Parts Of Downtown San Francisco Dirtier Than Slums Of India And Brazil

I moved out of SF last June because I was sick of dodging feces everywhere I went.

My biggest gross-out occurred one morning as I was ascending the escalator at the Embarcadero BART station and noticed at the very top a huge pile of feces that was being smashed and cycled through all the steps of the escalator.

Same thing is happening in LA, R1. WeHo in particular has become HoBo instead oHo. As in hobo. Plummer Park has basically become a campsite, especially at night, in certain areas. People are even sleeping in parking lots. Some in cars, some in sleeping bags. LA is getting just as bad as Frsco.

SHITHOLE.

one mans shithole

is another mans nirvana, mary.

ding ding ding

Seattle is a nightmare. I've never seen anyone shoot up or take a shit in public. Now I have.

jump....

Trump is right.

I love SF alot

city of friends...

I have been sailing there.

Very great city.

OP is right. I was there in Nov/Dec 2016. The city of my birth looked just like Calcutta. It was heartbreaking.

You cant paint the whole city by a few blocks downtown, were the tourists/beggars are.

most of the bay area is georgous.

[quote]most of the bay area is georgous.

R13 obviously has never been in Brisbane, South City, San Bruno, Pacifica, San Carlos, Redwood City, and the East Bay.

[quote]She says the city currently has 2,000 temporary beds but needs about 1,000 more, which will cost about $25million.

What am I reading wrong here. So the extra 1,000 beds will cost 25,000,000 / 1,000 = $25,000 a piece? I guess if you divide $25,000 by 12 month that's about $2,000 per month for a year. Are they saying that is what the price of a studio with a bed in SF is?

Yes and no, R15. The support systems, counseling and food would cost this per person. There would also be a need for drug and job counseling, psychiatric care and health services to get these people back into society. This is a tall order to fill!

yes is true very many homeless in down town area were are tourists

but still i treassure my 3 months living there.

unforgettabble.

When next you go there, i urge you to walk along the beach area. So amazing. I hope to retire there soon. I avoid the business district where hotels/tourists and bums are.

Magnificent is the Bay.

Who is shitting in public? The mentally ill or drug addicts?

both.

mostly mentally fukd up folks. in 15 yrs of living downtown ive seen them dump in public/ between cars, like 5 times. gimme a break.

its the homeless begging and bugging tourists thats the most common thing. dont know why the cops have eased up on taking the bums to jail, or to the nut houses...

.its true that its mainly concentrated in a 5 block radius around union square downtown, very intense there: where the touristas stay.very unfortunate.

5 block area? Rubbish! Try from Townsend by the train depot all up and down 2nd to 6th through much of the Market Street area to Union Square and Chinatown to much of North Beach. Calcutta by the Bay. It was indeed heartbreaking.

What's the scene with hiring day laborers?

Asking for a friend.

There really aren't any 'nut houses' anymore, R20.

When liberals rule.

San Francisco is what happens when you have archaic laws, NIMBY syndrome, coupled with rent control and Prop 13

Sounds like paradise. If you're a scat queen.

More free public toilets would ease the situation. There are not a lot of public places with toilet facilities where the homeless would be welcome. Able bodied adults on welfare could be recruited to guard, clean and maintain them in exchange for their benefits.

Not really, r27. NY has public toilets and there's still people shitting in the streets.

I love on nob hill and honey I don't see no scat.

be careful were u stay!

Here is the poo tracker of SF I love SF but dang it's gotten BAD near mkt/SoMa in the past 5 years

my best tricks were alwys from san fran

baby I love that city

R28, the problem is there are not enough free toilets on NYC. I have lots of friends form overseas who complain when they come here that they have a devil of a time finding places to pee in NY. The city needs to partner with private companies to adopt the model you see in this article.

indeed.;; they need more porto pottys in sf and nyc. them tourists n bums need more holes to pee n poop in!

it isn't toilets

It's mental illness and drug addiction. They intend to do nothing about either of them.

put em bak on the dam bus and send em bak to texas and Arkansas....

