Lone Mountain

Twin monuments to Jesuit faith and education stand but a few blocks apart in San Francisco. One, a massive church that looks as if might have been moved here from a Roman square, sits near the northeastern edge of Golden Gate Park. The other, a neo-Gothic/Mediterranean monolith with an imposing tower, rises above a campus situated on a hill misnamed Lone Mountain (it is actually about 450 feet high, more “mount” than “mountain”). Together, St. Ignatius and the University of San Francisco form a kind of village, being the spiritual and intellectual hubs of a neighborhood that comes as close as it gets to the look and feel of a traditional private-college town in San Francisco. Here, the Jesuits have held sway for the better part of the 20th century and into the 21st, with a classical liberalism at once embraced by the city and at times scorned by the Catholic Church of which it is so intrinsically a part.

Not that Lone Mountain’s link to one religion has rendered it an isolated area. For decades it was a burial ground, home from the mid-18th century on to at least three distinct cemeteries—Odd Fellows, Calvary, and Masonic, the graves of which were relocated south, to the town of Colma on the Peninsula, after the city enacted a law prohibiting burials within San Francisco’s municipal boundaries. Such a restriction enabled both the Catholic church and college (then both known as St. Ignatius) to relocate to the hilltop after settling in various locations of central San Francisco, the church in 1914 and the college (now university) in 1927. Since then, they have both exercised a decidedly benevolent hand on the area, making it one of San Francisco’s most desirable neighborhoods.

Today, Lone Mountain is a clean, well-ordered place, its streets (a number called “terraces”) lined with tidy homes and apartment buildings, many of them inhabited by university students and faculty. San Francisco University (with almost 9,000 students and 500 staff) should not be confused with the nearby University of California at San Francisco (the state university system’s school of medicine) or San Francisco State (one of the state college system’s liberal-arts universities, located near Lake Merced, in the city’s southwest quadrant). SFU, as it is known, is a private liberal-arts university run by the Jesuits (or Society of Jesus, as they are known in Catholic circles), with respectable schools of business, law, nursing, and education. Its main buildings are arrayed on two campuses (one a former women’s college—Lone Mountain College) a few blocks apart. Though the main campus is on Fulton Street, the other, the former women’s college that is now called the Lone Mountain Campus, is on Turk, and most people now think of this as the university proper, though it’s really just a northern extension of it.

St. Ignatius Church lies on the southwestern edge of both the main campus and the neighborhood, at Fulton and Parker, and it serves both the university and surrounding community. Because its spires rise 200 feet above the street on a fairly elevated block that can be seen from many points in the city, many mistake this church as San Francisco’s Catholic cathedral (which it is not; St. Mary’s—the modern, white marble structure on Geary and Gough, whose unusual shape prompted newspaper columnist Herb Caen to call it “Our Lady of Maytag”—claims the title). Nevertheless, St. Ignatius, designed by architect Charles J. I. Devlin in 1909, is a marvelous example of Italian Renaissance/Baroque architecture (though the numerous ornamental elements it incorporates have prompted many observers to call it “eclectic” or “Jesuit Baroque” and leave it at that). Still, the church has a traditional cruciform nave and semicircular sanctuary (the dome of the exterior being decorative, and not carried forth on the interior). A Venetian-style campanile abuts the church’s northeast side, from which the original St. Ignatius Church bell (purchased in 1863) peals at noon and 6 p.m. daily. Lit at night, the main towers can be observed from as far away as the Golden Gate Bridge.

Across Parker from St. Ignatius is a Carmelite Monastery—essentially, it’s a cloister for nuns, with a hushed and lovely chapel open at certain hours to the public for prayers and meditation in an exquisite neo-classical sanctuary.

The neighborhood, though made up of a changing population of students, faculty, and longtime residents, is fairly diverse. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the 10,000 residents of the area are 60 percent white, 20 percent Asian, 10 percent African American, and the remainder of two or mixed races. Though they are all solidly middle class (with a median annual household income of $65,000), only a little more than 25 percent own their homes.

The main attraction here is the university, with its many halls, classroom buildings, student housing complexes, and related structures, so don’t expect to find a commercial district teeming with shops and businesses. The stretch of Geary Boulevard on the neighborhood’s northern perimeter is pretty much what there is: it has a number of shops, restaurants, cafes and bars, services, and a post office, though it feels apart from the neighborhood, mostly because it lies geographically at the base of Lone Mountain. The area also lacks a park per se, though green space abounds (especially the artistically landscaped Lone Mountain campus) and Golden Gate Park lies literally at the entrance to the neighborhood. Koret Health and Recreation Center (on Stanyan and Turk) is open to both USF students and residents of the neighborhood.

Public transportation is by bus, with Muni buses Nos. 31 and 5 running along Turk and Fulton, respectively, and the No. 43 running up and down Masonic Avenue on its way to points east and west. Because of the number of day students who drive to the area to attend classes, and also because of St. Mary’s Medical Center, which fronts Fulton Street, parking can be difficult during business hours during the week. Residential parking permits “BB” and “L” are issued for this neighborhood so locals can shun the hourly parking limits.

Because of the predominant influence of the university, with all of its buildings and dedicated housing, there is no room for public schools. Parents can send their kids to any number of preschools, elementary schools, and middle schools in the surrounding area, including the private Marin Day Preschool in Laurel Heights (off California Street), as well as the public alternative elementary, New Traditions (on Grove Street), which rated 6 out of 10 by GreatSchools, and Roosevelt Middle School on Arguello and Geary. This award-winning school in an impressive red-brick building with three-story tower was rated 9 out of 10 by GreatSchools.

Crime in the area, according to San Francisco Police Department figures, is generally confined to noise nuisances such as car alarms and rowdy revelers, with an occasional robbery, burglary, and assault in any three-month period. Car theft and auto break-ins, however, are becoming more commonplace, in line with an upward trend throughout the city. Though the neighborhood is rarely the scene of violent crime, a double homicide in 2008 shocked the residents of this generally tranquil enclave; police investigators are still searching for a suspect and motive.

Real estate here is expensive, even as the neighborhood struggles to recover from the recent economic downturn. The other element is that because USF owns many of the properties adjacent to its campuses, there is not a big selection available. The median sales price of single-family homes is about 17 percent below where it stood before the recent downturn, according to Trulia, and sales have lagged even at the lower prices. Much of the available properties are condos, with three bedrooms/one bathroom going for close to $1 million and modest one bedroom, one bathroom units in the mid-$600,000 range. Apartments are reasonable (and large, in terms of square footage): a one-bedroom/one-bath apartment on Fulton recently listed for $1,300, while a five-bedroom, three-bath apartment with 2,000 square feet listed for $5,150 a month.

The quiet, buttoned-down feel of the neighborhood reflects the sedate university. This is a good area for students as well as couples getting through a graduate program. Longtime families and even retirees will also find the place a tranquil district, worth living in for its proximity to major attractions of the city while affording a peaceful refuge from what ails San Francisco in other grittier neighborhoods.