đź”· Open Thread

Ha! I saw that too. I was going to post it earlier but forgot.
 
Saw this on another board. It's one of those cartoon business maps from the 80s. Close up details here.

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Am I the only one who thinks the whole station shakes a little too much under all the bridges when semi's drive on 93 above Sullivan Station? I'm not an engineer and I realize a little sway is normal but it seems very old/rusty/loud/about to suddenly collapse at any moment but I'd really like to hear some others' opinions on the matter
 
hockey92 said:
Am I the only one who thinks the whole station shakes a little too much under all the bridges when semi's drive on 93 above Sullivan Station? I'm not an engineer and I realize a little sway is normal but it seems very old/rusty/loud/about to suddenly collapse at any moment but I'd really like to hear some others' opinions on the matter
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Someone should drop a bomb on Sullivan Sq, with ground zero being the station parking lot being ground zero. Then restitch the whole area back together.

Of all the places impacted by the Big Dig, I'm kind of surprised that the project did not extend from the inner belt ramps up to the Fellsway area. Sullivan Sq and Rutherford Ave probably should have been bundled in. But the Greenway probably would have extended all the way up Rutherford's median and into Sullivan Sq. And/or it would have been more autocentric than current plans for Sullivan.
 
Second time this year I've spotted our beloved Back Bay Tower guy... it's coming right for us!!

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So this was literally 20 minutes ago on the bus I take to work... I've never seen him in the area before (Brookline) but there he was walking right towards me, eyes focused right on the open seat in front of me and then plopping down in said seat.

So I thank you, oh glorious architectural humor gods, for giving me something to smile about on this ugly grey Tuesday-that-feels-like-a-Monday.
 
commuter guy said:
Hilarious. I'm impressed at your stealthy photo taking skills too.
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I honestly don't know how he managed to not notice me. I mean it wasn't like I had anywhere to hide my phone. I guess he was so consumed with locating an open seat that his peripherals failed to notice that kid with a phone pointed right at him.
 
kz1000ps said:
I honestly don't know how he managed to not notice me. I mean it wasn't like I had anywhere to hide my phone. I guess he was so consumed with locating an open seat that his peripherals failed to notice that kid with a phone pointed right at him.
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He was too busy mulling over the lyrics to his next NIMBY folk song. I wonder if he'll be playing right before you guys at the September Boston Calling.
 
Heineken: The Best Beer in the Atlantic Ocean. These ads are also on the T.

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Be glad you don't live in San Francisco today...

Muni sickout causing delays across city

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"Paul Rose, a Muni spokesman, said 400 of the 600 Muni vehicles that are normally on the streets were not in service. Some riders reported waiting more than an hour for a bus to show up.

All express and limited buses are stopping at every stop. There is no cable car service, but those lines are being supplemented by limited shuttle-bus service, the agency said."

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Muni-sickout-causing-delays-across-city-5522044.php
 
wut?

The forgotten Atlantic Ave subway in Brooklyn, NY and the efforts by one man to find a rumoured relic. (excerpt)

The Fight to Find John Wilkes Booth’s Diary in a Forgotten Subway Tunnel
By Joe Kloc / Newsweek / June 10, 2014

The tunnel had been sought by curious New Yorkers for more than a century. Though the city paid to have it filled in 1861, the year it closed, rumors had always persisted that the work was never done. In 1896, the Brooklyn Eagle investigated stories of “rendezvous for bandits, murders, escaped moonshiners, or crooks” beneath Atlantic Avenue and found that the “city works department knows absolutely nothing about the tunnel.” In 1936, police received an anonymous letter from Massachusetts that read “if you inspect the old tunnel you might find something interesting,” but were unable to locate an entry point.

The old civil engineer nevertheless welcomed Diamond’s efforts. After a fruitless search of the city’s records, Diamond came across a forgotten wooden box on a high shelf that probably hadn’t been open for almost a century. The two men broke off its rusty padlock. Inside was a map of the Atlantic Avenue Tunnel.

When the two men unfolded the 4-by-2-foot diagram, Diamond noticed a little blue dot where the tunnel’s roof met the street. “I figured it was a manhole.”

A year later, in August 1981, Diamond gathered a group of city employees on a corner of Court Street and busy Atlantic Avenue. Together, they pried open the manhole cover in the middle of the street. Diamond climbed inside but found there was only about three feet of clearance before he hit a dirt floor. His body halfway popping into the street, with cars passing on either side, Diamond remembers “starting to feel like a real moron. How did I get myself into this?” He ducked inside the narrow cavern and, clutching a radio and flashlight, he belly-crawled along the dirt floor, making his way into the darkness.

After crawling just 70 feet, however, Diamond hit a dirt wall. Having just seen Raiders of the Lost Ark the night before, he remembers thinking, What would Indiana Jones do? In quixotic desperation, he shoveled away handful after handful of dirt, and in a few minutes, he unearthed the top of a stone archway. It was, he realized, the entrance to the tunnel. Diamond tried to radio to the crew above him on the street. “But all I could do was laugh,” he recalls. But that was enough. “They knew I found it.”

