Mixed Reaction as Rehabbed Dolores Park Reopens

Thousands partied as Mission Dolores Park was fully reopened last week after a year and a half of renovations. Though touted as a grand re-opening, there was no official opening ceremony.

With the final phase of the Dolores Park renovations now completed, the "gay beach," a popular LGBT hangout on the hill alongside Church and 20th street near Muni's J Church line, was reclaimed by the community.

The renovations include newly planted grass and trees, new benches and lighting for the park, and newly constructed restrooms, as well as a children's playground complete with swings, slides, and climbing bars.

The $20.5 million renovation was funded through the 2008 Clean and Safe Neighborhood Parks Bond, San Francisco Recreation and Park Department said.

Thousands took advantage of the break in the rains and the mild temperatures. Revelers included a group of hula-hoopers and a diverse array of families who were there to enjoy a simple picnic. A number of people danced to the musical stylings of a local mariachi band - dancers included an attention-grabbing robot.

Gay District 8 Supervisor Scott Wiener told the Bay Area Reporter that he couldn't be happier with the new Dolores Park.

"Dolores Park is a community treasure, and it's now even better," Wiener said. "We increased the park's restroom capacity seven-fold, installed new irrigation and drainage systems, renewed the athletic facilities, and generally spruced things up. The project team did a fantastic job, as did the many community members who helped with the design process."

Parkgoers were also pleased.

"It looks awesome," said Lee Jewell, 55, as he sat on a hilltop bench that afforded him a view of the entire park. "They did an amazing job - come back to Dolores Park."

According to a news release from Joey Kahn of rec and park, the newly constructed restrooms brings the number of toilets in the park to 27 - the park previously offered only four toilets for public use. Additionally, near the gay beach is a pissoir, an outdoor, open-air urinal that now stands next to the outbound J-Church stop. The pissoir is modeled after similar urinals that are found in a variety of European cities.

One thing that did stick out was that the pissoir does not resemble a rendering that the B.A.R. published in December. In that illustration provided by rec and park, the sides of the pissoir look to be at least seven feet tall. But the pissoir walls actually come up to a man's chin, and using the urinal does not afford much privacy.

Kahn said this week that the pissoir had indeed changed.

"The design was changed due to community and operational concerns about vandalism and visibility, as well as to ensure ADA access," Kahn said in an email, referring to the Americans with Disabilities Act.

He added that plants on the exterior of the pissoir "will grow similarly to ivy over the next several months to provide for additional privacy."

Kahn said the pissoir was conceived to "address concerns of neighbors and park users who had seen people illegally relieving themselves on the Muni tracks and in bushes near homes."

One of the people who helped construct the pissoir also talked about it at the park last week.

"We want to give people a communal location to go to the bathroom," Peter Dickinson told the B.A.R. "We need it because people would rather not take the time to go down to a facility that might be locked after dark."

Dickinson said that he laid out the location for the pissoir's drain and coordinated its connection with the sewer system. He said that the pissoir is on an auto-timer that flushes water through it a number of times per day.

"If this works out, they'll consider using this system in other parks," Dickinson said.

The pissoir got high marks from gay artist Jokie X Wilson. "I love it," Wilson told the B.A.R. as he used the facility. "It brings back warm memories of Amsterdam - it's one of those things that makes life easier."

"I could have pissed all night, like a horse," added Wilson's friend, Roger Schachtel, 66. Schachtel was also quite pleased with the new Dolores Park as a whole.

"From where I stood, I beheld glittering crowds, the downtown vista and the tapestry of the heavens," he said. "I inhaled champagne air. I never wanted to go home."

Several neighborhood residents took a different view of the park's reopening. Lisa Geduldig, a popular comedian and LGBT activist, took issue with the personal habits of park attendees.

"I used to enjoy Dolores Park and was thrilled to have it around the corner from me," Geduldig said, who has lived in the neighborhood for 27 years. "But it has become a playground for the nouveau riche or hipsters or whoever the F they are who apparently never learned to clean up after themselves. Who goes to a park and leaves their shit behind?"

Geduldig was referring in part to photos of a trash-littered Dolores Park that were posted on Facebook the day after the reopening.

"Over the past few years or so, the place has suddenly become wall-to-wall and a pigsty," she added. "With that said, I haven't been there since it reopened. After eons of construction being an eyesore and parts of the park closed in different intervals, I'm glad the whole thing is open. But I must admit that I almost never go there anymore since the overly paid entitled set moved in. Get off my lawn."

Patrick Henry, a gay man who lives about a block from the park, took issue with the money the city spent on its redesign.

"If my impression remains that it seems odd to me that the city, which is currently routing homeless people out of their personal shelters, their tents, yet failing to provide adequate shelters or services to them - that the city had all this of this money to redo a pleasure-park," Henry said. "Of course, with all of the tax revenues from our dot-com businesses and high-priced property sales we should be able to afford all of it, right?"