Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

There's almost no problem so severe that it is immune to hyperbole. I'm always in such a strange place responding to comments like this, because I generally agree. San Francisco govt is very restrictive toward business - it bans plastic straws and happy meals - but it seems helpless in the face of severe misbehavior from addicts and mentally ill. So severe that people might wonder if some in government are willfully enabling this behavior.

I've lived in SF my whole life, and I'm pushing 50. My parents live here, I'm raising my kids here. Every day I wonder if I made the right decision. There's still time to leave. It hurts, feeling this way, because in many ways I still really love the place where I grew up, and I feel like a lot of my life is woven in here.

I said all that to make it clear that I agree with you And yet, there's still room for disagreement about how severe it is.

I've been on long walks (something I like doing in urban areas) since COVID hit. Where I go often depends on something I need to do in an area, an errand I have to run. I walked a long distance through the outer sunset along the great highway (closed to cars right now). From Washington and Presidio out through Clement street, for a ways. I surf, too, and while the waves don't have the shape of a point or reef break (think Santa Cruz), I'd much rather spread out in the beach break and find the occasional open corner than crowd in with a bunch of surfers all competing for the take-off spot (I felt this way before COVID, let alone now).

Plenty of others (Carl Nolte wrote about a walk of his own in the Chronicle this sunday[1]), I don't need to list them all. I have glorious days here, still - there is some intrusion from urban blight even on those glorious walks, but in some cases it was a still pretty minor. I was not accosted, nor did I have to constantly dodge human feces. The city showed well, the houses and buildings were interesting looking, the views were glorious, the people around were friendly. There are comments who make it sound like every square block of SF is like escape from New York. It isn't, though it's getting worse, and I'm worried. Some of this, I think, is motivated by a desire to disparage left-wing government (I'm ok with holding progressive San Francisco accountable for what the city has become, though I do think we need to consider macro factors beyond what they can control - not to dismiss the considerable role of SF's policies, but as part of the discussion).

I've also been downtown in plenty of other US cities - most recently, Seattle and Milwaukee. In some ways, the remarkable thing about SF's downtown is that it was inhabitable recently. Many cities wrote off their version of market street long, long ago. I do agree that parts of SF are pretty disgusting, and SF does win the top prize in this regard, but I actually don't agree that it is uniquely disgusting.

Anyway, this is just a disagreement about degree, and some hyperbole is intended as a kind of satire or comic rant. Overall, I agree, we have a really serious problem in SF.

[1] https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/The-city-Republi...

The Right of Return is an international law that allows citizens to return to their country of citizenship, and while some may have doubts about the willingness of the USA to follow the Geneva Convention, I'm pretty sure Canada still adheres to it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_of_return

> and spend a weekend somewhere like Big Sur or Yosemite a couple times a year. Bay Area nature is unparalleled.

If you've gotta drive 4 hours to get there, it isn't 'Bay Area nature'... There are very few places in this vast and beautiful country that aren't 3-4 hours away from jaw-dropping scenery - in fact I doubt you could find a single one.

3) A friend who is moving to Santa Cruz just to be closer to surf while we are remote

Yeah? I've lived in SF and Santa Cruz. The quality of surf in Santa Cruz is vastly better, but the crowds are intense and at times pretty angry. I found it was less about localism, more about the anger of a large number of often very talented surfers competing for a scarce resource. I got longer, better rides in SC than I typically did in SF (by a 20-1 margin), but I'd have to maneuver for an hour to get priority for a few rides. They were glorious waves, though. Up here in SF, I tend to spread out on the beach break and find an uncrowded corner. Every thing has to line up just right to get a long, open, peeling wave out of a sand bar at OB or nearby beaches - whereas SC beaches (steamer lane, the point) generate this stuff pretty routinely.

But that's why it gets so edgy in SC. Everyone's in there, you finally get into position, it's your moment, you get maybe two of these every hour, and... someone paddles through the peak. Someone drops in. Even worse, that a someone is you, and you'll get barked at, at best (and while maybe the guy's being a dick about it, you really did fuck up). It's just too edgy, just boils over too much for my tastes. I know people say "well, don't do those things", but you'd be surprised how difficult that is. How do you know if you're deepest on a wave that breaks both directions? Did you drop in, or did someone snake? If you sit too far out, you'll miss the wave, and if you make it, there will be a sea of people you have to dodge. If you sit too far in, you may be staring down the barrel of a dozen surfers all taking off on the peak - and they'll either run you over, buzz you, or kick out of the wave and be really pissed that you ruined the ride that they spent the last 30 minutes getting ready for. Or, if someone does that to you, you kick out (better that than run the guy over), and now you're now caught inside and pissing off the next guy.

I surf regularly, and I'd much rather be in SF or Pacifica than in Santa Cruz. It's a trade off, though. If you want consistently high quality waves, SC does have more to offer.

Sounds like a "tragedy of the commons" scenario.