Talk:San Francisco/Archive 5

Diversity

In the opening section of the article, the third paragraph reads: San Francisco is a popular international tourist destination renowned for its steep rolling hills, an eclectic mix of Victorian and modern architecture, and a cosmopolitan population that is highly diverse both ethnically and in sexual orientation.

I would like to see "both ethnically and in sexual orientation" removed. The statement creates a logical fallacy, being that ethnically and in sexual orientation are not the only ways in which a population can be diverse. The point of diversity can be more fully elaborated in the demographics and culture sections.

One66667 (talk) 18:06, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

San Francisco expansion

I feel like if san francisco really wants to become a great city it despertly needs to expand its borders. Los angeles has almost 500 square miles as well as new york city, i mean even san jose is 127 sqaure miles and oakland as well is larger then san fran. san fran stans at a good 49 square miles. Thats tiny. How would, or how could san francisco expand its city and county?????????

-- Part of the charm of San Francisco is that it's small and dense. Entertainment, big business, hippies, gay districts, and every damn thing all in 7x7 square miles. I think it'll grow vertically, but I'd hate to see it become the next LA. Oh, and it already is a great city.

--Agreed, it's already a great city but I don't really understand what is being suggested. It's surrounded by water on three sides and there's another city to the south. Where would it expand? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.144.167.194 (talk) 17:16, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

It wouldn't expand... manhattanization.... look into it. In fact, I heard the Bay Area is running out of places to develop because its landlocked by mountains and it's a breeding ground for anti-developers... Anyone can feel free to refute this considering I have no sources... —Preceding unsigned comment added by JustinKwood719 (talk • contribs) 18:11, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

It's always been a great city due to it's size. This forces builders to move vertically, which is why you have buildings such as the TransAmerica. Money will always flow into the city due to its stock exchange and location to Silicon Valley. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Slapshot24 (talk • contribs) 16:13, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

In the late 19th century, San Francisco tried to incorporate Oakland into its jurisdiction (as a borough), but Oakland voters told The City "no way." After the 1906 earthquake, the whole idea was forgotten. (Source: Imperial San Francisco, Gray Brechin, 1999). And given the current political conditions, I doubt that idea will come back anytime soon. The trend is to move away from centralization. In Southern California, San Fernando and Hollywood are constantly trying to leave L.A. and become their own cities.24.69.170.138 (talk) 19:45, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Suggestions for References/Further Reading

I'd like to add a new section to the article recommending good books to read that cover different aspects of San Francisco. If you have personal experience with any particularly good volumes, please nominate them here. Also, if you agree or disagree with any nominations, please add a comment so we can work towards consensus. Thanks!

Here are a few suggestions to start off:

• Lotchin, Roger W. (1997). San Francisco, 1846-1856: From Hamlet to City. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0252066316.
• Asbury, Hubert (1989). The Barbary Coast: An Informal History of the San Francisco Underworld. Dorset Press. ISBN 0880294280.
• Bronson, William (2006). The Earth Shook, the Sky Burned. Chronicle Books. ISBN 0811850471.
• Wiley, Peter Booth (2000). National Trust Guide San Francisco. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN 0-471-19120-5.
• Hansen, Gladys C. (1980). San Francisco Almanac: Everything you want to know about the city. Presidio Press. ISBN 0891410929. (Already listed as a reference)
• Ferlinghetti, Lawrence (1980). Literary San Francisco: A pictorial history from its beginnings to the present day. Harper & Row. ISBN 0062503251.
• Davidson, Michael (1991). The San Francisco Renaissance: Poetics and Community at Mid-Century (Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 052142304X.
• Dillon, Richard H. (1998). High Steel: Building the Bridges Across San Francisco Bay. Celestial Arts (Reissue edition). ISBN 0880294280.
• Cassady, Stephen (1987). Spanning the Gate. Square Books. ISBN 0916290360.

---

A couple comments

• Please keep dates wikified as per WP:MOSDATE
• Let's only add wikilinks to articles that exist.

--DaveOinSF 18:43, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

• A question? Is this homosexual info really needed, the facts have no releavence to me... --MacDude415 06:46, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Why not? The section is called Demographics and the gay population of San Francisco is legitimate demographic information.--DaveOinSF 22:30, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Why dont other cities on wikipedia have homosexual inofrmation then?Like how come london, new york city, or rome have there homosexual populations then???? I mean are we keeping track of how many people like it in the ass these dayz or what???????? for reals, that info seems unrevalent!!!!

There are plenty of other cities on Wikipedia that have the homosexual demographics on their article....San Francisco is well known for having a large and vocal gay population, it makes more sense to include the statistics than to exclude them. Your point is nonsense.

I totally agree. Homosexuality is VERY prominent in the San Francisco area. and just because something is "unrevalent" to a homophobic person like you, does not mean it is "unrevalent" to the rest of us. and cmon dude. your login name screams San Francisco, I can't seriously fathom why you would say such a thing and if so, why do you live here then? JustinKwood719 18:06, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

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METRO AREA OF SAN FRANCISCO

some one needs to change the metro population figure. It says there are only 4 million people in the san francisco metropolitan area. I thought the bay area had cloes to 7 million people???????

The San Francisco Combined Statistical Area does have over 7 million. That includes the larger city of San Jose (so then couldn't one call it the San Jose metro area?) as well as Oakland, Napa, Sonoma, Santa Cruz, et al. 75.209.184.32 04:24, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

See United States metropolitan area. The Census Bureau currently uses San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont as the Metropolitan Statistical Area, with San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara as a separate MSA. -- Sfmammamia 18:26, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

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POPULATION DENSITY

The article claims that SF is the second densest city in the U.S., and that claim's footnote does not cite a source, but instead names NYC as #1. While this is quite believable, I don't know if this (yet) merits the status of fact. Source? Thoughts? 75.209.184.32 04:24, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Chart and note referenced at footnote #6 is the source. -- Sfmammamia 18:25, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I believe we should remove this statement. The census data shows that a number of other inner urban governmental areas ("Cities", as Americans call them, though the usage isn't really internationally consistent) have higher densities -- Sommerville in the Boston metropolis, for instance Huntington Park in the LA metropolis. So the statement is kind of meaningless, and will confuse non-U.S. readers. pde 05:03, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

I think your last edit works. Really, the whole point of that sentence is to indicate that San Francisco is extremely dense, although with far fewer high-rises, not as dense as New York. Over-qualifying it just makes it confusing. --Loonymonkey 17:44, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Government section.

There are attempts to expand the Government section beyond the current scope where it simply describes the structure of city and county government (mayor's office, supervisors, etc) and the National and Foreign government offices located here. Adding specific policies and actions by the mayor or supervisors would greatly expand this section (and let's face it, lead to long and drawn out POV edit wars over controversial subjects, of which there are many).

I have removed a sentence about "Sanctuary City" policies pending discussion. I feel it is simply a policy (and a controversial one at that) and is irrelevent to a description of how the governement is made up and functions.

Comments? --Loonymonkey 15:14, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Spanish IPA in lead

I have deleted the insertion of the Spanish IPA in the lead. I see no need for it in an article about a city whose name is already Spanish. Citing the population of Spanish speakers in the city as a reason makes little sense to me as well, as there are similar cities with Spanish names with much higher percentages of Spanish speakers whose articles in English Wikipedia do not have this feature. I see it as clutter. This may be appropriate in Spanish Wikipedia, but I don't think that "translating" the pronunciation of a city name in a single-language Wikipedia article is appropriate or even that helpful. Have I misunderstood the purpose of IPA? Other thoughts? --Sfmammamia 21:21, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

If the name is in Spanish as you say, then shouldn't the pronunciation be in spanish?Cholga^talK! 21:32, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

I support the removal. I just don't see the relevance. -Chunky Rice 21:25, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

See Tucson, Arizona, also, regardless if it's Spanish, many articles on English language names with various pronunciations list 2 or 3 pronunciations of the name. San Francisco is in English actually, its spelled identically, but spoken differantly. It's helpful for people to know the original native spanish pronunciation. As for clutter look at the article of any world leader, or any country, they have plenty of things between the bolded article title in the opening parapgraph and the begining of the actual sentance. This of course could be ameliorated, some articles place the IPA in the infobox if there is one, if this is a layout issue then surely we can work it out. Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. Maybe it could be formatted better, just having it say (IPA s----f-----, s-----f-aaaaaa)?Cholga^talK! 21:31, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

also you may want to consider that almost everything in San Francisco is written in English, Spanish, and Chinese and many things are also in Tagalog and Russian. But the first three are de facto official languages of the city. Countries or cities with several official languages list the transliterations or IPA's of each language in their respective articles, in every language version of said articles.Cholga^talK! 21:35, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

as for other cities which don't have IPA in spanish and have more Spanish speakers thats really a non sequitor, as many cities don't even have em in English, but please point them out. I'd help.Cholga^talK! 21:37, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Moving multiple IPA pronunciations to an infobox would be an acceptable compromise to me. --Sfmammamia 21:44, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Great! you sure I can't sway you to keep it in the paragrapgh at the begining—or somewhere else in opening paragrapgh?Cholga^talK! 21:53, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Presidential Politics table....

