Posted on 01/12/2020 9:59:32 AM PST by SeekAndFind
San Francisco is getting to be a hellhole and not just because crooks are having a field day, or a vast homeless army has prompted new tech 'innovations' in poop-map apps.
It's actually becoming a city with a hollowed out look, redolent of some place like Steubenville, Ohio or maybe Utica, New York, during the bad years, empty storefronts and missing young people. So much for the trope that leftwing cities, with their walkable boulevards full of food trucks, handmade crafts, knitting shops, bookstores, artisan cheese shops, gourmet restaurants, and cafes are more lively and liveable than rightwing places. For awhile, that did seem to be the story. But it's coming to an end. Sure, there's vast wealth. But despite California being in an economic boom, the place is starting to look like Venezuela.
The U.K. Guardian of all places has a haunting report:
It the beginning of this decade, one beloved block in San Francisco had a taqueria, a flower shop and a bookstore. Sparky’s diner, a favorite final hangout for night owls, queer teens and the blackout drunk, was open round the clock.
Today, this block of Church Street just south of Market has the kind of abandoned storefronts that are usually a shorthand for declining mill towns, not centers of the tech future. But all those closed shops are emblematic of today’s San Francisco, where even in upscale areas, the city’s economic boom can look surprisingly like an economic crisis.
What this represents is a strange, second-wave gentrification, in which an influx of well-heeled residents means not Blue Bottle coffee shops and Kinfolk-inspired interior design stores, but emptiness.
Nobody mentions that maybe people don't want to shop in some place where a drunk is puking in the doorway and the district attorney doesn't want to prosecute, so the pukes ...
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Heck, the Niners don’t even play there anymore.
Riddle me this — if as the article says, San Francisco is a city of empty storefronts and missing young people, why are homes and real estate still the most expensive in the USA?
I would expect that if there is a mass exodus, the price of real estate would drop.
Riddle me this if as the article says, San Francisco is a city of empty storefronts and missing young people, why are homes and real estate still the most expensive in the USA?
I would expect that if there is a mass exodus, the price of real estate would drop.
“the price of real estate would drop.”
Only after massive foreclosures. That’s coming.
I took a job and spent 3 months in Utica, NY in the fall of 1997 (the time of which she speaks). I went to the local shopping mall, Sangertown Square, and it was a ghost town. There were no young people from age 18-40. Everyone was less then 18 and much older than 40. There was nobody in the middle. That’s when I decided to leave town like everyone else had done.
It’s amazing that a liberal city like SF can produce two powerhouse teams, the Giants in baseball and the 49ers.
They keep telling us that nearly 300 New Yorkers leave the state each day, but the prices of homes never drop!
My only guess is these leavers are being replaced by new immigrants from overseas ( e.g. Chinese, Indians, Koreans, etc. ).
Wait till California demonicRATS repeal Prop 13 which is in their crosshairs this session. Property taxes will skyrocket which will knock out even more businesses.
The price of real estate that is not tied up in a 12 year lawsuit is rising because of scarcity. The preimum for legal problem free is rising. The number of property owners waiting on a set of permits to become another class of property is well documented.
The case of a SF laundromat owner who wants to develop the land his family has owned for 40+ years into mix use multilateral earthquake ready low rise is well documented. He has been fighting city hall for 20+ years about the same block.
Albany screws with the real estate marlet with its STAR program. Makes it easier for geezers, harder for young families to stay. Not a recipe for a healthy, growing state.
Maybe dems want everyone to leave california...Then they can clean up the poor,dump them elsewhere and have the golden state all to themselves...Only people left will be the slaves needed to work...Like Apartheid....Rich dems,poor slaves...
RE: Wait till California demonicRATS repeal Prop 13 which is in their crosshairs this session.
So, California has no more Howard Jarvis-like folks waiting in the wings?
I’m sure the Howard Jarvis Taxpayer Association will put up a fight but California has super-majorities in both chambers. We’ll see what happens. Of course, they’ve had a super-majority for a few years now so Prop 13 is always in danger of being repealed.
Back in the early 90’s, I had to go to SF regularly for work. It was a vibrant city, clean, relatively safe. Took the wife there for a long weekend visit, enjoyed it. However, the tour guide on that trip warned that things were headed downhill. Now, you can’t pay me to go back there.
Comments on the Guardian website claim the vacant space problem is exaggerated.
I haven’t been in SF for about ten years personally.
In my area, 60 miles north of DeBlasio city, I’m seeing a massive influx of people moving up from there. Its ‘cheap” compared to the city proper. The original people here are leaving the state as fast as they can or after retirement.
It has sped up within the last 3 years.
High ticket prices can pay for great players.
“San Francisco is getting to be a hellhole “
It’s ALWAYS has been a hellhole.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.