Presidio

Located at the northernmost tip of San Francisco, the Presidio serves as San Francisco’s entryway from Marin County. It is home to the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and its hilly geography encompasses over 1,500 acres of parkland. The neighborhood borderes Sea Cliff, Inner Richmond, Laurel Heights, Pac Heights, Cow Hollow and the Marina, each of its edges soaking up a bit of its neighborly culture. The population is somewhat diverse, with white, african american and asian residents filling up most of the area.

Although the Presidio is one of the largest districts in San Francisco, it only houses a few thousand people. There is no real sense of community in this area, rather the district is made up of small unit housing clustered in different areas. Some houses are considered officer housing while others serve as maintenance buildings. In many of the empty units the the neighborhood hosts a myriad of non-profit and non-governmental organizations.

The area’s close proximity to the beach make the neighborhood a popular destination among tourists and San Francisco locals. The beachfronts provide pristine views of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Marine Headlands.

The Presidio has its fair share of history, where it served as the center of Defense for the western seaboard during WWII. Furthermore, the Walt Disney Family Museum presides on the northeastern end of the neighborhood. For more adventure, the area provides plenty of hiking trails along the sea cliffs and through clusters of wooden areas where people can ride bikes and walk their dogs. And finally, many locals come to enjoy the 18-hole golf course and bowling alley that lies just north of Inner Richmond.

Public transportation rarely visits the area. The community is served by only four bus lines. However, traffic is basically non-existent considering the community’s ample space and empty roads.

The Presidio is a park with massive gorgeous views of the city and the bay, but the thing I like most about the Presidio (because I'm a nerd) is the history. The Spanish set up their military camps in the Presidio so they could see the ships, what have you. And, then the Presidio was relinquished to the Mexicans which also used it as a military base. When the US won this territory in the Mexican - American war in the mid-19th century . . . you guessed it, they also used the Presidio as a US military base camp until the late 1980's. Basically, this massive chunk of some of the most beautiful, prime real estate in one of the biggest cities in the country has been completely undeveloped until around 1990. The government turned the land over to the city as a park and agreed to fund the large majority of the park until 2013. This has never been done before or since in American Parks. And, the coolest part about it, is that the park became self sufficient a number of years ago. And, people say that Californians are lazy . . . .
There are some fantastic Spanish style buildings in the park left over from the old military days, and the views can't be talked about enough. There are two parts of George Lucas' production team that reside in the Presidio (which I'm pretty sure had something to do with how the park is financially independent already), and you can even live here now -- but, I don't actually know anyone that does. I recently got excited because the Presidio was in one of my favorite shows: Ghosthunters where they tried to check out if the park is haunted by the spirits of multiple wars. I'm not gonna lie, it was a pretty cool program. As far as parks, there isn't as much to do as, say Golden Gate, but the Presidio is incredibly beautiful.

This is one of few neighborhoods (yes, people live here) that’s also a park. Yep, the whole thing’s a park.

Maybe the best way to get to know the Presidio is to stick to the outside of it. Starting at Marina Green, you can walk or bike along the waterfront all the way under the Golden Gate Bridge, passing through former airbase Crissy Fields and the touristy Warming Hut along the way. Keep going past the Golden Gate and you’ll be greeted by a rocky vista, terrific views of the Pacific to the West, and finally by the little-known gem that is the Sea Cliff neighborhood.

But you have to dig deeper to find the real meat of the Presidio. Explore the roads and trails of this former military base to see former officer’s houses, general barracks, and the San Francisco National Cemetery, where only military personnel with badges of honor are allowed to be buried. Enjoy the spectacular forest and various hikes the park has to offer. And back at Crissy Fields, don’t miss such awesome sites as the House of Air, a huge indoor trampoline center that’s open to the public, or the enormous Sports Basement for all of your outdoorsy needs.

The Presidio is one of the oldest spots in SF—sort of, anyway. The Presidio and Mission Dolores were the first two structures founded by the Spanish explorers who came from Baja California in 1776. Anyway they are the oldest conceptual buildings—they were both moved and rebuilt after that.

The Presidio was a military base until it got decommissioned after the end of the Cold War. It’s been turned over to the private sector now. I think Lucas Arts has some buildings there and that kind of thing. It is mostly however a big forested area—the one that you see when you’re on 101 heading up to the Golden Gate on the northern end of SF.

For me, the Presidio is really about Crissy Field, which a great beach area—perfect for morning jogs and that sort of thing. It is really the only real beach on the east side of the Golden Gate. There are other beaches on the Western end of the SF peninsula but this one is unique because it is more a part of the rest of the city.

The Presidio is one of San Francisco’s most historic landmarks/area, probably even one of the most historic sites in California or on the West Coast. The Presidio’s history dates back to 1776 under Spanish rule. The Presidio was even used as military base during World War II. The Presidio is the longest active military site, running for over 200 years, its military use ended not long ago. There is so much to do and see in the Presidio that I’m not sure where or what to start with in this review. In the Presidio you won’t only find historic landmarks to visit and see, there is also Baker Beach for those who live nearby and would love to go out here for a tan or just for beach fun in general. There is also the Exploratorium, a great place for San Franciscans and tourists alike, more for San Franciscans I’d say though because if you go to the Exploratorium, you can’t stay there for a mere several hours, you basically have to spend your whole day there to get the full experience. I exaggerate, but more around five hours and more of your time. The Presidio is also home to the Walt Disney Family Museum, if you’re a tourist, this would be a perfect reason for you to visit a museum, just because its Walt Disney, anything Disney related is fun and exciting.

