phase 2 of the soma alleyway improvement project — originally scheduled for completion in july of 2012 — is finally well under way and finally near completion.
one of the “improvements” is that the sidewalk on 6th st was raised where it crosses natoma street, to make it easier for pedestrians and wheelchairs traversing the sidewalk. it was raised so much that cars entering the streets now bottom out as they drive up on the raised sidewalk, and that is damaging cars and gouging out the concrete from the brand new sidewalk.
the gouge marks have been clearly visible since the concrete dried and the first cars started driving on it. it is painfully obvious that this is a problem. this should have been evident in the planning stage; at that point it would have been fairly inexpensive to correct. it should have been noticed and fixed in the construction phase; that would have been a little more expensive to correct. now that the work is almost complete it still needs to be fixed or drivers should start filing claims against the city for damage to their vehicles; either option will be much more expensive.
no time to do it right the first time around; plenty of time and money to re-do it though, eh city?
someone in the last two days painted “this sucks” on the concrete. (not sure who did the painting, but it does indeed suck.) and in those two days the paint has been very visibly gouged out where cars have been bottoming out.
the city inspectors pissed and moaned about the textured asphalt not being just right and made the subcontractor re-do the work (purely cosmetic). but this functional defect slides right by. seems that someone is asleep on their well-funded-and-with-incredible-benefits-and-huge-pension public service job. no surprise there.
as i was entering this problem report a city crew came out to — guess what — remove the “this sucks”. i asked the guy who was doing nothing and appeared to be the supervisor if there were any plans to fix it. he said — and i quote — “actually, now that we’re here nobody’s hitting it”. (yeah, because you’re in the way of the cars.) all the while with a huge smirk on his face. how did this idiot get on the city payroll? oh, no surprise there.
fix it, dammit.
THIS SUCKS. Concrete-gouging-car-damaging raised sidewalk. Natoma St & 6th St
THIS SUCKS. Concrete-gouging-car-damaging raised sidewalk. Natoma St & 6th St
SMUG SF DPW: “actually, now that we’re here nobody’s hitting it.”
