The last pharmacy in the Bayview will be reborn as an Autozone, if Autozone has anything to do with it
Autozone submitted a pre-application last month to open a location at the former Walgreens at 5300 3rd St.
Walgreens closed there in February 2025, along with eleven other Walgreens across the city. Since then, Bayview has not had a pharmacy.
Earl Shaddix, executive director of Economic Development on Third, a nonprofit that works to support businesses along the 3rd Street corridor, said the interest from Autozone came as a surprise, and, despite not being a pharmacy, it will help the corridor economically.
“Our 3rd Street businesses need foot traffic, plain and simple,” Shaddix wrote in his newsletter. “The likelihood of this space ever becoming a grocery or pharmacy is pretty slim.”
Residents interested in giving their input can go to the pre-application meeting on Feb. 11 at 7 p.m. via Zoom.
Nine new trees on the Third St Corridor
Nine new trees were planted Feb. 7; four on Newhall Avenue and Hudson Street by the bus stop, three on 3rd Street, and one in front of La Laguna Taqueria, and one at the Community Youth Center on 3rd Street.
Bayview has one of the smallest tree canopies in the city, so every tree helps.
“They came out really nice,” said a bus driver for the 15 who was getting ready for his route.
The trees were all planted about a block away from the Southeast Wastewater Treatment Plant — Bayview also handles about 80 percent of the city’s wastewater.
The trees were subsidized by Arcadis Inc., which renewed its $26.5 million contract with the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission in July to do construction management on the city’s biosolids digesters in Bayview.
Arcadis employees and Climate Action Now! volunteers did the planting.
Black history month ends with a very long bike ride
The Black History Month Parade & Block Party will be held at the Southeast Community Center on Valentines day. A few days later, on Feb. 17th the Bayview Mardi Gras Parade will set out at 11 a.m. from Gumbo Social.
Activities close out on Feb. 28 with a family-friendly bike ride starting at 9 a.m. at the Martin Luther King Jr. Fountain in Yerba Buena Gardens. The ride will follow the city’s eastern waterfront down to the Bayview, where a block party awaits at Smoke Soul Kitchen.
Stops along the route include the Museum of the African Diaspora and statues of baseball greats Willie Mays and Toni Stone.
Bring friends and expect company, including Shariff Wynn, Bayview resident and community engagement coordinator for the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition. The latter is co-hosting the ride with Livable Cities and the Mayor’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development.
Around 110 people have RSVPd, and Wynn is anticipating more. You don’t have to RSVP, she says, but please RSVP.
Demolition comes for Pier 92, (but not the grain towers)
Demolition of the abandoned buildings at Pier 92 at Islais Creek have begun. The steel elevators were demolished this week and cranes loom at the site ready for more work.
The Port will demolish nine ancillary buildings, as well as steel loading towers and timber wharf, to “improve safety and security of the site since these buildings are the main access points for trespassers,” according to a San Francisco Port staff memo from June 2025.
Also on site is an enormous mural painted on the side of two grain silos decommissioned in 1989 after the Loma Prieta earthquake. The Port filed for a demolition permit for the silos in 2024, but has no current plans to demolish the silos, according to a spokesperson for the Port. Documents also mention plans to use the land for unspecified future development opportunities.