R6, I take it you have never lived in New York? I remember when we still had actual phone booths. Homeless addicts would shoot up, smoke crack, and take shits right in the middle of Columbus Circle, or the Village.

The 80s were fantastic for that sort of thing.

R5, thanks for the info.

So I guess Rice a Roni is not the San Francisco treat these people are leaving in the streets.

[quote]When liberals rule.

I never thought I'd live in a place more liberal than me, but San Francisco proved me wrong. I moved there in 2001 and finally, fed up and unable to take stepping over piles of human feces, worrying about my dog stepping on used needles in the park, and fighting past the beggars and hustlers in front of every coffee shop, I gave up and moved in 2010. I miss the city, the restaurants and entertainment, the hot men, and everything that draws one to SF, but I cannot honestly say that the policies the City made on homelessness, vagrants, and the prohibition on telling people to stop shitting in the streets makes any kind of sense.

I don't think the problem is liberal rule per se, but more that there is a very vocal minority that doesn't care about quality of life, keeping the vibrancy of the city, or making it desirable to visit or live there. You can't let every state in the union ship their homeless, drug addicts, and worse there, and expect the charm and beauty to remain. Honestly, the best solution would be to monitor everyone getting off the bus at Folsom and Main, and instead of investing in more homeless shelters and case workers, buy them return seats and send them back to the cities and states that shipped them there in the first place.

"When liberals rule."

Except non of the cities governed by conservatives even come close to the greatness of liberal governed cities. You might not have tons of homeless or people shitting in the streets but at least in liberal cities you have interesting dynamic communities. I'll take the that trade off any day.

where do u fools live to step over shit? ive lived in frisco for 25 yrs near downtown and never seen shit.

git real..

needles, yes, bums sleeping or begging, yes, pissing? yes.

don't come bak if u don't like it u despicable bores.

R41 are you for real? You've lived 25 years near downtown and never seen human shit. You probably thought it was dog shit then or you are blind. I'm an occasional visitor in the Civic Center area and I've seen it more than once.

Aside from the junkies and crazies themselves, all the drug cities of the West Coast seems to have an ever-expanding group of people and organizations that are all pro-drugs, pro-tents, etc

the city is so damn awesome

I could give a dip bout a bum sleepin or beggin.

they know where is the finest place around (sadly, for the rest of us tho)

sunset at the beach is unforgettable.

The view from Cliff House , the restaurant that overlooks the ocean near lands end beach, is one of the most breathtaking view, specially on a stormy day., that I remember from my too brief a stay there.

So many different nature elements to SF, it being surrounded by water on 3 sides. . lots to enjoy.

It will find a way to better deal with the homeless, it alwys does. I notice that tourism continues to climb there, both a blessing and a curse.

What's wrong with San Carlos, R14?

My parents lived in San Francisco during WWII. They lived in a building across the street from Lafayette Park.

Can any of you residents or former residents tell me what that area is like?

georgous, very quaint and lovely....

expensive.

Isn't this happening in San Diego too? All this shit can cause a hepatitis outbreak. Where are the cops?

This is happening in SAN DIEGO? Jesus. Idyllic childhood memories there, seemed like a wholesome and almost conservative city

R46 Like so many Peninsula bedroom communities, a great deal of ugliness and fuck nothing. Not even worth a glance to your right as you drive down 101 or El Camino.

It’s unfortunate for SF that the rents and housing are going up while the numbers of homeless are increasing. But the city is too lax on the situation. I am in favor of a zero tolerance policy. Euthanasia would solve a lot of problems.

The problem is simple, first of all California has laws which make high density housing hard to build. For instance, LA has a law that says each new apartment has to have 1.5 parking spaces per occupied unit. So if it's a two bedroom you need 3 spaces. This also applies to new renovated housing, which means owners who could build up and make more housing don't do so, because if you have to provide parking, the only place to put it is underground which is cost prohibitive in earthquake area like LA. LA is now experimenting with small downtown areas that are relieved of that law to see how it goes.

Business 101 will tell you rent control is bad for everyone except for the people who get in at the start. Prop 13, is essentially rent control for homeowners, meaning your taxes will be based on what you purchase at, not current value.

