Good morning Mission! It’s 7 a.m., 46°, partly cloudy and headed to 52° — chilly but no rain in the forecast — and less windy than yesterday. Details for the next 10 days are here. Fingers crossed.
Be sure to take advantage of a nicer day with a Bayview Hill wildflower field trip hosted by the SF Rec and Park Department from 10 a.m. to noon. Meet at the end of Key Avenue, two blocks east of Third Street, very near the T streetcar line’s LeConte station. Heavy rain postpones to March 25.
SFRPD also notes that the Helen Diller playground at Dolores Park is set to open at the end of the month. How does one get their name on a playground (plus a hospital, a university endowment and more), you might ask? Philanthropy. The Mercer Fund gave $1.5 million to SFRPD in Diller’s name.
Meanwhile, a new neighborhood blog is in town, right down the street from us: Portola Planet. Here’s a bit from Simon Thorpe, Portola Planet’s editor:
“The Portola (pronounced PORE-toe-luh) is one of San Francisco’s lesser known neighborhoods. It’s situated between Excelsior/McLaren Park and Bayview. Relatively few San Franciscans know about it, let alone visit it. The adventurous who do are rewarded with a cool variety of eateries, markets and bakeries. Established in 1869, it was rural and sparsely populated until just after the 1906 earthquake, when a place away from the tall buildings probably didn’t look so bad. In the 1920s it became known as the garden district when it became home to as many as 19 nurseries. This was because of the uncharacteristically sunny weather for San Francisco which is drawing many new residents to the area today. The modern Portola is a place of change with many local programs creating new parks, upgrading existing ones, new pop-up art galleries and events taking place. Keep an eye out, the Portola is to be one of the new buzzes of San Francisco over the coming years.”
Lovely.
