act differently. i would ultimately argue we think differently. and if we can challenge ourselves to relate to that physical environment, i think there's trementdz amount that can be accomplished. we talk about what's going on in other citiest renaissance of chicago, no one would recognize it today if they came back after the hiatus. it's significant what mayor daly has done. that's not just commitment from political will be financial commitment. we've seen cities around the world elevated the status of their surroundings and obviously we're bringing some of these experts in and they're here today to share some of these ideas. but think about san francisco and the plane, the bar that we have in this city. it's so much higher than nine out of ten of the other cities around the world.

the physical beauty of the city in spite of ourselves the extraordinary. the climate is our friend. there's no excuse not to be great. forget good. great. good to great. we are good, but we can be great. octavia boulevard, allen and his team deserve great credit. every time i drive by there or walk by there -- i do walk by there? [laughter] it's not easy to drive by it it's before to walk so that's a timing issue. i'm reminded of that. when we put the david best skull chiewr in there and challenge people to think differently about art. we talk about great streets. again, it's not just what's going exclusively for cars, pedestrianing and bicyclists. it's about everybody. if there's anything that defines san francisco it's a city of

unique characterized districts based on cultural competency and unique lifestyles brought together. we should be advancing that notion by physically planning our spaces in ways people can truly advance together in ways they not necessarily have yet. so i'm excited about all this. i'm excited about ,qat dean's doing and planning department. we added 26 positions, allen, last year, not bad considering we had our fourth budget deficit in a row. you made a great case for me to submit more planning, planners rather in the planning department so we don't have to hire those wildly expensive consult scunlt -- consults. we're funding process so there's

no excuse about the lack of funding. approximate we've got good planning commissioners and good folks finally wrestling some control of special interest at the department of building inspection that think they're running the city not the rest of you in the room and the rest of us throughout san francisco and we're going to have to fight for another decade to winñr that battle. it's not done. guys like me come and go. folks sneak back up and get cooped in this town. we have to takes the jobs away from special interests and we have the leadership to do that and the support of the board to do that. it's a long way away to say let's not lose that momentum and resolve. we can be much more and much better. the plan, as allen says, outstanding character texture of our city. not the dumbing down of

architecture. architecture that incites, enliveness and challenges us to be before creative. get more public art in the streets. even if we don't like it it challenges us to think aknew. let's make the investment in greening the city. there's no reason we can't do all of these things and ut don't need to wait a decade. we don't need to wait 15 plus years. as other mayors have, again because the bar's so high in san francisco. let me end by this. money is an excuse, it's not a problem. it's the quality of imagination and the resolve to do things differently t money is out there. you have a $5.3 million budget. that's bigger than a dozen plus state budgets in this country. it's about as big as the city council's budget in los angeles, a city substantially larger than san francisco.

money is an excuse. it is not the problem. you know what? there are a lot of folks out in the community like yourself that will step up to the plate as well and may be stepping up to the plate to adopt that 100-dollar maintenance on the tree as allen is referring to oi folks that will give up their time to try to do a little more for parks and rec facilities and dpw and planning folks to make sure they start getting challenged and can provide the support they're looking for. we have 700 plus thousand remarkable human beings that give a damn. they wouldn't be in san francisco unless they didn't care about san francisco and they want to participate. i just think things are beginning the gelnr we have every reason to make good things happen, and i just want to thank deep and marshal for starting this series of discussions on a monthly basis so we're held to account for moving this ball forward. i want to thank automatic

outstanding folks within the planning department. we're discovering jewels in the rough that were dumbed down many the past because of the transactional nature that are saying wow, can i share my ideas and passions and expertise? there's a lot more right within these departments than what's wrong, and i just got to tell you as a cittic in the last few years, i'm bing a bing a defensive supporter. this's more going right than wrong. if we continue to supportñi thee guys, you'll be amazed how capable they are. allen, i know you challenge us, that's what we love. i love the fact that you're -- you know, the older you get the more you do this, the more timid you come in terms of expressing your personal opinions. i'm in politics, allen clearly is not. but i like the authenticity. i like, yeah,ality times the audacity to say stop the

nonsense and excuses. you can do more and demand that you do more and better. not just close with this about faith. it's about work. you know, it's one thing to sit on the side line and critique. it's another to participate many the process of reform. i want to challenge all of you. i mean this sincerely. a lot of you have been frustrating and been like me out there yelling and screaming. i ask you to come inside the yard today help dean and his department. we have a new director, dpw he's outstanding good folks like the been working hard. thank you all very much for your participation. thank you for being here and our two guests tonight, thank you very much for taking your time and lending your expertise. [applause]

>> i get gifts to give some of the finest, we're going to need more than eight pages but i love it. >> the story of melbourne how it was turned around in ten years. i'll be (inaudible). [applause] okay. i'm inspired. now, i hope you are so we can have some good questions. who wants to be first to ask a good question? no shyness. yes, sir. >> (inaudible). >> why don't you stand up so everyone canñi hear you. >> (inaudible)

>> in the '70s, yes. >> (inaudible) can you imagine trying to keep something like that the city today with dpw and ada and everybody elseñi fightig you all the way. there should be a (inaudible)ñi culture of anyway sayers and (inaudible)? >> how do you overcome the

culture of nay sayers? how do you get more places like delaware debose triangle and stuff like that? you know, i honest to god think it wouldn't be hard. i really don't. i don't know, you can talkñi to the dpw people and the player people and they'll come along. if they don't, then you play hard ball. but i assume they want a lot of the same things. then you've got to be smart.

