Sanhattan
I’ve been saying for awhile that San Francisco ought to be “Sanhattan” referencing of course Manhattan and the SF parochials who use Manhattanization as a pejorative. I finally searched for the term while writing about free parking and was slightly disappointed to find that an area of Santiago, Chile is already known as Sanhattan. Unless there has been an incredible amount of building since I visited that city in 1998 (loved it) I find it hard to justify the name.
Anyhow, I welcome plans to build the tallest building on the U.S. west coast in San Francisco, and lots of them. Manhattanization is boring. Turn the whole of San Francisco into Hong Kong. Too bad Hong Francisco or San Kong don’t flow like Sanhattan.
June 4th, 2006 at 11:40
Even if you wanted to populate San Francisco with a lot of tall buildings, it would probably not happen because of seismic concerns, something not of concern to Manhattan
June 4th, 2006 at 12:11
Arturo, earthquake risk at least as great as SF’s hasn’t stopped Tokyo skyscraper builders. Taipei, currently home to the tallest building in the world, is also in a very hot zone. My understanding is that midrises have greater earthquake risk than tall buildings more or less because the latter have more ability to sway.
June 4th, 2006 at 18:06
By the way earthquakes are of concern in NYC.
December 26th, 2006 at 14:32
[...] Two 1,200 foot towers are planned for the northwest corner of 1st and Mission Streets in San Francisco, site of a few run down buildings, one of which Bitzi had offices in for most of 2001 (spruced up some since then). Will San Francisco planners allow rapacious developers to destroy history? I hope so. Onward to Sanhattan! [...]
December 26th, 2006 at 18:39
I want huge buildings too…bring em on and clear out the ole weak ones.
May 4th, 2008 at 17:18
Gum Kong? Hong Shan?