most infamous intersections and one of its least understood. People from all walks of life cross paths here, but most don’t intermingle. The neighborhood is mostly known for its gritty liquor stores, strip clubs, and SROs, but the landscape is changing dramatically with pioneering restaurants, cutting edge galleries, and revitilization efforts taking hold. On Saturday, June 5th, to get a better sense of what the intersection is really like, locals from The Bold Italic decided to stay a while – for 24 hours in fact. They captured their experiences on video and in the vignettes below. Come back throughout the day as we recreate real time reports from a day on 6th Street.
Other contributors included: SF Public Press , Caliber SF , and KALW and YouTube. Images produced by Volume Inc.
Below will be excerpts from all reports that came in during the day. You can get the full reports at The Bold Italic.
I have seen knife fights before. I have never seen one before breakfast.
It is 5:55 a.m. when I arrive at the Rite-By Grocery. The store isn't open. I pass the time with Patches and David the Lion King, two homeless men, lovers, and longtime friends. David tells me he once stabbed a guy seven times and only went to jail for a week. They offer me a bit of their vodka and I accept. There are worse ways to spend a Saturday morning.
Audio from KALW.
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The fog begins to rise off 6th and Mission as amorphous masses of old sleeping bags and packing blankets begin to shift about. The homeless sleep in clusters, clinging to the north side of the street. One by one the security gates of the area's shops slide open, causing a stir among the waking people. Some leave while others slouch off to some yet unopened gate. Shopkeepers stand in front of their businesses in a silent territorial challenge.
Police Officer Julio Bandoni tells me there’s more action on the streets at 4 p.m. when more people are drinking, or at the end of month, when checks run out and hotels are empty. But he introduces me to a number of the local characters – some regulars whom he knows by name, and others passing through, whom he eyes more suspiciously. He knows the kind of trouble they get up to – turning tricks, smoking crack, making deals – and when he sees it go down, he takes notes in his little black book.
It is the warmest part of Saturday afternoon. I am sitting outside of Showdogs at the corner of 6th and Market. The sun is bright and the fog is still trapped out in the avenues. I have a beer, a fancy truffle chicken dog, and a basket of handmade onion rings. Obviously, I’m smiling.
Sitting outside of Showdogs on this tarnished, seedy intersection is like having front row seats to the best people-watching in the world. I’m catching a little bit of everything: junkies, winos, tourists, wealthy shoppers, punkers, gangsters, trannies, teenagers, hipsters, and hookers.
Fashion designer Jarred Garza gets frustrated when people complain that his Archetype Boutique, located next to The Warfield, is gentrifying the neighborhood. “I don’t see any of them investing in this area,” he says with a frown. “ We’re the ones taking risks.” And although he could do without the woman who regularly swings by to spit on his floor, he’s deeply connected to his location. Jarred calls this the heart of the theater district, and the unconventional clothing and jewelry he sells by emerging designers caters to the nearby opera, drag, and music scenes.
Watch Jennifer's YouTube Video
Walking down 6th Street on a warm afternoon, I'm having a difficult time ignoring the pungent smell of urine. Titus Tolliver and Rene Greenwood surely notice it, too, but that's the least of their worries as they head down an alley to check on a man who's lying down on the sidewalk. Titus and Rene are Sixth Street Community Guides and it's their job to make sure the guy on the ground wants to be there. If not, they'll help him get the food, shelter, or medical attention that he needs.
There are two types of Community Guides – the ones who patrol Central Market (on Market between 5th and 9th) in brown jackets and the ones in blue who are dedicated to 6th Street. They patrol the area Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Titus and Rene are meeting with me on a day off, and I discover there is plenty more selflessness where that came from.
When I arrive at her apartment with a Spanish speaking translator, Maria is a little nervous. Truthfully, so am I. She has sent her husband out to walk their Chihuahua with two of her three children; her middle son, Juan – who suffers from severe autism – is in a special class for the day. The family’s two rooms are small and neat. She likes the apartment better than their last one, which was in the Tenderloin and had a balcony. When Juan had his self-destructive anxious spells, he would often try to jump.
Living at 6th and Mission has been mixed at best for Maria. “I avoid 6th Street,” she tells us, even though it means going two blocks out of her way with three little ones in tow. She also almost never leaves her house after dark. Aside from getting the kids to and from school, one of her only destinations is a small park four blocks away.
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Number 117A is a storefront with whitewashed windows in The Rose Hotel building. Before it was legal, SF AIDS Foundation volunteers walked this neighborhood swapping syringes from baby buggies. Now they run exchanges, mostly mobile, reaching an estimated 75% of the city's 16,000 IV drug users. Staffer Chip Suparich shows me around. It's a small room and with today's heat it's too bad that someone in a long-forgotten moment of whimsy replaced the ceiling fan with a small disco ball.
On the Street: Big Opportunities for Small Changes
Sixth and Market at rush hour is a force to be reckoned with. I used to live near here and felt well-acquainted with the deafening hum of the traffic, the voracity of Market at 5 p.m. But that was before new traffic rules went into effect, cutting back 200 vehicles per hour -- just one of the new projects aimed at making this neighborhood exactly less deafening, less voracious, and maybe even… friendly?