Add to this, in California, the state allows local communities the say on what to build. You can have low income, high income, and put all sorts of zoning restrictions on it. It's ludicrous that the voters of Marian County north of SF are bitching about the situation when they were the fiercest opponents of low income housing (and successful at keeping it out) in their county.

San Francisco citizen are almost universally opposed to turning SF into another Manhattan with high density, so they vote down proposals, for new housing which means, demand exceeds availability, which any five year old can tell you the price goes up.

Add to that the "Not In My Backyard" attitude and you have a big mess.

LA currently is the most expensive city per person to live in. Other cities like DC, Boston, NYC and SF are more costly but the average person makes more. If you take the disparity between the average income of the citizens and the average rent/mortgage, LA is the most costly city to live in. Which makes sense due to the high transient nature of the entertainment industry.

Finally you throw in foreign buyers who are not using housing but parking their money there and you got where you are now. Canada recently started taxing vacant home units in Vancouver where Chinese were buying but not living. This tax is used to build homes that people will actually live in.

a city intrinsicly determines who will live there by its wage it pays and rent prices. those who cannot afford the city will leave. those who can afford to live there and thrive, will stay... thus creating the character of the place. some must go, some will stay. there are many other places folks can live than sf. its a great big world out there....

ciao bello....go find a place u can afford to live in successfully.

The whole of the downtown has become the Tenderloin.

The rework lyrics write themselves

the magic is still there

love the flowers in the high mist...

let urself go.

Maybe the solution is to build more affordable housing, cap rents etc. Cities need their middle class.

That would help some people, R58.

But for the feces in the street bunch, the answer would be build mental hospitals and crack down on drug use. And have drunk/drugged and disorderly laws that are enforced

They should start with building new public bathrooms. No one should have to shit on the street and no one should be allowed to shit on the street. They should be arrested for doing so.

It's BASIC civilisation.

Living on the street should also NOT be an option in a modern American city.

[quote]Living on the street should also NOT be an option in a modern American city

Yes. And not shitting in the street is basic, too.

A city that has lowered to this extent does not understand public bathrooms, nor do the mentally ill and drug addicts. The drug addicts will use them to shoot up and the mentally ill will live in them or not use them properly, or at all.

Mental hospitals and be strict against drugs,then add more public bathrooms

Have you ever set foot in those public toilets?....gross

San Fransico is incredibly expensive. A good segment of those homeless people are people who are from there but can't afford housing there.

And yes, they spend a lot of money on homeless shelters, but the waitlist for a bed in them is still over 1000 people. There are no easy answers.

There is a very easy answer. Build a shelter with 1,000 beds in Daly City and make it Damn Nice.

I lived in SF during much of the '90's. It was filthy and disgusting then. I am back now visiting a few old friends. It is worse now.

You can't even go to Mr. S Leather to buy a butt plug without being accosted numerous times by burned-out addicts. It is not right.

LOL you ditzy liberals have the worst solutions. It would never occur to you that the homeless could easily shit in plastic bags and dispose of it in trash cans, or even just leave it in a plastic bag rather than out on the street.

The fact is that these criminally insane shit on the middle of the sidewalk just to laugh at you while you step over it in disgust.

[quote]Build a shelter with 1,000 beds in Daly City and make it Damn Nice.

Daly Shitty is bad enough without importing yet more shit.

Sociopathic criminals shit on the sidewalks. "Let's build more public restrooms!"

Sociopaths smear shit on walls of public restrooms AND sidewalks "Let's build mobile bathrooms out of recycled buses!"

Sociopaths smear shit on walls of public restrooms and mobile bus bathrooms AND sidewalks

"Let's spend 3 million dollars to train these poor souls in how to use a toilet!"

Bathroom experts get shit thrown at them.

"Let's fire those bathroom experts and hire more empathetic caretakers to follow the homeless around with little toilets!"

Every city has its dumpy neighborhoods. I lived in SF for nearly 40 years now, and there are neighborhoods you just avoid. Downtown along Market Street is okay from the Ferry Building to Westfield Mall... further down is a mess. The stretch around City Hall and Twitter headquarter is just dismal. No mayor has been able to deal with the homeless issue well, much less solve it.

