OK, Bryant Street, You're Going on a Diet With More Greens

Traffic calming at Bryant Street near Cesar Chavez Street (click to enlarge) [Credit: SF Planning Department]

Planners call reducing the number of lanes on a street a "road diet" and last week, the Sustainable Streets Division of San Francisco’s MTA approved a strict one for Bryant Street between 26th Street and Cesar Chavez. One that includes a salad bar– two medians, 8 feet wide and planted by Friends of the Urban Forest. We're not sure how accurate the c.2009 image above is, but residents have been working for years to slow down high speed auto traffic coming off the nearby 101. The Mission District Streetscape Plan has a new look in mind for Bryant Street all the way to 23rd Street, and it looks like this shorter bit will be finished by the end of the year. The plan is worth a look, a kind of kinder, gentler, more pedestrian-friendly dreamscape we're happy to see being implemented, block by block, over the entire Mission. More at Mission Local. The Sustainable Streets Division is responsible for approving all the engineering and planning details that keep pedestrians, bikes and cars playing nicely together.
· Mission District Streetscape [SF Planning Department]
· SFMTA Approves Bryant Street Changes [Mission Local]