San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Ideas from Tokyo to save downtown
San Francisco is at a pivotal moment.
With foot traffic down 31% from pre-pandemic levels, and over 54,000 residents permanently gone, the need for a compelling new vision to revitalize our urban infrastructure is paramount — especially downtown.
I recently had the privilege of visiting Tokyo for the first time — and the city left me nothing short of starstruck with its urban design. Here are 10 ideas I saw that San Francisco can integrate into its city fabric to reinvigorate our ailing downtown.
Car-free streets
Walking through Tokyo, one of the first things I marveled at was the abundance of car-free streets. This widespread flexibility to walk unencumbered by traffic was inspiring.
Moreover, Tokyo’s walkability creates a thriving environment for small businesses and restaurants, as more foot traffic clearly leads to higher patronage. I didn’t see a single corridor where residents weren’t lining up for their favorite restaurant.
By prioritizing pedestrians, Tokyo also lowers air pollution. While San Francisco has about 460 cars per 1,000 people, Tokyo has 232. With this reduction in cars comes a commensurate reduction in traffic, congestion and pollution.
Double our sidewalk size
In the districts of Tokyo where cars are allowed, the sidewalks are massive; The pedestrian-to-car space ratio is easily 2:1.
The benefits of these larger sidewalks compound. More sidewalk space attracts more pedestrians. More pedestrians mean more foot traffic. And more foot traffic means more patronage for local businesses.
Large sidewalks also allow innovative use of space. Many in Tokyo have metal railings to protect pedestrians from cars. There are designated paths for both incoming and outgoing pedestrian traffic (you always walk on the left side in Tokyo). There’s more room for public toilets. And there are vending machines serving water, ramen or even ice cream.
With more sidewalk, there’s more room for people and the things that they need and enjoy.
Bikeable sidewalks
Tokyo’s widened sidewalks aren’t just for pedestrians, they accommodate bicycles as well — with separate designated lanes. Keeping bikes off the roadways allows for simpler, safer street designs, which could mean faster progress toward the Vision Zero goal of eliminating traffic fatalities here in San Francisco.
Cycling fatalities in Japan are around 2.3 per 100 million km cycled, vs 5.3 per 100 million km cycled in the U.S. Not having to share the roads with cars leads to less risk of traffic fatalities.
Urban canopies
Greenery is everywhere in Tokyo.
Wider sidewalks allow the city to more easily integrate trees and canopies as a form of beautification. They make the city more walkable during summer heat waves. Lest we forget, shade is good!
These trees also serve as carbon sinks. Considering that downtown San Francisco has the highest pollution and air quality rates in the city, more urban canopies can significantly help us meet our environmental goals.
Mixed-use districts
Part of the predicament of San Francisco’s downtown has been its over reliance on workers from a single industry — tech — to patronize bars and restaurants and keep its nightlife afloat. Tokyo by contrast has significantly invested in mixed-use districts where residential, commercial, and small businesses coexist harmoniously.
Exploring the corridors in the financial center of Shibuya (think Times Square in NYC) or the shopping center of Ginza (think FiDi in SF), one can find a mixture of housing, offices, businesses and cultural gems. In Ginza for instance, I could walk out of my hotel in the heart of downtown, stroll a mere 10 minutes, and discover a banana juice stand (aptly named Banana Juice) sandwiched between two skyscrapers and run by an elderly couple. It was also probably the best smoothie I have ever had.
When people can eat, work, and relax close to where they live, a city truly comes alive.
Markets between buildings
San Francisco is a small, dense city that some say is already too built out to allow new infrastructure.
Tokyo shows us how untrue that is. It is the city that leaves no stone unturned.
From food stalls in front of Tokyo’s oldest temple (Sensoji, completed in 645 AD), to fish markets and wagyu beef stands in Tsukiji, every possible inch of street space is a thriving urban corridor. And space, in this context, is both horizontal and vertical. Markets in Tokyo don’t just spread across blocks, they go up, too. Some buildings have 10 stories of restaurants.
More space for commerce means more opportunities for small businesses, often started by immigrant families, to flourish and thrive.
We could start in San Francisco by converting all of Market Street — from Embarcadero to Civic Center — into one giant night market, filled with food stalls, vendors and tourist memorabilia.
Markets beneath underpasses
A market underneath a highway? Sounds unpleasant, but it doesn’t have to be.
By far the most surprising market I discovered in Tokyo was underneath a busy underpass in Ginza. The walls were painted bright white with patches of exposed brick and modern sculptures. The shops ranged from casual yakitori bars to five-star omakase sushi restaurants. It was inspiring, but also somehow felt like a comfortable rest stop.
It makes total sense to better use these spaces. Underpasses largely sit vacant. Repurposing them as commercial corridors is straightforward.
Transit markets
Another striking feature of Tokyo’s urban infrastructure is that every train station doubles as a shopping mall, with ramen corridors, anime gift shops, food markets, and dessert shops. And that’s just on the lower levels. Upper levels often include hotels and cityscape viewing areas.
Such economic investment creates a symbiotic relationship between transit and local business. It’s easy to envision something similar for Embarcadero station. Given its relatively safe public environment, it could succeed where Powell Station and the Westfield Mall failed.
Easy-to-navigate public transit
Speaking of transit, it’s no mystery that Tokyo’s public transit infrastructure is unparalleled. But what also impressed me was its attention to detail of the user experience as well.
Each subway stop is numbered sequentially, making it extremely easy to plan routes and estimate time to destination. Each exit in the train station is numbered as well, making it even easier to navigate the station itself. The infrastructure is so optimized that Google recommendations can suggest specific train cars to board to make your transfers easier!
By implementing similar tweaks to our transit designs, we can transform the rider experience.
Rapid public transit
One key feature ensures Tokyo’s unparalleled urban infrastructure functions smoothly — reliable and punctual public transit.
Say you want to go from the city center to a park. In Tokyo, the journey from Tokyo Station to Shinjuku National Garden — a distance of about 5 miles — would take 13 minutes. By contrast, getting from the Ferry Building to Golden Gate Park in San Francisco takes nearly 30 minutes.
The difference is Tokyo’s investment in both infrastructure and staffing. With subway stops at nearly every block, trains arriving every 2-3 minutes, and a staff full of train operators to man them, you get a high frequency transit system with service that arrives on time, down to the second. Without this level of efficiency, a city spanning nearly 1,000 square miles could not work as well as it does.
To unlock the full potential of San Francisco, we need to do the same.
Staring down the prospect of an economic doom loop, we have a narrow window of time to ensure this city remains home to those of us who love it. We can do this by redefining our urban landscape and drawing inspiration from successful cities like Tokyo.