Mission Mission

Good news! The 24th St BART escalator is working!

Here we see the escalator in its new spin cycle. This is a new feature added by BART engineers to clear the escalator of HUMAN WASTE.

Via SFGate:

When work crews pulled open a broken BART escalator at San Francisco’s Civic Center Station last month, they found so much human excrement in its works they had to call a hazardous-materials team.

While the sheer volume of human waste was surprising, its presence was not. Once the stations close, the bottom of BART station stairwells in downtown San Francisco are often a prime location for homeless people to camp for the night or find a private place to relieve themselves.

All those biological excretions can gum up the wheels and gears of BART’s escalators, shutting them down for long periods of extended repairs, increasing station cleaning costs and creating an unpleasant aroma for morning commuters.

Thus far, BART has blamed this on:

1) the main drive gear

2) an overly-sensitive sensor

3) shit.

We should have a contest to guess what’s next on BART’s checklist. I’m guessing:

4) Birds!

Canada!

Reader @doogiehowsahthinks the timing is suspect:

Wow, it’s such an interesting coincidence that as the story of BART neglecting Mission stations started to gain traction, this story suddenly comes out, blaming dirty poor people for the problem.

We clearly need to wrap the escalator and all BART passengers in vinyl.

On the other hand, here’s a trippy panorama of the 24th St BART foyer:

Found this weird arrangement of stuff out front. What’s the deal? (Guerilla marketing attempt by Puccini Group?)

Good Eggs is this new thing where you can do your farmer’s market shopping online. You’d think maybe it would negate the need for an IRL farmer’s market like the Mission Community Market, but actually it looks like they’re working in tandem, which is great. (Some people seem to think it’s always real life vs. the internet, but I say why can’t we enjoy both, am I right or what?)

Anyway, to celebrate their launch, they’re roasting up a pig this evening! RSVP and invite your friends!

And if you want to know more about Good Eggs, Mission Local has a big feature up right here.

[via Funcheap SF] [Thanks, Kate S.!]

That’s supposed to be parallel parking there, so this guy must’ve gotten creamed in the intersection and spun ’round like crazy.

[via @flywithsig]

Every week, photographer Joshua Cobos shoots a roll of film just for us. He picks the best 13 photos and we post them here, and it’s called “Bad Blood with Joshua Cobos.” Here’s what Joshua has to say about this week’s installment:

In the twenty questions of my life, these are the ‘animal vegetable mineral’ variants of the past week or so. A majority of these images were taken with an upcoming series of still lifes I’m doing in mind. Enjoy.

Thanks, Joshua! Ten more shots after the jump:

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24th St BART Escalator Update:

No escalating. But a new sign!

Hey, wait, July’s almost August. Aaahh, I see, this memo is actually from May.

Anyway, I’m guessing we’ve passed the point of a “minor” repair? I say we just skip this escalation and implement Futurama-style pneumatic tubes. Though if this continues, the flux could build up to such a level that some passengers might enter a vortex and find themselves back in an alternate 1960s where we had BART hovercraft.

UPDATE: Mission Loc@l reports that there’s an oversensitive sensor to blame:

The escalator is back in service most of the time but there is a sensor that stops the escalator if a certain weight is exceeded. Technicians have made some adjustments to make the device less sensitive. Hopefully, that will work and will keep the escalator in service.

Vic Wong summarizes this for us:

Woah, that was quick. Less that 1.5 months after we checked out the brand new Popo’s pizza on 24th, it has closed. I’ll bet most of you never even got to eat there. This comes from Popo’s facebook:

On July 10th, Popo’s Pizza was closed due to a disagreement between Charles Hopkins, creator of Popo’s Pizza, and San Francisco Ventures LLC, the company that owned and operated Pizza Di Mano. Moving forward, Mr. Hopkins will no longer be associated with San Francisco Ventures LLC, who will be operating the business at 3331 24th Street in San Francisco. All original recipes and staff have left with Mr. Hopkins.

Doesn’t exactly sound like a clean break-up, judging from an update from Friday:

So a little up date on whats happening to popo’s …..besides trying to keep all my equipment Harold (ted) hand president of San Francisco Ventures LLC..witch ran pizza di mano is now trying to sue me for $50,000.00 …. i guess some people just cant make $$$$ from there own ideas.. oohhh well updates soon thank you all.

Oohhh well.

Update 7/30: This comment was just left from “SF Venturese” who appears to be on the other side of the story:

As always there is two sides to every story but when funds are missing from the bank account and cannot be accounted for, it’s time to pull the plug on an idea or person. Yes we also told him to sell slices.

Sheesh. Remind me to never get into the restaurant business.

We’ve already heard quite a bit about this project, but I thought this official message, circulated this morning, might also be of interest:

****FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE****

ALAMO DRAFTHOUSE IS COMING TO SAN FRANCISCO!

Austin, TX— Wednesday, July 25, 2012—Alamo Drafthouse Cinema is pleased to announce its plans for Alamo Drafthouse New Mission in San Francisco, CA.  Alamo Drafthouse New Mission is slated to open during the fourth quarter of 2013 at 2550 Mission St. in the historic New Mission theater.

“With the possible exception of Austin, San Francisco is my favorite city in the world.  My parents met there, I was born in Berkeley, and my wife was working in the city before I begged her to come help me start my first theater venture in Bakersfield, CA,” said Alamo CEO and Founder Tim League.  “There is no accident that the first theater outside of Austin that my wife and I pursued is in San Francisco.”

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I’ve always thought Bryant was one of the prettier thoroughfares in the neighborhood, but I guess the southernmost end needs just a little more juice. They’re gonna remove some left-turn lanes and add medians and bulb-outs in an effort to make things prettier and safer. Mission Local reports:

One of the new medians will go up at Bryant and 26th streets, and another at Bryant and Cesar Chavez streets. The medians will be 8 feet wide, 110 feet long and filled with greenery planted by Friends of the Urban Forest.

Read on for testimony from neighbors and info on how this will affect parking.

24th St BART escalator update: still broken.

The estimated repair date is now IN THE PAST.

Also, if BART ever hits 88 miles per hour, you might end up at the Smile Awhile Tavern.