One of the city officials climbed into the manhole with crowbars, and the two of them began prying away the bricks and cobblestones obstructing the entrance. For hours, they hacked away at the century-old rock, and when they finally broke through, a rush of cold air came out of the opening. After a little more digging, they discovered that there was a 15-foot drop to the floor of the tunnel. The official accompanying Diamond informed him this was as far as they could go because no ladder would fit through the manhole. “Just give me $20,” Diamond pleaded. Much to his surprise—”that was a lot of money back then”—the man complied. Diamond climbed out into the street, walked to Bruno’s Hardware on Atlantic and bought a chain ladder.

“Here,” he said to the official inside the tunnel. “Set it up.” They then lowered the ladder into the opening and Diamond descended into the dark cavern that had been untouched for about a century. He shined his light around the 137-year-old passage. It was huge, with an arched ceiling made of cobblestone. Larger, irregularly shaped stones formed the side walls. There were stray rocks, rail spikes and shards of a bootleg liquor bottle scattered on the dirt floor where the railroad tracks once ran. He wandered into the dark cavern. After walking about 1,600 feet, he hit the four-story wall of rocky debris that he now believes conceals Booth’s diaries and the lost locomotive. “It was like not being in New York anymore,” he says. “No sounds in the streets, no people—like another planet.”
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Well shit, to say my curiosity has been piqued would be a vast understatement.
 
San Francisco activists are going all in on the battle against rising prices...

Tax to brake S.F. real estate speculation headed to voters

Updated 12:50 pm, Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Supervisor Eric Mar and tenant activists unveiled a ballot measure Tuesday that would impose a steep tax on investors who sell an apartment building within five years of buying it, a proposal they said is aimed at reining in real estate speculators who are helping to drive up housing prices by flipping rental properties.

The "anti-speculation" tax, which would apply solely to smaller, rent-controlled, multi-unit buildings, will join several other housing measures on an already-crowded November ballot. It asks voters to approve a graduated tax that decreases the longer an owner holds onto a property - starting at 24 percent of the selling price if a building is sold within a year of purchase, falling to 14 percent at five years and disappearing in the sixth year.

The measure exempts single-family homes, condos, owner-occupied tenancies in common, properties not being sold at a profit, new construction, properties being turned into affordable housing, and buildings with more than 30 units.

The support of four supervisors is needed to place a measure on the ballot. Mar is joined by Supervisors John Avalos, David Campos and Jane Kim.

"This is a serious situation we are in - the unstable housing costs in the city, even the average cost of a rental unit is so out of whack right now and it's driven ... by wealthy, powerful interests who are flipping apartment buildings and making a lot of money quickly," said Mar. "This will slow down or stop the flipping by greedy speculators, help ensure more of a balance of housing in the city, and hopefully address the out-of-whack, super increase in apartment rental prices right now."

Mar said the measure will also help protect neighborhood character by allowing long-time tenants to stay in their homes.

The idea was first raised in the city in 1978 by Supervisor Harvey Milk, shortly before his assassination, said Sara Shortt, executive director of the Housing Rights Committee of San Francisco. This time, it grew out of a tenants convention in February, said Gen Fujioka, a member of the San Francisco Anti Displacement Coalition and longtime affordable housing activist.

Fuijoka said the proposal is aimed at "hit-and-run investors" who swoop into the city to make a huge profit, not small landlords - but he acknowledged that it's unlikely the tenants will garner support from property owners who stand to profit from an increase in housing prices.

Realtors have serious concerns about the proposal, said Jay Cheng, deputy director of government and community relations for the San Francisco Association of Realtors. Cheng said it should at least exempt people selling their property to family members. It could end up driving housing prices even higher by reducing the number of properties on the market, he said.

"All this is really going to do is slow down the pace of the housing market - but prices will still increase," Cheng said.

He said he was baffled as to why the proposal exempts larger apartment buildings, saying it will just hurt "mom and pop" landlords who tend to own smaller properties. It could also have negative impacts on younger, first-time buyers who have to sell because their careers take them elsewhere, he said.

"It's really unfortunate that Eric Mar's office never reached out to us," he said. "As Realtors, we could have helped mitigate some of the unintended consequences."

Still, Cheng said, the association will review the proposal more closely before deciding whether to campaign against the measure.

Noni Richen, president of the Small Property Owners of San Francisco, said rent control is really to blame for the hot real estate market. She said the rents at her four-unit San Francisco building, for example "are about what a family member receives by renting out a one-bedroom condo."

"The tenant activists are reacting to a situation that they themselves have caused by creating a business environment where small operators are forced to operate at a loss by subsidizing people at below-market rents that don't keep up with inflation," she said.

It leads to people, in some cases, having to sell their buildings, "sometimes to 'flippers,' " she said.

'Anti-speculation' tax
The proposed ballot measure would impose a graduated tax on investors who sell a multi-unit building within five years of purchase. The tax would be based on a percentage of the resale price. It would decrease every year, and disappear after the fifth year. It would range from:

-- 24 percent in year one

-- 22 percent in year two

-- 20 percent in year three

-- 18 percent in year four

-- 14 percent in year five

Source: Anti Displacement Coalition

Marisa Lagos is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: mlagos@sfchronicle.com Twitter @mlagos
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http://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/Tax-to-brake-S-F-real-estate-speculation-headed-5558857.php
 
Okay, I've owned up to it before and I'll own up to it again.

I don't really like soccer.

Having said that, I tried to get into soccer by watching the USA/Portugal game and...

...ugh. What an awful result.

We're basically eliminated now, right? We would need to beat Germany or draw them to advance. Do I interpret that result correctly?
 
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