In adddition to some minor vandalism which may have been a mistake (replacing the image of San Francisco the city with Saint Francis the person, etc.) an anonymous user has created a table of of presidential election results going back to 1960. This seems completely unnecessary and serves only to bloat the article. If there are no objections, I'm going to revert it. --Loonymonkey 15:50, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

I would add that "Politics of San Francisco" could make an excellent daughter page. Politics are covered in the Culture of San Francisco article, but as politics play such a large part in the city and its image, a seperate article may be warranted. --Loonymonkey 16:09, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Totally agree. San Francisco politics are already mentioned in this article in the last paragraph of the culture section, which I think is a perfectly adequate treatment of the subject in the main article. The addition was redundant and unnecesary detail. --Sfmammamia 17:36, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

OK see here is the thing. The article for this page totally sucks, in fact, I feel that it is vague on the subject of politics thats why I put it there. All the other counties in the bay area on wikipedia, if you enter in their names, have political presidential election information providing for them back to 1960. I feel that instead of making a daughter page, I could just simply add the political table (considering I worked a good half hour on finding the data) into the culture of San Francisco section, It's that simple and you can keep your picture and everything else the way it was before I edited it (remember, not vandalizing here... I was simply editing the page and giving it a little bit of a makeover... but apparently everyones all fussy over some dumb photo i took). JustinKwood719 17:49, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

JustinKwood719, thanks for your efforts. As noted at the top of this page, the San Francisco article has been rated as a feature article (Wikipedia's highest rating). As you can probably imagine, that has taken a lot of effort by numerous editors who therefore probably have good reason to disagree with your announcement that the article "totally sucks". There are also comments throughout the article suggesting that additions be made to daughter pages, as managing this article's length is a continuing challenge. That said, I can understand it is frustrating to put a lot of effort into creating a table only to see it removed. I suggest that it would be better placed in the daughter article on culture, but perhaps we can let this discussion run for a bit and see what others think about either better placing it in this article or placing it in the daughter article? That would be in keeping with Wikipedia's suggested BOLD, revert, discuss editing cycle. Either way, your work is not wasted or lost. Also, the term "San Francisco values" is most frequently used as a pejorative, as noted in that article, so the summary paragraph you inserted appeared to have a biased point of view. Thanks again. --Sfmammamia 18:36, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Well put, and very diplomatic. For reasons that have already been explained, the table is the sort of information that would be great on the daughter page (especially if some context is given), but here it only serves to unnecessarily lengthen an already gigantic article. As articles get larger, they need to become more general in nature and spread out the specifics through daughter pages. This is ideal Wiki structure. The effort is not wasted as the information is useful, it just needs to be in the proper place. Also, JustinKwood719, please remember to sign your posts by typing four tildes (~~~~) at the end. --Loonymonkey 22:00, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

The article once had such a table, but it was removed during the Featured Article process as being unnecessary and bloating and now lives here: San Francisco Politics: Federal Elections--Paul 22:49, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Paul, a question -- given that the content is orphaned there, would it not be appropriate to link to it within the main San Francisco article? --Sfmammamia 02:46, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Rather, it should be merged into the main San Francisco politics article. A lot of the articles pertaining to San Francisco have been split off during the FA-making process of this article; it is now time to clean up and consolidate those bits and pieces. —Kurykh 02:51, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Don't see a San Francisco politics article. Are you suggesting creation of one? --Sfmammamia 03:44, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Might as well, I'll start it right now. Just need a title... -Goodshoped 03:51, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

The standard Politics of San Francisco, California. —Kurykh 03:52, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Great. Either someone deleted the info or I can't find it. Just a Wikitable? -Goodshoped 03:56, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I think one of the articles will do just fine. -Goodshoped 03:57, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

OK so now that someone has made a Politics of San Francisco article... I am going to put a link to it below the link to the elaborate article culture of san francisco... making the data easier to access. JustinPacificaCA 02:19, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Demographics Section

The demographics section is very vague. I would like to see some more hardcore data and numbers. I look at other cities wikipedia profiles and they all seem to have down to the nearest hundredth the percentages of ethnicity. Here it just says that the asians are a third of the population and whites are nearly half... that's VAGUE if you ask me. 75.61.69.23 21:28, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Frisco

Is it mentioned here that Bay Area citizens discourage the nickname "Frisco"? 192.235.1.34 20:36, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, please mention that "Frisco," or "San Fran" for that matter, are not welcome nicknames. Non-natives or tourists who want to sound "in" use those terms. The youth, who don't get it yet, perpetuate this by wearing t-shirts with "FRISCO" emblazoned across their chest. Born here, I was brought up--like many others--to understand that saying "Frisco" is like saying the f-word. I think this sentiment should be noted.Undici (talk) 13:33, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

See the 1872 edict here (note #20): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Norton#Imperial_career Undici (talk) 13:33, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Apparently you haven't read the article very carefully; not only is it mentioned that "Frisco" is disparaged by local residents, but the article also points out that no less a notable San Franciscan than Herb Caen, who had previously campaigned against the use of that nickname, later relented and acknowledged that "Frisco" was, in fact, used by a fair number of City residents. Also, keep in mind that the name of the game is to be descriptive here, not prescriptive.

Sorry, my bad: I was mixing up this article w/California English, which does have that explanation of Caen's reevaluation of Frisco. Probably too trivial for this article, though. +ILike2BeAnonymous (talk) 06:16, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Article length

I removed the "verylong" template recently added to the article. I did a quick check of the article's readable prose and came up with 45K — less than half the overall size and well within the length guidelines. Since the article achieved feature article status a little over a year ago, the size has crept up slightly, but there are numerous editors who are very watchful over additions, and I've witnessed many efforts to manage the length by deleting extraneous details or pushing additions into daughter pages. So I see no issue requiring the template. --Sfmammamia 19:47, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

I didn't post the template, but just comparing to other city articles, it seems in order to see the "history", "culture and contemporary life", and "transportation" sections shortened in favor of placing the current full-length text in their own separate articles.--Loodog 20:52, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Could someone get this done please? Gary King (talk) 20:12, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

The article was 42K of prose when it achieved Featured Article Status, it is now 45K and about 7300 words. As mentioned above, WP:SIZE says Readers may tire of reading a page much longer than about 6,000 to 10,000 words, which roughly corresponds to 30 to 50 KB of readable prose. The Encyclopaedia Brittanica entry on San Francisco contains 6800 words. Conclusion, under both peer comparison and WP guidlines, this article is not too long. That's not to say that there aren't some sections that are here because everyone wants a mention in the main article. For instance, I'd personally be willing to cut the "Bicycling" section, but I'd bet it just gets put back. (Also, there is a discussion about the length of the article at WP:Featured article candidates/San Francisco, California).--Paul (talk) 22:10, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Also, here are some other city article sizes for comparison:

Wikipedia Article	"readable prose"	# Words
Seattle, Washington	46K	7464
Detroit, Michigan	50K	8069
Chicago, Illinois	56K	9262
Los Angeles, California	47K	7669
London	57K	9188
Denver, Colorado	43K	7205
New Orleans, Louisiana	60K	9977
Boston, Massachusetts	43K	6976

--Paul (talk) 22:25, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Established at the Golden gate?

In 1776, the Spanish settled the tip of the peninsula, establishing a fort at the Golden Gate and a mission named for Francis of Assisi. <- The Golden Gate didn't exist yet. I'm confused. Klosterdev (talk) 09:18, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

The Golden Gate *Bridge* didn't exist... the body of water it crosses, the Golden Gate, did. 71.141.225.64 (talk) 22:11, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

"Everybody's Favorite City"?

I've seen this nickname used for San Francisco more than a few times. Can anyone find a verifiable source for this so it can be added under Nicknames in the Infobox?

