Van Ness Avenue, long considered one of San Francisco’s most significant traffic arteries, has lost the esteem it once enjoyed among residents. Declining interest and disconnection from the community point to a confluence of issues that have left the street at a low point, with Supervisor Stephen Sherrill declaring that “Van Ness is in crisis.”
The thoroughfare, comparable to Broadway in New York and Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, serves as a crucial transportation corridor, supporting the daily life of the city. Urban designer Ben Grant from SITELab remarks, “What makes those kinds of streets work in other cities is a thing that SF doesn’t do very well — which is to say having large numbers of middle-income people living a dense urban lifestyle without a car.”
According to Grant, Van Ness is “underperforming,” lacking the sense of place that such a vital street should have. While new rapid bus routes have been introduced along Van Ness, construction for this initiative negatively impacted local businesses, already struggling due to the rise of online shopping and the effects of COVID-19. The Office of Economic and Workforce Development’s commercial real estate finder reveals a landscape of units for sale and lease along Van Ness and its neighboring blocks.
Furthermore, the area is primarily devoid of residential presence, with only a few clusters of new high-rises near Market Street and the Bay standing as exceptions. Sherrill advocates for increased flexibility in zoning to facilitate the influx of new businesses and housing to rejuvenate the corridor.
Historically, Van Ness Avenue was once a desirable location, filled with fine residences, churches, and institutions following the Gold Rush. In the 20th century, the avenue hosted the city’s premier auto showrooms, showcasing the grandeur of American industry and architectural style. However, many of these impressive buildings have now fallen into disrepair, either empty or underutilized.
The future of Van Ness is crucial to achieving San Francisco’s ambitious goal of adding over 82,000 new homes. City planners envision transforming Van Ness into a bustling urban corridor, home to some of the tallest residential buildings in the city, potentially providing the middle-income urban environment that San Francisco desperately needs.
However, the challenge lies in the fact that Van Ness is not a traditional neighborhood; it functions as a connector running through multiple neighborhoods, each with its own interests and concerns. Some residents fear that a denser and taller Van Ness will not serve their community’s best interests. The Van Ness Corridor Neighborhood Coalition, which includes stakeholders from Cathedral Hill, Russian Hill, and surrounding areas, expressed their concerns in a letter to planners, requesting lower height limits in the proposed city map.
Rich Hillis, a former SF Planning director, acknowledged the differing opinions regarding acceptable heights along Van Ness during discussions with neighbors. He emphasized that planners must accommodate increased housing capacity throughout the city. As a major transit corridor, Van Ness is ideally suited to shoulder a significant share of this growth and should, in theory, be an attractive place for residents to call home.
Historically, Van Ness Avenue was a prime residential corridor, characterized by “some of the grandest houses” before the 1906 earthquake and fire, according to SF historian Woody LaBounty. During this disaster, Van Ness’s wide lanes acted as a firebreak, protecting parts of the Pacific Heights neighborhood, while many homes along the avenue were lost.
In the wake of the earthquake, Van Ness transitioned into a commercial identity, becoming a proxy for downtown San Francisco. Many architectural masterpieces, such as the beaux arts style structures housing Cadillac’s West Coast headquarters, were established along this corridor, designed to impress passersby, whether they drove through or visited the area.
Although the street has served as a boundary between various districts, including police and political divisions, it has not functioned as a cohesive neighborhood. By the early 20th century, the southern end of Van Ness was a hub of transit lines, yet like many American cities, San Francisco later removed rail lines to prioritize cars in the transportation landscape. The end of rail service on Van Ness came in the 1950s, marking a shift in the street’s character.
Furthermore, Van Ness serves as a connector for Highway 101, becoming burdened with traffic, a legacy described as a “sacrificial street” by Tom Radulovich, senior policy fellow at the nonprofit Livable City, who referred to Van Ness as a “car sewer.” Although SF voters initially approved a new rail line for the street in 1989, the project faced decades of delays, ultimately resulting in a rapid bus system with dedicated lanes instead.
Merchants on Van Ness endured several years of disruption during the construction phase, which they argue severely impacted their businesses. Yet, recent reports from the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) highlight a noticeable improvement, as 86 percent of bus riders reported shorter commutes and increased reliability after the new bus line began operations in 2022. SFMTA also stated there’s potential to expand the busway’s service frequency and capacity significantly if needed.
If San Francisco aims to maintain Van Ness as merely a workhorse traffic corridor, the bus lanes represent a substantial step forward. However, converting it into a vibrant residential area with thousands of new residents will necessitate extensive development. The historic buildings that adorn the street may remain intact, but many less significant structures could be primed for redevelopment.
As the city updates its housing rules and maps, plans may soon authorize high-rise buildings along Van Ness, with some structures reaching heights of 650 feet (approximately 60 stories). Supervisor Danny Sauter contends this strategy aligns well with the city’s goal of concentrating housing growth along major corridors like Van Ness.
The city is set to hold hearings on this plan in the fall, with state regulators poised to penalize the city if new housing rules aren’t approved by the end of January. The Van Ness Corridor Neighborhood Coalition put forth requests to reduce maximum heights, particularly for blocks squeezed between Pacific Heights to the west and Russian Hill and Nob Hill to the east. They proposed capping heights on specific blocks at 100 feet instead of 250 feet, and adjusting maximum heights from 350 feet to 120 feet along another stretch.
In response to the coalition’s May letter, the city amended its proposed map, but many of the coalition’s requests went unheeded. Local preservationist and Victorian enthusiast Jim Warshell, representing the coalition, noted that they are not opposed to development on Van Ness but emphasized the need for a thorough discussion of the detailed planning.
The prospect of adding thousands of new residents to Van Ness presents both a challenge and an opportunity for revitalizing the area’s retail landscape. The commercial corridor has suffered losses, exacerbated by a changing retail environment and the pandemic’s impacts. According to Sauter, the once-thriving car showrooms have now rendered many spaces unmarketable.
Many modern businesses do not require the expansive spaces left behind by the auto industry. In response, Sauter and Sherrill spearheaded a series of regulatory changes aimed at Van Ness, including legalizing the division of larger commercial spaces into smaller areas and relaxing restrictions on chain stores. The opening of a new movie theater in an old Cadillac showroom marks a step toward revitalizing the retail environment.
To promote vibrant street-level activity, new residential developments must incorporate cafes, shops, and other amenities, according to Radulovich, who criticized many recent large apartment projects that fail to engage the street effectively. Merchants still operating on Van Ness face new worries regarding the potential for displacement, despite San Francisco’s strong tenant protections for residents that do not extend to commercial tenants. Planners have signaled their intent to address this gap as part of the upzoning strategy, but specifics remain elusive.
Currently, only legacy business protections exist, and of the hundreds registered in the city, merely four are situated along Van Ness. For the merchants who have persevered through recent challenges, the potential for new residents living nearby, and even above their commercial spaces, could mean a new customer base.
As the bus project is completed and ridership climbs, Van Ness may evolve into the kind of corridor where increased density is both welcomed and viable. The pressing question remains whether this transformation can be successfully realized.
image source from：thefrisc