As the Golden Gate Bridge runs through the Presidio, a great place to stop by is Fort Point. Fort Point is probably the best and most chill place in the Presidio. Here you can get a great view of the San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge. On foggy days, Fort Point will feel majestic and awesome since you’re standing at a high elevation in the midst of a thick fog. It is also very windy up at Fort Point. As you’re on the 101 heading towards the Golden Gate Bridge and driving through the Presidio, it’ll feel like you’re driving through a forest. There is also a tunnel you will have to go through in the Presidio on the 101, and a lot of people like to hold their breath through the duration of this tunnel because if done, they get a wish. This tunnel is not too long nor too short so it is a hot spot for such wishful actions.

In the Presidio is also a golf course and the San Francisco National Cemetery. There are a lot of historic landmarks to look at in the Presidio, if you go to the right place, you can even see old military equipment used back during Spanish rule, especially several noticeable cannons. Rather than spoiling what there is to see in the Presidio, you the reader should go to the Presidio yourself to find all these interesting historic sites.

As you go through the Presidio you will also notice that some of the street names are quite unique or sound like they are named after people, and true they are. Some of them are named after remarkable people, such as past presidents, generals, etc.

In many ways, the Presidio is where San Francisco ends, an outcropping of cliffs and dunes and rocky coast that form the southern side of the Golden Gate, that thin band of ocean that flows in and out of the bay roughly twice a day. Though these 1,491 acres have been in use for centuries, first by native hunter-gatherers and then primarily by the militaries of Spain, Mexico, and the United States, today the Presidio represents the last of the Bay Area’s great open spaces, much of it undeveloped land with unobstructed views of sea and Marin hills and the Golden Gate Bridge in between, and dozens of historic buildings that are ripe with potential. The fictional “Star Trek” TV series referenced the Presidio as a center of the new federation of planets in the 22nd century, and many people likewise wonder if the place isn’t more about its future than its past.

In its current incarnation as a national park, the Presidio must satisfy a number of needs: provide accessible open space, ensure historic preservation of existing structures, and conserve the natural resources that exist or that can be recovered. But what of the rest? So much real estate is left once all the mandates have been satisfied, isn’t it, in a sense, the last frontier as well?

As with so many land-use issues in San Francisco, that question depends on whom you talk to. The developers say that the Army built up the Presidio for more than 100 years, so they’re only proposing redevelopment of altered land. The conservationists argue that the moment is right to preserve and restore these tracts of undeveloped land as part of the area’s heritage. After all, they say, San Francisco is the second most densely populated urban area in the county (after New York), so why make it worse? Furthermore, social-justice promoters maintain that the Presidio must atone for its decades in America’s military machine by offering space to environmental, labor, and human-rights organizations.

However these matters are settled, perhaps the first thing to know about the Presidio as a neighborhood is that it’s not really a San Francisco neighborhood at all. Rather, it’s a collection of spread-out housing units and assigned-use buildings grouped according to their function within the Army’s master plan for the military base (main parade grounds, barracks, officers’ housing, warehouses, maintenance facilities, etc.). The U.S. Army considered the remaining open spaces reserves, available for development as the defense needs of the nation required. But when the Cold War ended in the late 20th century, and the need to defend San Francisco from attack by conventional means diminished, the Army relinquished the costly base for use as a national park.

Today, despite the fog and gusty winds it at times shares with the rest of San Francisco, the park has the feel of a place separate from the city, a self-contained community with its own telecommunications system; 25 miles of roads; its own water supply (from Los Lobos Creek); a water treatment plant and water distribution system; a high-voltage electricity distribution system; a sanitary sewer system, and a storm sewer system. The Presidio also has its own town square (around Moraga Street), distinct (if tiny) neighborhoods, restaurants, a bowling alley, even a golf course.

Though residents of the Presidio still vote and pay taxes as if they were part of San Francisco, many city ordinances do not apply here (notably rent control). For the most part, the City and County of San Francisco does not govern the Presidio; after the handover to the National Park Service in 1994, Congress created the Presidio Trust to administer the park in a cooperative arrangement with the NPS. That takes some getting used to for people who live here. They vote in municipal elections (for instance, the park lies within the second district of the Board of Supervisors), but they have different police and fire departments. And, because they live in a park, they must also obey rules about what they can and cannot do in their own backyard.

That’s because the Presidio, the oldest continually operating military base in the country, was made a national historic landmark in 1962. Its nearly 1,500 acres have about 870 structures, 470 of which have some historic significance and cannot be altered without authorization. The Presidio’s coastal cliffs, beaches, tidal marsh, and a few historic military edifices are managed by the National Park Service. The Presidio’s interior, including its open spaces and forests as well as the majority of the former post’s buildings, are managed by the Presidio Trust, which is also tasked with making the park self-sustaining by 2013.

