News to Know Archives

San Francisco Records Its Fourth Pedestrian Death for 2024

7Mar

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

News to Know

San Francisco Records Its Fourth Pedestrian Death for 2024

A 41-year-old man was fatally struck by a vehicle in a hit-and-run crash on March 2nd in SF’s Tenderloin neighborhood. San Francisco has already documented an unusually high number of pedestrian deaths for 2024. (Even one life lost to a vehicle is more than should be accepted, but we digress.) Before March 2nd, three pedestrians had died on San Francisco roads due to collisions with vehicles; the first of this year involved a 72-year-old man leaving a senior community center in Golden Gate Park; the man was fatally struck crossing the notoriously dangerous intersection at Fulton Street and Arguello Boulevard. Last week, yet another pedestrian death was recorded in San Francisco this year when an adult man was killed in a hit-and-run collision at the intersection of Golden Gate Aven...

Two SF Bay Area Institutions Become (Or Intend to Become) Unions (Because F*ck Yes)

28Feb

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Culture + Travel, Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

Two SF Bay Area Institutions Become (Or Intend to Become) Unions (Because F*ck Yes)

Good Vibrations joins the ranks of a growing number of Bay Area working cohorts opting to unionize, and the staff at the Oakland Museum of California has officially announced unionization plans Unionization — the act of establishing a trade union amongst a group of like-employed workers — continues to increase across the United States, year after year. In 2022, more than 200,000 workers in the United States became union members; amid demoralizing earning gaps between corporate executives and middle-class earners, stagnant salaries and hourly earnings creating more of a housing burden, and predatory firing tactics on the rise (as well as union busting), the peace of mind and protections afforded by workers’ guilds have great appeal. Mind you, unions appeal to the middle-class to low-income...

SF Bay Area Rapid Transit Agency Just Recorded an All-Time High Record Ridership Since 2020

26Feb

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

SF Bay Area Rapid Transit Agency Just Recorded an All-Time High Record Ridership Since 2020

Two big Bay Area events helped push BART to its new post-pandemic Saturday record for ridership over this past weekend. During the dark and isolating days of the COVID-19 pandemic, ridership among mass transit declined across the country… for obvious reasons. Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) saw ridership plummet some 70% — a drop that’s taken years to pull back out of it. And the agency still isn’t quite there; now-permanent WFH or hybrid in-office day models and overhyped local exoduses have played a major part in that hard climb back up. Nevertheless, Saturday, February 24th, saw a glimpse into a future where BART is thriving. Two large regional events, San Francisco’s Chinese New Year Parade (which remains the largest of its kind outside Asia) and Oakland’s Fans' Fest fe...

We’re Big Fans of This SF Drag Queen’s Queer 2024 Voting Guide

21Feb

By Juanita MORE!No Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

We’re Big Fans of This SF Drag Queen’s Queer 2024 Voting Guide

In a time when voting rights are under attack, it's imperative we all practice our right to participate in the Democratic process... (while we still can). The time has come for me to put together my Queer Agenda Voting Guide for the March 5, 2024, Presidential Primary Election with the help of some of my friends and community members whose opinions I trust. It's as challenging as ever to be optimistic about the political landscape. We are witnessing atrocities in our world and country that have left us feeling helpless, even when we have shouted from the top of our lungs for justice. Some news outlets and social media platforms continue to be full of disinformation, extremism, and distraction. And politics has an overwhelming, unfair influence from big money. For a moment, I though...

Overdue Library Book Returned in San Francisco — 54 Years Late

18Feb

By Matt Charnock2 Comments

Editors' Picks, Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

Overdue Library Book Returned in San Francisco — 54 Years Late

A copy of Langston Hughes's 'The Best of Simple' found its way into the return pile at SF's Merced Branch Library... decades after it was checked out. San Francisco has a network of 29 public libraries that collectively check out tens of thousands of books a year; it's one of many reasons why SF is largely regarded as among the most well-read, bibliophilic metros in the nation. Just this past summer the San Francisco Public Library had its 12 millionth book checked out since opening its first branch — the location opened on June 7, 1879, in Pacific Hall which housed a collection of 6,000 books in a Bush Street office building in the Financial District — 144 years ago. But, some public library books in SF inevitably take longer to find their way back home (by way of return bins) tha...

