And, here is your Afternoon Report.
The city is installing a new stoplight at the dangerous intersection of 16th and Capp streets.
“It is extremely, extremely dangerous,” said Paula Tejeda, the owner of nearby Chile Lindo. “Cars are coming and they are distracted with their cell phones so they don’t see people.”
A man in an electric-powered wheelchair, going at least 5 miles per hour, buzzed through the intersection today as cars impatiently waited for him to finish crossing.
But maybe that’s the kind of speed that’s required to cross through the intersection as cars trying to make a green light on Mission Street seldom yield to pedestrians.
The Capp Street Crap blog noticed the new lights recently and reached out to the SFMTA about the streetlight.
“[The intersection] is on what the agency calls its ‘High Injury Network,’ a small fraction of streets that account for 60 percent of the city’s fatal and serious pedestrian injuries.”
The lights are expected to go live next year.
Food Co. Stories
Food Co., the discount grocery store on 15th and Shotwell streets, is well-known for its extreme bargains, but it is also a gold mine of characters, said the security guard Ashanti Payne.
An informal economy of window-washers and tamale vendors hang out at the parking lot in the afternoon. It can be kind of scary, like the time this reporter saw a Jeep trying to run over a man who was trying to write down his license plate. The Jeep driver was apparently trying to steal groceries.
Still, it is a very popular place and an interesting one, Payne said.
Just in the past few weeks she saw a woman wearing nothing but a jacket and boots, another woman who fell asleep in between the aisles. Then there’s the usual characters, like the man who goes in with a cat on his shoulder.
“I’ve seen a bird on a shoulder before, but a full-grown cat? I have never seen that before,” she said. “And the cat was still and quiet.”
This has been your Afternoon Report—a new series we’re trying out in which we offer a quickie post-meridian rundown of some minor developments in the always-happening streets of the Mission District. Got ideas or suggestions? Let us know what you think by sending an email to info@missionlocal.com.
I personally hate new stop signs, but that intersection is very dangerous so I welcome this particular one.
Putting stop lights at the “alley” intersections with the numbered streets sets an unfortunate precedent. There’s been one at 18th and Capp for a few years now, although personally I never saw the point. Worst case, put in a 4-way stop.
Or a 2-way stop, given that 16th Street has a million times more traffic than Capp Street, at least outside of hooker hours.
the point is hundreds of pedestrians cross that intersection a day. a 2 or 4 way stop would only make the heavy car traffic there more snarled. a light would actually regulate both the car traffic and the pedestrian traffic to flow more smoothly. As someone who both walks and drives in that neighborhood daily, the new stoplight is very welcome.