A Digital Journal - San Francisco Public Works
In the Works
October 2025
Public Works locksmiths keep San Francisco’s civic buildings and public spaces safe, functional and secure. From cutting keys to maintaining century-old locks, learn about the skill, creativity and teamwork of the professionals who hold the keys to the City.
Jan. 8, 1900, was the day the City of San Francisco officially marked the beginning of the San Francisco Board of Public Works through legislation that would usher in an era of cleaner streets and safer infrastructure for the residents of the City.
Today, we're known as San Francisco Public Works and we continue to provide many of the same programs and services that we did 125 years ago – while facing many of the same challenges.
Take a trip through our history with many rare images from early in the 20th century, which trace the development of Public Works and the City of San Francisco.
FEATURE STORIES
Pumped Up: Upgrades to the City’s Emergency Firefighting Water System Advance
San Francisco moved a step closer toward earthquake resiliency this month with the completion of seismic upgrades to Pump Station No. 2. The historic structure houses equipment that can deliver up to 10,800 gallons of Bay water per minute into the City’s Emergency Firefighting Water System.
#LoveOurCity
This month, scores of volunteers joined us for our Love Our City: Neighborhood Beautification Day greening and cleaning workday to plant trees, pick up litter, weed and plant community gardens and roadway medians, wipe out graffiti and put fresh coats of paint on benches in the Sunset and Parkside neighborhoods.
Public Works locksmith Vincent Vou carefully reassembles a lock after cleaning its parts.
Key
to the
City
Unlocking the Mystery Behind the Locksmiths of Public Works
Looking for something positive to do after school, 15-year-old Jacob De Losada got a job at Divisadero Lock and Hardware, a San Francisco lock shop owned by a friend of his father, on Divisadero Street. He started with simple tasks – sweeping the floors, closing the store at the end of the day – but within months, his curiosity for taking things apart and fixing them began to take hold.
Divisadero Lock and Hardware on Divisadero Street.
Before long, his boss was passing down everything he knew about keys and locks to the teenager. Within two years, De Losada earned his locksmith license, began driving the store’s specialty van and set out to prove himself to customers who were skeptical of his experience.
“I’ve always enjoyed being able to open things, bypass things,” he recalled. “One of my favorite things to do is open safes as well as pick locks – it’s fun, intriguing and challenging.”
Jacob De Losada is the Lock Shop supervisor for Public Works.
Today, the San Francisco native serves as the supervisor for the Public Works Lock Shop, located at the department’s Operations Yard on Cesar Chavez Street in the Bayview, where he oversees a team of three locksmiths.
De Losada joined the department in 2014 after hearing about a job opportunity from a Public Works plumbing supervisor he knew. Over the next six years, he learned the ins and outs of working for a government agency and eventually took on the role of acting supervisor.
During the pandemic, he left for a few years to work for a construction company but returned to Public Works in 2023 to lead the shop.
Jacob De Losada manages the Lock Shop from his office at the Public Works Operations Yard.
As locksmith supervisor, he oversees his staff’s work and ensures the team has the right tools, materials and safety equipment for the job. The team handles locksmithing needs across City facilities, from neighborhood libraries and jails to City Hall and fire stations.
Although his current role takes him out of the frontline action more than he would like, he is doing the crucial work necessary to meet the ever-evolving needs of a world-class city: producing job estimates for client requests, formulating strategies to tackle complex issues and keeping the shop up to date with technological advances.
A wooden sign in the shape of a key made by a Public Works carpenter brings a dash of welcoming charm to the Lock Shop entrance.
The entrance to the Lock Shop is painted in San Francisco Giants orange.
The Lock Shop
A hand-crafted sign with ‘Lock Shop’ etched into the wood sways in the breeze above a bright orange door. Inside, the walls are lined with tools – everything from basic hammers, handsaws and files to specialized instruments of the locksmith’s trade, such as die grinders, pin kits and key gauges. There is no shortage of workbench space. In a room at the back of the shop a grid of blank keys glints behind curious-looking cutting machines.
