I think Salesforce Park has a branding problem.
“Salesforce Park” sounds like someplace you need a lanyard to enter. Or possibly a corporate picnic area where someone from HR has arranged team-building exercises.
It is neither.
It’s one of my favorite urban parks in San Francisco. And I swear half the people I know who would love it have never bothered to go up there.
You’re missing out.
Salesforce Park is 5.4 acres of gardens, walking paths, lawns, public art, and gathering spaces sitting 70 feet above downtown San Francisco, on top of the Salesforce Transit Center.
Yes. On the roof.
There are trees up there. Gardens. Lawns. Places to eat and drink. You can wander for almost half a mile above the city while buses and commuters do their thing underneath you.
There’s even a fountain that springs to life when a bus passes underneath it. Like the ring of a bell when a ferry gets her wings. Okay, not exactly. But it’s very San Francisco.
IIt’s weird.
It’s wonderful.
And if I were considering of East Cut as my new hood, Salesforce Park would be reason #1.
Go Before We Lose the Extra Hour
From May through October 31, Salesforce Park stays open until 9 p.m.
On November 1, it switches to its shorter seasonal schedule and closes at 8.
One hour. Not exactly a tragedy.
But that extra hour matters more than it sounds like it would, particularly if you’re walking up there after work, grabbing something to eat, catching music, or just sitting outside while San Francisco does that ridiculously beautiful early-evening-light thing it occasionally does to remind us why we put up with everything else.
And this year, there’s another reason to get up there before October ends.
The park’s high-season calendar has been bonkers.
The Transbay Joint Powers Authority, working with the East Cut Community Benefit District, put together nearly 20 free public programs a week during the May-through-October season.
Twenty.
Apparently Salesforce Park has a more active social life than I do.
You Could Basically Spend the Week Up There
There are four recurring live-music series alone.
Live on the Lawn happens Thursdays from noon to 1:30 on the Central Lawn, featuring musicians trained at the San Francisco Rock Project.
Rooftop Jazz takes over the amphitheater Friday mornings.
On Saturdays, Bluegrass Breeze and Big Band Jazz rotate through.
There’s also Plaza Pulse, with DJ sets on first and third Thursday evenings.
Then throw in a monthly Sunday Drum Circle, Bollywood Nights, Argentine Tango, and the rest of the rotating calendar.
And here’s the part I particularly appreciate:
A lot of it is free.
No ticket. No reservation. No refreshing Resy exactly 30 days in advance at 5 p.m. while questioning your life choices.
You go upstairs.
There is music.
This should not be revolutionary, and yet I find it delightful.
And Yes, People Actually Live Here
This is the part of the East Cut that I find more interesting.
For years, this part of San Francisco had a reputation as somewhere people worked, not necessarily somewhere they lived.
Glass towers. Offices. Transit. Everybody leaves.
That’s increasingly not the whole story.
And Salesforce Park is a huge part of what makes the neighborhood feel less like a collection of very expensive buildings and more like somewhere humans might actually spend a Saturday.
That’s why I think people dismissing it because of the Salesforce name are making a mistake.
Forget the name.
Pretend it’s called Really Cool Park Floating Above Downtown.
Better?
Go.
The Party Downstairs Doesn’t End October 31
There’s also a completely different thing happening at street level.
Downtown First Thursdays, or DFT, shuts down three blocks of 2nd Street between Market and Howard, along with parts of Jessie, Minna, and Natoma, from 5 to 10 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month.
And unlike the park’s high-season programming, this one isn’t packing up for winter.
It’s a free street party with DJs, food, outdoor bars, drag performances, and the occasional wait, seriously? headliner.
Janelle Monáe DJ’d there during Pride.
That’s a slightly different Thursday evening than wandering home from the office and reheating something from Trader Joe’s.
What I like is that the East Cut is developing two different kinds of public life.
Upstairs: this beautiful, landscaped park with free programming and a distinctly daytime/early-evening rhythm.
Downstairs: streets and alleys increasingly being used for events that keep people downtown after work.
That’s much more interesting to me than “the park closes an hour earlier starting November 1.”
Then There Are the Little Things
Some of my favorite neighborhood stuff isn’t an event at all.
There’s the Lansing Tiled Stairway, a mosaic installation by artist Wilma Wyss.
There’s Andytown Coffee Roasters at 181 Fremont.
There’s Barebottle’s beer garden inside the park.
There are places to grab a quick bite inside the Transit Center.
And there are all these little pockets where someone has clearly asked:
What if people wanted to stay here rather than just pass through?
That’s the question that makes the East Cut interesting.
Because beautiful residential towers alone don’t make a neighborhood.
People outside do.
So Here’s My October Assignment for You
Go to Salesforce Park.
Seriously.
If you’ve lived in San Francisco for years and somehow haven’t been because you thought it was some corporate Salesforce thing, I am specifically talking to you.
Take the escalator up.
Walk the whole thing.
Catch Rooftop Jazz if you can. Go to Live on the Lawn. Have a coffee. Sit somewhere. Look down at the city and marvel briefly at the fact that somebody built all of this on top of a bus station.
Do it before October 31 and you’ve got the longer evening hours and the full high-season calendar.
Do it in November and guess what?
The park is still wonderful.
You just have to leave an hour earlier.
And if you’re actually considering living in the East Cut, then yes, I think this park materially changes the conversation.
Would I choose the East Cut over my beloved old San Francisco neighborhoods?
Maybe.
But Salesforce Park?
Salesforce Park could almost talk me into it.
You can read my guide to the East Cut for the parts of the neighborhood that don’t have seasonal hours.
And if you’re considering buying or selling here, come talk to me. I will happily discuss the housing market, the neighborhood, and my ongoing campaign to get San Franciscans to stop ignoring the excellent park hiding on top of the bus station.