--68.125.166.201 (talk) 11:11, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

List of museums

Congratulations on putting together an awesome article -- one of the best I have seen for a city. I apologize in advance if I don’t present this with a NPOV, but I wanted to give the editors on this page a head’s up on some recent changes that may effect this page. Recently the List of museums in the United States was made into separate state articles. In discussions at Talk:List of museums in the United States, there is proposed format changes to “lists of museums” including discussion of adopting a sortable wikitable such as the one at List of museums in Connecticut. This means the link to the List of Museums in San Francisco grouping used on this page may or may not work as it does now. Please join in on that discussion. Thanks! FieldMarine (talk) 04:27, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

contradiction with another WP article

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=San_Francisco%2C_California&diff=185950001&oldid=185714209

The previous version said residents wanted the highways demolished. But read here...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embarcadero_Freeway The Board of Supervisors voted on November 5, 1985 to tear down the Embarcadero Freeway.[7] The proposal was put to the voters in 1987, and soundly defeated. The October 17, 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake damaged the structure, and Caltrans planned to retrofit and retain the two-decker freeway. Many accounts since then have suggested that the earthquake resulted in the demolition of the freeway, but the record shows that the city convulsed over the issue, with many supporting a rebuild. Then Mayor Art Agnos proposed instead demolishing the freeway in favor of a boulevard with an underpass at the Ferry Building to allow for a large plaza. Opposition to demolishing the freeway mounted again, with over 20,000 signatures gathered to again create a ballot measure.

Therefore, I've changed the SF article to a neutrally worded version simply saying that the highway was demolished. Mrs.EasterBunny (talk) 20:36, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I've attempted more accurate wording that reflects the fact that the demise of Embarcadero Freeway and Central Freeway were different. Agnos and the Board of Supes decided on demolition of the Embarcadero, but it was the voters in 1999 who decided the fate of the Central Freeway.[1],[2] --Sfmammamia (talk) 20:53, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Ackshooly, as I remember it, there were three votes on the Central Freeway, two for demolition and one (in the middle) against, plus a whole lot of foot-dragging on the part of Caltrans ... +ILike2BeAnonymous (talk) 07:26, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Flag contradiction

The flag contradicts itself with the tags upon it. the vector-images.com licence template states that "vector versions are not permitted" and directly below it there is a Convert to SVG template that states that it "should be recreated using vector graphics". Now is that saying that its still free if a vector version that didn't come from vector-images.com is produced, or and according to the Vector-Images.com template second deletion request vector-images.com "do not provide the rights to revectorize [their] images" did whoever tag that image not read what they were actually adding, should the svg tag be removed, or does it all depend on the outcome of this discussion? — Balthazar ^(T|C) 15:39, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I've taken out the request for SVG. Fixed. Binksternet (talk) 16:03, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Healthy San Francisco

I attempted to add a single sentence about San Francisco's nationally unique program -- Healthy San Francisco -- which is being implemented to provide health coverage to all uninsured residents. It was deleted as WP:RECENTISM, which is neither a WP policy nor guideline, but an essay. This program has been nationally recognized as a leading, innovative effort (see the reference provided) and as such, I believe, reaches the level of notability to deserve mention in a single sentence in this article. We mention the 2006 budget, which is already outdated, and certainly is more an example of recentism than this long-term program (in fact, the budget should be updated to 2007, or 2008 if available). [I updated the budget figure]. Other thoughts? --Sfmammamia (talk) 00:00, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable to me. Binksternet (talk) 08:02, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Cultural movements?

Hi all, I was a little underwhelmed by the Culture section of this article. As of now it reads like a trivia list of cultural attractions and doesn't mention the important cultural *movements* that shaped San Francisco. Now I'm no academic, but two main ones come to mind, the Beats and the 1960's hippie counterculture/Summer of Love, yet neither is explicitly mentioned in this section. Weren't these subjects important/influential enough in contributing to SF's current identity to be expanded upon, or at the very least, explicitly mentioned or linked? None of it is even mentioned in the greater Culture of San Francisco article. Admittedly, I don't live in SF, so maybe it's a point of controversy with some San Franciscans. Otherwise, if NYC's Culture section can mention Harlem Renaissance and abstract expressionism, and considering SF is a just as important culturally (and a unique one at that) as NYC, I don't see why we can't include them. Thoughts? Foscoe (talk) 00:02, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Link to usgs forcast

May it be usefull to have an ext. link:

• United States Geological Survey - Preparedness and Forecast

it´s about UCERF Earthquake Probabilities --Asdfj 20:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

section heading structure vs. recommendations at WP:USCITY

Would it make sense to take a fresh look at the section structure of this article? I notice that it is increasingly departing from this recommendation, namely "Editors are strongly encouraged, however, to at least begin with the lead/infobox, followed by history, geography, demographics, and economy, since these sections have some good basic information that might be sought after by readers first. Beyond that, editors working on city articles are advised to come to a consensus that works best for the city in question." I suggest "cityscape" and "neighborhoods" be moved under Geography, then Demographics and Economy be moved up. Not sure why "Tourism" has been added where it is, this is addressed in the economy section and seems out of place where it has been added. Other thoughts?--Sfmammamia (talk) 01:47, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Last first: The "tourism" section is definitely out of place. First off, there's a wikitravel article for that, and second, it has grouped non-tourist material under an inaccurate heading. The "Tourism" change should be reverted. First second: "neighborhoods" were under "cityscape" which I think is where they belong; I also can see moving "cityscape" under "Geography," though they aren't exactly the same. I think "cityscape" is a useful way to group this information. --Paul (talk) 02:03, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Re: Tourism heading, agreed, change reverted. But what does "Cityscape" really mean? --Sfmammamia (talk) 02:10, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

One of the Merriam-Webster definitions for 'cityscape' is: "an urban environment." My understanding of the concept is that it is the urban equivalent of this definition of 'landscape' "the landforms of a region in the aggregate." Thus it describes the totality of a built urban environment. Thus, as used in the SF article, "neighborhoods" and "beaches and parks" are subsets of the cityscape. "Neighborhoods" really aren't part of the geography of a place, they are more of a human artifact. I think that WP:USCITY should adopt a 'cityscape' heading. They're missing the boat! --Paul (talk) 02:27, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

"Cityscape" to me means general urban fabric and feel. Such a thing is sometimes hard to get good sources on, but you can include easily verifiable demo info like density and overall city size, common knowledge observations like what types of buildings are found in what neighborhoods, streets/grid, etc... The Providence article does a nice job with this.--Loodog (talk) 03:09, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

Firefox layout issue

Loading the page today I notice some layout issues affecting pictures. IE doesn't have those, but the layout differs noticably. Specifically, the History section has pictures overlapping text (Mission San Francisco D'Asis and the panorama of the 1906 fires). By contrast, the IE article has the pictures correct but a large gap after the History section. Because no one else has reported this and it could be idiosyncratic to my machine, I'm not making any changes, but reporting it in case someone else can replicate it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.21.252.107 (talk) 18:49, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Expansion

There should be a Topic about the restricted use of skateboards in the city, and not only that but some other bans in the city-Jh553738 (talk) 08:47, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

I think this excerpt from the History of California article should have at least a short, condensed version of it included on the main San Francisco article:

"On July 31, 1846, Yerba Buena doubled in population when about 240 Mormon migrants from the East coast arrived on the ship Brooklyn, led by Sam Brannan. Brannan, also a member of the Mormon Church, would later become well known for being the first publicist of the California Gold Rush of 1849 and the first millionaire resulting from it."

I think that this should be included because Mormons appear to be a major influence in early San Francisco life. The article ignores this detail altogether, when this event doubled the city population and probably significantly shaped the culture of the time.

What do you guys think?

aspen04 (talk) 18:20, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Ref format and sections needing references

Given the attention that this article's references are getting in the Featured Article review, I'd like to suggest we agree on a reference format. The article's earlier references did not use cite templates; numerous refs added since then do. Consistent cite format is necessary for featured articles these days, so we need to agree on a consistent format and make all the refs conform to it. I'd be happy to work on this, but don't want to work at cross purposes with other editors. Preferences?

