San Francisco Warning or Danger Tips by atufft

There are a number of BART hassles in terms of ticketing which can't be figured out looking at the machine...

1) Only one credit card transaction permitted per day on BART ticket machines. So, buy all your tickets at once or risk the need to dig for cash for the next ticket purchase.

2) Extra fare required if a stop is made along the route. We took a friend to the airport, and on the return decided to stop at the Powell street station for a quick walk to Union Square and back. When we reached our destination at the Dublin-Pleasanton station we couldn't get past the gate. The ticket direct from SFO to Dublin-Pleasanton station was cheaper than if we stop off along the way. We had to add $2.55 in value to our ticket for the luxury of stopping along the way. I consider that an expensive stop in terms of ride value.

3) BART help kiosk will vary in terms of flexibility and friendliness. We've been let through the gate for lack of fare, and have also been given sacreligious remarks, "Jez Christ, man, it's obvious" for our confusion on this system. If you have a complaint, they can be filed on-line or by comment cards distributed at the kiosk.

4) In addition to all of the above, the machines often fail to do what they are supposed to, so approaching the kiosk for help is common.

Bathroom lines are often long, and can't be accessed until you are a ticketed passenger inside the gate. The facilities are solo occupancy type bathrooms, so expect to wait in line. If you come to a BART station on a bicycle, locate the bicycle parking racks INSIDE the ticketed area for increased security. The bicycle must be securely locked, or expect to find it gone when you return.

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Website: http://www.bart.gov/index.asp

San Francisco is generally a very health conscious city, and smoking is not only frowned upon, but, no joke, it is illegal within all public buildings, stadiums, public transportation, private restaurants, and even bars. It is technically illegal to smoke within 25 feet of the entrance to any public building although I've never actually seen a person get a ticket for this. Suffice to say, the penalties are severe both socially and legally.

It is legal to smoke on the street, but keen observers of the local culture will notice that San Francisco smokers don't flaunt their habit in the faces or noses of others. Sorry, but this is not France or Japan, and arrogance regarding the tobacco habit are as dead as a trampled cigarette butt. Within the financial district, hooked businessmen nervously stand in alleyways cheeking filtered Marborro Lights, while in the Northbeach outdoor cafes, old beat generation groupies smoking self-rolled cigarettes flirt with death, holding their habit low and away from next the table so as not to attract unwanted attention.

This is not to say that cigarettes are not popular among a subset of die-hard addicts and street people, or that all quarters of the city are free from the bondage of the tobacco companies, or even that urban young adults don't daringly flirt with death at parties as they do elsewhere in the world. Corner liquor stores still push and profit handsomely from the nicotine habit in San Francisco, particulary in Chinatown, the Mission District, and Hunter's Point neighborhoods. But, the trend is increasingly also symbolic of individual self-annihilation at society's expense, of willful annihilation of innocent others through second hand smoke, and poverty, ruined self-esteem, and otherwise the self-marginalized social realm of the ordinary alleyway drug addict. Thus, in San Francisco, smokers and their habit are at a distinct disadvantage, particularly within the more upscale neighborhoods in town.

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The City Government of San Francisco has stopped the practice of purchasing bottled water and is considering a plan to ban plastic bottled water throughout the city. Call it mineral water if you like, but it's really just tap water adjusted by factory filters. Nevermind what the bottle label promises. Worse yet, the environmental cost of the plastic bottle is enormous in terms of energy and ultimate landfill. Empty plastic bottle are a nuisance garbage that kicks round the streets of most urban centers, and San Francisco has set its mind to stop this. Same with plastic bags. The city has passed ordinances that will forbid stores from packing items into plastic bags. I haven't seen this in practice very widely yet, as most tourists will still have their stuff put into a plastic bag at the check-out counter. But, the trend toward being GREEN means that tourists might consider putting their items into a backpack or cloth bag that they have brought with them. Some corporations have already seen the $$ in this, as companies like Home Depot sell at cost store logo canvas bags near the check-out counter. Go GREEN San Francisco and California!

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The city of San Francisco is particularly civic-centric, a sort of ego-centricity based upon the city in which one lives. Like the new kid in a classroom, the fresh immigrant to San Francisco is motivated learn quickly the ways of the city. Meanwhile, those born or raised in the city debate among themselves nuances about who was first. If one is a REAL San Franciscan, he can claim to have graduated from one of the public high schools in the city. Enthusiastic tourists confused by this geographically mixed up city are of course targets of derision or laughter. Travelers be warned: Not all San Franciscans will show patience and hospitality. Despite the obvious value of hospitality to the paycheck of the average San Franciscan (the city is the nation's number one adult tourist attraction), gray matter withers and rudeness occurs.

Worse yet, some San Franciscans take on aires relative to the rest of the Bay Area, or even the entire state of California. As a native that's lived about the Bay Area, this civic-centrism is a real kicker. Here the civic-centric thinker perceives the city is the center to Bay Area culture, and so is somehow superior or more fashionable culturally than it's neighbors. There are environmental organizations in the city whose civic-centric minded members would like to impose SF solutions and politics on the waterways, wetlands, and forests of the Bay Area and Northern California, not realizing that the ideas may be greeen in theory but in unrealistic in the field. Nevermind that the city water supply is stolen from pristine alpine region reservoirs in Yosemite only to be dumped polluted back into the bay. Similarly, without the produce and meat from the Salinas or San Joaquin Valleys, wine from Napa or Sonoma, redwood lumber from Humbolt, and college graduates from Stanford, Berkeley, and Davis, the city would certainly wither and die.

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