The Mexican sailing ship Cuauhtémoc is berthed at P27 through July 18th.
July 13, 2009
June 13, 2009
Smog check?
Yesterday morning I took pictures of three ships leaving within a ten-minute-or-so period, all of them spewing crap into the air. We, of course, need to have our cars smog-checked every two years. Ships coming in and out of harbor. Not.
Why not?
Update: Ah. … A federal appeals court agreed Wednesday [27 Feb 2008] that state air pollution regulators can’t order ships arriving at California ports to reduce their toxic contributions to local smog.” The Court ruled that the State Air Board’s rules couldn’t take precedence over the federal Clean Air Act and the state would have to get a waiver from the EPA to allow its rules to go into effect.
OK. So when is =that= going to happen, now that TPTB at the EPA have changed? Soon? Have we asked?
May 31, 2009
New cranes
New cranes showed up in our vista a few days back.
We can only see a bit of what is happening on the eastern span. I’m assuming these new cranes are needed to lift the roadbeds into place for the temporary span that will be used while the permanent span is built, but ? who knows?
May 4, 2009
Photos earlier today
We have another visitor down at P29 — not as big a ship as the cruise ship earlier this week. This is the Golden Bear, belonging to the California Maritime Academy in Vallejo.
(For Don’s benefit, note the fog covering Treasure Island and Berkeley beyond …)
A lovely sight — watching the fog ebb and flow across Treasure Island and Yerba Buena.
And then ebb. Flow. Back again.
It’s dark out now and we don’t see the fog. We only see the lights on the islands get blotted out and then come back into view. Yerba Buena is almost clear now.
For a while. …
(n.b. The planes from SFO are taking off to the north. Our short flurry of rains is over for the nonce.)
May 2, 2009
A visit from Carnival Splendor
[Blogger wasn't FTPing nicely this afternoon so this post was delayed. ...]
Carl Nolte writes, Flu outbreak diverts Mexico’s cruises to S.F.
The Mariner of the Seas (>1K’ long — displaces 137,276 tons) berthed early this morning at Pier 35.
<PALIN> We can see it from our bedroom window! </PALIN>
(yeah, yeah, yeah. I know that was SNL and not Palin.)
Just now, [well, sometime after lunch] the Carnival Splendor (952′) came into Pier 29 and I took a mess of photographs. Together the two ships have ~ 6800 passengers aboard.
I feel kind of :-((( for the passengers because the weather was grey and drippy today. Rainy a bit and then not a bit and then rainy again. MUCH chillier than the folks on the cruise (who had signed up for Puerto Vallarta and Acapulco, &c.) were dressed for. We thought, boy, those folks down by the wharf are probably upping the prices on their fleece jackets and umbrellas.
Seems we’ll have more of the same (cruise ships, that is) for a while now. …
I imagine Butterfly restaurant down at Pier 33 is not the place to go for lunch. Not that we had any plans to do so. We have [had] a Cinco party down at Mercedes – Hair of the Dog Cantina starting at 6p.
[The Cinco was terrific. We walked down (con paraguas), stopping off at the bank to drop off a rent check. Got to the cantina a bit early. No prob. Met some new folks, old friends. Mariachis out front. Folks who weren’t invited to the par-tay were sitting on the benches in the alley enjoying. Music (after the mariachis were done) by Carlos Godinez and his sidemen. We were seated RIGHT THERE. (Literally. We chatted across to them between songs.) Godinez played some Jobim, which made me happy.(Jobim? Cinco music? No, not really, but made me happy.) The spread was terrif. (Munchies followed by buffet. All you can drink vino blanco o rojo, margaritas o Dos Equis o whatever you wish.) I heartily endorse Mercedes – Hair of the Dog Cantina. Owner/staff were swell. We had a good time.]
(and then hoofed it home — sin paraguas … ~2mi total RT)
We got home to find the cruise ship nestled, all snug in its berth …
The Mariner of the Seas leaves in a half hour or so, but I think the Carnival ship won’t leave until morning. …
April 14, 2009
April 11, 2009
April 10, 2009
February 27, 2009
Let us now gaze down on the Port of San Francisco
Specifically, Piers 23, 19, and 17. (Click on the photo to get an enlarged version.)
Note the pilings on the north apron of Pier 23.
Note the shabby temporary patches on the roof of the Port building facing the Embarcadero where Pier 21 would be, if there were a Pier 21.
Check out the pilings on the north apron of Pier 19. You can barely see the pair of orange cones keeping you from accidentally walking where the worst of the damage to the apron is. (The apron has crumpled and is no longer horizontal.) What you can’t see in the picture very well is that the bulk of the apron to the west of the orange cones has disintegrated and fallen into the drink as well.
Check out the pilings at Pier 17 (the last pier you can see in the picture). They don’t look in very great shape either, do they?
To quote from a SPUR document, published in The Urbanist in August, 2007:
The Port’s 10-year Capital Plan is based on a comprehensive survey of the physical condition of all Port properties under its ownership. The Plan identifies the cost of bringing the Port into basic compliance with health, safety, seismic and Americans with Disabilities Act regulations, as well as fulfilling waterfront open-space needs, at nearly $1.5 billion. Almost one-third of the costs identified in this Capital Plan are for substructure repair and seismic strengthening of the Port’s pile-supported structures.
Something must be done.
What will it be? What to do, what to do, what to do. …
February 26, 2009
Grey day. Hoping for some rain.
Update: Day didn’t turn to rain. Quite the contrary. Sunny with interesting clouds.
