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October, 2008
By Chris Long
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Be Aware When the Rubber Hits the Road
You might spot one from time to time if you’re
really looking, but unfortunately many of us notice them after it’s too
late, when we hear that costly thud, followed, perhaps, by our favorite
series of swear words. As any San Francisco driver, skateboarder or
bicyclist knows, Bay Area roads suffer from an assortment of potholes,
defects, cracks and other dangers. A casual internet search suggests
that potholes are an increasingly hot issue in the City. A San
Francisco potholes Flickr.com group has 10 members; Yelp.com has an
entry for “Potholes on Divisadero Street;” and Youtube.com features a
video called “Potholes of San Francisco.”(more...)
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August 2008
By Kerry Fleisher |
Back Streets Businesses Want to Stay in Southeast San Francisco
A seamstress at Advanced Technical Sewing
(ATS) meticulously darns medical bags in a large, well-lit facility in
Bayview, just a T-Third Muni ride away from her front door in
Chinatown. Around the corner at Bode Gravel and Concrete, cement
trucks roll in and out, dispatching concrete to Mission Bay, Dogpatch,
and South-of-Market building sites. ATS and Bode are two of 10,000
Back Streets Businesses – small and medium-sized firms that provide
industrial products or services – that are located within San
Francisco, but rarely visit City Hall to vocalize their needs. (more...) |
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July 2008
By Deia de Brito |
City’s Worst Playgrounds Get Dream Makeovers Bounded by 16th, 17th, Bryant and Hampshire
streets, Franklin Square is located at the outer edges of the Mission
and Potrero Hill. Well-used by soccer teams from outside the
neighborhood, the park is rarely visited by nearby residents, save the
occasional dog walker. Once a shining example of Victorian-era design,
complete with an athletic field and meandering pathways, the 4.4 acre
park is dilapidated and dangerous; a magnet for the homeless, drug use
and prostitution... (more...)
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June 2008
By Deia de Brito
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Peaker Plants Still in Play
Intense politicking by
Environmental Defense Fund, Natural Resource Defense Council, and
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) has slowed the momentum
behind San Francisco Public Utility Commission’s (SFPUC) proposal to
site three combustion turbines (CT) in the Dogpatch neighborhood as a
way to retire Mirant Corporation’s 1960s-era Potrero Power Plant. Last
month Mayor Gavin Newsom asked the Board of Supervisors to delay voting
on the CTs to provide more time to consider alternative reliability
plans (more...)
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May 2008
By Deia de Brito |
Forty-Year Old Potrero Power Plant Continues to Pollute Southeast San Francisco; Need for Replacement Generation Questioned
Almost a decade ago the Potrero Power
Plant Citizen’s Task Force was created by the San Francisco Board of
Supervisors to examine Mirant Corporation’s proposal to construct a 540
megawatt (MW) generating station to replace the existing Potrero Power
Plant, San Francisco’s largest single pollution source. Had the
California Energy Commission approved the proposal, the new, larger
facility would have operated for at least a third of a century. Mirant
pitched the plant, in part, as a way of replacing the Hunters Point
Power Plant, which was ultimately shuttered two years ago in exchange
for the development of Pacific Gas and Electric Company’s multi-million
dollar Jefferson-Martin transmission line... (more...)
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April 2008 By Kerry Fleisher |
Developers Bid to Makeover Parking Lot Adjacent to AT&T Park:Port of San Francisco Reviews Proposals to Lease China Basin Seawall Lot 337
Four teams are competing to develop a
rough-hewn parking lot just south of AT&T Stadium, known as China
Basin Seawall Lot 337. The 16-acre lot is one of the nation’s largest
undeveloped urban parcels near the heart of a major city center. After
issuing a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) last fall, the Port of San
Francisco is currently reviewing draft development proposals. The
Port’s hand-selected Citizen Advisory Task Force will make its
recommendations early this month, after which the Port will short-list
the most qualified teams to submit their final proposals by the end of
April...(more...)
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April 2008
By Kerry Fleisher |
Jackson Park Attracts All Walks of Life
If you travel down 17th
Street it’s hard not to notice — and perhaps revel in —Jackson Park, a
refreshingly green patch of land in an otherwise industrial pocket of
Potrero Hill. The park is one of the City’s most popular open spaces,
according to Mike Cheetham, Recreation Director of Athletic Field
Reservations...(more...)
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April 2008
By Steven Moss
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Publisher's View: Democracy
While Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton
continue to wrestle for the Democratic Party presidential nomination,
San Francisco is in the middle of an internecine battle between three
candidates for the State Senate. Current State Senator Carole Migden
is running against Assemblyman Mark Leno and former Assemblyman Joe
Nation...(more...)
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March 2008
By Stacey Palevsky |
Health Centers Train Teens to Teach Their Peers About Safe Sex
When Joanna Scott was just 15 years-old she
took two buses to get to her health clinic of choice. Her trek began
in Bayview-Hunters Point, where she’d board the Number 44 bus. She’d
get off at Silver and Charter Oak avenues, transfer to the Number Nine,
and take that bus to her final location, New Generations Health Center,
located near Potrero Avenue and 18th Street... (more...)
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March 2008
By Kerry Fleisher
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Potrero Hill and Dogpatch Condominiums Attract Buyers
Young urban professionals, empty nesters
and families in the market for their first San Francisco home are often
torn between the quaintness of a Victorian and the efficiency of a new
condominium. Condominium developers in Potrero Hill are banking on a
historic-cum-modern approach that works both these angles, and the
strategy seems to be working... (more...)
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March 2008
By Heather World
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Lead Backpacks
Add backpacks, vinyl raincoats and
school-issued bookbags to the growing list of children’s products
contaminated with lead, a substance proven harmful to human health,
especially to the young... (more...)
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February, 2008
By Andrea de Brito |
The S.S. Independence: at Port on the Central Waterfront
For the last five years one of
only three remaining American-made cruise ships, the S.S. Independence,
has been laid-up at Pier 70. You can see the huge white ocean-liner if
you drive eastward from Potrero Hill on Mariposa or 18th streets...(more...)
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February, 2008 By Kerry Fleisher |
Steadily-Increasing Growth in the Central Valley Continues to Push-Out Farmers
Agricultural commissioners and city
planners from eight Central Valley counties are embarking on the
first-ever San Joaquin Valley Blueprint, a policy vision that’s
intended to identify ways to preserve California’s most fertile
farmland from the encroachment of residential subdivisions, strip
malls, and hobby ranches... (more)
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