Pavement to Parks

There's a bend in the road where San Jose Avenue becomes Guerrero Street that's been the site of numerous collisions between speeding cars and pedestrians, bicyclists, buildings, parked cars, et cetera. A while ago, this part of San Jose was closed off to cars and converted to a temporary park.



Twenty-five percent of San Francisco land is paved road and sidewalk, and many of the roads are excessively wide, resulting in wasted space.

"San Francisco’s new 'Pavement to Parks' projects seek to temporarily reclaim these unused swathes and quickly and inexpensively turn them into new public plazas and parks. During the temporary closure, the success of these plazas will be evaluated to understand what adjustments need to be made in the short term, and ultimately, whether the temporary closure should be a long term community investment."

The idea came from New York City where apparently they've had success making Broadway more people-friendly.

I've found this parklet kind of ugly when when I'm, um, speeding by, but it's grown on me. And it's rather nice inside.





It's surprisingly peaceful inside even with the traffic whooshing by.



Logs from trees felled in Golden Gate Park line the side of the road and form the sides of raised beds.





Giant, shiny cans of bamboo made from recycled ducts should be visible to drivers even at some distance.







They used every part of the tree





And the soil was made locally too. The plants are all the usual suspects.





The median on this part of San Jose and Guerrero has been extensively planted in a greening project that began in 2005.











It was very foggy this morning when I was running errands.





This is the hardware store I'm always walking to.