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Comment by johnny99k | Hacker News Reader

doubtful? Have you see the crime in SF? Walgreens has to have nearly everything locked up.

You are right though. It's not just the crime. It's because the current government isn't willing to prosecute criminals that are stealing from these businesses.

SF is starting to resemble Detroit, which has nearly no grocery stores in the city limits because of rampant crime.

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Whole Foods just broke ground in the Western Addition, Lucky opened a new store in the Bayview, and a whole new local grocery chain called Luke's just sprang into existence in the last year.

Flagship Whole Foods on market just shut down because of safety reasons.

https://abc7.com/amp/whole-foods-san-francisco-store-closing...

To the point argued by the OP in this comment thread, Flagship Whole Foods /claims/ they shut down because of safety reasons. It looks better for leadership if the reasons they have to shut down are outside of their control, rather than things they should have been reasonably able to predict and thus look bad on them, like that opening a high end grocery store in a largely office district during the middle of a pandemic when no one was there is going to the area lead to issues getting people there.

They opened a Whole Foods in a location that has been problematic for at least 50 years and then complain about all the crime in the area. Whatever…

This is the truth. Mid market has always been sketchy. Nobody lives or hangs out in downtown SF. Downtown is for the “bridge and tunnel” crowd. Like why would you ever put it here and not in one of the neighborhoods (ex Sunset, Richmond, Glen Park, Soma).

That being said the 5th street area losing Nordstrom is a big blow. Things there have certainly gotten worse recently as it has started more and more resemble Market street on the other side of Seventh.

A quick Google search seems to suggest there are plenty of grocery stores within San Francisco.

I said starting to resemble. I referenced a Walgreens, so obviously they still have stores.

If SF was starting to resemble a place without grocery stores, I would expect few grocery stores. Instead I found hundreds.

Downtown Detroit had large department stores too. They all closed. This was the beginning of the spiral downward. If things continue, SF will look like Detroit in 10 years.

> SF is starting to resemble Detroit

Ways you can tell that someone has never been to either San Francisco nor Detroit: a case in point.

heh. I lived in Detroit for 2 decades (I was born there) and still visit regularly. I also worked in SF for a long time as well.

Reply-guys being reply-guys.

I lived in Toledo for four years so visited Detroit often during that time, and I lived in the Bay Area for a few years as well. I just can’t see anyone saying SF is like Detroit without some huge distortions going on.

Where in the Bay Area do you currently live? We are talking about market street sf here, not sea cliff.

Lived, sorry, typo, for 2 years. I’m pretty familiar with market street. Heck, I worked right next to the Caltrain station for a year, that area isn’t the nicest.

"Right next to the Caltrain station" on 4th and King is way, way nicer than the problem parts of Market Street. There is no comparison.

No it’s not. Many of the people complaining about people pooping on the street happens in the area between the Caltrain station and the convention center, not market. It’s not like we didn’t walk to market often enough for lunch.

I’ve seen burned out neighborhoods in Detroit, places that look like war zones. SF just has a large number of homeless in comparison, most of whom get there via the greyhound bus station.

>Many of the people complaining about people pooping on the street happens in the area between the Caltrain station and the convention center, not market.

Your definition of "many" differs from that of the rest of us. I lived in that exact area for years. As I said, there is no comparison whatsoever between there and the problem parts of Market Street in terms of homeless (whether defecating or not) or other things, like public drug use. To claim otherwise is a blatant lie.

>I’ve seen burned out neighborhoods in Detroit, places that look like war zones.

I have only visited Detroit once, years ago, so cannot personally make a current comparison between the two. SF has not (yet) reached the point where (as I remember seeing) entire blocks are completely burned down and empty, but that's hardly a high standard to meet. The people here who are making the Detroit comparisons aren't saying otherwise; they are warning that we may see a similar civic collapse, in kind if not necessarily in scale.

>SF just has a large number of homeless in comparison, most of whom get there via the greyhound bus station.

Ah yes, the old claim that "[insert city here] gives bus tickets to their homeless to go to San Francisco". Maybe this happened in the past, but 87% of surveyed homeless have lived in SF for more than one year, and 35% for ten or more years. <https://sfstandard.com/2023/05/22/san-francisco-homeless-peo...>

They don’t have to give them bus tickets, tickets are cheap enough on their own, or open tickets are given easy enough. If you have ever ridden greyhound for a long distance journey, you’ll notice they pick up a bunch at each prison, and these people get off at SF, LA, Portland, or Seattle. No surprise, good weather, you won’t die if you live outside.

Self reporting surveys are useless as data. You can ask a guy doing heroin if he has ever done drugs and he’ll say no. It’s like, sure, what else are they going to say?

Elections are coming soon.

Can't prosecute the voters if you want to be reelected.

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