3/22/25, 8 a.m. SW 16th Street Plaza. Photo by Lydia Chávez
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I’m leaving the city for a bit so I took these photos on my way to catch BART for the airport. I expect others will submit some later photos, and I will add them at the end of the day. In doing this daily, we’re looking for progress and patterns that might be helpful in understanding how to change the dynamic of an intersection and corridor that has long been a high-crime area.
Why, for instance, are the sidestreets on the southside — with the exception of Capp Street — on the southside generally as clean as Rondel Place pictured below?
We’re also talking to experts to see what they have to say, neighbors, and city officials. We’ll also look more carefully at the research on urban dynamics. So, stay tuned. This isn’t just a 16th Street problem but a dynamic you can find at any number of intersections.
Accountability figured large in Mayor Daniel Lurie’s campaign for mayor and he seems anxious to have voters hold him to his word. (This week, he promised residents thing would change, and acknowledged that conditions were still “unacceptable.”)
3/22/25, 7:58 a.m. Caledonia. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25, 8 a.m. Julian Avenue, west side. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25 Julian Avenue, 8 a.m. east side. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25 Rondel Place looking south. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22//25 7:59 a.m. Wiese Street Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25, 8 a.m. NE 16th Street Plaza. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25, 8 a.m. SW 16th Street Plaza. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25, 8 a.m.SW 16th Street Plaza. Photo by Lydia Chávez3:22:25 Capp Street looking south. Photo by Lydia Chávez3/22/25 Capp Street, west side, looking south. Photo by Mark Rabine
Founder/Executive Editor. I’ve been a Mission resident since 1998 and a professor emeritus at Berkeley’s J-school since 2019. I got my start in newspapers at the Albuquerque Tribune in the city where I was born and raised. Like many local news outlets, The Tribune no longer exists. I left daily newspapers after working at The New York Times for the business, foreign and city desks. Lucky for all of us, it is still here.
As an old friend once pointed out, local has long been in my bones. My Master’s Project at Columbia, later published in New York Magazine, was on New York City’s experiment in community boards.
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Saturday was a clear sign that the “clearing of the plaza” is literally pushing everything just one block away. One hour later Mission between 16 and 15 was crowded. There was more than just vending occurring. And nothing was done. I write this not as a criticism of the people on the sidewalks. I write it simply to show the ineffectiveness of solving every social ill with “COPS!”
Until we address the root causes of poverty, which no politician seems to actually care about any longer, there is no solution to the issue of vending, homelessness, or substance use. It is incredibly obvious that people need housing, people need treatment, people need meals, people need someone to truly listen to them (not criminalize / medicalize them), people need healthcare, people need the services necessary to make living possible.
Lurie’s approach is the same as Browns is the same as Newsoms is the same as Lees is the same as Farrells is the same as Breeds (all the Mayors whose policies I’ve lived under). Cops are nothing new. What would be new is some real solutions to the structural inequity of our country, state, and city’s founding.
16th and Mission Playa has been out of control for quite some year’s. Cleaning up the 16th Mission Playa is long overdue but it is not a final solution, you clean one area and they just move to your door steps. You gotta look at some of the other surrounding cities and asked yourself; what are they doing to keep their cities clean and safe, one example is Fremont CA?
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Saturday was a clear sign that the “clearing of the plaza” is literally pushing everything just one block away. One hour later Mission between 16 and 15 was crowded. There was more than just vending occurring. And nothing was done. I write this not as a criticism of the people on the sidewalks. I write it simply to show the ineffectiveness of solving every social ill with “COPS!”
Until we address the root causes of poverty, which no politician seems to actually care about any longer, there is no solution to the issue of vending, homelessness, or substance use. It is incredibly obvious that people need housing, people need treatment, people need meals, people need someone to truly listen to them (not criminalize / medicalize them), people need healthcare, people need the services necessary to make living possible.
Lurie’s approach is the same as Browns is the same as Newsoms is the same as Lees is the same as Farrells is the same as Breeds (all the Mayors whose policies I’ve lived under). Cops are nothing new. What would be new is some real solutions to the structural inequity of our country, state, and city’s founding.
16th and Mission Playa has been out of control for quite some year’s. Cleaning up the 16th Mission Playa is long overdue but it is not a final solution, you clean one area and they just move to your door steps. You gotta look at some of the other surrounding cities and asked yourself; what are they doing to keep their cities clean and safe, one example is Fremont CA?
Just ran an quick errand to Casa Latina for some limes, and the bustling 16th/Mission intersection looked kinda normal for a Saturday midday.
16th & Mission plaza is an embarrassment to San Francisco.
Time for serious law enforcement procedures.