The Inner Sunset District
The big pointy part in red closest to the center of the city.
This area surrounding 9th and Juday is truly "the strip" for the inner Sunset. In this picture I wanted to show several layers that are central to the feeling of "place" for this area. You can't see it of course, but behind me as I took the picture, one block away, is the jewel of San Francisco, Golden Gate park. If you ever look on a map, we are very close to the 9th and Lincoln entrance to the park. In the picture itself, the (mostly) non-chain businesses are housed within low-rise buildings that don't make you feel hemmed in. Later, we will see the kind of housing that's just around the corner. Now, way up on the hill on the left you notice some large buildings, that is the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF). Two pictures from now we will climb the hill to be near UCSF and we will look down on these blocks. UCSF is a world-reknowned teaching hospital and sister to its equally famous UC system school across the bay, UC Berkeley. I have actually done computer contracts at UCSF, it has this atmosphere of enormous competence. Now, just as important to the psychology of the inner sunset, is the enormous green mountain next to it, Mount Sutro. That mount abuts UCSF, and also Twin Peaks, and is the site for the enormous 60-storey tripod red-and-white antenna that towers over San Francisco. Mount Sutro actually is a wonderful place for urban adventures, it has a nearly-unknown very short trail skirting a deep eucalyptus-filled gorge that I love to visit to impress friends or hold casual picnics. All of this in just one picture!
On Irving Street near 7th Avenue
(Looking to the SouthEast)
7th Avenue and Judah Street
(Looking West)
Here we are one block up from the picture above. Golden Gate Park is parallel to this street, two blocks to our right. The interesting thing about this picture is how the business strip slowly melds into a residential area. You can see things turning a bit less commercial at this intesection, though the hustle and bustle is still present two blocks from here at 9th and Judah, at the spot where you can see the closest streetcar. Those MUNI streetcars ride their rails from here over that hill and down the slope straight along Judah allllll the way to the beach, on 48th Avenue. The streetcar closest to us, with its lights on, is exactly at 9th and Judah and is about to make a left turn (towards our right).
On 6th Avenue Near Judah Street (and near UCSF)
(Looking South)
This gives you a sense of the neighborhood, not from the edge of Golden Gate Park looking upwards (like in the previous pictures), but standing atop the rising foothills of Mount Sutro, looking down on the neighborhood and on Golden Gate Park. What's good about this picture is you see the mix of housing available in this part of town; apartment buildings next to duplexes and single-family homes. Competition for apartments is fierce, because right behind me as I took this picture was UCSF, and many students, nurses, etc, would like to live in such a nice area half a block from work. At the bottom of the street, the tall treeline is my beloved Golden Gate Park.
On 7th Avenue near Lincoln Way (the block next to Golden Gate Park)
Looking Northwest
We have walked down the hill from the picture above and are now within a block of Golden Gate Park. This shows you how nice and massive the homes are near the park, a somewhat more upscale block, probably composed heavily of homeowners rather than renters as in one picture ago.
6th Avenue, not sure of the cross street
Looking South
Still in the somewhat more upscale part of the inner sunset, but we have moved further away from Golden Gate Park now. This is a bit of a closer look for a "you are there standing on the sidewalk" feeling.
On 7th Avenue near Judah
(Looking Southeast)
Now, this is interesting to me, because you get to see several layers. There's something about seeing cars and people walking that lends an air of 'place' and 'reality' to me. You have homes on the left and an apartment building on the right. Way back in the background, you see the skirts of Mount Sutro, on a very steep slope that can only accomodate one timid snaking street. The view from those apartments way up there is great though. If you follow the curve of the moutl leftward, you see that the hill continues upward until it peeks between the rooves of the two homes, giving you an idea how tall Mount Sutro is, about 1500 feet. The gentle reader will recall that Mount Sutro is the home of the 977-foot tripod antenna named Sutro Tower, which we will see in the next picture.
7th Avenue and Kirkham
(Looking Southeast)
One block south from the picture above, this gives a bit of a wider view of what's going on in this part of the Sunset. We have begun to leave the commercial strip a few blocks behind, and everything is strictly residential now. In the foreground, housing is clean and well-kempt. To a small-town boy like me, it is strange that the streets seem so desolate - where are the kids playing, the neighbors saying hello, and the young people flirting and socializing? Behind the homes you see a very unusual sight - very tall apartment buildings, around 15 stories. I believe these are unique in the Sunset, I have no idea how anybody got a permit to build such huge overpowering buildings in this small neighborhood. Behind them you see Mount Sutro, and by now you know that UCSF is just off camera range to our left, abutting Mount Sutro. If you look very carefully you will see two of the three antennae at the very top of 1,800-foot Sutro Tower.
7th Avenue and Kirkam
(Looking Southwest)
And now we turn our camera around, and we see how the inner Sunset fades and blends into the central Sunset. Gone are all the commercial influences, yet we still see the slightly higher density associated with the inner Sunset - three- and four-storey homes are not too rare, a great contrast with the decidedly two-story beach-town look of the Central and Outer Sunset. At the very peak of the neighborhood, to our left, we see the bare windswept hill topped by a stand of trees. That section of the Sunset is called "Golden Gate Heights", and the hill itself is known as Moraga Park. Beyond that hill is the rest of the Sunset, gently sloping down all the way to the Ocean. I highly recommend Moraga Park for a leisurely, lingering picnic there on a warm day. As a rare and special feature, I invite you now to walk with me to the top of Moraga Park, and look to the West . . .
