Let me add some more illustrations of chaos:
- Around Market and 9th to 11th, a mostly residential and expensive main and small streets, the noise is not that of the homeless in the street (of which there are many). It's mostly the INSANE level of noise of firefighters and ambulances. Second is the noise of the oh-so-touristic tramways. By contrast in the Mission the problem is the noise of the homeless shouting at each other and playing music in the street - early, all day, late. Firefighters and ambulances are rather quiet and much less frequent.
- "safest it has ever been". WTF? It has been years since people bothered to report "non-violent crime" such as smashing car windows for kicks and giggles. (There is an online system where you can get a number if you really need one for your insurance, without inconveniencing too many people.) And my friends and I have stopped even reporting most violent crime. Because what's the point? My score is now at 4 physical assaults and uncounted (because who has even the time) verbal ones. A friend has a better score but also uncounted: "every time I leave the apartment".
- Meanwhile, some neighborhoods are perfectly civilized: Usually no homeless and no poop on the sidewalks (dog or human), peaceful, construction work is discreet. No police in sight (same as mostly anywhere). If these people mostly live in these neighborhoods, they don't have anything to complain about.
- "millions!!! [...] for extra police overtime". Not for hiring, mind you. Just for paying cops to stands around doing nothing more profitably. Which is a double edged thing anyway: It's dangerous when SF cops DO something. For all the "progressiveness" of the city, many minorities don't feel safe when the cops are around. Some events actively ask the participants to NOT call the cops if something happens - because it would only aggravate the situation for the people who do belong there.
- It can be hard to get the official service to pick up trash for you. But on the other hand you can just leave stuff on the sidewalk and most will disappear fast. That's convenient. /s
- "too much ideology. Not enough action." There is a lot of that. Not just from the government.
- Transit. Great, right? There is a decent density of public transit in San Francisco. That should be good, right? Yes and no: It's slow. It's very often not on time - sometimes missing entirely. It sometimes isn't safe. It often doesn't feel safe. It's often disgusting. And even the giant busses sometimes have a hard time navigating the potholes.
- "The city has an annual budget of fifteen billion dollars". Really? I didn't know that. Funny. The web says $6.4B in 2010, $14.6B in 2023-2024. Amazing. So much money for so little result.
- Street cleaning. SF uses "street cleaning" as a pretext for parking tickets largely. On some streets, the street sweeper zooms through at warp speed, in the middle of the street, after the ticket brigade came through, and then you can park again. Elsewhere, the sweeper assiduously scrubs this way and that again - beautiful.
So anyway, chaos. And good luck San Francisco!
What can fix it? Beats me. Not one thing certainly. Less red tape of course, less corruption of course (of every kind including not doing one's job or using one's job as a platform for ones' obsessions), less infighting no doubt wouldn't hurt, more voting probably (but this is California, running on a platform "for housing" means absolutely nothing in practice.)
Oh: The weather is great. Hard to beat really depending on your preferences.