SF Examiner Interviews La Lengua Comandante Burrito Justice

/ Todd_Lappin / 14 Comments

The dead-tree San Francisco Examiner published a piece of La Lengua propaganda last weekend which shines a spotlight on rebel comandante Burrito Justice and his effort to establish La Lengua as an autonomous zone independent from both Bernal Heights and the Mission District.

Upon learning of the Examiner’s plan to glorify the La Lengua separatists, Bernalwood picked up our red hotline phone to begin immediate summit talks with comandante Burrito Justice. These were summit talks in the most literal sense; lacking a coherent agenda, we met at the summit of Bernal Hill for a candid exchange of views on such matters as the economic impact of rising energy input prices, current prospects for Middle East peace in light of recent quasi-democratic uprisings, the viral popularity of Justin Bieber, and preferred menu options at Taqueria Can-Cun.

Burrito JusticeBut back to the Examiner. Here’s what they had to say about La Lengua, and the rebel leader who defined its autonomous identity:

Welcome to La Lengua, the Mission district-Bernal Heights microhood that needed a name. Yes, that’s right, it’s Spanish for “the Tongue,” a reference to the district’s shape, its preponderance of eateries serving tongue meat and the active imagination of the dude behind the Burrito Justice blog.

“It started off sort of tongue-in-cheek,” he said, recalling how the inside joke about the neighborhood’s nickname began circulating San Francisco’s lively blog scene about two years ago.

La Lengua is the area west of Bernal Heights Park and east of Noe Valley, the narrow stretch between Mission and Guerrero streets, bordered by 24th and 30th streets on the north and south, respectively.

The blogger, who asked that we only refer to him as JohnnyO in order to maintain his behind-the-scenes status, said he grew tired of people incorrectly calling his neighborhood Noe Valley, Bernal Heights or the Outer Mission. So he and his friends decided they’d give the area a new name.

“This is a grass-roots thing. I had no motive except that I live here, and I think that it needed a name,” JohnnyO said. But then, something happened — people in real life actually starting calling it La Lengua.

Read the whole piece, right here.

UPDATE: CBS 5 did a piece about Burrito Justice and the Rise of the La Lenguans during last night’s broadcast. Watch it right here.

PHOTO: Rebel leader Burrito Justice/JohnnyO, photographed by Telstar Logistics

Our Seismologist Explains Why the 1906 Earthquake Did Little Damage to Bernalwood

/ Julian Lozos / 7 Comments

As we noted earlier, today is the 105th anniversary of the Great Earthquake of 1906 — the infamous M7.8 rupture along the San Andreas Fault that severely damaged San Francisco before subsequent fires did the rest of the work destroying much of the City. The devastation was near-complete in the core of San Francisco, but Bernal Heights rode out the disaster relatively unscathed.

There were several reasons for this. Geologically speaking, Bernalwood is actually closer to the San Andreas than downtown, but the solid chert bedrock that makes up Bernal Hill didn’t shake nearly as hard as the soft sediment and artificial fill of the Financial District, Mission, or SoMa. That same chert explains why Bernal residents often miss smaller quakes that rattle people in other parts of the City.

That said, geology was secondary to Bernalwood’s survival in 1906. At the time, Bernal Heights was very much a part of the relatively-unsettled outskirts of town. There were fewer structures in Bernal to be destroyed, and most of the buildings that did exist were wood-framed working-class homes. Even on bad soil — but especially on chert! –wood structures perform better than masonry in strong shaking.

Though it was relatively uninvolved in the destruction, Bernal Heights played a big part in the phoenix-like rebirth of San Francisco in the years immediately following 1906. Amid the transition from the tent camps and wooden shacks that occupied places like Dolores and Precita Parks, people noticed that Bernal had largely escaped the catastrophe, and that it might be a (somewhat) safer place to be during any future earthquakes. Happily, that’s still true today.

PHOTOS: Top, Bernal Hill chert, by Telstar Logistics. Below, earthquake shacks in Precita Park, 1906, via Bernal History Project.

How to Bike on Alabama Without Biking Up Alabama (Hint: Follow the Bernal Chicken)

/ Molly Samuel / 14 Comments

Alabama Uphill
I bike down Alabama in the morning to get to work, which, with the combination of awful pavement, loose gravel, and the 67 bus (which seems to only come when I am biking) feels like tempting death. On the way home, there’s no way I can make it back up that hill.

Or, there WAS no way! Another cyclist let me in on a little secret:

This route has steep parts, but there’s some flat in there, the roads are in better shape than Alabama, and there’s less traffic. It’s so pleasant, in fact, that I’ve been biking down the hill this way, too.

The Lower Haight has The Wiggle. Maybe it’s the season, but I think this looks kind of like the outline of a peep. Is Bernal too laid back and private to name a bike route? (NO! — Ed.) I’m not suggesting we get signs or bikes painted on the road, but based on the shape of the route, let’s call this shortcut the Bernal Chicken, just among friends?

PHOTO:Looking up Alabama Street, by Telstar Logistics

The 1906 Earthquake, as Experienced from Bernal Heights

/ Todd_Lappin / 2 Comments

Today is the 105th anniversary of the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. So what was the big event like here in Bernal Heights?

Rather uneventful, actually. Bernal itself suffered relatively little damage — thank you, chert! — and the fires that ravaged much of the rest of the City never made it this far south. (As you can see above, Bernal Hill proved an excellent vantage point for gawking the disaster as it unfolded.) Later, parts of the neighborhood — most famously Precita Park — were used as encampments to shelter displaced City residents, which in part explains why the quake ultimately turned out to be a boon to Bernal Heights development.

