My five days in San Fran are done, en route to Denver. This 34 hour train ride has given me plenty of time to write. Let’s dive in.
Official City Review List
Car Independence: 9 / 10
San Fransisco has some really spiffy public transportation. The Bart (Metro) is very fast and clean, goes everywhere I could want. It is a tad pricey, but like it is San Fransisco so that is a given. Biking is also pretty good here as long as your quads can handle the hills (I had to shamefully walk up a few with my rental bike). Lanes are great and traffic is slow. Very comfortable even going on more main roads because of this. They also got a really nice Ferry system, I highly recommend it. It’s like $4 to go on one and you don’t deal with tourists.
Side rant: The Lyft bike shares are pretty garbage, they have taken over every city I have been to so far. I remember them starting off decent, however they have been enshittified like everything else. Now they have this very squishy CVT transmission, it feels like you are constantly biking through mud. They did it to save costs and prevent chain derailment, but now the bikes don’t feel nearly as useful. In addition, Lyft started by offering a cheap service in cities. Once it cemented itself, the prices in all the cities have been raised to like $0.35 a minute. It is kinda disappointing because they used to be really nice when I used them a few years ago.
Public Spaces & Social: 7 / 10
Libraries were pretty meh, my favorite was the one in San Fransisco’s Chinatown. Asians are so considerate, great people to share a library with. There’s museums and all that stuff but like I will be ok if I never see another old clay pot again.
Churches were kind of lacking. They are beautiful here, but they are locked up most of the day. I asked someone working there why, apparently people will go in and vandalize all the stuff. They also put gum at the end of straws and go fishing inside the donation boxes. Hence, the churches are closed.
Job Opportunity: 8 / 10
This section of my rating system bores me, every city has good job opportunity besides Portland. I don’t want to go back and modify the old posts though so…
People & Culture: 6 / 10
The burritos are insane. I had no clue how much they have evolved over here. Also, the only way to eat out for under $20. I spent about the same amount of money on burritos as the hostel ($30 a day).
Californians seemed nice, but man do I see the difference between the east and west coast. I miss east coast bluntness and the drawn-out accent is kind of annoying. Churches here were also decently empty like Portland, but I went to a mass in French which was fun. I felt like San Fransisco has strip clubs and adult stores way more frequently than other cities (besides God-forsaken Portland). Fentanyl zombies were present, more frequent than Chicago and DC but way less than Portland. Overall not too bad but could be better. I think people exaggerate the extent of it here.
I will say that San Fransisco has some particularly bad pockets. In all these cities I am taking the bus, biking, and usually walking 20-30 miles, so I am seeing a lot more than the main streets. There were zones here where I did not feel safe at all. Oakland seemed a lot worse in this regard, but they had the most Chinay Chinatown I have ever been in. Check it out if you can, it’s neat.
Outdoors & Weather: 9 / 10
I really enjoyed the climate here, but it is a bit cooler than I expected. It was the same exact temperature every day, 50s at night and 70s during the day. There was never any rain, almost always fog in the mornings. The piers are really pretty.
The nature nearby was very pleasant. Ocean beach was probably my favorite, it was outside of the bay so it had some nice waves. I went in the Pacific and see why everyone is wearing a wetsuit. It is kinda far from the main part of San Fransisco too, so there aren’t many people. Parks were also very large and pleasant, but there actually didn’t seem to be too many. There is a nice mountain in Daly City as well, it has some really nice paths and I maybe saw 5 people over the span of 3 hours. Yosemite is somewhat nearby, but I did not have the time to go there.
Price & Value: 7 / 10
Everything is pretty expensive here, but I don’t think that is a bombshell to anybody. DC and Chicago seem a better value, which may explain the higher homeless rates in San Fransisco. It definitely helps to have a Silicon Valley tech bro job in this area. At the end of the day though, salaries here are higher and you get a lot in return.
Overall: 46 / 60
I like it. If I wanted to be on the west coast it actually seems like one of the best options. The city is one of the most developed in the US and has easy access to anything you could want.