On the second floor, hundreds and hundreds more boxes, drawers and containers fill the shelves. And De Losada knows what is in every single one of them: closers, locks, panic bars, hinges, hasps and more.
Locksmith supervisor Jacob De Losada and locksmith Vincent Vou review the master key list for the North Beach Branch Library.
Jacob De Losada demonstrates how a key is cut on a key cutting machine.
The space is incredibly organized – it has to be – with tens of thousands of small parts, some smaller than half a grain of rice. Everything needs to be meticulously labeled, carefully arranged and diligently tracked.
The Lock Shop’s second floor serves as a stock room for the operation.
The Public Works annual report for 1950 makes the first mention of our dedicated Lock Shop. The earliest records of anything locksmith-related can be found in Public Works’ 1946 annual report, showing four locksmiths on the payroll – along with a persistent issue of break-ins into the City’s clubhouses and schools that would last well into the next decade.
Left: An excerpt from our 1950 annual report mentions issues the Lock Shop had with vandalism and stolen keys. Right: The Lock Shop in 1958.
Since then, the number of locksmiths has fluctuated, from a peak of 10 in the 1970s to a team of four serving the entire city today: De Losada and locksmiths Andrew Pham, Giovannie Piril and Vincent Vou.
Jacob De Losada adjusts the pins on a lock cylinder.
A Key 8 Inches Long
With a few exceptions, Public Works’ locksmiths are responsible for anything with a key and lock that is owned by the City and County of San Francisco. Clients include the San Francisco Police Department, San Francisco Fire Department, San Francisco Public Library, Hall of Justice, City Attorney’s Office, Department of Real Estate and civic buildings, such as the War Memorial Opera House and City Hall.
A handful of other agencies, including the San Francisco Airport and Department of Public Health with its network of hospitals and clinics, have their own designated locksmiths but occasionally call on our team to provide support.
De Losada and his staff perform regular maintenance of City buildings, including ensuring functioning access to entrances and fire stairwells and producing keys for agencies’ doors and filing cabinets. The team also responds to emergencies.
“Our main job is to ensure the security and integrity of all of our hardware and key systems,” De Losada said. “I know what needs to happen most of the time, but we always get that curveball here and there.”
The Lock Shop crew also works a lot with our electricians, glaziers, carpenters, metalworkers and steamfitters. Some newer locks may require electrical wiring to be installed or a time-sensitive request might go out to the Metal Shop to create brackets or do some welding. Mostly, the Lock Shop works with carpenters and glaziers, since doors are generally made from wood and glass.
De Losada hammers an imprint into a key with a letter stamp to label and track it.
Keeping track of keys is also a major part of their work. Each key used in the City’s civic buildings is stamped with identifying letters and numbers to ensure proper tracking. The Lock Shop also manages high-security key systems that use multiple master-key levels to control access throughout a facility. At different sub-levels, there are sets of keys that only open certain areas – perhaps all the doors on a specific floor or in mechanical rooms. It can get very complicated.
There are likely more than 50,000 types of key blanks in use worldwide; the Public Works Lock Shop is able to handle short of 1,000. The hardest ones to work with are the ones they don’t deal with often, like off-brand vehicle or jail keys.
The latter may require labor-intensive hand-filing and jail keys usually are some of the biggest keys the City uses – sometimes reaching 8 inches in length! As De Losada pulled out an example of a shorter jail key, with accompanying dust, he said, “That image you see in movies with the jailer and the ring of keys? That still exists.”
Jail keys are much longer than a standard key.
“Exploding” Locks
Before sunrise, at 6:30 a.m. on a Friday in early September, locksmith Vincent Vou arrived at the shop to go over the day’s work scope with De Losada. Vou was scheduled to perform maintenance at the North Beach Branch Library at the beginning of the day, then move on to another library after lunch. After prepping tools and materials and grabbing a set of master keys for the library, he climbed into his van and headed across the City to the site.
