper detailing the physical, regulatory, fiscal and transportation challenges the Port faces, while presenting a palette of possible solutions for public consideration.
Read the policy paper online at www.spur.org/documents/070801_article_01.shtm.
Planning and DBI reform
In March of 2004, SPUR and the San Francisco chapter of the American Institute of Architects collaborated on a project to help reform the Planning Department and the Department of Building Inspection. In 2007, SPUR and AIASF revisited these recommendations to determine what had been accomplished and what has yet to be done. The result, “Planning the City’s Future: An Updated Agenda for Change in the San Francisco Planning Department and Department of Building Inspection” is now in the hands of new Planning Director John Rahaim and new DBI Director Isam Hasenin. We look forward to working with both Rahaim and Hasenin to help insure that the Planning Department and DBI continue to become ever more effective agencies.
Review the recommendations of SPUR and the AIASF at www.spur.org/documents/083001_article_01.shtm.
Project review
Under the leadership of SPUR Board Member Kirby Sack and SPUR member Reuben Schwartz, our Project Review Committee continued to examine some of San Francisco’s most interesting and important projects, including the Neuroscience Institute at the California Pacific Medical Center’s Davies Campus; a mixed-use residential development at 2235 Third Street; and SummerHill Homes, another mixed-use project near San Francisco State University.
First Annual Piero N. Patri Fellowship in Urban Design
The Piero N. Patri Fellowship was established by Piero’s brother, Remo, his wife Johanna Patri, his brother Tito and his wife, Bobby Reich Patri in honor of Piero’s commitment to good planning and urban design. In 2007, the first fellowship was awarded to Mike Ernst a graduate student in City and Regional Planning at UC Berkeley. His excellent report, “Envisioning Warmwater Cove,” presents a strategy for changing what is known as “toxic tire beach" to an active public park along the city’s Blue Greenway.
Visit www.spur.org/patri to see the Warmwater Cove report and for more information on this year’s project.
Japantown Better Neighborhoods Plan
San Francisco’s Japantown — one of the oldest in the United States — is the focus of the newest Better Neighborhoods plan. In 2007, the Planning Department kicked off the Japantown planning process with a series of workshops. With the involvement of SPUR Board Member Sandy Mori and Advisory Council Member Caryl Ito, SPUR hosted a walking tour of Japantown and a recent forum discussion on the process to date. We look forward to seeing the draft plan move forward in 2008.
Learn more about Japantown’s history and future at www.sfgov.org/site/planning_index.asp?id=57149.
Privately owned public open spaces
San Francisco’s resident art collective Rebar (John Bela, Blaine Merker and Matthew Passmore) wowed us with their COMMONspace project – a detailed survey of the city’s “privately owned public open spaces” that, in turn, set up “paraperformances” to test the physical and behavioral norms of these important urban spaces. Working in cooperation with Rebar, SPUR Board Member George Williams and SPUR Member Eva Liebermann, our policy team launched a task force to develop recommendations for improving the design, management and programming of such open spaces in San Francisco.
Visit Rebar’s COMMONspace project at www.rebargroup.org/projects/commonspace/index2.html.
Mayor’s Open Space Task Force
SPUR teamed up with the Neighborhood Parks Council to facilitate a year-long Mayor’s Open Space Task Force. The purpose is to create a consensus vision and action plan for the future course of the city’s neighborhood parks and playgrounds. The task force will develop recommendations for improving open space policies; defining funding strategies for acquiring, developing, renovating and maintaining parkland; and increasing coordination among City agencies and community partners to enhance the quality of all recreational areas.
Find out more about the mayor’s open space task force at at www.openspacesf.org.
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