Honor Award
Powell Street Promenade
San Francisco
Hood Design, Oakland, CA
Client: Union Square Business Improvement District
Close Me!Audi USA sponsored the Promenade, transforming Powell Street from a corridor that people pass through into a destination in itself. Conceptual design focused on creating engaging public spaces.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Hood Design Studio, LLC
Image 2 of 16
Close Me!The Promenade is made up of a kit-of-parts: modular segments of aluminum grating form the walking surface, while aluminum ribbons form benches, tables, planters and towers.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Hood Design Studio, LLC
Image 3 of 16
Close Me!The Promenade is made up of a kit-of-parts: modular segments of aluminum grating form the walking surface, while aluminum ribbons form benches, tables, planters and towers.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Hood Design Studio, LLC
Image 4 of 16
Close Me!A time-lapse video of Powell Street documented the speedy installation process.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 5 of 16
Close Me!View of Powell St. Promenade, showing planters and a photovoltaic tower. The aluminum and wood grating extend the width of the existing sidewalk by 6’-2”.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 6 of 16
Close Me!View of the Powell St. Promenade, showing planters and benches. The Promenade replaced nearly 4,000 sq ft of street parking.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 7 of 16
Close Me!The Promenade sits adjacent to the historic Cable Car Tracks in downtown San Francisco.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 8 of 16
Close Me!Curving planters offer a place to sit while photovoltaic towers generate power for the free Promenade Wifi.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 9 of 16
Close Me!Powell Street is one of the busiest pedestrian thoroughfares in the country. Top: patrons rest while out of the way of pedestrian flow. Below: 36”-high tables give passersby the opportunity to rest, eat, or work.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 10 of 16
Close Me!Planters and railings buffer the interaction between pedestrian and vehicular movement.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 11 of 16
Close Me!Detail views of Street Furniture. Left: ribbons of aluminum fluidly emerge from the walking surface. Right: ribs support winding ribbons of aluminum, encasing a planter box.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 12 of 16
Close Me!Benches emerge from the walking surface, recalling an iconic curvature. Below: a daytime/nighttime composite detail photograph shows how the LED lighting “glows” from underneath the Promenade grating.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 13 of 16
Close Me!PV Panels are used to generate electricity to power LED lights along the Promenade at night.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 14 of 16
Close Me!PV Panels are used to generate electricity to power LED lights along the Promenade at night.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 15 of 16
Close Me!The Promenade is a place of pedestrian refuge: an opportunity to sit, to drink coffee, to meet friends, or to simply pause and take in the constant flow of pedestrian, vehicular, and historic cable car traffic.
Download Hi-Res ImageImage: Marion Brenner and Beth Amann
Image 16 of 16
Project Statement
On one of the busiest thoroughfares in San Francisco, four city blocks of parallel parking are replaced with a new pedestrian promenade. The Powell Street Promenade provides a 6’2” extension of the existing sidewalk, combining material innovation, technology and urban design into a new landscape that offers refuges for pedestrians amid the street’s busy vehicular and historic cable car traffic. It is the largest example of the city’s “Pavement to Parks” program, which seeks to reclaim swathes of urban land for pedestrian amenities. The project was funded in a public-private partnership with Audi USA and was intended to reflect their notion of ‘A Boldly Designed World’.
Project Narrative
—2012 Professional Awards Jury
Site & Context
The Powell Street Promenade is located on Powell Street in downtown San Francisco, spanning two blocks between Ellis St. and Geary St. and connecting to the edge of San Francisco’s Union Square. The existing city street included cable car tracks, vehicular thoroughfare, street parking, and sidewalks on each side of the street. The Powell Street Promenade installation replaced the existing street parking adjacent to the existing sidewalks on both sides of the street. Powell Street is one of the busiest pedestrian zones in America, second only to New York’s Times Square in number of visitors with 25,000 to 35,000 visitors per weekend day. The streets are lined with retail stores and restaurants. The historic San Francisco Cable Car transports more than 7.5 million passengers per year through this area of Powell Street.
Scope and Size
The Promenade is a 6’2” wide extension of the existing city sidewalk on both sides of the street, spanning a total of two city blocks. The installation removed nearly 4,500 total sq ft of street parking, and replaced it with pedestrian activity space. The scope of the project included designing and installing new pedestrian walking surfaces, street furnishings, and planting along the two blocks.
Design Intent
The Promenade transforms Powell Street from a corridor that people pass through into a destination in itself; engaging, enhancing, and immersing pedestrians in an urban environment that is distinctly new, while retaining its existing iconic presence. The design merges surface with furnishings creating a new constructed walk that floats between street and sidewalk, giving visitors and new experience adjacent to cable cars and storefronts.
The new walking surface is constructed of aluminum grating with spacing between 1/8” and 3/16.” This narrow dimension allows for ADA approved pedestrian surface while accommodating surface drainage. This structure also connects benches, planters, rails and photovoltaic towers so that they emerge from the walking surface skeuomorphically in one sculptural gesture along the street.
Materials & Installation
The Promenade’s surface is constructed of modular segments of slip resistant aluminum grating with wood embellishment. Benches, tables, rails and 12-foot tall towers are also constructed of aluminum. Photovoltaic panels atop these towers generate energy throughout the day, which is then stored and used to power free Wifi access along with LED lighting on site. The lighting is integrated beneath the grating, providing a glow effect from underneath the promenade during the busy nighttime hours. Low-water and native plantings are employed throughout the promenade to frame spaces for pedestrians to linger. The fast-track installation took place over the course of two months.
Social Impact
The Promenade places a priority on the needs of pedestrians, transit users and cyclists. After the Promenade’s initial installation, pedestrian volumes increased on all the blocks in the site area. Post-occupancy studies conducted by the Union Square District of San Francisco also showed an increase in the amount of time pedestrians spent on the blocks, with more people from the immediate neighborhood patronizing businesses on the corridor. Weekday pedestrian volumes on the street increased by as much as 18percent.
At the ribbon cutting event, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee commented, “Two-thirds of the millions of annual visitors make their way here… They love coming here, and why not link the historic cable car stop on Market Street (to Union Square) and make a wonderful experience. This unique public private non-profit partnership creates a safe, green, forward thinking and contemporary space for everyone...”
Project Resources
Hood Design Studio
Lead Designer: Walter Hood, ASLA
Project Client & Design Consultant:
Audi, USA
Design & Construction Team
City Design Group and Permitting Consultants
City of San Francisco Dept. of Public Works
& San Francisco Planning Department
Engineering Services
Smith Engineering, Inc.
Project Manager, Media and Marketing
Venables Bell & Partners
Featured Products
Aluminum Grating Suppliers
Barnett Bates
Fabrication
NorCal Metal Fabricators
Fabrication and Installation
Atthowe Fine Art Services
Plants
Flora Grubb Gardens
PV / Lighting
Alter Systems / TeemDesign