Also, the following sections could use references. Rather than clutter up the article with templates, I thought it more appropriate to simply list them here;

1. Geography
2. Neighborhoods
3. Beaches and parks
4. Entertainment and performing arts
5. Sports (some paragraphs)
6. Seaports

--Sfmammamia (talk) 00:37, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Although I'm not really a contributor to the article, I'd like to suggest the {{cite web}} and {{cite book}} templates. They're easy to use and give the information in a "clean" manner. I'm willing to help with this. GaryColemanFan (talk) 01:29, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I concur. Notice that I use the cite web template on all the new references I added to the article.—Chris! _ct 02:04, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I ran Dispenser's link checker against the page to check some of the urls[3]. But I didn't verify that pages against the material, just against internet archive copies. There are still some possible dead links. So check those as you go through and template the citations. -Optigan13 (talk) 06:33, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I fixed the one absolutely dead link that the link checker found. --Paul (talk) 12:27, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Edit war: "The City"

Rather than reverting each other's edits, would anyone be open to going to WP:RFC or something similar to settle this debate? GaryColemanFan (talk) 22:42, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't think an RfC is necessary yet. Why don't we just talk about it? According to the The City page, the San Francisco Warriors (now Golden State Warriors) had "The City" emblazoned on their uniforms as the nickname for San Francisco. No source, but a visit to the Warrior website [4] verifies the uniform, as does this SF Gate story [5]. Further, a Google news search [6] turns up a couple hits that seem to verify (pay only, unfortunately). Still quotes like, "Al Attles remembers the night in 1966 when the San Francisco Warriors unveiled ... What would New York, known as the city everywhere but in San Francisco..." would seem to indicate that San Francisco is known as the City, at least locally. Which, as a local resident, I can attest to. Though, obviously, I am not a reliable source. -Chunky Rice (talk) 22:57, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I think a consensus discussion right here would be just fine. BTW, a few more nicknames: SF, SFC, Sucker-Free City, and San Pancho. Maybe we could have an article or a section about it. Obviously, "the City" is a frequently used term used to apply to the city, and has taken on some identificatory significance beyond just saying one is living in an urbanized area - mention in San Jose, a city larger in size and numbers in the same metropolitan region, that one is going to "the City" and other than some sneers and protests, they know exactly what one is saying. We may not have a source right now but this is almost certainly sourceable. Nevertheless, "The City" is applied to many different cities and may not be a nickname so much as a generalized sense of place. People refer to "Downtown" or "Uptown", "Southland", etc... I'm not sure what to call it. It's not really a nickname so much as a designation. I personally think we should leave this one out of the infobox because it is not specific to SF, but I would welcome some encyclopedic treatment of different names that have been given the place. Probably in its own article, to avoid weight problems. Wikidemo (talk) 23:06, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

San Francisco is always known as "The City" locally (look at the GS Warriors example) and it has been in the article for a long time. I don't understand why the whole issue suddenly comes up.—Chris! _ct 23:18, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

It does seem to be silly to be arguing over nicknames, but here goes. 1) There is no doubt that in the San Francisco Bay Area, that if you say that you live in The City or are going to The City for dinner, every knows exactly what you are talking about: San Francisco. 2) That said, however, I don't think this qualifies as a nickname for San Francisco. It is, as Wikidemo says, more like a generalized language for "Downtown" - or has others have suggested - a common usage in many urban areas when referring to the most important city in the area. I don't think it should be listed as a nickname. If you were to go to Bloomington, Indiana and ask them what city "The City" refers to, no one is going to answer "San Francisco." However, if you asked about "Baghdad by the Bay" or (horrors) "Frisco" you would likely get the desired answer.--Paul (talk) 23:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I think that putting "The City" on the local pro-sports team uniform makes it a bit more than just the standard "large local city" usage. -Chunky Rice (talk) 23:31, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Would this be the Golden State Warriors that don't have San Francisco in their name and that don't play their home games in San Francisco? I don't think that whatever the Warriors may have or have had on their jerseys makes "The City" any more a nickname than, "the city" is.--Paul (talk) 23:59, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Wow, that's a lot of sarcasm for someone who apparently didn't look at the links. This would be from when they were known as the "San Francisco Warriors" that played at the Cow Palace (okay, borderline SF, but still). -Chunky Rice (talk) 00:06, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Reiterate my edit summary: This is absurd. Look at The City; most popular usage meant "New York", "Chicago" and "Boston" respectively. Do a google search; SF doesn't even appear on the first page. Somebody produce a single source that elevates SF's usage of this phrase of every other city that uses it.--Loodog (talk) 00:56, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

That survey doesn't have a random sample, so I'm not sure we should be using for anything. And I've already cited the fact that it was used on a pro-sports franchise uniform, which is something that elevates it above general use. Also, a google search for a common word like "city" is silly to use as evidence against it's use in a particular circumstance. -Chunky Rice (talk) 01:36, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

No. "City" is commmon. "The City" as a phrase in caps is not. And wikipedia is based on reliable sources found in print or other media, not phrases on obsolete sports uniforms.

As for The Survey, it was taken across the country. It had more people from California than any other state, so I don't see the problem. To insist that any one city is THE city is, as our article puts it: "deep-seated civic pride held by people who live in that region."--Loodog (talk) 02:11, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that it's not a random sampling. Statistically speaking, it's useless. I'm not suggesting that SF is the only city referred to as "The City." I agree with that statement from the article. The people in SF are extremely provincial. I'm not sure why that would mean we would exclude it from the article. Also, there certainly are sources that talk about the "The City" jersey. See my post above. And "The City" is still an extremely common search term. It's disingenuous to say otherwise. -Chunky Rice (talk) 02:19, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Notwithstanding good sources talking about the jersey, it's still a claim that's being made on a jersey and nothing else, when you have equally inane examples like City Sports, City Convenience in Boston, "Sex and the City" and The City in New York, The City in Seattle, The City in Philadelphia. Unless you're seriously suggesting going to every one of these pages and adding "The City" as a nickname.

And the reason "The City" is an extremely popular search term? It's an extremely popular nickname and location reference and it's disingenuous to say otherwise.--Loodog (talk) 02:31, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Why wouldn't we include it in a list of nicknames if it is being used as such? Does it matter how common it is? Regardless, it's not clear from your examples that the phrase "The city" is being used instead of just using "the" as an article. -Chunky Rice (talk) 03:50, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Because 1) there are five cities that would take the nickname first [7] and 2) no reliable source has been presented showing "The City" as a SF nickname.--Loodog (talk) 03:54, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

First, I think I already mentioned that the survey you're citing has no statistical relevance to anything. Second, what do you think that the San Francisco Warriors were referring to with "The City" on their Jerseys? New York? -Chunky Rice (talk) 04:04, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

It has more statistical relevance than anything you've presented. Even if I agreed with you that the nickname should be added, there'd be no source do this compliant to WP policy.--Loodog (talk) 04:07, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not arguing statistics. I've only said that it's a nickname that is used for San Francisco, which you don't seem to dispute. And I'm not sure what source you need. If the claim is that San Francisco is sometimes referred to as "The City," the citation that the SF Warriors used the phrase to identify the city is sufficient. -Chunky Rice (talk) 04:14, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

As I've said before, team jerseys are not a reliable source; our {{cite jersey}} template isn't running.--Loodog (talk) 04:16, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

This reliable source discusses the uniforms with "The City". GaryColemanFan (talk) 04:17, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

But then you're blatantly ignoring what the source says and claiming it to be saying what it's not. Unless the source says The City is a nickname, or that the jerseys are evidence of this, you're comitting original reseach and synthesis.--Loodog (talk) 04:19, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

(De-indent) Use some common sense, please. While it doesn't say "nick-name" we have a clear example of "The City" being used as a stand in for San Francisco. That's what a nickname is. You're basically saying that if I cited an article that said there were 2 male giraffes and 2 female giraffes at the zoo and I wrote that there are 4 giraffes at the zoo, that's original research. Synonyms are not original research. -Chunky Rice (talk) 04:26, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

No, you're saying that if you cited an article saying there were 2 female giraffes and 2 male giraffes, it'd be fine to say the zoo's nickname is Giraffe Zoo. There are very clear examples of sources showing nicknames. Maybe you should check the sources behind the nicknames we are accepting: [8][Caen, Herb (1949). Baghdad-by-the-Bay. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday. LC F869.S3 C12.]. Look at the source used in the Baltimore article: [9][10][11]. Look at the sources used in Boston: [12]. IF this is an established nickname, it shouldn't be too hard to find a source commenting on it.--Loodog (talk) 04:35, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Something like this if you won't look.--Loodog (talk) 04:41, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the link you just provided shows "The City" as a nickname for both Oklahoma City and San Francisco.—Chris! _ct 05:37, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Not a reliable source, but yes, "The City" is a nickname for OKC as well. Anyone in the state and a few miles on either side would probably recognize that. Even in Dallas perhaps. BTW, I hope everyone is in good spirits because if you aren't smiling when you use words like "disingenuous" and "blatantly", "absurd", etc., I'm going to have to send you to a City Council public hearing to get a taste for people getting worked up over nothing. This article is under FA review so we'd better not add anything without a citation...everyone who's been there knows that "The City" is a name for SF beyond simply referring to the nearest center of population density. But like lots of common knowledge about word usage, the nuance may simply not have any reliable sourcing. Not everything true is verifiable or encyclopedic. And even if it is reliably sourced, as mentioned above that does not make it a nickname. It may still be a location designation, like "Downtown" or the "Financial District." Cheers, Wikidemo (talk) 06:12, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

