Namaste, Market Street.
It took a grim human toll, two decades of lobbying, and several shots of political will to get here, but the city’s downtown core is starting to call itself to order.
On January 29, Mayor London Breed, Supervisor Matt Haney, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Walk San Francisco and SF Municipal Transportation Agency cut a ribbon and heralded a new era for San Francisco’s main thoroughfare. The busiest two-mile stretch of Market Street still teems with Muni buses, commercial trucks, and commuters on foot, bike, and scooter. But the redirection of private cars, including Uber and Lyft vehicles, brings a new look, sound, and feel. It’s almost, dare I say, pleasant.
Incessantly honking horns? Gone. Same for the panicked voices of pedestrians and bicyclists trying to navigate clogged streets with low visibility. With space opened up, the half-million people who walk on Market Street every day can breathe a little easier, at least westbound from Steuart Street to Van Ness and eastbound from 10th to Main Street.
Market Street going carless is a $3.5 million down payment on a bigger vision to make the city’s major corridor safer and more people-friendly. The 15-year Better Market Street plan calls for built-out sidewalks, separated bikeways, and redesigned bus-loading islands to be fully accessible to people with disabilities, and more.
The area between Union Square and Civic Center is notoriously dangerous, but all of Market is on the high-injury network, the 13% of San Francisco streets that make up 75% of severe and fatal traffic crashes, according to Walk SF, the nonprofit advocacy group.
“This used to be a pipe dream and now it’s a reality,” Walk SF’s executive director Jodie Medeiros said of the new Market Street. “It’s been proven that it’s possible and now we want to see more of this.”
That’s not to say the new Market is flawless. Some snags need to be worked out, such as light timing — making sure the intersections where drivers cross Market stay clear when lights turn red.
“Lights are so not sexy, but they are a big part of pedestrian safety and the way that traffic flows,” Medeiros said.
Drivers who do turn onto or use Market Street despite the new rules face a fine of $238 and a point on their license.
Medeiros led her group’s monthly walk on January 30 along Market from Van Ness to Steuart Street to celebrate the historic change. About 30 members joined the trek, some carrying signs or wearing party hats to mark the occasion.
Susan Witka, age 69, was one of them. She came to San Francisco in 1975 and found work as a bike messenger. A member of Walk San Francisco, the SF Bicycle Coalition, and the SF Transit Riders, she’s watched in dismay as the city struggled to respond to a growing public safety crisis.
“Traffic violations don’t seem to be enforced. Coming here I almost got hit” in an intersection, she said, noting that a line of cars turning right had laid on the horn for the closest car to her to accelerate through the intersection — where she was crossing legally. “Cars behind this driver wanted her to plow through me, I suppose, because at this time of day ‘I want to get my kids to school, I want to get to work on time.’”
Witka, an Outer Richmond resident, was enthusiastic about the prospects for a full Market Street makeover. “We need to get San Francisco more civilized, traffic-wise,” she added. “This is a beginning.”
She’d like to see fewer sweeps of homeless people and more speeding tickets written. “Being homeless is not a crime. Speeding in a car is a crime.”
Witka chooses to ride her bike, walk or take transit around the city. She owns a 1988 Volvo that she says sits in her driveway except for the rare occasions that she needs to get out of town.
Phillip Davis, a resident of the Mission district, walked the two-mile car-free stretch with Kristina Pappas, his wife. The couple has been Walk SF members for four or five years now. “We just walk through San Francisco all the time and love the fact it’s becoming safer all the time,” Davis said.
When the walk was over and the group started dispersing around Steuart, he grinned, ready to put the newly decongested Market Street to the test. “We’re going to take the F [train] back to see if it’s faster, do our own experiment!”
For the next car-free zone, Medeiros has her sights set on John F. Kennedy Drive in Golden Gate Park, where cars often barrel through. In the Mission, on Valencia Street between 15th and 19th Streets, injury crashes between cars and bikes and cars and pedestrians have increased markedly, she said.
City agencies have employed less dramatic tactics to stem the tide of traffic violence as well. Daylighting, the act of painting curbs to prevent cars from parking near corners to improve visibility for pedestrians, has been an ongoing project. About 60 new daylit curbs were added in the last quarter of 2019, she said.
In the somewhat paradoxical race to slow things down and get as close as possible to Vision Zero, meaning zero deaths from traffic, New York was first with its recent ban on cars on heavily traveled 14th Street. Now it appears Los Angeles, which has been struggling to contain safety and environmental risks from cars, has downtown traffic-control envy.
While vendors hawked their wares from the safety of the large pavement landing at Steuart Street, a strolling couple stopped in the middle of Market to take a selfie on the yellow median strip, the length of the iconic street disappearing to the horizon behind them in the picture. Medeiros cringed with worry. It’s still not the sidewalk, people.
Kristen Gerencher is an award-winning journalist and an occupational therapist.