I meet up with Kit Hodge from the SF Great Streets Project. Kit is working to make public spaces more enjoyable and functional for pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers alike. Kit defines great spaces as those that encompass four basic principles: things to do, space to socialize, comfort and safe access. At the heart of the city and so many different uses, 6th and Market is no doubt well-populated -- but, as Kit points out to me, "You'll notice one thing they're not doing is stopping." That seems like an understatement. For all its foot traffic at the center of the city, 6th and Market is plagued by empty storefronts. People pass through with their heads down, not looking around. The new traffic rules are already making 6th and Market a more safe and comfortable place for pedestrians. Now the place's biggest hurdle might be providing something for all those people to do.
So how do you get tourists, SRO residents, and Warfield condo dwellers to hang out together? The city thinks the answer is art. The San Francisco Arts Commission started the Art in Storefronts campaign at 6th and Market in 2009 in an effort to, as the Mayor's Project Director Rich Hillis says, "activate the public space." Some of the pieces still stand, including Chor Boogie's massive mural that largely obscures the boarded-up Hollywood Billiards building. People stop and take the piece in where they would've otherwise shuffled quickly past plastic sheeting and roosting pigeons. A couple walking nearby nod approvingly; a man lugging a big duffel bag does a full stop to turn and study the thing like it's on the wall of SFMOMA. The SFAC and the mayor's office also recently applied for a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, which would provide funds for artists to create more large pieces around 6th and Market.
But this isn't just about making a prettier place. Great places "have some very tangible benefits to everyone," says Kit. "They tend to be good for business, they're safer, you're often healthier. Great places are what make your life great." Some of the positive changes here don't make for the best pedestrian experience, though. Kit and I are continually interrupted by a deafening high-speed sidewalk sweeper that I guess I'd choose over mid-Market refuse, though it's a close call. Mostly I'm just left wanting a return of the seating the city tore out years ago to discourage overnight sleeping. A place to sit while I finish jotting down these notes, watching all the newly comfortable cyclists go by? That would be pretty great.
Watch Susie Cagle's YouTube video
At 4th Street, I hear the sirens. At 5th, the dynamite exploding in the street. By the time I reach 6th and Market, I can see the action: 1,200 Juggalos, the painted-face fans of the Insane Clown Posse (ICP). They are surrounded by a handful of police, The Warfield’s goliath security officers, nervous tourists, and in the middle of it all, a 70-year-old woman collecting empty bottles from the fans.
Outside, the SFPD and security officers are trying to contain the crowd. Inside, the staff is preparing for their own chaos. Every surface of the theater is covered in Dexter-strength plastic in anticipation of the gallons of Faygo soda that will be sprayed by both fans and performers during the show. It’s triple thick this year; the mistake was made of using single plastic last year. “The inside is as close to a condom as we can get,” says The Warfield’s house manager, who is still in disbelief that the band was allowed back for another year.
On my way to get something to eat on 6th Street I witness a few sketchy scenes (including a narrowly diffused knife fight) involving a few unsavory characters that might kill the appetite of those with a weaker stomach. Undeterred, I continue to my first destination, a marker of the new movement to revitalize the neighborhood and make it a destination for adventurous foodies – San Francisco's grittier answer to Berkeley's Gourmet Ghetto.
Walking into Market Street Cinema and identifying yourself as a reporter is like going to a police sting and wearing your wire on the outside. It's a dumb move. The dancers are keeping their distance as if I'm the Shit Demon from Dogma .
At 10 p.m. this place might as well be a church, albeit one with fully nude nuns. Even the group of Hells Angels who roll up on their choppers are chill. “The later it gets, the better it gets,” one worker says. By midnight though, there isn’t much more action. The Hells Angels hang out near the juice bar, with two sets of friends occupying the front row. I’m told the main crowd blows in after the bars and clubs shut down at 2 a.m., but even so, it’s been slow for the last month.
The experience of turning off gritty mid-Market onto sketchy 6th Street at midnight on a Saturday is akin to jumping from the trenches and into the line of fire. Confronted by panhandlers, addicts, and that pesky stench of vomit – markings left behind by drunk Juggalos after the Insane Clown Posse show at The Warfield - I know my only solace in this notorious “containment zone” will be found inside of a bar.
Single Room Occupancy hotels rent by the day, week, or month, although guests often stick around permanently. Sixth Street is lousy with them, and the mangers all wave me away when I inquire about lodging for a single night, preferring to let their rooms to city-approved monthly tenants. “One night?” they say. “No vacancy.” My last stop is the Haveli Hotel. A tired-looking manager behind Plexiglas is placating a disheveled man, promising him a new room in a better state of repair. This is a bad sign: a guy whom I suspect is homeless complaining that his room is too filthy.
The manager agrees to give me a room just for the night. It is absolutely disgusting. A mismatched set of sheets is left unmade atop a stained mattress, obviously just slept in. It carries the unmistakable odor of long-term human habitation. I always conduct “dead hooker checks” in hotels. Underneath the bed is my main concern. Luckily, I find only an empty bag of Cheetos and dust balls as big as tumbleweeds. Despite the absence of a body, my first impression is borne out: cigarette butts dot the carpeting; a can of olives sits open on the dresser; organic-looking stains foul the walls; the sink reeks of urine; a well-thumbed Christian pamphlet asks, Where did you come from? Why must you die?
Also published by Daily Casserole.
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