Streetlight strife ignited during redo of Van Ness
Responding to pressure from neighborhood groups and the Board of Supervisors, San Francisco officials have agreed to spend an extra $6.5 million to install 350 faux-historic streetlights on the redone Van Ness Avenue.
The streetlights, which will cost $18,500 each to make and install on the sidewalks, are intended to replicate Van Ness’ original trolley poles. Those poles were converted to streetlights, with signature teardrop fixtures, around the time the Golden Gate Bridge opened in 1937.
The idea behind the retro look is to add a bit of panache to the $315 million redo of Van Ness from Market to Lombard streets. It
helped sell the project to skeptical neighborhood groups that were concerned about everything from the loss of parking to the removal of trees from the median to make way for rapid bus lanes.
“Everybody wanted something that said San Francisco, not some suburban parkway lights,” said Darcy Brown, executive director of the civic improvement group San Francisco Beautiful.
But then a funny thing happened after the project was cleared for takeoff — the Municipal Transportation Agency, which is running the Van Ness redo, switched to modern lights.
“I only learned about it by chance when taking a walking tour of the project,” said Lynne Newhouse Segal, president of the Pacific Heights Residents Association.
MTA spokesman Paul Rose said the change was made at the suggestion of the Arts Commission and the Historic Preservation Commission — the thinking being that the modern design wouldn’t detract from the historic architecture along the route.
Segal and other neighborhood activists pressed MTA officials to bring back the streetlights, but got nowhere. So they took their case to the Board of Supervisors, which was more sympathetic.
“We got thousands of emails on this that expressed a desire to evoke the historic character of San Francisco, as we have done on other main streets like Market, Kearny and the Embarcadero,” said Supervisor Aaron Peskin.
The MTA Board of Directors got the message and approved the lights in August 2016 They’ll start going in next month.
“I understand the desire to honor our past and keep interesting old features,” said Cheryl Brinkman, who chairs the board.
But this is San Francisco, where nothing is ever really settled.
The Historic Preservation Commission wasn’t impressed by the streetlights — “they aren’t genuine replicas; they are more just old-timey-looking,” said panel President Andrew Wolfram.
The commission also concluded that the streetlights weren’t even good replicas of the original trolley poles — they’re taller and shaped differently than the originals. So it put the kibosh on installing them on one part of Van Ness.
That would be the genuine historic part — the stretch from Fell Street to Golden Gate Avenue, which includes City Hall, the Opera House and the War Memorial Building. The commission, which has the say-so over historic features on those blocks, concluded that the replicas didn’t meet federal standards for historic districts and opted for modern lights instead.
“They are clean, sleek and actually elegant-looking,” Wolfram said of the 21st century lights. “They don’t create a lot of visual clutter.”
The commissioners did agree, however, to allow four of the original light poles in the area that are in salvageable condition to be refurbished — but only to “serve as a monument” to the old streetscape.
And they won’t be turned on. The light for the block will come from the modern fixtures.
“It is ironic,” Wolfram said.
“It’s not just ironic, it’s ridiculous, ”said San Francisco Beautiful’s Brown.
MTA board chairwoman Brinkman said the blocks around City Hall were “a bit out of our control, and the compromise reached is probably the best anyone can hope for.”
“Preservation versus the Disneyland effect,” she said. “It’s a fine line to tread.”
Especially here in the land of Oz.