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Comment by freyr | Hacker News Reader

Will my car still get broken into every few months? Will I still have to walk over needles and human waste on my walk home? Will toothpaste still be locked up? San Francisco has a long way to go before it’s an attractive place to live and work again

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This isn't an accurate description of most peoples' lives in San Fransisco.

It was an accurate description of mine having lived at two places on market (and east of VanNess) over a 4yr period.

You're right in that it's not "Most" in the sense that there's a lot more areas of SF, but if you work/life basically anywhere boxed in East of Van Ness, South of California St. , North of 16th street (Potrero Hill area) Then you're going to experience that daily. I'm a decent sized guy and I was physically assaulted twice in by homeless(mentally unstable) people.

I had enough of it, and left California.

I've lived in SF for over 6 years, in at least 10 different neighborhoods from fidi to Mission to lower pac heights. This is completely accurate in my experience.

In 30 years of being around SF, this is really only accurate of Tenderloin, Civic Center, SOMA, Market and Mission St, roughly 10% of SF. Almost every time someone complains about SF, they're describing their experience in SOMA or near BART.

I don't think so, and even if that were the case you've described the locations where a huge portion of SFs population lives.

I currently live in Haight, it's nearly just as bad as those you listed. I'm on Divisidero right now, there is poo everywhere and I can see needles in some gutters nearby.

The areas where there are only single family homes are fairly clean, but anywhere people actually go when they leave their homes is filthy.

Much more than 10% of SF by population -- those neighborhoods are where the most people live: https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/vtoqd7/oc_san...

  In 30 years of being around SF, this is really only accurate of Tenderloin,
  Civic Center, SOMA, Market and Mission St, roughly 10% of SF

Most of San Francisco has been pretty rough for most of its history. The Haight has struggled with being a destination for street kids for going on fifty years. Vis Valley? Probably the most infamous projects west of the Mississippi. Chinatown? That's pretty much always been tenement housing and the sort of grunge that you get with that many people essentially living on top of each other.

What about Richmond or Sunset?

Those are two very cherry picked examples. And I agree I'd probably have a totally different view of SF if I had lived there instead. But you're also talking like 30+ minutes commute to an office near Market street/Civic Center/SOMa

Fair, but people throughout the Bay Area- those living in South Bay for instance- deal with commutes of such lengths every day, if not longer. Plenty of people live in Oakland and the East Bay and commute to San Francisco. Richmond and Sunset seem to be a destination for the savvy who want S.F. amenities and manageable commutes at cheaper rents without living outside of the city. Not to even mention those who live in Portola, Excelsior, or even Daly City.

Also, Portrero Hill and Dogpatch are just east of the Mission. Dogpatch is (was) on the up and up before the pandemic.

For those taking ^^ advice, NB: but also to deal with not being protected from the crazy weather patterns by Twin Peaks. The weather west of twin peaks is quite a bit more chaotic (stronger wins, more fog) than elsewhere at least as I recall living in it.

like, half of the city is a 'cherry picked example'?

what about the marina. or noe valley? or corona heights?

i think tech people live/visit in soma/mission/market and then write off the entire city based on that--like the only place to live in 7th and minna and everything else isn't close enough to.... something....

I guess I basically think of stuff west of van ness to be like the "suburbs" of San Francisco. It's not nearly the same density as the core. Sure it's much more dense than like the suburbs of Austin, but also far far less going on besides little pockets like Divis or Cow Hollow .

This is very much accurate description of my part of Richmond (Geary@19th Avenue).

Those are getting bad too, now.

Maybe it's not accurate for someone who lives in Twin Peaks and never leaves their house, but anyone who goes to any part of the city that could be called "downtown" sees needles and human waste every single day, and is very likely to have their car broken into if they leave it overnight.

As an SF resident for over a decade, it is absolutely accurate. SF was not as much like this before, but over the past 15 years, it has become an absolute hive of scum and villainy. I am not joking about this at all, several times I have seen people get into physical altercations on the street with mentally deranged drug addicts. I've had my car broken into so many times that I've had to rent a garage space for $550/month. This used to be only characteristic of the Tenderloin and its surroundings, but it has spread far and wide. Well into SOMA, the mission district, and beyond.

As a Bay Area resident for 2+ decades, SF was very much like this before the Twitter boom brought tech into SF. SOMA, Mission etc were never areas where you could, 'leave your car' and not expect it to be broken into. I read your garage space comment and laughed, in '99 my friends in SF faced the same issues.

SOMA was mostly residential hotels before those were converted into nice apartments and the residents were kicked to the streets. Before the ballpark there was never really any reason for tech workers to go in there.

Mission was quite dangerous to walk around after night before it was deemed hip and thus gentrified.

The period around the 2010 era was the nicest SF has ever been since Mark Twain walked the sidewalks.

It’s 100% accurate for me having lived and worked in 3 neighborhoods over 7 years.

Do you actually live there? It seems as if a lot of people that do have a very different opinion from you, so I’m curious where yours comes from.

This is only because most people in San Francisco don't own cars. For those that do, it's quite accurate.

Is there a map of which surviving Walgreens/CVS have locked up toothpaste?

The scale of the problem is pretty bad when you have to specify "surviving" retail locations.

The scale of the problem is pretty bad when you have to resort to half truths.

https://sfist.com/2023/01/05/walgreens-ceo-says-maybe-we-cri...

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