Jacob De Losada and Vincent Vou prepare materials for the day’s projects.
Each locksmith has a mobile lock shop that can handle most of their needs while out in the field.
Fridays are typically maintenance days at one or two of the City’s 27 library branches and usually include such work as cleaning the hinges on doors and tightening their screws, lubricating the hardware and ensuring handles turn smoothly and locks function properly. They also check to see if doors close slowly enough to meet state and federal accessibility standards.
Vincent Vou inspects an exit door at the North Beach Branch Library before it opens to the public.
Vou, also a San Francisco native, began his career as a locksmith at a private firm and has been with Public Works for a little more than a year. He really likes working at the libraries on Friday mornings because they typically don’t open until 1 p.m., which gives him some space and quiet time before people start to trickle in.
Vincent Vou tightens the screws of the hinges on the library’s eastern entrance doors as part of his maintenance duties.
After starting the day with maintenance work at the North Beach Branch Library’s eastern entrance, Vou took a look at the bathroom doors on the second floor. He didn’t like how the doorknob was turning on one of them. It wasn’t smooth; he felt it catching.
He removed the mortise lock, laid it flat on his cart – deliberately, slowly, making sure everything stayed in place – and unscrewed the lid to expose the beautiful mechanism underneath.
The bathroom door’s mortise lock needs cleaning.
“If you’re not careful, sometimes the locks can ‘explode’ and that can ruin your day,” Vou said. “Sometimes they have multiple springs and if those pop out – it can take more than a couple of hands to hold them down and put everything back in place.”
Vincent Vou reassembles the mortise lock after cleaning and lubricating its parts.
He delicately removed each piece, one by one, cleaned them with a rag, lubricated some, then reassembled everything like an intricate puzzle. After the lock was reinstalled, Vou tested the bolt to see how it felt. When it is working right, “the spring practically pushes the bolt out,” he explained.
Despite these weekly scheduled visits, there really isn’t a routine day for the Lock Shop crew.
Take, for example, the time the crew got called into the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium to fix a door after someone broke in to steal a bottle of vodka from the bar. Or another time when a trespasser entered with their scooter and drove around the empty auditorium – just a few examples of break-ins that have occurred there over the past year.
The issue? The doors’ thresholds – the metal plates at the base of the door frame installed over the sill – had warped over time due to the constant stream of heavy music equipment, supplies and chairs being carted in and out for events. The sunken thresholds prevented the bottom of the doors from latching properly, compromising their security. Trespassers were also using the doors’ handles as leverage to pry the doors open.
Locksmith Andrew Pham, who joined Public Works from the San Francisco Unified School District where he held a similar role, has spent the past few months reinforcing the venue’s doors. He has been installing new, thicker thresholds and replacing the handles with blank plates in hopes of reducing future break-ins. Our Glass Shop assisted with removing the doors and installing the thresholds.
Andrew Pham works on the threshold of a set of doors at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium.
“Every day's different,” De Losada said. “Some days we’re on a project where we have to put in 15 pieces of hardware. Other days, it’s shop cleanup. Or it’s just all hands on deck on an emergency – and it can be four or five of them!”
The shop gets its work in a number of ways, primarily through a work-order system with other City departments. The team also receives a lot of urgent calls – often a person who locked themselves in the bathroom, or the lock to a secure facility isn’t working – and jumps into action right away.
There are rough days, too. De Losada recalled being summoned by the City Attorney’s Office to accompany the police to a residence for a wellness check and finding the person alive, but their living space to be a biohazard – they literally had to get into hazmat suits.
“It’s hard to prepare for that. It leaves you with a sense of wanting to be more humane and wanting to help others as much as possible,” De Losada said.
Vincent Vou removes the lock unit from a cell room’s entryway at the Bayview Police Station.
Halfway through the day, and just when Vou was about to work on a storage closet that wasn’t staying closed at the North Beach Branch Library, he received an urgent call to the Bayview Police Station to fix the keypad door unit on the entryway to the holding cell block.
