Not as bad as the conservative media makes it out to seem but still bad.
Had my drink knocked out of my hand by a couple of guys,had to buy boots because of the human feces, saw smashed in car windows daily.
Im super tolerant but that felt like alot.
Also, not saying it isn't bad, and not saying we shouldn't do something (anything) to make things better, but you probably walked down one of the worst stretches (depending on which part of market street you went down).
The smash-and-grab situation alone makes L.A.s homeless look like samaritans.
I think it's a direct result of a complete and utter lack of real estate development, but the fact of the matter is people shit in the street here, regularly. People shoot up heroin openly here. Needles littered on the streets here is normal. People smoke meth and crack, openly.
If you don't want to see it, you can avoid it with a car, but i bike and take transit.
The tenderloin is drug dealers and junkies. 16th and Mission is mentally ill people. Haight is crustypunks. Besides that, there are more normal things like people in tents in parks and under the highways.
I've seen things more like this in places on the west coast, but i've never seen the type of open and welcome drug dependency except in this region. I definitely am supportive of giving addicts a way to get help or even use in a healthy, non-threatening setting that is safe and separated from the rest of us going about our lives, but that's not what's happening.
I know that stuff happens everywhere, but it's so far out in the open in SF, you can't avoid it.
Part of it also has to do with the topology of the city. Homeless people don't want to live on hills, but rich people do, so that creates pools of homeless camps in flat areas.
Stopped in at City Lights, bought a couple books, went for lunch, and walked through North Beach to the pier. Walked along Embarcadero to the BART station there and had a great (albeit short) layover there. I saw a few people who appeared to be homeless. No more than I see in Toronto or Hamilton—but I can’t speak to what kind of measure that is anymore.
And the stench. Nothing like the glorious smell of ocean breezes and human excrement in the morning!
And to think the Embarcadero is relatively clean by SF standards. The Tenderloin is where it gets real fun.
The second time I asked one of the guys trying to sell me coke why that was happening, he said it was really the only reason white people walk there.
The whole thing was very different from the super-liberal picture of SF I had in my head.
I just find much of the rhetoric makes it sound like the city is overrun and in shambles and that wasn't my experience. Of course, if I lived in those concentrated locales I might feel that way.
- Market St.
- Embarcadero & Washington St. intersection
- King St. (esp. around the CalTrain station)
- Pretty much all the BART stations within SF city limits
Those are the areas I'm in pretty frequently, at least.
San Fran doesn't care how terrible their city looks to tourists nor care for its people like NYC does? I don't get it ... uber super tech rich living in the most expensive houses in the US with human feces outside on their pavements or around the corner.
Whatever San Fran is doing and methodology it's following it doesnt seem to be working out for itself!
The way I see it, fundamentally, San Francisco views the homeless as part of it's people, many other places do not.
I guess that's now considered the charm of San Francisco. Disgusting!
People often say the same kinds of things about Toronto but the place is hardly overrun.
I just thought it would be a valuable single data point from a visitor’s perspective. No assumptions, just an experience.