The Government section

As I am looking for references to cite the Government section, I notice that the majority of the section is a directly copy from here. I think it is a copyright violation, though I am not sure. If so, then we would have to rewrite the whole section and use the link I found as reference.—Chris! _ct 05:41, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I doubt that there are any copyright issues with this text, but it sure does appear to be plagerism. It will provide a great reference for a re-worded section. Half of the problem is solved.--Paul (talk) 00:02, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Composite image in infobox

I guess I missed the discussion about changing the opening image to be a composite of various SF scenes. The problem I have with User:Marlith's composite image is that it isn't simple and elegant; it doesn't have any visual flow within the montage. I'd much rather see the components of the composite image salted into the rest of the article, and stick with the iconic view of SF over the top of the Golden Gate Bridge. Here's the image in question:

Binksternet (talk) 05:17, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Creeping gentrification

Gentrification seems to be taking over the article - I've removed 3 out of five references to this as unencyclopedic. The very concept of gentrification is controversial. Not everyone would agree that describing neighborhood change in this way is valid. It ties together a number of different things that may or may not be related: social displacement, rising prices, changing ethnic and class make-ups, etc. Not all would agree that boutiques, restaurants, nightlife, etc., are related. The term is also pejorative to some, and politically loaded. Better to simply describe as accurately as possible, in a sourced neutral way, the character of different neighborhoods and any notable changes. Wikidemo (talk) 21:19, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Final "citation needed" tag

I'm having trouble finding a source that says that buildings and bridges must be retrofitted. It's pretty easy to find a source that says that many have been retrofitted, though, so I was wondering about changing the wording. For example, this article discusses retrofitted the buildings, and there are many reliable sources (including this) that discuss the retrofitting of bridges. Would anyone be opposed to change the sentence to read "New buildings must meet high structural standards, and older buildings and bridges have been retrofitted to comply with new building codes."? GaryColemanFan (talk) 22:08, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

This source[13] would dispute that. Apparently, all but 160 of the unreinforced masonry buildings in the city have at long last been retrofitted, under a city mandate to do so (google umb / unreinforced masonry building and you'll probably find the requirement). However, several thousand soft story buildings have not been retrofitted and are at danger of collapse - I don't think there is a requirement for those. Bridges would fall under a different regime and are government owned, so it wouldn't make too much sense to speak of a requirement that they be fixed. It's merely a government program to do so, and that work is ongoing (the Bay Bridge replacement and Golden Gate retrofit are years from completion). Wikidemo (talk) 22:32, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I made a bold edit of the sentence so that it discusses only building codes, not bridges, and added an older Chronicle story on building codes as well as the page 1 story from the Chronicle today that notes current gaps in building safety. Because bridges are the responsibility of state government, I took mention of bridge retrofiting out of this context. --Sfmammamia (talk) 07:10, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Those edits, and your others today are well done and seem apt. Wikidemo (talk) 08:12, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Alpha/world city

The Chicago article prominently states this. Perhaps SF should too. see world city .:davumaya:. 15:53, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

San Francisco is a BETA World City. It is already in the article. Personally, I'd remove this from the article. It's just boosterism and doesn't really tell you anything useful about San Francisco. It's like that press releases from NGO's that are on NPR "news" programs all of the time. --Paul (talk) 17:58, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, thats what that ranking means. It is a bit of a silly ranking though the definitions are still being formed in scholar fields on globalization. It may take credence one day. .:davumaya:. 19:52, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Sister cities

Where are the sister cities? I've also noticed that in some other cities articles, such as Shanghai, there are no sister cities listed there as well. Why is that? Lady Galaxy 03:25, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

They were moved to a subarticle when this article was polished for FA status. —Kurykh 03:33, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

• The Sister Cities link is available in the "City and County of San Francisco" box at the bottom of the article.

Subarticle titles

As I was going through the article, I noticed the subarticles have not yet decided on a single naming scheme. Some have "San Francisco, California" at the end (e.g., History of San Francisco, California), while others have only "San Francisco" (e.g., Culture of San Francisco). At the risk of opening a can of worms, I think we should decide on one naming scheme and stick to it, whichever it turns out to be. Naturally, this naming scheme excludes articles like San Francisco Municipal Railway, San Francisco International Airport, etc. —kurykh 17:29, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I know the US uses "city, state" conventions and this argument has been overdone, but I still don't see why San Francisco can't be just at San Francisco. According to the consensus it's "City, State" unless it's one of the cities that can be written as just "City" according to the AP Stylebook, of which San Francisco is one of them. According to my (non-American) view, the San Francisco in California is literally the only San Francisco I have ever heard of. --Joowwww (talk) 16:08, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Whilst I understand that the most commonly known San Francisco is located in California, there are several other major cities named San Francisco elsewhere in the world. One is located in the Philippines, and then there are several located in various Latin American and South American countries, like, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, etc. Toropop (talk) 10:26, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Photo of a Muni bus with Tagalog ad

A San Francisco Muni bus with ad in Tagalog

I added this photo to the demographics section, as it demonstrates visually the city's Asian population and the fact that many people were born outside the U.S. (both of which are mentioned many times in the section and the article.) User:Paul.h removed it twice saying it wasn't applicable. I think it's useful and interesting. Anybody else? --AW (talk) 19:14, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Agree. The photo is notable and appropriate because of the city's large Filipino population.--Loodog (talk) 21:14, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Also, if you got a picture of the full bus, we could be able to use it on more articles :) BoL (Talk) 03:48, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't think this is a good photo at all. Using an ad on a bus to show SF's Asian population, you're kidding right! :) If you want to demonstrates visually about the city's Asian population, using a picture of Chinatown is even better.—Chris! _ct 04:46, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't feel the image should be added. One of the issues raised at the recent FAR was that the use of images was somewhat excessive, and the total size and number of them was reduced, so the usage of images needs to kept in check and any additions of images may need to be balanced with removing some. Also the picture doesn't quickly convey information related to the text in an accurate manner. One Tagalog bus ad doesn't really convey much, especially considered Filipino people only only account for 15% of the total Asian population and around 5% of the total city population compared to 64% and 20% for Chinese. The image wouldn't add to a readers understanding, it is somewhat difficult to read, would add to an already full set of images, and gives undue weight to a population.

If anything the population growth could be swapped for another chart representing distribution of race, languages spoken at home, or population of foreign born residents. I've thrown together two quick examples at (Image:San Francisco, CA - Languages spoken at home 2006.gif and Image:San Francisco, CA - Race w Asian subdivision (2006).gif) Also, the page Demographic maps of San Francisco, California is a collection of images. If you really want to give a more in depth profile of the diversity of San Francisco you could expand on the information presented in that article, and/or move the images into a gallery page at commons. Another you could look at is Daly City, California, where Filipinos are the largest group with 36% of the population compared to 27% for Whites and 23% for Latinos. -Optigan13 (talk) 07:08, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Optigan13, for all the reasons stated. Signs and billboards in languages other than English are quite common these days, and not just in San Francisco. --Sfmammamia (talk) 16:24, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

• Most of what I was going to say has been expertly covered by Optigan13 (talk). I agree with the points made above, especially about undue weight, and the obscure linkage between the photo and the point it supposed to be illustrating. The text doesn't mention a Filipino population nor any of the languages spoken in the city. My only additional point is that I don't see any compelling argument to change the population growth graph out for anything else, as that would mean adding a population growth table unnecessarily expanding the article.--Paul (talk) 16:34, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Infobox montage

Is there a reason the montage picture was taken down? Taifarious1 10:13, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Some editor preferred the view from the Marin Headlands. I'm agnostic on the issue, I think both pictures are good. One, however, might be called "iconic"--Paul (talk) 17:12, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I could take it or leave it with the two pictures as well. I don't think it helps that you called it Frisco in the image name (See San Francisco, California#cite note-1), so I've requested a rename on commons. -Optigan13 (talk) 22:07, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

There is currently a proposal on the table to amend the Wikipedia naming conventions for US cities to follow the AP Stylebook's suggested names. This would effectively move a number of US city articles currently on the list, so San Francisco, California would be moved to San Francisco. To comment on this discussion, please go here. Dr. Cash (talk) 16:55, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Bike Lanes