Vincent Vou tries to diagnose the problem with the lock in the station’s holding cell block.
Vincent Vou closely examines one of the lock’s parts for any defects.
Again, he disassembled the lock, diagnosed the problem, fixed it and reassembled the lock with surgeon-like dexterity – each finger doing something independent of the others. The issue? A simplex internal clutch, thin as a wafer and about 1 inch in diameter, needed replacing because a worn inner ring prevented the lock from resetting. The crucial mechanism engages and disengages the latch on a push-button lock.
The simplex internal clutch with the worn inner ring.
Vou proudly reflected on the day’s work. “Being able to fix the right part instead of replacing the whole thing? That’s where the real locksmithing is.”
Past, Meet Future
The following week, Vou arrived at City Hall with a handful of work orders from the historic building’s management team. From inside a tiny satellite lock shop in the City Hall basement, he reviewed the day’s tasks: replace the hinges on some bathroom doors and flip a lock unit around in one of the conference rooms so that it locks from the other side.
Easier said than done.
Locksmith Vincent Vou cleans the operators to City Hall’s entrance doors as part of routine maintenance for the iconic building.
The satellite lock shop at City Hall includes basic locksmithing tools and parts relevant to the building’s unique lock systems.
City Hall is full of mystery locks with a lot of history, many of which were put into production right after World War II. Their mechanisms can be antiquated and complicated; parts can be difficult to find or replace; and few people still know how they work.
Vincent Vou works on a City Hall lock unit and door handle.
Lock units, handles and knobs that are taken out of service are still kept for parts inside the City Hall lock shop.
Adding another layer of difficulty, the original handles, knobs and rosettes – decorative covers encircling the handles to shroud the locking mechanisms – are historic and must be retained to preserve the heritage and aesthetic of the grand Beaux-Arts landmark building.
De Losada is in the process of designing new mortise locks, ones that will work seamlessly with the original handles and rosettes, to replace the old locks when they inevitably wear down. The modern locks also will bolster security and be easier to service in the future. But because the locks are hidden inside the door itself, the update won’t be visually noticeable and change the historic look.
Yet, in most other civic buildings throughout the City, the transition to modernity is much more pronounced – electronics and digital technology are ushering in what De Losada calls the security integration era.
Already, the team has been installing more electric locks and automatic operators to meet ADA requirements. That means a power supply, wiring and additional components to open the door.
Add access control, which may involve the use of cards, biometrics, readers, controllers or telephone entry, and you can sometimes have up to five different systems. Access control allows for remote management of users and provides benefits like enhanced security and detailed entry logs.
“We’re more than just technicians,” De Losada said. “We’re also a little bit of programmers – our industry is definitely merging with computers, with technology."
Even in his early days, he noticed the transition to digital and electronic locks and has been trying to stay a step ahead of developments in access control ever since. “This job is constantly changing, constantly evolving,” he said.
“Walking up to a door with your phone and tapping it – or it just senses you’re nearby and opens?” he mused. “That’s the future.”
‘We Are the Keys to the City’
During a tour of the Lock Shop, De Losada opened a cabinet and pulled out two contraptions. One was a piece of wood with an intricate lock mounted on it, inner workings on display behind a sheet of Plexiglas. You could press a small button underneath it to unlock the mechanism and, if quick enough, observe the numerous moving parts and complex engineering that go into a process that takes less than a second.
Jacob De Losada had these lock demos built for visiting students during our Public Works Week open house this year.
The other, a custom-made tiny door with the Public Works logo on the front that he worked with our Carpentry Shop to build, stays locked when an electric current, like from a battery, is connected to it. When disconnected, it opens.
He created these demos for students visiting his shop during Public Works Week – an annual spring event where the department celebrates and showcases its employees and the work they do throughout the year – not only to exhibit his pride for the trade, but also to pique the interest of a young person who might consider locksmithing as a career one day.
