A Block Away, A World Apart: the Unexpected Beauty of the Grid

The street grid is a popular punching bag, even among fellow urbanists. The most common accusation is that it’s boring. Parallel and perpendicular lines dicing up the city seem to impose a lifeless logic to human habitat. It’s…inorganic. Sterile, even.

I love the grid. To list the obvious advantages: grids are easy to navigate, even if you’re unfamiliar with an area. With evenly spaced intersections, there are options for getting from point A to point B. This flexibility makes it resilient because if one route is blocked, there’s an alternative (literally) right around the corner.

Mechanical advantages of grid patterns aside, there’s a distinct beauty to them. In San Francisco, the arrangement of the grid allows for straight lines of sight. From Yerba Buena Island capping the view down Folsom to Twin Peaks lording over Market, it’s these straight-as-an-arrow streets that frame some of our best sightlines.

Cities are never defined by their form alone – streets and public spaces are a stage, and any stage is uninspired until you’ve built a set atop it. It’s not the relative arrangement of streets that define their character, it’s the buildings and other structures that make up the street walls. The abutting architecture and the active mixture of public and private space give streets their character.

Part of the beauty of a big city is that there is no one way to enjoy a street - there are as many perspectives on its character as there are people strolling through it. In this article, I'm going to share my own (admittedly) narrow perspective. If you feel differently than I do, I'd love to read your opinion in the comments. This is to be a discussion, not a lecture.

In San Francisco, there’s no better example of unique street character than what's in the Mission District. Mission, Valencia, Guerrero and Dolores Streets all run parallel to each other. But each is a world of its own.

Mission St.

The workhorse of the Mission District street grid, Mission is a blue-collar line slicing through a pastel-toned sea of gentrification. It’s the neighborhood’s main transit artery, but not its main drag. That title goes to 24th St., which runs perpendicular to Mission in its southern reach.

24th and Mission is a node, with ad-hoc marketplaces springing up on the opposite corners hosting the BART plazas. Traveling north, the street’s grocery stores, money transfers and cell phone repair shops set the tone of this working street. There isn’t much lingering on Mission – the only people staying still are the street vendors hawking elote and others selling bottles of shampoo obtained under…questionable circumstances.

Mission is a place for running errands, not window shopping. For casual perusing, you’ll want to head two blocks over to Valencia.

Valencia St.

This street is more accurately classified as a mall. Valencia is substantially narrower than Mission, ?giving it a slower vibe than its faster-paced compatriot. It’s also very trendy, with every store under five years in business undertaking the ironic task of distinguishing itself with the most minimalist aesthetic on the block. Some of the older shops give the street a more eclectic vibe: it might be the only place where you can buy an antique couch (Aunt Bill’s Stuff), a vinyl record (Stranded Records) and a coyote penis bone (Paxton Gate) in one frenzied session of retail therapy.

Valencia invites pedestrians to stay a while. It always feels like you can duck into a parklet to catch your breath if the throngs of meticulously-styled-to-look-unstyled 20/30 somethings are crowding you to the point that omg you literally can’t even. And hey, since you’re already there, you might as well get an oatmilk cortado from the adjacent cafe.

Guerrero St.

Guerrero is defined by a mix of modest mid-century and majestic Victorian homes on either side of four lanes. Home to neighborhood icons such as the original Tartine bakery and only a block away from the Bi-Rite Grocery, Guerrero marks a boundary in the Mission District.

On Guerrero’s east is the mural-adorned, taqueria-anchored Mission, rich in Hispanic culture. On Guerrero’s west, there isn’t much Mission left before the neighborhood bleeds into Noe Valley, Dolores Heights, Eureka Valley, or the Castro.

Guerrero really embodies its border nature. The aforementioned mix of building vintages is an indication of this, to the point that I don’t think I can classify Guerrero as ritzy or not. Some houses on the street are fancy, some aren’t. There is everything from single-family homes to condo complexes, affordable housing to true mansions. It’s a street on the edge, frozen in transition. I think it always will be. That’s what makes it Guerrero.

Dolores St.

Unlike Guerrero, Dolores does not suffer from an identity crisis. It knows exactly what it is: high and haughty in every respect. The ornate Victorians, grassy palm-adorned median, and shared name with the largest park in the Mission give this street a certain nobility. There are very few retailers to speak of on this street. It’s primarily residential, and primarily single-family Victorians.

Every dimension of this street is big. Its road is four lanes wide. Its sidewalks are some of the widest in the district, and the hills are undoubtedly the steepest of any in the Mission. Everything about Dolores St. is grand, and rightfully so. It’s home to Mission Dolores, San Francisco’s oldest building. It almost feels like Dolores St. is trying to claim its rightful place as the City’s main street. Its ornate nature demands recognition. For those who know it, this street’s personality is clear.

So there you have it: four streets just a few blocks apart, alike in alignment but worlds apart in character. Dealt a grid, our urban dynamic created distinct, vibrant places through varied architecture, street widths, and land uses.

Love your grid, and be part of defining your own street. Dress up your windows, open a bike shop, plant some planters or paint a mural. If your grid is boing, it’s not the shape of the streets doing it. It’s the content of their character.