An outfit calling itself the San Francisco Bay Area Bench Collective lived up to its name this week: The group installed eight benches in and around the Mission over the weekend at bus stops from Bryant and 16th streets to Church and 30th streets.
Though two of the benches were quickly removed, users were appreciative.
“I have nerve damage, and I can’t stand for very long,” said Mauricio Guevara, sitting at 26th and Mission streets while he waited for the 14 bus. There are ordinarily no seats at the corner’s stop, which is marked only by a small sign. “Usually, I would just stand against the trash can. I rely on public transportation. I’m here every day.”
The San Francisco Bay Area Bench Collective is a grassroots group that builds and installs benches at bus stops across the Bay Area to “improve accessibility and comfort for all people — especially children, families, seniors, and people with disabilities.”
It hosts bench builds and avoids onerous city permitting by installing them illicitly where it feels they are needed.
Their efforts are rarely unwelcome. Of the 80 installations the group has placed in the East Bay over the past year and a half, only three were removed without explanation, the collective said in an email. Another bench was removed due to graffiti, and nowadays the collective regularly buffs out tags.
San Francisco is proving to be tougher. Only hours after their installation, two of the eight new benches, those placed along 30th Street, were removed. At 30th and Dolores streets, a local “didn’t want the bench near their house,” so Upper Noe neighbors removed it, the collective wrote on its website.
The group grew out of Safe Street Rebels, specifically the work of member Mingwei Samuel and housing activist co-collaborator Darrell Owens, according to Berkeleyside. The rebels are a decentralized group of transit activists focused on boosting transit and decreasing dependence on cars, and in San Francisco have put cones on Waymo robotaxis to stop them in their tracks and illicitly installed street signs on the Wiggle that were quickly removed.
The effort was inspired by the work of engineer and roller-skating enthusiast Chris Duderstadt, according to the collective’s website. The group uses a design developed by Duderstadt, a Sunset District local, who has solo-built and installed more than 220 benches across the city. While Duderstadt’s work has mostly been donated to local businesses, the bench collective is taking his initiative to public bus stops.
Unlike public benches, which can run thousands of dollars, not including maintenance, both Duderstadt and the bench collective deliver their benches free of charge.
The main reason it’s so expensive for the city to build benches is that the work must comply with prevailing wage requirements. If these folks don’t like that, they should lobby their legislators to change the Labor Code.
Some potential issues with these:
1. Blocking pedestrian pathways.
2. Blocking wheelchair ramps from vehicles.
3. If it breaks and causes injury, person could sue the City alleging it was implicitly public property.
4. Unhoused folks sleep on it.
5. No public process for stakeholders to weigh in.
6. Probably not code compliant (flammable, too high, etc.)
The idea that stakeholders need to weigh in on every bus stop bench strangles transit.
This attitude is also the reason why, instead of building homes, the city is tearing down the last-resort shantytowns it’s forced people to build for themselves.
I need to sit down sometimes because I have osteoarthritis and back pain. I hate that they took out all the benches. I appreciate the work of the Bench Collective.
Terrific!
Tied my dog up at one of these benches. Few moments later a lady with cane came up and started talking to me. She was extremely appreciative that her bus stop got a bench. TBH I didn’t even know there was a bus stop there without the bench.
I think this is a great idea. Unfortunately most of the benches at bus stops are populated by people doing drugs and nodding out. I don’t know how many times I’ve walked by a bus shelter and seen an elderly person standing up while someone is passed out on the seating. Please MTA, clear these shelters. Otherwise bravo to the bench fairies
Very fascinating read!