From gold mining in the 1800’s to naval warship production during WWII, from the first dot com boom of the late 1990’s to early 2020’s global epicenter of technology and innovation, the Bay Area has always been a boom and bust town. Relocating from across the country and from around the world, people come for jobs, cutting edge restaurants, music, a diverse and experimental arts scene and the proximity to some of the most beautiful undeveloped coastline on the planet.
Throughout time, and especially in the last 20 years, they’ve confronted the reality of living in one of the most expensive cities in the world. The problems they’ve heard about – thousands of homeless on the streets, needles in the gutters, walkways and parks, lack of parking, lack of community, lack of a mythical historical San Francisco – are real. Their idealized dream of San Francisco of long ago, is gone.
In March 2020, San Francisco shut down: one of the first places in the country to enact strict social distancing rules restricting businesses and personal movement around the bay area. Parks shut, parking lots were blocked, people were not allowed to visit places outside a few miles of their homes. Myriad tech companies, the drivers of the massive influx of people to the Bay Area since 2008, saw the shifting landscape and enacted long term policies changes to allow “work from home” for the mid to long term future. Would you stay in San Francisco with all of the problems and expense if you could work from anywhere?
“You don’t get to hate San Francisco. You don’t get to hate it unless you love it,” says Jimmie Fails, a character played by the actor Jimmie Fails in the 2019 film The Last Black Man in San Francisco.
The first people to leave in times of crisis or change are not the people who truly love San Francisco, they will always come and go in times of change. To truly love a place is to see beyond the current moment, to see the place outside of time altogether. The Bay Area, despite its challenges, is the embodiment of an ideal: a way of living and being in the world.
The term “California dreaming” has long been used in reference a long gone Southern California but is alive and well in the Bay Area regardless of the pandemic.
San Francisco is one of the few places in the world where you can ski the Sierras, surf the Pacific, attend a performance at the SF Opera and then a late night dinner at a Michelin starred restaurant (ok, the last year during Covid, but parts of this can happen despite the current climate). All in one day. In a radius of a few hundred miles.
A short drive from San Francisco puts you in the heart of some of the most “stellar regions” in the world. Sonoma, Napa, Santa Cruz, Mendocino and Anderson Valley produce some of the worlds most distinct wines from a dizzying array of microclimates. Fishing boats leave ports up and down the coast line catching everything from Dungeness crab to anchovies. Farmers grow every imaginable vegetable that are the envy of chefs from around the world (ask any NYC chef what its like to do an event in SF and they immediately extoll the virtues of the produce). Ranchers raise a bounty of meat and poultry that define both quality and sustainability. Don Watson’s spring lamb, Brent Wolf’s quail and Stemple Creek’s beef are legendary.
You can hike the Marin Headlands, sail the bay, mountain bike single track and road bike some of the most challenging loops in cycling outside France, Spain and Italy. You can ski, backcountry snowboard and surf some of the least populated waves anywhere in the world. You can eat oysters from Tomales Bay, forage mussels from the coastline south of San Francisco, fish, forage mushrooms (all over the place, but we can’t tell you where) and light a bonfire on the beach with your friends to celebrate and cook it all.
Restaurants will return, museums reopen, theater and music resume. Meanwhile bands are playing in the parks and on street corners, performers are staging readings and plays on balconies and backyards.
The boom and busters will come and go. Those who truly love San Francisco, who see it beyond a moment in time, who see it as a lifestyle – the truly “California Dreaming” – will still be here. And we will be here sailing, surfing, harvesting, drinking and eating with them.
“San Francisco’s exodus is real” (SF Chronicle)
“Bay Area exodus leading edge of pandemic housing reshuffle” (Reuters)
“They Can’t Leave the Bay Area Fast Enough” (New York Times)
“In Boom-and-Bust San Francisco, Pandemic Brings Grim New Reality (Bloomberg)
