A milestone of sorts was reached recently as part of the ongoing (and steadily advancing) Cesar Chavez Boulevard streetscape improvement project. Actually, a milestone was removed. Which is also kind of a milestone unto itself. The milestone of the removal of a milestone, that is. Or something.
Anyway, Neighbor Lynn wrote to say that the very old, very ugly freeway onramp directional sign that spanned Cesar Chavez eastbound near Hampshire Street was unceremoniously removed late last week, under the cover of darkness:
We have lived on Hampshire Street for twenty-five years. At about 2 a.m. on Aug. 9, workers took out the eyesore sign that bridged Cesar Chavez. My wife, Margo, shot these photos with her iPhone. It shows guys on ladders cutting the steel posts with acetylene torches. In the background is the giant crane that soon would grab the sign and lower to it the pavement.
… and good riddance.
PHOTOS: Neighbors Lynn and Margo
Bernalwood 
I would like to know what they are doing with the signage that will replace this.
Hoversigns! Retinal freeway sign projections!
I agree. Freeway signs, road signs, stop signs, direction signs are part of urban living. What will these little Bernal hobbit folks want next? no more signs at all?
ohh, THAT’S what’s different. Driving to work this morning felt weird, but I couldn’t figure out why!
oh I don’t know, for those of us who have lived in Bernal for over 10 years, it kind of reminded you that you had 3 lesser choices in your direction, rather than just stay home in Bernal..
love your “half-full” spirit!
yay! our little neighborhood is getting more and more beautiful….love it!
I’m not sure I really get what they’re doing with this project. I get that Cesar Chavez is ugly, but it is also a MAJOR thoroughfare. Making it pretty is not going to change that, and making it pretty at the expense of a lane on each side is only going to make it worse.
Looks pretty good to me. The addition of dedicated left-turn lanes should make up for the reduction to two lanes on each side since folks’ turning left effectively did the same thing in the past.
Everyone have a look here: http://sfdpw.org/modules/showdocument.aspx?documentid=1841
Maybe it will work out. My ire draws mainly from the irritating construction that’s been going on there for seemingly-forever. And also because as a part-time motorcyclist, that road drives like a damn moto-cross track.
Pretty was never the goal. Making the street safe and accessible for people who walk, bike, bus, or just plain live there was always the guiding principle for the changes now taking place. And the landscaping that will fill in the holes now being dug on the median and sidewalks will help with flood control (assuming it ever rains again!).
I guess I’d become so inured to its presence that I haven’t even noticed its absence.
Ah, I see. I can understand that. Cesar Chavez definitely feels like a damn highway or something, it’s part of why I don’t like driving on it, feel like I’m in LA for 1.5 miles or something.
Ah, well there you go.
Cesar Chavez — Army Street — WAS designed to be a highway. Sort of. It was created as we now know it in the late 1940s, and up until the mid 1980s there was a common fantasy that we would build another bridge to the East Bay someday, terminating around Third and Army where it hits the Bay. Army St. was thus designed and intended to be a major crosstown artery serving a bay crossing, and the Chavez/101 spaghetti bowl was engineered with this “future” in mind.
Chavez makes a lot more sense when you understand it really was designed to serve a high-volume, totally car-centric scenario. But that’s not how the future quite turned out. So now Cesar Chavez get a different vision of a different future. Which may or may not be the future we actually end up with.
Read all about the proposed Southern Crossing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Crossing_(California)
Here’s a map of what it would have looked like:
Interesting history lesson, thanks. So Cesar Chavez is less car-centric now? Cuz it still seems like a highway to me (for better or worse) and I just hope whatever they are doing isn’t going to turn it into more of a parking lot.
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I’ve lived near Precita for 28 years and didn’t notice the sign was gone! I agree with some other commenters…removing traffic lanes = traffic nightmare (some of us really do need to drive)…I’m so tired of all the construction (and the city is letting the contractor do a lousy job (talk about danger! few flagpeople, no pedestrian crosswalks, etc.).
Pingback: A Brief History of How Cesar Chavez/Army Street Became So Awful in the First Place | Bernalwood
Lived in SF all of my life, mainly Mission/Bernal. How bizarre – I could not place the sign being removed. I guess after awhile, some things just start blending into the landscape. Or maybe I just always knew what direction to go, therefore not needing a sign to look at?