Shitting in a plastic bag may solve the sidewalk problem but I’m not so sure residents and tourists want to see homeless on Market Street squatting and hovering over a plastic Safeway or Target or Wal Mart bag doing their business.

Where are the people shitting on the sidewalk?

They belong in mental hospital or jail. The politicians do not care about what happens to the city.

[quote]A city that has lowered to this extent does not understand public bathrooms, nor do the mentally ill and drug addicts. The drug addicts will use them to shoot up and the mentally ill will live in them or not use them properly, or at all.

Then you have people on site. Very strict.

In France they always had women on site in public bathrooms. They'd sit there all day. They still exist. Saucer on table for tips.

I went to one in Deauville (north of France) at the beach, a few years ago and the woman in there would have friends visit her for lunch and they'd sit eating sandwiches together in there.

She was particularly interested in me and would look across at me taking a piss in the urinal and be all flirty when I came out.

And you pay 2K a month on rent to have someone shitting at your front door.

r70, classic liberal comment:

"Shitting in a plastic bag may solve the sidewalk problem but I’m not so sure residents and tourists want to see homeless on Market Street squatting and hovering over a plastic Safeway or Target or Wal Mart bag doing their business."

Oh yeah, r70, people would much rather see the homeless shitting on the sidewalk and leaving it there for weeks rather than seeing the homeless shit into plastic bags.

r70, just making more excuses and infantilizing the most anti-social "members of society".

Lock r70 up with the criminally insane for two days and see how humanitarian he is to their "plight".

[quote]I went to one in Deauville (north of France) at the beach

OMG! There's even a photo of it online.

The restroom in the SF Main Library across from City Hall is essentially a public bathroom for the homeless.

And the restroom in the basement of City hall is also a bathroom for the homeless.

Now there are dead bodies on the streets!

I live in sf for 40 yrs tween downtown and Chinatown,

never seen shit on streets

are u people making this up??? are u Russian bots? show me pic proof!!!

I lived on Sumner Street in SoMa for a year, it’s like an alley, and when I’d walk out to Howard I was just astounded at how much shit there was! It’s why I moved back to post Giuliani Manhattan. I couldn’t hack it.

o well, its no mans land down there.

beware

not fit for man nor beast.

leave crack on street for them laced with rat poison?

I see men pee all the time

never seen one take a poop

perplexed by these shit sighters

I live near van ness and polk ,,,,tenderloin aint far.

I’ve only witnessed someone shitting once. He was clearly a crackhead and he was squatted and had a death grip on his ankles . So disgusting but in the moment I was totally amused because the ankle gripping... it was so absurd looking

Last year, I saw a black dude with his dick hanging out of his fly standing at Grant and Market. Maybe he was pissing and taking his time putting it back in... It was evening and kind of dark, so I didn't recognize what I was looking at as I was walking about, and only realize it was his dick a few steps after I passed him by. LOL

ive seen naked homeless men with dik out, jus playin with it. kinda eerie

once saw man and woman bums fukin under blanket: horrible traumatizing sight.. scarred me

Couldn't happen to a nicer city

Remember this video of SF crackheads posted on datalounge?

Why can't they just pick it up like you do for your dog?

This one is even called "Frisco" like that one queen on here is always calling SF.

Thanks for the video R89

R84, since vanness and polk run parallel, you could live anywhere from the loin to the marina. where you at?

If we were able to harness power from feces, we could pay the homeless to crap!

Green city! Poop free!

Win, win!

Feces contains energy. Raw sewage could power a city. It's not a very sexy area of research, but it should be pursued.

Green energy could also be brown.

Love all comments on this thread about "it's only the downtown tourist area". WTF? If you care about nothing else, you should at least have enough pride in your city to make it a priority to clean up the areas visitors see.

