Thanking longtime members: proud pedestrian activist Fran Taylor
Walk SF is celebrating our 25th anniversary – and everyone who’s been part of our work for safe streets through the years! Fran Taylor has been a Walk SF member since 2003.
Don’t ask Fran where her favorite place to walk in San Francisco is.
“I don’t really think like that,” says Fran. “I walk to get someplace. To get from point A to point B. It’s transportation!”
But Fran does think like an activist.
Twenty years ago, it was getting around her Mission neighborhood on foot that inspired her to become a proud pedestrian activist.
Fran frequently walked on Cesar Chavez Street – with a lot of fear for her safety as a pedestrian. The six-lane street was hostile to anyone outside a car, with dangerous speeds the norm. Some called Cesar Chavez Street the ‘Berlin Wall’ because of how it divided the Mission from Bernal Heights.
The street needed serious changes. And thankfully, Fran and a small group of folks came together in 2005 as a grassroots effort called CC Puede, a play on the farmworker rallying cry of “!Sí Se Puede, (Yes We Can)!”
CC Puede pushed to transform what many called a “traffic sewer.” CC Puede also had a bigger vision: to connect and support the community, while bringing nature and beauty to this bleak street.
CC Puede did a lot of bridge-building, political navigating, and most importantly, organizing. At one point in the campaign, CC Puede hand-delivered a letter explaining the project and its goals in English and Spanish to every door along Cesar Chavez and several side streets, inviting neighbors to speak up and ask questions. CC Puede also worked closely with the Day Labor Program on Cesar Chavez. Their support made a huge difference, both when then-director Renee Saucedo spoke at an SFMTA hearing in support of the campaign and more generally as a buffer against arguments that this was an act of gentrification.
In reality, the campaign was an act of securing basic safety for workers, children, seniors, and neighbors.
It took years, but activism by the group paid off. In 2014, the City finished a redesign that removed two lanes of traffic and added bike lanes, pedestrian ‘bulb outs’ (sidewalk extensions that slow turning drivers and shorten crossing distances) with rain gardens, a center median lined with trees and native plans, and a !Sí Se Puede! Plaza at the northeast corner of Cesar Chavez and Mission Street.
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The work of CC Puede also supported a growing recognition of the kind of paradigm shift needed in how – and for whom – streets are designed in San Francisco.
Fran has been a member of Walk SF since 2003 because “walking is something that affects me everyday,” says Fran. Fran has volunteered many hours with us over the years, plus shown up at countless public hearings, actions, and rallies. Fran embodies Walk SF and inspires our staff every time we’re with her. Thank you, Fran!
Photo credit: Fiona Yim (banner); 2014 photo by Aaron Bialick via SF Streetsblog Cesar Chavez: A Traffic Sewer Transformed into a Safer Street); 2014 slide presentation by Mike Sallaberry of SFMTA.