In "Sports", it says there are more than 200 miles of bike lanes in the city. In "Roads and Highways", it says there are 68 miles of bike lanes in the city. The reference used is identical, although listed as separate footnotes. The reference claims more than 200 miles of bicycle routes of various style, but could perhaps be interpreted to mean only 68 miles that are bicycle-exclusive. In any case, can we come to consensus about what the correct number of bike routes is, and then come to consensus as to whether that information should be in "Sports" or in "Roads and Highways" as it clearly does not need to appear in both.--67.101.43.251 (talk) 16:35, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Let's not confuse "bike lanes" (Class 2) with "bike routes" (class 3) both of which are different types of "bikeways" (using CA nomenclature). The third type of bikeway is the bike path (Class 1). So we just need to be clear whether we're talking about miles of Class 1, 2 or 3 bikeways, or all combined. See Segregated cycle facilities for (much) more information. --Born2cycle (talk) 18:42, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Regardless, an article about San Francisco is not the place to define these terms. Let's pick a number that reflects bike facilities in San Francisco, and only cite it once. My preference: use the 200 miles term and leave it in "Sports" and drop it from "Roads and highways".--67.101.44.240 (talk) 18:31, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

This article is not the place to define those terms, true, but it is a place to use them properly. So, it's 200 miles of what, exactly? --Born2cycle (talk) 18:35, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

The reference describes it as a "Bicycle network" and futher lists 4 classes of bike routes. Let's say there is a 200-mile bicycle network, or let's say there are 200 miles of bike routes. Which do you prefer?--67.101.44.240 (talk) 21:53, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Interesting that the source distinguishes Class III bikeways (bike routes) with wide curb lanes from those without. That's good. Anyway, the current statement is false about 200 miles of bike lanes - the reference itself clearly states that there are 45 miles of bike lanes. And stating 200 miles of bike route would be misleading if not false too, as only 79 miles of the network are designated as Class III bike routes (with or without WCL).

What I suggest changing is this:

There are more than 200 miles (320 km) of bicycle lanes in the city ...

to this:

There are more than 200 miles (320 km) of bicycle paths, lanes and bike routes in the city ...

I would not use the word "network" because that's misleading - it's not like these paths, bike lanes and bike routes are all connected in one continuous network.

I think it's appropriate to mention bikeways in the "Sports" section rather than Transportation because all roads in San Francisco, except the freeways, are available for bicycle transportation (now, there's a viable network). It's recreational cyclists that mostly seek these types of facilities.

However, a separate Bicycling sub-section under Transportation noting this fact about all SF roads being available to bicyclists, making vehicular cycling a viable transportation option there, might be worth mentioning as well. --Born2cycle (talk) 22:54, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm going ahead with the first change above; the correction in the Sports section. --Born2cycle (talk) 22:57, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. Binksternet (talk) 17:37, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Population

An editor has recently removed the population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau and replaced them with estimates from the State of California. State of California numbers are always biased high so they can get more funds from the national government. This article has always used Census Bureau numbers for consistency with other articles and because they are more stable.

I think the article should continue to use only U.S. Census population numbers. If the State numbers came out in January 2009 and the last Census Bureau numbers are for 2007 or 2008 so be it. They'll get around to updating the estimates.

Are there other opinions?--Paul (talk) 18:25, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Transportation infrastructure - change hesitation

I was about to make some changes to the transportation section of this article, however stopped upon noting its "Feature Article" status. What I'm looking at is the same format that all other CA county articles follow, with route graphics included. Now again, I don't want to detract from an already great article, about a great city. (I find myself up there in SF at least three to five times a year, solely for recreation and just to take in the clean air and cityscape!) I'd appreciate some input on this one. Edit Centric (talk) 07:02, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

What information would a list of routes (along the lines of those found in other County article) add that the current section does not capture? Does adding the logo of any particular route add to the understanding of San Francisco? This article summarizes all the major routes traversing the city, and does so in prose form. That is far preferable to a list.--ABIJXY (talk) 23:59, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

I can see where the prose form of this is preferable, and agree somewhat! How about doing it the way it's been done at Sonoma County's transportation section? I rather like the fact that it still shows the route shields (aiding in mnemonics for the driver / reader), and describes in prose the way these routes traverse the county. Please keep in mind that not only is SFO a city, its also its own county as well. As to your question if route shields add to the understanding of SF, I would have to say yes, from the perspective of someone who loves to drive up there four times a year, and wants to know which routes enter the peninsula from which direction, again from a mnemonics angle. (You can't knock mnemonics, why do you think Windows and OS-X are so popular? Icons have become engrained in our day-to-day!)

Granted that the flow of prose in this article is fantastic, just like the city its self. Its just an idea, and I greatly appreciate the dialogue on this one, as it also serves to advance my editing skills and considerations. Edit Centric (talk) 08:26, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, I would think including things like route shields would be more appropriate at Transportation in the San Francisco Bay Area than here. This article attained feature status in part, I think, because it has shied away from lists and trivia.--ABIJXY (talk) 20:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Politics

How strange that even though the article mentions politics in the lead, a section or part of a section on politics doesn't exist, instead only having a link to a subarticle. Should we expand the government section into the "government and politics" section and add at least some information on politics? —kurykh 05:31, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

There are a couple of sentences about politics in the section on culture and contemporary life. I think what's there is adequate to the topic. The article is already plenty long as it is. --Sfmammamia (talk) 07:03, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Population Density ranking

This page has had issues regarding the statement that it is "second most densely" populated city before. Qualification of the statement with "of cities over 500,000 population" in the main text (indeed, in the lead paragraph), while correct, is weasely and appears designed specifically for the purpose of being able to make the statement. THe original wording, that SF is "one of" the most densely populated major cities is an appropriate compromise, keeping the notability of the city's population density without giving a specific ranking subject to interpretation is, in my view, the best solution, and I seek others' input on this question.

Some past edits on this issue are listed below: [14] [15]

I revert, once again, to language prior to recent edits by 76.192.161.86 subject to discussion by all editors and some engagement by this author. --ABIJXY (talk) 17:11, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

The initial GA version of this article had the claim that SF is the 2nd-most dense large city in the US. It really is. If you look at the other "cities" that rank above SF in population per square mile they are all either part of the NYC or Boston megalopolis and/or are quite small (less than 10 square miles or population less than 100K). You do have to define what a large city is, but SF clearly is the 2nd most dense large city in the U.S., and the density is an important part of San Francisco's character.--Paul (talk) 17:54, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree that its density is an important attribute and should clearly be mentioned. THe problem is that claiming that SF is "2nd most densely populated large city" necessitates defining what "large city" or "major city" is and qualifying the statement with "among cities with greater than 500,000 population" is weasely and sounds specifically selected solely for the purpose of excluding those small cities that are in the reference which are more densely populated than San Francisco - e.g. Somerville MA, Union City NJ, Huntington Park CA. It's also distracting as this article should be about San Francisco, and not about defining what a "major American city" is. I'm happy to change to language to "second most densely populated American city" but move the "of cities greater than X" to a footnote (so as not to be defining "major" or "large city" in the lead introductory text of the article). I also see that this language has come and gone several times over the life of this article, so discussing it here could possibly put this to bed for a long time.--ABIJXY (talk) 18:23, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

As an added observation, I note that New York City says it is the "most densely populated American city" with any qualification included not in the main text but listed as a footnote. This might be the best option for this article as well.--ABIJXY (talk) 18:26, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Here is the previous sentence: San Francisco is the second most densely populated major city in the U.S.--Paul (talk) 19:04, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good. I'll add it along those lines and maybe include the smaller cities in the note.--ABIJXY (talk) 04:54, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Portola expedition

The way the history section opens, it implies that Portola himself entered the territory of modern-day San Francisco. While it's true he "found" San Francisco Bay, I'm not certain that either he or members of his expedition actually made it to what we now know as San Francisco. Does anyone else have any information or reference that can help clear this up?--ABIJXY (talk) 18:04, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't think there is any way to clear it up. Nor do I think it is necessary. At the time of Portola, there was no such thing as San Francisco. Portola probably got near what is now San Mateo and saw the bay, and certainly that is enough. His expedition is recognized as having been the first to see the San Francisco Bay area. Why should we doubt this?--Paul (talk) 22:15, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Oh I tend to agree with you - Portola's discovery of the Bay was critical. I recently edited (and expanded) that section of the History section. Before I started, it said "The Yelamu group of the Ohlone people resided in several small villages when a Spanish exploration party led by Don Gaspar de Portolá arrived on November 2 1769, the first documented European visit to San Francisco Bay.". I think that wording was a bit inaccurate, as it implies he arrived in SF and interacted with the Yelamu in their villages. I think how I recently reworked it makes it a bit more accurate.--ABIJXY (talk) 23:03, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Religion

I'm thinking of composing a small section on "Religion" under the section "Culture and contemporary life". There is almost no discussion of this in the article so far. This section would discuss notable religious organizations based in SF (Catholice and Episcopalian Archdioceses of San Francisco; Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia), mention some notable churches and congregations (Grace Cathedral, Glide Memorial Church, Temple Emanu-El), and give some statistics on numbers of congregations and adherents (and non-adherents) from the only source I've found (http://www.thearda.com/mapsReports/reports/counties/06075_2000.asp).

