Mission Mission

Sunday Streets appears to have been a success. The weather was great and the attendance was certainly high. Burrito Justice and Mission Loc@l have the breakdown in pictures.

Update: Check out Streetsblog’s great coverage of the event.  They are also calling for the event to occur weekly and for the city to extend the hours beyond 10am-2pm.

On an unfortunate side note, reader guero comes to us with news that the city was being a little liberal with towing Mission resident’s cars before the event. He reports that the towing began at 1 A.M–9 hours prior to the start of the event:

Crazy…I live on one of the blocks for this what-not and I swear about 15 tow trucks descended upon the cars still parked on the street. (about 20 minutes ago- some still here). I read the signs and moved my car earlier today but I guess a lot of people didn’t bother. I have to admit, the signs were really flimsy and I’m not surprised that folks missed them. This must be a cash cow for the city and tow trucks. After each vehicle was hooked up, there were officers writing citations before they drove them off.

After hearing about what neighbors had to deal with during Carnaval, you have to wonder why there is not more outcry against the city’s unreasonable actions towards Mission residents during public events.

In case you missed it, Saturday night was certainly an exciting and interesting scene in the Mission. After El Salvador upset Mexico in a World Cup qualifier, the district lost its collective shit. The streets were full of cars speeding up and down Mission St. flying flags and honking their horns as small crowds, waving flags and cheering, gathered on street corners. Naturally, as the night progressed, the neighborhood turned into a public toilet for vomiting and urinating.

From afar, this looked like an AIPAC rally.

“PBR For Pups” spotted at Bender’s:

Sexy Soup Cart got busted by the cops last night.  Good thing!  Nothing is more criminal than vegan Carrot Ginger Coconut Soup.

SF Weekly’s SFoodie blog called it Thursday:

What’s the likelihood that city authorities will stage a crackdown on scofflaw entrepreneurs, especially in the face of mainstream buzz? Conversations with officials from both the police and the Health Department suggested that while the city doesn’t currently seem to have much appetite for busts of vendors like Curtis the Crème Brulee Guy, Cookie Wag, Amuse Bouche, or Sexy Soup Lady, the possibility of future action is real.

Richard Lee, the city’s director of Health Regulatory Programs, told SFoodie that action against unlicensed vendors almost always comes from the police. “Anytime we see or know about a violation, we report it to the police,” said Lee. “They can shut the vendor down, and a lot of the time they might confiscate their food.” The Health Department has some two dozen inspectors crisscrossing the city to perform inspections of restaurants and other permitted facilities. When they notice a street vendor they suspect of being unlicensed, procedure calls for them to alert the cops.

…

Early last month, Lee’s department was reportedly monitoring vendor tweets about when and where food sellers would show up to do business. He said it informed officers at Mission Station about suspected illegal sales. (link)

That said, Sexy Soup Lady speculated that last night’s bust might have not been provoked by City Hall, but by neighbors:

Cops were kinda cool (warning, no fine)…seemed like they were called by Linda St. residents. Have to find a new spot… StealthSoupCart.;) (link)

With hate potentially coming from multiple directions now, it will be interesting to see if the more production-oriented carts like Sexy Soup and Magic Curry can survive while dodging the police and regulators desperate for their absurd $10,000 permit fees.  Unfortunately, it sounds like more mobile street food vendors, which can easily evade the police, will be the only game in town in a couple of months.

Yesterday the S.F. Chronicle published a piece detailing the “Mission District Sugar Trail.”  Nothing too interesting there, it is just a standard list of the usual sugar haunts: Bi-Rite Creamery, St. Francis, Mission Pie, Tartine etc.  The major note is that now, according to Eater SF, there is “a fun new term” for “the veritable explosion of sweets offerings in the Mission.”

Maybe I am missing something here, but this does not look like a trail.  It looks like two lines.  We can do better than this.

"The Mission District Sugar Rails." Not only is it edgy but it is Mission-relevant as a popular district remedy for drowning out the pain of working at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway.

Just in case you didn’t know, this Sunday is Sunday Streets in the Mission.  From 10am until 2pm, a chunk of 24th and Valencia will be closed to motorized traffic so people can be good neighbors n’ stuff.  Now you can pedal your fixie with reckless abandon into moms with baby strollers from “da Noe” instead of  2-dollar Toyota’s from the 1980′s with 600-dollar rims.

There is a long list of events I’m not going to bother summarizing.  However, you can check out Mission Loc@l’s movie slideshow with audio about the events.

Found at the bus stop at 23rd and Mission. (Credit – Brittney Gilbert)

From Thor Muller’s twitter:

“Quinn unveils his big 1st grade project: a scale version of the Mission District out of milk cartons” (link)

David Kelso sums up a pretty standard Thursday in the Mission.  Anyone else spot the hit and run on 16th and Valencia?

Update: David sends us an update as to what happened: “Dude skating got hit, slid up the hood and then punched the windscreen. Car sped off with him still on the hood. Fell off after a block.”  Rumor has it that the driver went up onto the curb in an effort to shake the skateboarder off.  The guy was pretty messed up and had to be taken away in an ambulance.  Epic.

From Shotwell’s Bar Twitter:

Unfortunately the dog wasn’t actually playing pool, but we’ll take it.

This could have been the scene at Shotwell's had the dog had a nice hat and opposable thumbs.