Strong Support For Condos Sans Parking At 7th And Bryant
February 10, 2015
Plans to demolish the single story office building on the southwest corner of 7th and Bryant have been submitted to Planning. And as proposed, a five-story building with 16 condos and parking for 16 bikes, and zero cars, would rise on the Showplace Square site.
In order to proceed, the owner of the 502 7th Street parcel will need to hold a pre-application meeting with the surrounding neighbors, such as the methadone clinic next door and San Francisco’s Hall of Justice across the street.
And in general, San Francisco’s Planning Department supports the plan for the parcel, “strongly” supporting its development with an absence of parking as proposed.
Comments from Plugged-In Readers
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Ummmm. Yuck.
Who wants to live next to a methadone clinic?
recovering addicts?
I would love to live next to the Method One acting clinic.
Plenty of people would live there… there are dozens of us!
7th and Bryant are major traffic arteries to/from Bay Bridge and 101 and although I am sure there is a bus line around there, the idea of living on that corner, next to a meth clinic and without a car, might appeal to some, but not many. Market will decide on this.
They only need to convince 16 households, not 400,000. Child’s play
parking there during court hours is unbelievably bad. This is stupid.
Why? The people who live there will likely not have a car and will walk. BEHOLD!
Assemble larger parcels and build larger. This is ridiculous. Good morning.
Hey, at least this is not the sort of location that might appeal to car-dependent southbound commuters, right? Nah, they all live in the Outer Richmond where parking is easy.
assuming you are being TIC. SOMA is probably the most popular neighborhood for south bound commuters.
yes, hence the sarcasm about building a car-free building in this location.
Why should we care?
I would agree if this was to be low cost housing for the poor but I know it isn’t.
Who’s going to build that? The magical housing fairy? We need 100,000 housing units. This is a great location to build as many units as we possibly can.
I lived on the other side of this building ( Langton St) for 2 years. The methadone clinic was a very minor inconvenience – the only time I noticed it was early in the early morning when the line formed and folks were standing around chatting / smoking while I was just waking up. Otherwise, it was a clean and respectful neighbor – no complaints. Honestly, the police building with all the sirens was the bigger problem.
I have friends who live on Langton Street right now – they say it’s not an issue.
i think the biggest issue is that they are only building 16 units on such a big lot.
Agreed. A waste of air. Our precious air.
The biggest waste is building 16 units without 16 parking spaces.
Ding ding ding.
Great. Encourage 16 more cars to live in the neighborhood. Great idea.
We need fewer cars, not more. Get a clue.
It’s a short walk to AirBnB, Zynga, Adobe. A modest bike ride to Twitter, Yelp, SalesForce, Google, 2nd street corridor. Any techie would be happy with those commutes.
Street noise is the real issue.
When the members of the planning committee, the mayor and his staff all demonstrate how they live without a car in the city – I will support this.
Why do you need those specific people to demonstrate this when there are already thousands of SF residents who can show how to live car free?
You’re cleverly distorting the facts. Yes, SOME live without a car because they cannot AFFORD a car.
Others live without a car by choice. Big difference.
He still has a point. Lots of people live in SF without a car.
Some people live without a house in Tahoe because they can’t afford one.
Others live without it by choice.
What’s your point?
I support parking on site with new construction, generally at the 1:1 ration because that is how people, for the most part, will live. When they buy here, or elsewhere, they will (mostly) have a car. Off street parking is desirable and a reality of need.
The people who cannot afford a car will, mostly likely, not be able to afford buying a unit.
futurist – you are living in the past.
Hey Futurist – Can you be more specific on what facts you think I’m distorting? I thought my statement was clear and true.
A 1:1/units: parking ratio has already become anachronistic. See the article in this morning’s Chron Business Section on car sharing.
Shame on you, ” Futurist”!
I can’t live without a car right now so I secured housing in a place with parking in a suburb. I had no car or parking earlier in life and might prefer this again when I’m old. You make it sound like a punishment.
or Communist. 🙂
Ludicrous. If there is an area of the city that support higher density, this is it. And this is what planning chooses to “strongly support”?
I wonder how many buyers know the Hall of Justice has to be rebuilt for seismic. The west wing will be demolished and the site will be under construction for years.
If the city is going to approve dense housing along Bryant, then they should widen the sidewalks.
FWIW, SoMa has the greatest split in car ownership rates between renters and home owners of any SF neighborhood. Only 8% of SoMa owner-occupied units are without a car (about average for SF), while 61% of renters don’t have a car. Many low income renters, but not many low income owners.
Commute mode for this census tract is:
40% car
29% transit
18% walk
14% work at home
10% bike
BTW, Census has a new interactive map of their commute to work data (namelink). It goes down to the census tract. It has data from 1990, 2000, and 2012.
thanks for providing the great stats again
Jake, Can you provide the link to access the data?
The SF neighborhood data that includes car ownership rates is a summary of US Census data published by SF Planning (so it is their boundaries of each neighborhood). The most recent version as a pdf.
The census commute to work data down to the census tract is at namelink. It is map in flash and you have to either zoom to your location or enter an address. The data is color coded but you can see the details when you hover over the spot on the map. Be careful when hovering over small spots like a census tract. I mixed a couple for this location. The correct mode split data is:
35% car
29% transit
18% walk
14% work at home
4% bike
They’re going to tear down that architectural wonder? Say it ain’t so, that’s exactly the kind of one story corner windowless office I’ve ben searching for.
There isn’t a whole lot of retail businesses in this neighborhood to support a good walkability score. Great if you can walk to work. Good as a starter type home until lifestyle choices dictate a move. Buyer can always keep the condo and rent it out down the road. No rent control.
You need to have lots of people in a neighborhood before you can support all the retail. Let’s get lots of housing built and you’ll see the demand for retail. If you build the storefronts first (and then prevent chain stores – god forbid), they will sit empty. 4 floors of housing over 1 floor of retail is not enough density for all that retail. Especially at SF’s retail rents. Thank all the NIMBYs for driving all sorts of rents UP (housing, retail and office space).
REI, Trader Joe’s, Bed, Bath & Beyond, Mar’s Bar! Potrero Whole Paycheck is walkable but not extremely close.
The City should require the developer to provide first floor garage space for 16 bicycle spaces, 16 motor scooter spaces, and 1 Car share space. You don’t need a full-time car if you live here.