The real estate watchers over at SocketSite caught two Mission development stories we missed in the smoky hubbub of last week. A long-abandoned property could get 150 below-market units and an operating furniture company could become 60 condos.
The plot of land at 1950 Mission Street near the corner of 16th and Mission has finally been transferred from the San Francisco Unified School District to the Mayor’s Office of Housing to be developed into affordable housing. As we reported earlier this year, the Board of Education, in December of 2013, approved the transfer of the property, which was once home to Phoenix Continuation High School. But the project has been stalled since then.
As SocketSite reports, the Board of Supervisors Budget and Finance Committee approved the transfer of the land (in exchange the SFUSD is getting $2.6 million as well as city-owned property in Hayes Valley). The full Board of Supervisors is expected to vote to finalize the transfer today. Here are the details of the proposed project on the site:
Upon the nearly one-acre Mission District parcel, an 85-foot-tall building with up to 150 below market rate apartments over 10,000 square feet of retail, community and commercial space on the ground floor, and an underground garage for 75 cars, is slated to rise. And the City is already working behind-the-scenes to fast-track the development.
While the Mayor’s Office has promised to fast-track this project, the city’s final acquisition of the property is just one step in a long process until those 150 units can finally house people.
Meanwhile, plans have been brewing at 19th and Bryant to demolish the existing home of Fitzgerald Furniture Company and put up a six-story building with 60 condos above 10,112 square-feet of ground-floor commercial space. The preliminary plans were submitted by Brand and Allen Architects, designers of San Francisco’s W Hotel. You can see those preliminary plans here. According to its website, the Fitzgerald Furniture Company has been in business since 1953.
Ah, our fearless Sam-John has given up on the Mission … it only took a few months 😉
‘Concentrate the bad actors’ sounds like totalitarian social engineering. Actually that strategy has a foul and long history. Still, I’m surprised you’re advocating for this. I thought that affordable housing in SF wasn’t possible and that anyone who can’t afford needs to move.
I’ve almost definitely been in the Mission longer than you, if you even live here at all, so “giving up” is not something that can be reasonably ascribed to me.
That said, the Mission is really several neighborhoods under the umbrella of a single name and, as such, it should surprise nobody that there are islands both of leafy affluence and success on the one hand, and abject misery and despair on the other. compare Liberty hill with 16th and Mission for instance. Or rather, try, because there is no comparison.
I never said that affordable housing could not be built. It can if the taxpayers are willing stump up enough in tax and subsidies. What I have said and continue to say is that such largesse and welfare cannot scale, so only a lucky few can get a subsidy.
Why can’t they put affordable housing in other areas of the city? It would be interesting to know which areas of the city have what percentage of affordable housing. Should Pacific heights, the Marina, Cow hollow, Nob Hill, etc.. have affordable housing? I think so. Putting a project next to another project doesn’t create the best atmosphere for success as many of the kids in these complexes have working parents. No one is home to watch over them. I don’t care how rich or poor you are, unsupervised teenagers cause trouble no matter what race, religion or creed. Spread out these project across the city vs. putting them all in one place.
Or one could take the opposite view i.e. that the Mission will always be a cesspit, but other neighborhoods are not. So why not concentrate the bad actors and elements in one place, so at least most of the city can be sane and safe?
I thought you liked the Mission? Now you think that it is a cesspit. You should really take time to sort out your thoughts before posting on everything everywhere always. You make me look considered. Congrats.