I took my first (and last) trip to Seattle a few years ago. Stayed at a Marriott in the "historic district". The hotel was nice but the surrounding area was a hell hole. I was there with my elderly parents and we walked a few blocks from the hotel to try to find a place to eat. There was nothing. Just boarded up shops and restaurants (even ones that still had ratings on Trip Advisor), and there were homeless and drug addicts everywhere. A couple of them followed us for a while--frightening.

How could city officials NOT make it a #1 priority to clean up a so called "old city" historic area? And the locals seem to have a high tolerance for it too---making a lot of lame excuses. "They're not hurting anyone". "They have to live somewhere". "No one uses the park at night, so the city lets them sleep there". JFC, have some fucking pride.

Paris has the self-cleaning toilets around the city (free). Why doesn't San Fran invest in buying a couple hundred of them?

They won't use them or they will destroy them. They are mentally ill and drug addicts.

agreed. we native frisco folks are aghast that the cops don't make an effort to drag the bums away from union square. tourist area. I see it every day, tourists appalled at the bums with their pushy demands.

we don't know why they wont put em away. bewildering...of all spots, ude think they would realize that many just wont come back cause of the human trash.... I never see cops walking around like I used to. where are they???

still, I love the fukin city, so many fine spots in sf to be dazzled by nature and the ocean.

I work at Civic Center - it’s San Franshitco!

[quote]He was clearly a crackhead

And you know this how? Did you sell him the crack on oft occasion and witness him taking it?

You will notice how they don't say the slums of Johannesburg or Nairobi or Lagos as that would be racist.

R101 Saying India and Brazil is racist enough.

Just to be clear, the idea of a human being required to shit in some plastic bag sounded barbaric and humiliating and lacked any human dignity.

SF is a wealthy community. Construction of some basic, supervised comfort stations would afford the homeless at the very least, a respect for them as citizens and some human kindness.

And yes, I’m a proud liberal who has compassion for their plight as mentally ill or victims of their situation.

R103 The richer they are the greedier they get. Wealth is for hording not for caring. SF is a liberal haven only in the eyes of the deplorables.

R104 Remember SF was a gold rush city... now it's a tech rush city. Greedy people come here from all over.

To those saying you never see people squatting in the streets in SF--- I read that in India, where human feces in the streets is a HUGE problem, the people hold it until after dark and go outside to take a dump under the cover of night, for modesty's sake. Maybe that's what's going on in SF too.

I pity the poor fugs

can u imagine havin to live on the street, sleep on concrete, beg for money, dumpster dive.

in know they are nuts and need live in a nut house

but dam its a ruff life, I don't know how they do it

"You can't let every state in the union ship their homeless, drug addicts, and worse there, and expect the charm and beauty to remain."

But, state's aren't countries. If you're a U.S. citizen, you can move about the country freely. If you're born in, say, Minnesota, that doesn't mean you have some irreversible status as a "Minnesotan" and that Minnesota thereafter is always responsible for you, such that other State's can ship you back if they don't want you. They can encourage and/or coerce you, but legally, it's not a situation where, "you weren't born in this state, you legally have to leave."

"a city intrinsicly determines who will live there by its wage it pays and rent prices. those who cannot afford the city will leave. those who can afford to live there and thrive, will stay... thus creating the character of the place."

Then why do well-off big cities that cost a lot still have homeless people?

Is there a long history of this in SF? Also, why, as the city gets richer and more exclusive, does the problem persist, at least to the degree that it does? Manhattan become a playground for the rich and a lot of social ills decreased (not that they still don't exist, but they decreased). Weather has to be one thing, right (though wouldn't LA or SD be better).

The Drug culture and a bureaucracy created to support drug addiction and homelessness is a big part of it.

Why don't the police drag them off to somewhere, make them do manual labor for drugs...

The homeless problem has actually improved from 2016 to 2017. The tent encampments are way down. Mayor Lee finally took action, God Save His Soul. I saw one tent in the Castro in December and the SFPD came and took that down right quick.

Most of the homeless were bussed out of conservatives towns. I have my suspicions that some of them just final solution the rest.

many of them seem to want to go to heaven.

if only there were a way to help them..