![locksmith story[41].jpeg](https://static.wixstatic.com/media/588bd9_f724002708874388886e38417a0ecfc9~mv2.jpeg/v1/fill/w_600,h_398,al_c,q_80,usm_0.66_1.00_0.01,enc_avif,quality_auto/locksmith%20story%5B41%5D.jpeg)
Previous Lock Shop supervisor Gino Assereto explains to students how a key cutter works during Public Works Week 2012.
De Losada reflected on his youthful days as a locksmith and how it helped him learn the skills to calm people during some of their most difficult moments – maybe their car got broken into, their home burglarized. “I learned how to be courteous, polite and treat everyone equally. And it’s contributed to a big part of my character and how I am today.”
He considers it an honor to work for the City and County of San Francisco. “This is the city I grew up in. This is the city that my family has been in for five generations and where I’d like to continue my family one day. There’s just a sense of love and appreciation I’ve had all my life, and it feels amazing to give back to that.”
When asked if there’s such a thing as the key to the City, he chuckled and shook his head. “We are the keys to the City.”
Jacob De Losada welcomes you to the Lock Shop.
Episode 80
Want to unlock more information about our locksmiths? Check out this episode of Public Works TV! We'll take you behind the scenes and get a closer look at the work our Lock Shop does to keep San Francisco's civic buildings safe and secure.
Key to the City
BY THE NUM83R5
PUBLIC WORKS
2025 -YEAR TO DATE (through end of September 2025)
8,350
POTHOLES
FILLED
10,167
TREES
PRUNED
897
CURB RAMPS
CONSTRUCTED
472
NUMBER OF BLOCKS RESURFACED
17,309
TONS OF DEBRIS COLLECTED
Public Works landscape crews plant new street trees on Junipero Serra Boulevard in the Balboa Terrace neighborhood.
New Street Trees
Take Root in
Southwest San Francisco
Beneath gray skies, along a busy corridor in the City’s southwest corner, Public Works’ pro gardeners helped grow San Francisco's urban forest this month.
Crews from the Bureau of Urban Forestry landscape team – led by Manager Douglas Reed and Acting Supervisor Sabrina Soto – began planting more than 40 new street trees at Ocean Avenue and Junipero Serra Boulevard in the Balboa Terrace neighborhood, a prime gateway to San Francisco near Stonestown and San Francisco State University.
Gardener Sean Robinson led the crew during a morning of strenuous digging and planting, alongside Balboa Terrace Homes Association board member Robert Mann who has been a lead planner of the planting project.
The project, Mann said, will be a huge benefit to visitors and residents, including helping improve air quality and mitigate noise issues from nearby traffic.
Before trees go into the ground, crews need to dig out the holes and prep the basins.
What’s more, the crews planted the trees using a process called sheet mulching – a landscape practice that uses degradable cardboard or permeable mulching tarp in combination with a layer of compost. The method conserves water, helps minimize weeds and improves soil quality, among other benefits.
Crews mostly planted strawberry trees, which are known to do well in the sandy soils and windy, foggy climate of the neighborhood.
The benefits of street trees in an urban environment are well-documented – not only do they make neighborhoods more inviting, but they manage stormwater, reduce air pollution, improve human health, cool homes and streets, provide wildlife habitat and calm traffic.
Balboa Terrace neighbor Robert Mann (center) helped plan the tree-planting initiative.
Public Works maintains and cares for the City’s more than 125,000 street trees through a voter-approved program called StreetTreeSF.
Robinson, the Public Works gardener and a San Francisco native, said he appreciates whenever residents join forces with City crews.
“I just really think this is a nice beautification project,” he said. “When you have a community involved in a project like this, it makes it easier in building community and building a better San Francisco.”
San Francisco firefighters demonstrate the Emergency Firefighting Water System.
Pumped Up: Upgrades to the City’s Emergency Firefighting
Water System Advance
San Francisco moved a step closer toward earthquake resiliency this month with the completion of seismic upgrades to Pump Station No. 2. The historic structure at the base of Russian Hill near Aquatic Park houses equipment that can deliver up to 10,800 gallons of Bay water per minute into the City’s Emergency Firefighting Water System.
