Day one of the great POPO tour
Since I started working in downtown San Francisco, I’ve talked John into helping me with a project I’ve been idly imagining for years: visit every one of the sites on this list of “publicly owned, privately operated” spaces. I thought we’d start from the end of the list and work down, just because.
Today I took an exploratory look at 611 Folsom. It’s as bad as the pamphlet says. Windswept, scraggly trees spaced far apart; big pointless flat areas paved with pale reddish brick. Plenty of seating on the brick benches, at full-on lunchtime, because only a few people were depression-proof enough to hang around. I’ve seen smoking rooms at airports that looked friendlier.
Here’s John modeling the way the surrounding buildings loom over the site, making you think of Mordor, or Wall St. He’s struggling to keep up his cheer in the face of these enormous masses of gloom bearing down on him from behind.
One thing that could save it: with all that heavy built-in furniture, it might have made a convenient skateboarding location. Skaters bring a certain something to a neighborhood, and they’re fun to watch on your lunch break, like the break dancers and drummers who entertain in the subway. But the authorities have killed off that possibility by installing those nasty little steel blades all over every surface. They don’t just repel skaters, of course: they repel anybody who doesn’t like nasty little steel blades.
Upside: Mehfil Indian restaurant, just across Folsom street, has a quick, cheap and tasty to-go menu. I had the meatballs in yogurt gravy and a mango lassi. Most satisfying.
Next time: Marathon Plaza, aka (I think) 303 2nd St. Plaza.
Categorised as: Travels