I've looked around, and few city articles appear to contain any information about religious observance in the city. It's probably a minefield to actually compose, but was wondering what other opinions were. To balance space, some stuff from Sports could possibly be trimmed.--ABIJXY (talk) 19:04, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Space isn't an issue. Whether the section is appropriate at all is. —kurykh 20:53, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I would say just leave a sentence or two in the culture and contemporary life section rather than create an entirely new subsection; in the whole scheme of things it's not terribly important. —kurykh 20:55, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't think such a section is either needed or appropriate. San Francisco is not like Rome, religion is not an integral part of the city's character. Plus, it's like politics, if you start talking about one religion, where do you stop? There are no good reasons for such a section, but there are loads of pitfalls.--Paul (talk) 22:01, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I think this would be a minefield, although it would be nice if things like Grace Cathedral and Glide Memorial Church could be worked in somehow; neither are mentioned as yet. I think I'll just add some of the data from the link above to the Demographics section and leave it at that.--ABIJXY (talk) 05:37, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Earthquake photo

Would there be any objections to changing out the picutre that's being used to illustrate the 1906 Earthquake? The one currently being used doesn't really have any recognizable features other than a lot of smoke. There's a couple at the page on the Earthquake that maybe have more encyclopedic value:

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I like the top one myself, since it captures the earthquake's destruction, the fire, SF architecture, cable cars, SF high society all in one image.

Thoughts? --ABIJXY (talk) 00:48, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

The Genthe picture was originally in the article but was replaced during the GA editing process with the current photo which I think is a perfect match with the Jack London quote. The London quote talks about an apocalypse, the picture in the article shows great overall destruction and is an excellent match with the quote. I don't see that things would be improved by changing either the picture or the quote.--Paul (talk) 04:08, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

The quote's fine, but the current picture doesn't really say "San Francisco".--ABIJXY (talk) 06:34, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

After further review, I checked to see the version of this page when it was a GA nominee. It didn't have any earthquake photo in it. link During its first failed FA nomination, the current, sepia-toned photo was already there, without the Jack London quote. link I didn't find any version of this page with the Genthe picture in it.--ABIJXY (talk) 06:41, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

I like the 936 × 221 pixel image better than either of these two. If one iconic, recognizable image is needed, how about something like City Hall burning, or fire fighting near Lotta's Fountain? Binksternet (talk) 07:44, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Potential minor changes

As part of a usability test conducted by the Wikimedia Foundation, users might be asked to make and save small changes to the San Francisco entry. These changes will not be harmful and will be undone immediately following the test.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.101.56.124 (talk) 16:56, March 23, 2009

If you're from Wikimedia Foundation, why didn't you sign this notice? Binksternet (talk) 01:16, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Because not all staff members are yet fully adept at remembering to sign (or even logging in, it seems!). Remember to assume good faith (and take a look at recent history); and trust me, it was the Foundation. Cary Bass (talk) 21:54, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Okeley-dokeley. After so much vandalism reversion, I've gone far afield from assuming good faith. Binksternet (talk) 23:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Murder Rate

San Francisco's murder total for 2007 was 100, according to the FBI. I have edited this into the demographics section of the page numerous times, where SF's crime rate is listed, yet it keeps getting deleted for some reason. Here's the link: http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/data/table_08_ca.html

Scroll down to San Francisco, and see what it says: 100 homicides. I request that whoever keeps deleting this statistic, would please stop, as there's no reason to do so, unless one wishes to mislead people about SF's murder rate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.164.186.68 (talk) 10:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Stop accusing people of deliberate obfuscation, and maybe you'll get somewhere constructive. The reason why it is removed is that is is not terribly important relative to the rest of the article. The most recent number will suffice. What makes 2007 so special that 2006 is not? Or 2005? Or 2004? Merely because of some arbitrarily decided "12 year high"? —kurykh 16:05, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

We are all in agreement that the number of homicides is notable enough that it should be included in this article. As such, this article includes the number of homicides (NOT the murder rate) in San Francisco in the most recent year for which data is available, 2008. Thank you for providing an updated reference that corrects 2008's total to 99 from 98. I fail to see what inclusion of 2007 data adds to this article. I would encourage you to spend your efforts on a new daughter article called "Crime in San Francisco" if giving year-by-year statistics is important to you.--ABIJXY (talk) 17:32, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Climate

The climate averages give summer temperatures that are too high for the city. The link of where the data comes from [52] has different numbers than the displayed numbers come from. I tried to fix it but there doesn't seem to be a way to edit it.

I have fixed this once before. Thanks for pointing it out, I've fixed it again. You can edit the weather infobox by editing the template: template:San Francisco weatherbox.--Paul (talk) 01:53, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Demographics

How come it says that its 7.0% african american. Hunters point, sunnydale, lakeview, and fillmore are all black areas so that would be at least 25% —Preceding unsigned comment added by BaYaReABOi (talk • contribs) 05:09, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Have you looked at the census data that's referenced? The cited number is correct. --Dpryan (talk) 06:35, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

Your obviously not from there if you think its correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by BaYaReABOi (talk • contribs) 04:00, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

I do live there and it's a believable estimate. If you're going to suggest that the 2000 census data is off by a factor of 4 you might want to come up with some actual data. --Dpryan (talk) 04:27, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi BayAreaBoi and welcome to wikipedia. You should take a look at the policy prohibiting original research. Original research includes trying to argue that the neighborhoods you're familiar with in the city are more of a factor in the population than what reliable sources like recent census data say. Also most, if not all of the main editors you will encounter on this article are locals. -Optigan13 (talk) 05:18, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with both. I do beleive that the census does correctly say that its 7.0% but i think that the accurate census may be wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by SaNfRaNcIsCo415 (talk • contribs) 23:32, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Frisco

The following text was added, then quickly deleted as original research:

In more recent years, "Frisco" has made a comeback among some residents, especially young and working-class natives. Many modern San Franciscans find "Frisco" to be acceptable, but deeply despise the term "San Fran", which they perceive as a painfully cheesy name used only by annoying out-of-towners.

This is true and likely sourceable (minus opinionated terms like "painfully cheesy"). A discussion of the city's many nicknames (San Pancho, Sucker Free City, San Fran, SFO, SF, "the City") is interesting, likely sourceable, and could be presented in encyclopedic fashion. But I'm not sure it fits in this article - the footnote about Frisco is already pretty long. Can anyone think of a good place to put that info? Would a separate article on nicknames for San Francisco be okay? I'd like to figure that out in advance rather than going through a deletion / merge discussion later. Wikidemon (talk) 19:22, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I like the thought of a separate article—it could work. Binksternet (talk) 00:34, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Metro Area Population

The metro area population is given as 4,203,898 while the San Jose metro population in that Wikipedia article is given as 7,354,555 (CSA 7/1/08). This seems a bit odd to me that two different measures of metropolitan area are being used for the two different Wikipedia articles for what most area residents would consider the to be their metro, "The Bay Area." These statistics for San Jose are probably coming from something like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_census_statistical_areas which shows the CSAs for California.

I'd argue that the CSA is a much closer match for what people mean when they talk about "The Bay Area" and talk about the metro area. The metros of "San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont" or the "San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara" are odd MSAs. Maybe they made sense in 1950 when Sunnyvale was all orchards, but I don't really know people who think about the Bay Area as two separate metro areas of San Francisco/East Bay and Santa Clara County and environs. Lots of people live in San Francisco and work in Sunnyvale, or live in Fremont and work in San Jose or live in Mountain View and work in San Francisco.

Most real practical divisions in the bay area are all about position to the Bay such as North Bay, East Bay, Peninsula, South Bay. Most regional traffic, weather for news is talked about this way and there is no arbitrary division as two different metro areas.