Firefighters can tap into the resilient, standalone high-pressure system should the regular water system be knocked offline during an earthquake or other emergency.
“San Francisco is the only city in the nation with a high-pressure water network dedicated solely to firefighting. This system will be instrumental for combating significant fires that may arise after a disaster," said San Francisco Fire Chief Dean Crispen.
He was joined by Mayor Daniel Lurie, Public Works Director Carla Short and other City leaders at an event on Oct. 16 outside Pump Station No. 2 that included a live demonstration of the Emergency Firefighting Water System.
City officials representing Public Works, the Fire Department, the Office of Resilience and Capital Planning and the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission attended a celebration that marked upgrades to Pump Station No. 2.
The auxiliary water system consists of 1,500 dedicated fire hydrants, a 135-mile pipeline network, a high-elevation reservoir, two large capacity tanks, two Bay saltwater pumping stations and Bay water intakes.
Pump Station No. 2, owned and operated by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, was built in 1912 after the Great 1906 Earthquake and Fire that devasted much of San Francisco. It was designed to withstand major earthquakes but has become seismically vulnerable over the past century-plus.
The interior of Pump Station No. 2, a critical component of the City’s Emergency Firefighting Water System. (Photo circa 1975)
Today – benefitting from new construction techniques informed by a greater understanding of seismic movements – the retrofitted facility is expected to withstand a 7.9-magnitude earthquake. The improvements include a new steel roof, rebuilt generator room, reinforced concrete walls with interior steel bracing and other upgrades.
San Francisco has been making seismic upgrades to the critical system through the Earthquake Safety and Emergency Response (ESER) Bond Program, which Public Works manages on behalf of the City. The pump station project represents one of the latest ESER projects to be completed.
Among the others are new and renovated fire and police stations, a new headquarters for the chief medical examiner and a new ambulance deployment center. And there’s more work on tap to improve and expand the Emergency Firefighting Water System; Public Works hydraulic engineers are involved in designing the system upgrades.
“The voter-approved Earthquake Safety and Emergency Response Bond Program is vital to strengthening San Francisco’s resiliency,” Short said. “In close collaboration with our City partners, we are delivering projects to safeguard San Francisco.”
The Oct. 16 demonstration involved the pump station moving water from the Bay into an isolated portion of the Emergency Firefighting Water System. The water then flowed from a high-pressure hydrant into a fire hose. High atop a ladder truck, a firefighter then sprayed the water back into the Bay.
The event was held on the eve of the 36th anniversary of the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake – and just hours after a quake on the Hayward Fault in the East Bay that was felt in San Francisco. Both the anniversary and the morning jolt served as reminders of why the City invests in these important earthquake-safety enhancements.
The question isn’t whether a big earthquake will hit San Francisco again, but when. And it is imperative that we bolster our critical infrastructure to keep the City safe when disaster strikes.
Learn more about the City’s ESER projects here: https://sfpublicworks.org/eser
Pedestrians safely navigate the new streetscape outside West Portal Station. (SFMTA photo)
A Safer and More Beautiful
West Portal Streetscape
An estimated 5,000 Muni riders a day board a bus or train near the intersection of West Portal Avenue and Ulloa Street, creating a busy crossroads bordering the West Portal commercial corridor and bringing into sharp focus the need for increased pedestrian safety measures.
This month, the City marked the completion of a traffic safety and beautification project that focused on the half circle outside West Portal Station known as “the horseshoe.”
The new elements include a street mural with a colorful polka-dot design, decorative crosswalks, a new bikeshare station and placemaking murals inside the station. A series of planters were placed strategically on the pavement to keep pedestrians away from vehicles and gently direct them toward a safe and legal crosswalk.
The Public Works landscape architecture team designed the project. Community input helped shape the look and feel.