To put all this in perspective, enjoy this video produced by Vicky Walker of the Bernal History Project. It tells the tale of what the Great Quake was like here in Bernal Heights:

PHOTO: via Bernal History Project

Off The Hill: 38 Must-Try Restaurants, Who Rules the Board of Supes, and the View from the Farallons

/ Todd_Lappin

U00813

Updated April 2011 Edition of the 38 Essential San Francisco Restaurants (Eater SF)

Recreating a Mission Mural Originally Painted by Ohlone Indians in 1791 (7×7)

Who’s Up and Who’s Down on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors (SFist)

Parking or a Park at 17th and Folsom in the Mission? (Socketsite)

The View of San Francisco as Seen from the Farallon Islands (Burrito Justice)

Fantastic 1906 Earthquake Photos Released by SFMTA (Uptown Almanac)

A Muni Neck Tattoo?! (Muni Diaries)

PHOTO: Howard Street (today’s South Van Ness) after the earthquake, by SFMTA

Residents Protest SFPD’s Transfer of Sergeant James Miller, Bernal’s Best Crimefighter

/ Todd_Lappin / 2 Comments

There’s serious concern on the Bernalsafe mailing list about the San Francisco Police Department’s recent decision to transfer Sgt. James Miller from the Ingleside
Station (which covers Bernal Heights) to another part of the City. The transfer is ostensibly temporary, but there’s no sign that Sgt. Miller is coming back anytime soon.

By most accounts, Sgt. Miller’s intelligence and intimate familiarity with Bernal Heights have made him an invaluable resource for neighborhood crimestoppers. A letter-writing campaign is now underway to try to reverse the SFPD’s decision.

Here’s one such letter, written by Deb McDonald of the Andersen Street Safe Alliance (and republished here with her permission):

Dear Chief Godown,

I am one of a large group of committed citizens in Bernal Heights who follow the goings on at SFPD closely because we have serious ongoing public safety (crime) concerns here in this part of the city.

So when I heard this morning that Sgt. Jim Miller was being transferred from Ingleside to the Central Station I jumped into action along with hundreds of my neighbors.

Sgt. Miller is the best SFPD resource we have in Ingleside. He knows every inch of this district and he knows many of us personally. He is my first point of contact at SFPD whenever I have a serious concern about crime in my immediate area. He has consistently provided this community with solid support and direction in improving public safety.

We are just getting to know you as temporary Chief of Police. You could go a long way toward gaining our support in the future if you immediately reverse this bad decision and keep Sgt. Miller here in Ingleside where his knowledge of the community and his long standing relationships with us represent one of SFPD’s greatest assets.

We are waiting to hear from you about this. Please do the right thing. KEEP SGT. MILLER AT INGLESIDE!!!

Thank you.

On behalf of Anderson Street Safe Alliance

Deb McDonald

If you’d like to write as well, Chief Godown can be reached at jeffrey.godown@sfgov.org. Remember: Please remain courteous but clear in your correspondence with the Chief.

PHOTO: Telstar Logistics

A Visual Tale of Transition on Mission Street

/ Todd_Lappin / 3 Comments

Bernal Northwest

I took this photo of the 3300 block of Mission Street, right across from our Taoist Safeway, last weekend. Looking at the image after I got home, I saw many divergent elements of the transformation taking place in this part of the neighborhood: The world-class Ichi Sushi, right alongside a nail shop, which sits next to a post-hippie actupuncturist and a check-cashing shop. There’s a backpack-toting hipster on one end of the block, and a person in a wheelchair waiting for the bus at the other. New meets old, and old rubs shoulders with new, and the only thing that we know for sure is that it will all look different and somehow the same a few years from now.

PHOTO: Telstar Logistics

Pesticide Application Notice Posted on Bernal Hill

/ Todd_Lappin / 11 Comments

Notice
Bernaljournal reports that some new signs went up recently at the north and south gates to Bernal Heights Boulevard. It seems The City plans to use weed killer to combat fennel on the Hill. For what it’s worth, Bernaljournal is anti-pleased:

Trying to stop invasive and non natural plants is futile. They’ve been here for a couple hundred years and poisoning the hill is no remedy.

I’d propose bringing in sheep and goats as an alternative, but I suspect that wouldn’t go over well with the canine crowd.

PHOTO: Telstar Logistics

Bicycle from Bernalwood to the Western Addition in Three Minutes

/ Todd_Lappin / 4 Comments

This time-lapse video compresses a bicycle ride from Bernal Heights to the Western Addition into a very fast-paced three minutes:

I taped a cam to my handle bars and rolled from Bernal Heights to Western Addition. The trip took about 28 minutes, it was super windy. The track is a Deep Cuts classic called Beats for the Beast, a song for my cat.

Okay then!  Yay cat! The video is cool, but you may want to avoid it if you are prone to visually induced  epileptic seizures.

Eat Pancakes and Bacon, Help the Children, Saturday

/ Todd_Lappin

Reader Josh emailed the Bernalwood listener call-in line with a tasty announcement about a benefit breakfast taking place at Leonard Flynn Elementary School (at the corner of Harrison and Precita) on Saturday morning:

There is going to be a pancake breakfast next Saturday, April 16, at Leonard Flynn Elementary in the cafeteria from 8-11AM.  It’s $5 per person for pancakes, coffee, bacon, etc… What a great way to support the kids/families in the neighborhood that go to Flynn!