In SF, the homeless are really bad at Civic Center and south of Portrero. Probably other neighborhood that I am not aware of. It will not end well when our so-called President is encouraging armed civilians

Sorry, east of Potrero

Unfortunately, the streets of San Francisco have become an open sewer in the past several years, although they have been getting worse for decades.

The city streets are foul. Public Works dept cleans shit off some streets and says they are filthy again just hours later. Hundreds of $$ millions, from the 70s on, from mayors Moscone (RIP) to Feinstein to Agnos, to Gavin Newsom and Lee, and it has NEVER been as bad as it has gotten in the past two or three years. Human shit on sidewalks, open drug use and sales, open sores on street people, and no end in sight.

Civic Center, with its performing arts venues and museums, Opera House, Asian Art Museum? It is an open toilet, AVOID IT. Union Square, with its shopping, cable cars? Disgusting. SoMA? All of Market Street? Eyesores.

See recent stories on SF Gate or the alternative weekly SF Bay Guardian. And the reason it cannot be fixed—the reason the very political culture of SF defies any solution to this problem— is illustrated by poor, dim r103, for whom the mere suggestion that people dispose of their own waste in plastic bags, rather than leave it on the street, sounds “barbaric”.

The city‘s proud liberals would rather the city's workers, business owners, travelers, tourists and residents be forced to walk through shit and syringes every day, than enforce drug laws or require decency from sidewalk squatters.

i have visited the lovely SF many times

i have seen no poop on the street

a few needles, but no feces, sir.

R119 Maybe you didn't go to right places. Actually, the poop is exaggerated in my experience. But SF is a very segmented city. A few blocks can make a world of difference. Actually, I remember there used to be tour buses of Asian tourists that stop regularly in front of the SF Main Library. And they also used the public restroom in the library but I don't know if they still do that now. I thought bringing tourists to that area is like showcasing the homeless to them, but I guess they have to take pictures of City Hall.

[quote]You will notice how they don't say the slums of Johannesburg or Nairobi or Lagos as that would be racist.

Or...they think those places are worse.

So eager to be offended. Get of the cross, faguette.

FIND A MORE BEAUTIFUL CITY

I DARE YOU

If you're going to San Francisco

Be sure to put some feces in your hair

A more beautiful city than San Francisco? Take your pick. The natural setting is stunning. But the city? No.

It is wedged tight with shitty buildings that are unspeakably ugly. 90% of the buildings there desecrate the land they sit upon. There is very little architecture of importance in the city. Just a lot of Spraycrete. If most of it would burn to the ground, again, we could replace it with something that does justice to the natural setting.

San Francisco is many things, but it is not a beautiful city. It is a filthy mess that ruins a breath-taking piece of land.

why do tourists flock by the thousands every day to see our paradise by the bay ????

Tourist who are into scat love SF.

I agree about the architecture, R124, and it always surprised me that there aren't more beautiful buildings in SF. But, a city's location is part of the city's looks. Why wouldn't it be? it's permanent and inseparable from the city; SF isn't going to lose it's setting and the beauty it provides. So, IMO, a stunning natural setting can beautify a city to some degree, even if the architecture isn't great.

[quote]FIND A MORE BEAUTIFUL CITY

Venice

Jerusalem

Bruges

Prague

Positano

Sydney

THOUSANDS FLY IN EVERY DAY TO PARTAKE OF THE DIVINE MIST OF sf........

For R47, the area around Lafayette Park is in the Pacific Heights district, which is posh and very expensive. The park was recently renovated. I used to live across from the park, but I couldn't afford to live there now.

For R96, the Decaux toilets have been tried in San Francisco and some are still in operation, but it wasn't the solution we all hoped for. Street people use the toilets to shoot up and turn tricks, and as someone else pointed out, some won't even bother to use them.

For R11, it's not true that liberal San Franciscans would rather "force [people] to walk through shit and syringes every day" than see the drug and public decency laws enforced. Baloney! We all would like to see the problem go away, but there's no easy solution, especially when cities in conservative states keep shipping their homeless here.

The Civic Center is definitely in crisis. Needles on the Muni steps, junkies shooting up at ATM machines, crazy beggars everywhere

Democrats destroying America, one city at a time.