Meet San Francisco’s Newest (and Most Viral) Invasive Species

14Feb

By Matt Charnock17 Comments

Editors' Picks, Hyperlocal News + Stories, Nature + Climate Crisis, News to Know

Meet San Francisco’s Newest (and Most Viral) Invasive Species

The potential sighting of a large American bullfrog in SF’s Golden Gate Park has set off alarm bells for ecologists. San Francisco is no stranger to alien flora in fauna. After al., the City’s official animal is an invasive parrot from South America that began taking permanent roost sometime in the early 1990s. The initial two pairs of escaped (or intentionally released) cherry-headed conures lucked out, managing to find an ecological niche on Telegraph; now, there are an estimated 200 cherry-headed conures in San Francisco. But because of their lack of genetic diversity, these birds are susceptible to genetic defects; the ingested rat poisoning that threatened many of their lives a few years ago was an unrelated illness to their inbreeding; we humans were at fault for that. But SF...

San Francisco’s Got 99 Problems, but Inflation Ain’t One

13Feb

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

San Francisco’s Got 99 Problems, but Inflation Ain’t One

Despite our nauseating rents and $7 coffees, San Francisco has one of the lowest inflation problems among America's largest cities. Residing in San Francisco is synonymous with existing within a high-cost-of-living metro. Though the past few years have seen the viral, demoralizing rent prices of yesteryear, more or less, disappear — a result of the now ubiquitous WFH policies birthed from the pandemic, which have eased market strain on America’s second-most densely inhabited city — they’re still eye-watering. The average one-bedroom apartment rents for about $2,800 in San Francisco, representing a fairly flat-lined price that’s remained mostly the same the past two years; the national average rent for a similar-sized domicile is around $1,700 for context. SF is the home of Million...

San Francisco Records Second Pedestrian Death for 2024 in Less Than Two Weeks

13Feb

By Matt Charnock1 Comment

Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

San Francisco Records Second Pedestrian Death for 2024 in Less Than Two Weeks

A 32-year-old man was fatally struck in a hit-and-run crash on February 8th at 6th and Bryant streets — becoming SF’s second pedestrian death this year. As bike-friendly and walkable as San Francisco is, especially when contrasted with, say, Los Angeles, the city is latticed with extremely dangerous intersections. Vision Zero’s San Francisco chapter notes just 12% of City street miles account for some 68% of all severe and fatal pedestrian injuries; the 6th and Brytan streets intersection in San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood, where a thirty-something man lost his life crossing the road early in the morning on February 8th, is among those City-managed roadways included in Vision Zero’s high-injury network — the small percentage of San Francisco streets that account for the overw...

It Happened: A Self-Driving Car Was Set Fire in San Francisco

12Feb

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories, News to Know

It Happened: A Self-Driving Car Was Set Fire in San Francisco

The Waymo-operated vehicle in San Francisco was met with a "mob" of bipeds... who destroyed it in the city's Chinatown on Luna New Year. There are few things as divisive in San Francisco as the discourse around self-driving cars. (The only items with equal zeal are Valencia Street’s center bikeway and the ongoing shock over Noe Valley’s $1.7 toilet.) The autonomous vehicles by Waymo and Cruise — the latter company now only allowed to operate in San Francisco with human-assisted vehicles — are subject to boiling rage… from both sides of the argument. Those who believe self-driving cars have a future will fight tooth-and-nail over their thinking, gazing over at how our country’s failure to increase public transit systems and embrace railways can’t be solved by the very modality of tr...

California’s Largest Reservoirs Are Beating Historical Averages

9Feb

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories, Nature + Climate Crisis, News to Know

California’s Largest Reservoirs Are Beating Historical Averages

The recent deluges have handsomely shored up California's water reservoir levels — leaving the vast majority of them to now beat their historical averages. The state of California has been nothing but wet and drenched, windy and gloomy since early last week. Since then, feet — yes, feet — of water flooded various parts of the state, most notably affecting Southern California where six months of rain totals fell over a single day. Compared to where the state was just two years ago, it’s a night and day difference; 98% of California has experienced drought conditions in 2022, per the U.S. Drought Monitor; as of publishing, no areas in the state are organized under these same aforenoted conditions, with just 7% of California noted as experiencing “unusually dry” conditions, though not...