1. The F Market
Down Market Street, the F goes from the Castro to the Embarcadero, where it takes a left and goes up to the Wharf. Going along the Embarcadero is great enough, but the gravy here is that the F runs restored streetcars from other cities. So you might find yourself on a classic car from New Orleans or Boston. It’s a great line.
Down Market Street, the F goes from the Castro to the Embarcadero, where it takes a left and goes up to the Wharf. Going along the Embarcadero is great enough, but the gravy here is that the F runs restored streetcars from other cities. So you might find yourself on a classic car from New Orleans or Boston. It’s a great line.
2. The 39-Coit
Sure, it only runs in about an 8-by-12 block area, but it’s a phenomenal 8 by 12 blocks. The 39 goes down Powell in North Beach and hits North Point and Beach at the Wharf, but the money shot is the trip straight up to Coit Tower and some of the best views in San Francisco.
3. The N Judah
I have a strong sentimental attachment to the N Judah, as it was my home line from ’91 to ’97 and then again from ’04 to ’07. Rush hours are packed with mostly 20-and-30-somethings commuting from shared apartments in the Haight to their Fisher Price My First Grownup Jobs downtown, but you also get street kids, old Asian women with crinkly bags, hippies, and every other slice of San Francisco life. An indispensible line.
Awesome picture, huh? The caption is "Mayor Rolph pilots the first N-Judah car, October 21, 1928."4. The 22-Fillmore
The only line here to be immortalized in a song, as far as I know (“You looked like you were sleeping/Waiting days for the 22,” from the late, great Beulah’s “Lay Low for the Letdown”), the 22, like many of us, leads a double or triple life. It starts in the Marina, where it might get spray-tanned and have a latte, shoots up over Pacific Heights, drops into the Fillmore, then stops for beers and crack in the Lower Haight before moving on to the Inner Mission, where it takes a hard left and heads for Potrero Hill and then Dogpatch, which will be the neighborhood in 2012, mark my words.
5. The Powell-Hyde cable car
Be honest, when’s the last time you rode on a cable car? C’mon, don’t be such a stick in the mud. They’re fun! Don’t be a sucker and wait at the turnaround at Powell & Market with all the Germans and the street hustlers. If you have a Fast Pass, go a couple blocks up Powell and jump on when that thing slows down. Then enjoy the ride up Nob Hill, over to Russian Hill, and then vertiginously dropping straight down Hyde. Seriously, it’ll make you feel 10 years old again.
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ReplyDeletei would've thought you would've included the 33 Stanyan, because of that gnarly part where it kind of precariously u-turns onto upper market (Google Street View depiction here)
ReplyDeleteFunny you should mention the 33. That was one of the lines on the bubble for me. I decided it didn't make the cut since I still have kind of a grudge against it after waiting for it for more than a half-hour on several occasions.
ReplyDeleteyeah waiting sucks. and really, the route the 33 takes is more fun on foot anyway.
ReplyDeleteThe 33 has perhaps the best route in the whole city passing through every neighborhood of record. in fact your entire list is suspiciously missing cross-town routes.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised you didn't just mail it in and list the 30 AX or whatever it is that speeds Chad and Jenn out to the presidio
Except the 22, didn't see that.
ReplyDeleteMy bad.
TK,
ReplyDeleteI love your MUNI list. I've never been on the 39 before so I'm really excited to hit that one. Thanks for sharing!