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Cont
William H. Fain, Jr.
KNOWLEDGE 204 REGION 274
Appendix
Acknowledgments 326
Project Leaders 328
Johnson Fain Team 329
Project Sponsors 330
Project Data 332
Image Credits 335
Development of the 300-acre Mission Bay district of San Francisco — the largest addition in the city’s history — presented an opportunity to marshal the physical, social, political and market forces of urban growth all at once, in contrast to typical conditions that unfold incrementally over time. Originally a marshland and later the dump for debris from the 1906 earthquake and fire, Mission Bay was repeatedly planned for redevelopment four separate times over a twenty-year period, consistently failing to garner support and, in the process, hardening the surrounding communities into opposition of real estate development throughout the city. In a bold move, the site’s owners terminated the fourth plan because it lacked economic viability with its low densities and high costs. The new, fifth plan had to achieve greater densities and, critically, gain community support by being attentive to their concerns and unquestionably “San Francisco” in its character.
The master plan drew from historic research seeking the “DNA of the city” and found the “vara block” (vara being a Spanish unit of measure) used by surveyor Jean-Jacques Vioget in laying out the original twelve blocks of the city in 1839. The block dimensions are an efficient size for today’s development types and yield walkable streets. The plan also adopted the layout of San Francisco’s street grid, nearly always perpendicular to the Bayfront, enabling views of
MISSION BAY
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA
• AIA National, Honor Award for Regional and Urban Design
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PACIFIC OCEAN
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SAN FRANCISCO BAY
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connectedness, the plan proposes predominately commercial office uses while also including diverse types of residential development within the same zone. Active, pedestrian-serving uses are encouraged at ground and lower levels. At two key locations, the plan encourages businessserving hotels, and a focused retail street anchors the largely residential western area of the plan. The block structure provides practical dimensions for the development of major commercial buildings while providing convenient access for enhanced walkability as well as limited vehicular access. The plan incorporates three commuter rail stations currently under construction. In addition to requiring sustainable principles and emerging trends of nature-based practices, the architecture will be modern and highly variegated, reflecting optimism about global markets and commerce.
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and ultimately to one plan, selected and refined by additional workshops.
The resulting plan included more than 2,000 housing units, both market rate and affordable units recalling the mix that had existed before the fair. Citizens sought to restore the historic road system to reconnect to surrounding streets while dividing the large aggregated fair site into smaller scale neighborhood blocks. The plan recommended that the Convention Center, developed shortly after the fair in 1968, be removed to allow for the development of a large city-owned Central Park; a site for new Convention facilities for Riverwalk visitors is provided a short distance away. Since elected officials participated in the public workshops from the beginning, when the plan was presented to the City Council, there was less than fifteen minutes of discussion before a unanimous Council vote approved the plan.
Master Plan Features
1 Reinstatement of the historic street grid removed in the 1960s
2 Expand Convention Center to the east, remove outdated facility from the northwestern site area
3 Preservation and reuse of the remaining historic structures on the site through restoration of their historic street context
4 Location and character definition of three major parks and a greenway system to connect them
5 Height, setback, and use standards for new mixed-use development to reestablish street life and street character
6 Strategies for access and connectivity: parking, pedestrian and bike circulation, and connections with transit
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View of Highway 111 looking west towards Grove Gate Park
Cahuilla Interpretive Center and Well
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the “gown” in a traditional planning relationship. Ironically, the Main Street plan seeking to turn this about by establishing a connection between the two was proposed by the legacy firm of the planning group that developed the original plan. The Main Street plan, organized into four conceptual zones, integrates the Main Street development with the campus’s park-like background. Four zones provide transitional spaces and activities for the pedestrian: from the urban mixed-use Main Street to a series of landscaped semi-public courtyards to a set of academic buildings-in-the-park and finally to the bucolic central Aldrich Park itself. The Main Street creates a new sense of place through density and mix of uses, enclosed street edges, architectural scale, and massing relationships. The plan fulfills the daily needs of a burgeoning campus population and is easily accessible on foot or by bicycle.
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