Among the park’s increasing roster of commercial tenants is the cornerstone Letterman Digital Arts Center (which houses Lucasfilm, the company founded by George Lucas and most famous for the “Star Wars” franchise, along with Lucas’s Industrial Light and Magic, Skywalker Sound, and LucasArts videogame production firm). Four main buildings designed to harmonize with the Presidio’s historic architecture anchor a 23-acre campus, 17 of which are public space designed by famed landscape architect Lawrence Halprin. The center employs some 1,500 workers, many of whom walk or bicycle to their jobs from homes close by.

A number of other organizations, most of them nonprofit and nongovernmental, make their base of operations in the Presidio’s repurposed buildings, most of which can be found near the Letterman Center in the park’s northeastern quadrant (adjoining the Marina District and Cow Hollow). Among the notable groups are the Friends of the Urban Forest, the Goldman Environmental Prize, the Moore Foundation, the Presidio School of Management, the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund, the Rudolf Steiner Foundation, the San Francisco Film Society, the Thoreau Center for Sustainability, the Tides Foundation, and the World Wildlife Fund. The Walt Disney Family Museum, which chronicles Disney’s life and works, has a home here, too, on Montgomery off Lincoln Boulevard.

The Presidio counts among its numerous visitors’ attractions its fine beaches: Baker’s (with its famous nude section at the northern end; Marshall’s (also swimwear optional, and predominantly gay); and East Beach at Crissy Field. There is also Fort Point National Historic Site (the red-brick redoubt under the Golden Gate Bridge where the famous scene in “Vertigo” of Kim Novak [or her double] taking a suicide plunge was filmed). Crissy Field (some call it “Prissy Field,” disdaining its many “keep off” and “habitat restoration” signs and the somewhat precious Warming Hut, with its menu created by Alice Waters) is hugely popular for visitors and residents of the Presidio as well as adjacent neighborhoods. Joggers, walkers, cyclists, and strollers jam the paved promenade on most days and especially weekends. Nearby is the 28-acre San Francisco National Cemetery, with its tight rows of short marble headstones, a solemn resting place for almost 30,000 of the fallen in battle, including Civil War generals up to the Vietnam War. (The cemetery was officially closed in 1973 to new interments except in reserved gravesites.)

On the southern side of the Presidio, along its border with the Richmond District, the Public Health Services District, with the long-vacant former marine hospital and doctors’ and nurses’ residences on adjacent Wyman Avenue, have undergone renovation as a cluster of some 150 apartments and more substantial homes. This development, just across Park Presidio from Mountain Lake, is intended to serve as the gateway to the Presidio from the Richmond, with roads and public trails leading to attractions such as Baker Beach, the Presidio Golf Course (18 holes now open to the public, with a new clubhouse and restaurant), and Inspiration Point.

The U.S. Park Police has jurisdiction here, in coordination with the SFPD. (There is also a separate fire department, which also coordinates with its counterpart in San Francisco.) Crime is rare in the Presidio, with noise nuisances the most frequently reported, along with an occasional petty theft, car break-in, or drunken driving. No homicides have been recorded since 2007.

For such a large area, the Presidio is somewhat underserved by public transit (particularly seeing how the Presidio Trust encourages residents not to drive their cars). Only four MUNI bus lines cover the entire five-square mile area: the 28 goes north/south along Veterans Boulevard, then east/west along Doyle Drive; the 76 runs along Doyle Drive out to the Marin Headlands and back downtown; the 43 cuts a spaghetti loop through the Presidio’s southeast corner; and the 29 scoots down Lincoln Boulevard in the Presidio’s southwest corner long enough to turn around and head back to its lengthy trajectory over most of the western and southern parts of the city. Golden Gate Transit, which links Marin and Sonoma counties to San Francisco via bus and ferry, makes only two stops in the Presidio, one just after the bridge, the other just before entering the city proper near Lombard Street.

Most kids who live here are bused to public schools in districts within San Francisco proper, though high school students might attend Bay School of San Francisco, a college prep off Lincoln Boulevard and Keyes Avenue.

More than 2,700 residents make the Presidio home. According to U.S. Census Bureau figures, it’s a fairly diverse, educated populace, more than three-quarters white, with Asians and African Americans making up the bulk of the remaining quarter, and 75 percent of all residents having a college degree. For the most part, everyone rents their living space—generally former military housing—some 1,100 residential units in 21 separate neighborhoods around the park, ranging from $2,100 for a no-frills two-bedroom apartment in South Baker Beach to more than $12,000 for a sprawling, amenity-stuffed 7,000-square-foot former general’s home. Pets are strictly controlled (generally, they must be kept indoors or on leash at all times outdoors). Because no rent control laws here restrict rent hikes, people may eventually pay more to live here than elsewhere in San Francisco. But the advantages of a Presidio address are self-evident, with abundant open space, little traffic, access to beaches and trails, and views variously described as “drop dead” and “among the best in the world.” Go see for yourself.