A whimsical polka-dot street mural and new planters are among the elements of the project upgrades in West Portal. (SFMTA photo)
“The intent was to improve the pedestrian experience and safety – and to enhance community identity at the station,” said Public Works Landscape Architect Katy Taylor, who worked on the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency-led project. Taylor’s colleagues Lilia Pharazyn and Lizzy Hirsch also were part of the team.
The horseshoe redesign builds on other safety improvements installed in West Portal over the past year. Among them: Left-turn restrictions at key intersections, two-way streets made into one-way streets and a new pedestrian crossing beacon that allows people crossing at Ulloa and Wawona streets to push a button to activate flashing lights that signal to drivers to slow down when approaching the crosswalk.
In addition to design work on the latest improvements, the Public Works landscape architecture team also made sure the contractor carried out the project as envisioned.
Taylor said the project was challenging given its spatial restrictions and material limitations, but that the tight constraints can be invigorating to work with.
A map outlines the streetscape pedestrian-safety enhancements.
“They challenge us as designers to ‘solve’ a multi-layered puzzle,” she said. “It is satisfying when we are able to realize a cohesive design that may appear simple on the surface, but in fact has been crafted to respond to numerous underlying constraints and demands.”
New colorful stripes adorn the crosswalks at Sixth Avenue and Clement Street.
Inner Richmond Crosswalks
Earn Their Stripes
A splash of color and delight arrived this month at the Clement Street and Sixth Avenue intersection in the Inner Richmond with the installation of new decorative crosswalks.
The Public Works project management and construction management teams oversaw the project, which was spearheaded by District 1 Supervisor Connie Chan and the Clement Street Merchants Association. Public Works landscape architects turned the community-driven concept into the final design.
The decorative Clement Street crosswalk stripes – in shades of green, blue, yellow and red – are fashioned out of thermoplastic, a material that when heated melts onto the pavement. First, crews lay down the thermoplastic in the desired design’s shapes and colors, then they use heat machines to attach it.
Asphalt Impressions’ crews set the thermoplastic stripes in a pre-designed pattern.
Creative crosswalks have been brought to life for more than a decade now in San Francisco, starting with a rainbow design at 18th Street and Castro Street in the Castro in 2014.
Stripes, swirls, polka dots and clouds are just some of the design elements used in the patterned pavement.
Most, but not all, are associated with larger streetscape improvement projects. A handful are one-off initiatives championed by neighbors and community groups. They often align with a neighborhood’s distinct identity or cultural touchstones.
The Clement Street Merchants Association came up with the design concept for the creative crosswalks in the Inner Richmond.
Decorative crosswalks can be found at intersections in neighborhoods across the City. Among them: Washington Street and Stockton Street in Chinatown, Taraval Street and 46th Avenue in the Sunset, Bright Street and Randolph Street in the Oceanview, Noe Street and 24th Street in Noe Valley, Union Street and Stockton Street in North Beach, Sixth Street and Mission Street in the South of Market and 16th Street and Mission Street in the Mission.
Seventeen new bollards have been installed along Pier 35, ready for cruise ships and other large vessels to moor.
Pier Pressure:
How We Delivered a Crucial Port Infrastructure
Project on a Tight Timeline
In early June, Public Works project manager Tony Abuyaghi received a call about a time-sensitive project for the Port of San Francisco: Could his team replace all 15 mooring bollards and add two more along Pier 35 before Fleet Week in early October?
A cruise ship earlier in the year had damaged several of the bollards – short, thick posts along the edge of the pier used to secure ships’ ropes – and portions of the apron deck while attempting to dock.
The Port requested the bollard replacements to restore ship berthing capabilities at the pier, located near the foot of Bay Street between the Ferry Building and Fisherman’s Wharf on the City’s northeastern waterfront.
The October deadline was driven by the U.S. Navy's need to dock the USS Anchorage in anticipation of its participation in the naval parade scheduled for the start of Fleet Week.
The existing bollards were rusted, weathered and contained hazardous material. And they certainly weren’t strong enough to handle the massive weight of a naval vessel like the USS Anchorage.
