The “East Cut” —the area of San Francisco formerly known as Rincon Hill at the base of the Bay Bridge — is a neighborhood of superlatives. It’s home to the tallest building west of the Mississippi, the brand-new Salesforce Tower. It boasts the city’s priciest penthouse, listed at a whopping $42 million. And it’s the site of one of the largest civic projects in San Francisco history—the Transbay Transit Center.
Another record it can claim? Officially being the fastest-growing and densest neighborhood in the city.
And yet basically no one has heard of it.
That’s because this slice of the city, about 25 blocks in total just south of Market Street and east of 2nd Street, has only recently been bestowed the trendy “East Cut” name as part of an effort to rebrand the neighborhood as a place that represents where people actually live and play, rather than just work and sit in traffic.
Resident Shelley Costantini has lived in the East Cut since long before it had that name. When she bought her apartment 17 years ago, just after 9/11, the prices were a fraction of what they are today. No one used to want to live in the desolate industrial neighborhood where, long before Uber, it was nearly impossible to get taxis.
Surrounded by not much more than vacant buildings and the nightclub the Sound Factory, she knew almost no one except one other couple in her building. “There was zero community whatsoever,” Costantini said.
Over the last few years, she’s watched her neighborhood completely transform. Skeletons of high-rises replaced low-rise buildings. Large apartment complexes opened where parking lots once stood. The Transbay project got underway. Traffic closures became common. Construction sprung up everywhere. “The construction is unbearable, but I am pretty much numb to it,” she said.
But somehow, in the middle of all this rapid change, a new sense of community has started to emerge.
The number of development projects in this area is dizzying and hard to track. Of the 14 skyscrapers under construction right now across San Francisco, half are in the East Cut. The number of apartment buildings, and therefore people who live here, has also grown dramatically. The area is currently home to 10,000 residents, and 5,000 more are expected to move in during the next two years.
Commuters are also a full-blown force. Roughly 80,000 people make their way to work here each day already, and Salesforce plans to add another 2,500 into the mix. Not to mention Facebook’s plans to move into this neighborhood, having recently signed a lease for more than 400,000 square feet of space at 181 Fremont. And the company just signed another at 250 Howard at more more than 700,000 square feet. While Facebook has been quiet about how many employees they expect to have in their San Francisco offices, some estimate that it may be as high as 8,000.
But somehow, in the middle of all this rapid change, a new sense of community has started to emerge. “Slowly but surely through the last year, I have been passing people in the street calling out ‘Hey, Shelley.’ We never had that before,” Costantini said.
She credits a lot of that change to the East Cut Community Benefit District, a nonprofit created by a 2015 ballot measure and funded by a special assessment to property owners, that provides services to a neighborhood in transition, such as street cleanup, a security patrol, outreach to homeless individuals, community events and a 24-hour dispatch, a sort of hyperlocal 311 that residents can call anytime with issues. It is often at these meetings, which mix the business of neighborhood planning with art appreciation or local music, that Costantini has gotten to know some of her neighbors.
“They were scared someone was coming in and taking their money just to rebrand,” she said.
But not everyone has been so happy with the new neighborhood brand. Originally called the Greater Rincon Hill Central Business District, the neighborhood got its name change last summer, resulting in confused and mixed responses. And when the San Francisco Chronicle reported that the marketing campaign had a price tag of $68,000, residents erupted, furious.
Tammy Riemer, a realtor with Climb Real Estate who specializes in the East Cut, explained that residents hadn’t felt like they were involved enough in the process. “They were scared someone was coming in and taking their money just to rebrand,” she said.
But a year has made a difference. While some still oppose the new name, many residents report real improvements. Costantini, for example, was happy when the CBD provided her with trash bags for the Rincon Hill Dog Park. Maurice Bizzarri, who has lived in the neighborhood for 10 years, says the stairs at the end of Lansing are finally staying clean. And Anthony Philpott, who has lived in the 32-story apartment tower Solaire since it opened two years ago, has met new friends at the Third Friday pop-up parties that the East Cut hosts.
“Everyone is living very close together, but sometimes it is very hard to meet people in those high-rises,” Riemer said.
Andrew Robinson, the executive director of the East Cut Community Benefit District, explains that San Francisco has always been a city of neighborhoods, so it’s important for the East Cut to feel like one, too, especially as it swells with new residents, employees and visitors. “A lot of buildings here are changing the skyline,” Robinson said. “But our task centers on how we work on the human-scaled details — the places where people linger, the green spaces.”
The retail coming into the neighborhood will help with that. Last summer the opening of the grocery story Woodlands Market at the corner of Folsom and Main was key. And more restaurants and coffee shops should be moving in soon.
And then there are the parks — the most notable, destination-worthy one being the 5.5-acre rooftop city park on the top of the Salesforce Transit Center, which will be opening at the end of the summer. And after eight long years of construction and numerous delays, with the completion of the Transit Center now in sight, residents are excited to see how the new neighborhood will shape up.
The pieces are finally falling into place, but what is the East Cut going to become in the next couple of years after all these projects become populated? Only time will tell.
Hey! The Bold Italic recently launched a podcast, This Is Your Life in Silicon Valley. Check out the full season or listen to the episode below featuring Eileen Rinaldi, CEO and founder of Ritual Coffee. More coming soon, so stay tuned!
