{"id":37731,"date":"2024-11-20T12:14:05","date_gmt":"2024-11-20T20:14:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=37731"},"modified":"2024-11-20T12:14:06","modified_gmt":"2024-11-20T20:14:06","slug":"the-beautiful-transit-friendly-great-highway-park-i-should-live-so-long","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2024\/11\/20\/the-beautiful-transit-friendly-great-highway-park-i-should-live-so-long\/","title":{"rendered":"The beautiful, transit-friendly Great Highway park: I should live so long"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

There’s no money for improvements or maintenance. What Prop. K got us is a closed road and maybe a few chairs.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By TIM REDMOND<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NOVEMBER 18, 2024 (48hills.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The supporters of Prop. K talked over and over during the campaign about a new \u201cpark\u201d at Ocean Beach. Some of the opponents worried that the fancy new waterfront park will just spur more development<\/a> along San Francisco\u2019s coast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

State Sen. Scott Wiener was among those who celebrated the new \u201cpark\u201d in a rally Saturday<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis has been a contentious issue, but I am confident that years from now, we will all look back and say, \u2018Why was this even controversial? \u2019\u201d state Sen. Scott Wiener said at the rally. \u201cPeople are going to love this park so much, so let\u2019s keep moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This looks lovely. There\u2019s no money to pay for it. Image via greathighwaypark.com<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe that\u2019s true, some day, \u201cyears from now,\u201d when San Francisco has vastly improved public transit on the West side, so nobody needs a car, and Donald Trump is long gone, and the nation and the state and the city have reduced economic inequality by taxing the rich to pay for things like nice new parks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh, and new housing near the beach is affordable to the working class, not just to rich people, because that new tax money has turned housing into a public good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I can\u2019t wait to take the new high-speed subway out to the new park (on those rare days when it\u2019s nice out, if the rising sea level hasn\u2019t turned the park into a swimming pool).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But for now \u2026 it\u2019s not happening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the campaign promises, there isn\u2019t going to be a fancy new park along Ocean Beach<\/strong>\u00a0any time in the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prop. K didn\u2019t include any funding for improvements of any sort, from infrastructure to road replacement. The city\u2019s maxed out its bond capacity, and as far as I can tell, there\u2019s no extra money in the Rec-Park bond fund, which can\u2019t be diverted for projects that the voters didn\u2019t approve, and there won\u2019t be another park bond for years to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With a massive budget deficit, incoming Mayor Daniel Lurie is not going to find the cash to pay for anything new at Ocean Beach, and Rec Park has and in the immediate future will continue to have nothing in its budget to fund operations and maintenance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I emailed Tamara Aperton, the Rec-Park media person, and asked where the money might come from for all these improvements. She didn\u2019t respond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So for now, it won\u2019t be a grand park, as supporters envisioned. It\u2019s going to be a strip of roadway that\u2019s closed to cars, with a few chairs, some public art, and a few other improvements paid for by private donors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nice place for kids to learn to ride a bike (except for the wind and fog, and the fact that a lot of them will probably drive there). Nice place for the bicyclists who ride through Golden Gate Park to add some fun to their ride.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But a lovely new waterfront park, with native plants and sculptured sand dunes and bathrooms and playgrounds, served by adequate public transit?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I should live so long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

48 Hills welcomes comments in the form of letters to the editor, which you can submit\u00a0here<\/a>. We also invite you to join the conversation on our\u00a0Facebook<\/a>,\u00a0Twitter<\/a>, and\u00a0Instagram<\/a>.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tim Redmond<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tim Redmond has been a political and investigative reporter in San Francisco for more than 30 years. He spent much of that time as executive editor of the Bay Guardian. He is the founder of 48hills.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There’s no money for improvements or maintenance. What Prop. K got us is a closed road and maybe a few chairs. By TIM REDMOND NOVEMBER 18, 2024 (48hills.org) The supporters of Prop. K talked over and over during the campaign about a new \u201cpark\u201d at Ocean Beach. Some of the… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37731"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37731"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37731\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37733,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37731\/revisions\/37733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}