Admittedly, the CSA isn't 100% right, either, since it includes Santa Rosa-Petaluma, Santa Cruz-Watsonville and Napa which have about 800,000 people that most Bay Area residents wouldn't claim. Still, I'd argue that the CSA is a much better approximation of what residents consider the metro area, rather than the San Francisco-Oakland one, which is limited and weird.

I'd go ahead and change it, but I'm sure someone will freak out and revert because it doesn't match the MSA. But at least can we get San Francisco and San Jose articles to use the same measurements, whether MSA or CSA? It would be very confusing for someone who doesn't know better to think that San Jose Metro is about twice the size of San Francisco Metro because it uses the CSA measurement while San Francisco uses a different measurement. Personally I think they should both use the CSA number, but if not, at least they should use numbers that make sense and are comparable when people read the articles about the region.

70.231.254.248 (talk) 03:09, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Early opposition to the Pacific Railroad by the CCSF

San Francisco "Pacific Railroad Bond" delayed for two years by the CCSF's opposition

While the Pacific Railroad clearly eventually benefited the Bay Area, it was originally strongly opposed by the City and County of San Francisco which obstructed its crucial early financing for two years (1863-65). The railroad was not a project of San Francisco businessmen but instead of a Sacramento based group ("The Big Four") which was led by Leland Stanford. While Stanford was Governor of California, on April 22, 1863, the Legislature passed "An Act to Authorize the Board of Supervisors of the City and County of San Francisco to take and subscribe One Million Dollars to the Capital Stock of the Western Pacific Rail Road Company and the Central Pacific Rail Road Company of California and to provide for the payment of the same and other matters relating thereto" (which was later amended by Section Five of the "Compromise Act" of April 4, 1864), and on May 19, 1863, this was approved by the electors of the City and County of San Francisco by a vote of 6,329 to 3,116 at a highly controversial Special Election. However the issuance of the Bonds by the City and Country necessary to finance the investment (which became known as the "Dutch Flat Swindle") was delayed for two years when Mayor Henry P. Coon, and then the County Clerk, Wilhelm Loewy, each subsequently refused to countersign the Bonds until ordered to do so by the Supreme Court of the State of California which granted Writs of Mandamus against Coon in 1864 ("The People of the State of California ex rel the Central Pacific Railroad Company vs. Henry P. Coon, Mayor; Henry M. Hale, Auditor; and Joseph S. Paxson, Treasurer, of the City and County of San Francisco." 25 Cal. 635) and Loewy in 1865 ("The People ex rel The Central Pacific Railroad Company of California vs.The Board of Supervisors of the City and County of San Francisco, and Wilhelm Lowey, Clerk" 27 Cal. 655) directing that the Bonds be countersigned and delivered. This delay seriously impacted the ability of the CPRR to begin construction of the railroad and considerably delayed its completion and ability to provide rail service to the Bay Area until 1869. Failure to acknowledge this early opposition and obstruction by the CCSF in relation to the economic impact of the CPRR/WPRR to San Francisco and the Bay Area, and that it was not a project of San Francisco based entrepreneurs thus leaves a misleading impression that it had been originally promoted and supported by San Francisco interests when quite the opposite was the case. (Centpacrr (talk) 14:10, 15 July 2009 (UTC))

Sounds like a fascinating tale for one of the daughter pages.--ABIJXY (talk) 17:07, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

By reverting the changes I made to half a sentence in order to accurately reflect the real original relationship of the Pacific Railroad to San Francisco you have reintroduced several pieces of false and misleading information into the text, to-wit:

• You have re-ambiguated the wikilink for "The Big Four" to a page that gives 44 possible meanings for the term and away from the Wikipedia page that relates to the actual "Big Four" that built the Central Pacific Railroad;

• By deleting the words "Sacramento based" relating to the "Big Four" in an article centered on San Francisco you are in effect leaving the false impression that Gov. Stanford's group was based in (and supported by) the San Francisco business and political community. This was not the case until much later. (Stanford did not relocate to San Francisco until a decade later in 1874.) In fact one of the main reasons that the San Francisco business interests and "city fathers" fought so bitterly against the CPRR and the "Big Four" (whom they accused of perpetrating the "Great Dutch Flat Swindle" in the belief that the Big Four only intended to build a railroad as far as Dutch Flat where it would meet the Dutch Flat Wagon Road that they already controlled) was because they were not San Francisco entrepreneurs;

• "The "Big Four" built the Central Pacific Railroad from Sacramento to Promontory Summit, Utah Territory, over a distance of 828 miles; the remainder of the Pacific Railroad ("First Transcontinental Railroad") between Promontory Summit and Omaha (1,026 miles) was built by the Union Pacific Railroad which was a bitter rival and competitor of the CPRR in constructing the Pacific Railroad, not it's friendly collaborator. In fact the two year delay in the CPRR obtaining its crucial early financing caused by the obstruction perpetrated by the City and County of San Francisco greatly aided the UPRR in its competition with the CPRR by causing the point of meeting of the two lines to be much further west than it would have been had the Mayor and Board of Supervisors not interfered with the issuance and delivery of the bonds authorized by the electorate in May, 1863.

• By deleting the words "...a project which the City fathers originally opposed." you are leaving the impression that there was not conflict, obstruction, controversy, or adverse economic impact of the actions of the City and County officials which significantly delayed the start of construction of the railroad as well as the opening of rail service to San Francisco and the Bay Area.

While I have no problem with including the details of this elsewhere, the basic facts noted above should be provided in the paragraph at a minimum if you are going to make any mention of the Pacific Railroad in the context of San Francisco's entrepreneurs having "sought to capitalize on the wealth generated by the Gold Rush" which I attempted to cure with the half sentence "...and the railroad industry as the Sacramento based "Big Four", led by Gov. Leland Stanford, were building the Central Pacific Railroad, a project which the City fathers originally opposed." If you feel this is "WAAAAY to much information" then just leave out any reference to the railroad altogether. Reverting to the false and misleading language currently there (..."and the railroad industry, as the magnates of the Big Four, led by Leland Stanford, collaborated in the building of the First Transcontinental Railroad."), however, is contrary to both the spirit and policies of Wikipedia because it the opposite of what was actually the case. Is that really what you intend to do? (Centpacrr (talk) 22:04, 15 July 2009 (UTC))

• In the absence of any response to my previous comments above regarding misleading language restored to the article, I have corrected the half sentence (with sourcing) relating to the railroad industry as it impacted San Francisco to accurately reflect the history of that relationship. Any further proposed changes or reversions, and the basis and sourcing therefore, should be discussed here first before being made in the article. (Centpacrr (talk) 15:12, 18 July 2009 (UTC))

Centpacrr, I appreciate that you have taken the time to acquire expertise on the the Central Pacific Railroad and its early financing. However, the paragraph where you have inserted the material only talks about the early days of the Gold Rush and who got rich. It is not a paragraph that talks about the unrelated political infighting associated with the financing of the railroad, nor should it talk about that rather obscure subject. Your other point is that Leland Stanford was living in Sacramento at the time of the founding of the CPRR, and this is a San Francisco article. Really, I don't think that should make a difference in an article about San Francisco. After all, Stanford did live in San Francisco from 1856 until he was elected Governor, and he moved back in 1874, building a gigantic mansion on Nob Hill. He was clearly associated the city and pointing out that the Big Four were based in Sacramento at various times is a bit pedantic and entirely unnecessary in this article, as they were all San Franciscans too. I'd like to strike "although the San Francisco Board of Supervisors had bitterly opposed the city's helping to fund that project" as being too detailed for this article. It does have a wikilink to the CPRR article where that piece of data can be found.--Paul (talk) 21:20, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Removing this brief clause ignores a significant event in the business and political history of San Francisco which had a negative effect on the timing of completion of the railroad and delayed service to the Bay Area. Stanford, Crocker, Huntington, and Hopkins were all prominent merchants in Sacramento prior to, during, and for some years after the entire financing, construction, and early operational phases of the CPRR who all also had business interests which in one way or another competed with similar interests in San Francisco. Deleting either of these references would therefore, I believe, tend to introduce misleading impressions as to the impact of the railroad on the city and Bay Area. (Centpacrr (talk) 18:07, 24 July 2009 (UTC))

As you are unwilling to include any reference of the CCSF's bitter opposition to supporting the CPRR, and the fact that the line was built by competing Sacramento (as opposed to San Francisco) business interests, I have deleted the mention of the railroad altogether as leaving it in without this context is misleading. The was not a small or casual thing in the history of either San Francisco or the railroad. (Centpacrr (talk) 22:11, 24 July 2009 (UTC))