San Francisco Launches Revitalization of Cesar Chavez Street
SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) - San Francisco is embarking on a plan to make one of the busiest streets in the City's Mission District more livable.
KCBS' Barbara Taylor Reports:
"It's all about beautifying and revitalizing our streetscape," outgoing Mayor Gavin Newsom declared.
First there were some Sunday street closures, then mini parks started popping up all over San Francisco. Parks were replacing asphalt where cars and trucks used to whiz by.
Now, Newsom explained a similar makeover was in the works for Cesar Chavez St., a busy thoroughfare that divides the Mission District from Bernal Heights.
Some people still know it by its old name, Army Street.
"Cesar Chavez in particular is one of those streets in San Francisco with an interesting history, of course the controversy in the name change, but also a street that kind of separates the neighborhood," said Newsom.
San Francisco hoped to blur that neighborhood division by adding a bit of landscaping and bike lanes, reducing traffic from six to four lanes, and by widening sidewalks.
Those efforts were expected to not only reduce traffic, but to make Cesar Chavez St. an overall more inviting destination.
The $28 million project was expected to formally launch in Spring 2011.
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