The old bollards were rusted and contained hazardous materials.
Despite the tight timeline, Abuyaghi felt confident the project could be completed on schedule given the strength of the team: the Port of San Francisco as the client agency with its expertise in over-water projects; Moffatt & Nichol, specialists in the planning and design of coastline facilities, as the lead engineers of record; Svala Construction as the prime contractor and Power Engineering Construction as the subcontractor, both with extensive port experience; and a capable group of project managers, construction managers, contract staff and regulatory and site remediation staff from Public Works.
The $2.2 million Pier 35 Mooring Bollard Replacement Project was ultimately completed on time and under budget, though not without its challenges.
An aerial view of the newly installed bollards along Pier 35.
First came the question of procurement. Ordering from an overseas manufacturer in Asia would have caused major delays due to shipping time. A domestic supplier in Southern California could deliver faster – but at a higher cost. The team chose the latter to meet the deadline.
Then there were the complications of working in a marine environment: salt water, tides, waves and wind. These conditions forced the team to make on-site design adjustments and adapt to unexpected challenges.
Crews installed the new bollards with careful attention to how they would be anchored to the pier’s concrete substructure, ensuring proper weight distribution across the deck. Each concrete-filled bollard can weigh several tons, requiring substantial equipment to install, which also adds more weight that crews need to consider.
After their removal, the old bollards were safely disposed of at a certified hazardous waste facility.
At 95% completion, the project team conducted a final on-site inspection with the client and design team to confirm that the contractor’s work met all the specifications and matched the drawings. They reviewed measurements, the integrity of the bolts used to anchor them and the quality of the epoxy coating. Everything passed.
The project team conducted inspections of each bollard by boat.
Abuyaghi and the Public Works team managed the final design phase and saw the project through to completion.
Project team members (from left to right): Brian Chau (Bureau of Construction Management), Tony Abuyaghi (Bureau of Project Management), Lexi Lee (Bureau of Construction Management) and Leslie Wong (Port of San Francisco) conduct a walking inspection of each bollard along the dock.
Ultimately, the USS Anchorage never got its chance to dock at Pier 35; the federal government shutdown canceled many Fleet Week events, including the naval parade and ship tours.
Still, the new bollards will bring lasting benefits to San Francisco’s economy. With only Pier 27 and Pier 35 serving as the City’s cruise ship terminals, the upgrades will allow Pier 35 to accommodate more cruise ship dockings each year – each visit generating roughly $500,000 in economic activity for San Francisco.
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Volunteers spread mulch on the Sunset Boulevard greenway.
#LoveOurCity
Every month, scores of volunteers join us for our Love Our City: Neighborhood Beautification Day greening and cleaning workday where community members join Public Works crews to plant trees, pick up litter, weed and plant community gardens and roadway medians, wipe out graffiti and put fresh coats of paint on benches.
The collective muscle power and spirited passion go a long way toward improving our shared public spaces.
This month, on Oct. 4, the Neighborhood Beautification Day team focused its time and attention on the Sunset and Parkside neighborhoods. Among the day’s accomplishments: planting street trees on Irving Street, putting down mulch on the Sunset Boulevard greenway and sprucing up the Sunset Elementary School campus garden.
Volunteers work with the Public Works team to plant trees on Irving Street.
We kicked off the day honoring Washington High School student Aiden Liu as our first “NBD All Star.” Liu has volunteered his time at six Neighborhood Beautification Day events so far this year.
The San Francisco teen could have been doing a lot of other things on his Saturday mornings but chose to give his time and energy to community service. A big thanks to Liu and all the other volunteers!
Public Works Director Carla Short (right) recognized Washington High School student Aiden Liu as an “NBD All Star” for
stepping up to volunteer at six Neighborhood Beautification Day events this year.
November’s Neighborhood Beautification Day event is set for Nov. 8 in North Beach, Chinatown and other District 3 neighborhoods. Kickoff is at 9 a.m. at Francisco Middle School, 361 Francisco St. We hope to see you there!