you've got to show the player people that their engines can get in. you've got to do tests to show that. you've got to let it be known that you know that the fire people met in las vegas a year, year and a half ago and everybody was there and they talked about why (inaudible) should be biggers? and they -- in a big meeting in los vegas? they picked a heck of a place to do that. it doesn't have to be that way. on the one hand we did right on actaif i can't -- we had the argument on octavia. we did right on the one side and used the four inch curb inside so those gizmos could go over

the curb. on the other hand we did wrong and you ought to admit that, that the lane is a foot, foot and a half too wide. i know it. i know it and shame on me for stopping fighting. they wanted it wider. we thought shame on them. it should be a foot, foot and a half narrower, the whole thing. i'm not -- you know, you can't criticize your own work you're in deep trouble. at the same time we propose it be a different (inaudible), that would be a different (inaudible). okay. you can -- my point is you can do it and you do it sometimes little by little, sometimes a lot by a lot.

i don't want to get into war stories, you know, in other places. why is that, but ask yourself, how come that median on international boulevard in fruitvale withñr benches in the middle of the street, how come that happened? how come traffic is slow there now? that's called hard ball. that was my cheerful departure from -- (inaudible). >> what? >> (inaudible) union square, you let me broach that. i've been wanting to ask you (inaudible)

>> it's been redesigned and it's built and they kaint going to change it over-- ain't going to change it overnight. (inaudible) and it was a matter of it was a matter of they knew -- i knew if i stayed there and didn't walk offt one that was going to win might get built. and if i walked off, it might not get built. anyway -- let me answer it this way. how would i design it? i don't know. because i -- i haven't been given the contract. but two of our students earlier had done the design for union square and students, matthew

henning was the chief designer. he works over at -- in the east bay. they did a spectacular design that in two terraces came down to the macy's facade there, they took off one layer of parking. the sort of thing that yan talks about. this was underground. they took off one layer of parking and came down in two steps into a grand, inviting place. i was heart struck when i realized they hadn't submitted, but that's the way i would

approach it. yes, right over here. >> yes. i am really inspired by the (inaudible) and endorsing these ideas and i wonder why he has such -- we have such a chip on our shoulder here that can't simply say (inaudible). mr. gail, i'm wondering in the examples that you gave of the (inaudible), what were the (inaudible) was it the leadership that we need to

better (inaudible), was it a citizen based (inaudible) was it a (inaudible)? what were those things that (inaudible)? >> it's very interesting with all the cities which have turned around and there are many more than the nine i mentioned by now because when the first ones had started and it worked, then it's much easier to follow and learn prosecute the other examples. from all these these poone,rs e one thing in common. it's a diverse leadership. sometimes it the mayor and sometimes it's a group of citizens or the green partly that comes into power own one is elected mayor and he does it.

sometimes it's the architect who has the about it to talk with continue. sometimes in copenhagen it was a mixture of a good city architect who liked a good traffic engineer who liked a good mayor. the three of them were great friends and go tot. normally city architect and traffic planner fight with each other and suddenly there was a body that could have the vision. it's some people with vision, some people who want things to be changed. that has been the passion and that still is a very good recipe to lift the torch and run towards a better goal. luckily we have a number of examples and when we hear about all these various departments can -- will not accept this or

that, i know it's a good policy to come with examples that it has been done in other places and it works. also with business men or businesses in cities, they are generally very afraid of changes, as they say, if you do this and that, our business will be ruined if after some planning changes there are any changes in their businesses, they'll come running and and blame it on the planner saying you ruined my business because you closed that street or took away these six parking places. we have found again if we have knowledge of what's going on in the city, if we have data about how people use the cities, then we can also have a much more detailed and proper debate about what happens. i can tell you about the story from copenhagen where we have for many years data about how the city's being used and the

mayor has told me she never ever more has visit from the business men when there are changes because whenever they came running up and say now you have ruined my business, she would take one data collections and look you're living there, you have your business there, there's 6,000 people a day more than ten years ago, are you sure you're a business businessman? [laughter] so it's very good to have information and it's very good to have example and best practice. i'm a very -- i was thinking about those of us have worked hard throughout our life in education, we are strong believers you can tell about what other people have done and then you can get a shared feeling of let's go and do it and do it based on knowledge of what has been achieved in other

places. information is very important and whoever has if we have patience to give information to people doing the jobs, they can understand that they can do marvelous jobs. so i think things like events like this and (inaudible) folks and whatever is very good in spreading the news that we can have much better cities. [applause] >> yes, sir? speak loud. >> what's your most recent (inaudible). >> my most recent what? >> eepiphany.

>> i haven't had a epiphany -- >> repeat your question. >> i was wonder what your most recent epiphany was about (inaudible) >> i think they're looking for an example that inspired you in some way or another. >> i never heard that way before but you have to learn all life. fascinating word. i think if we look at the area of quality in cities and public space, the area where there's been the most remarkable improvements are the areas of lighting. in two places we had a traffic lamp or park lamp. now we can see how one city after the other worked artistically and talented so at various types of the year and

types of (inaudible) whatever you can regulate the life, you can use much less energy now and have much more beautiful -- you can really -- the night is a very important part of every city and much more can be done and that is some of the things within the last ten years really have been developed and especially a city like leon is famous for being one of the most beautiful and eleet in the world. another has been in the more and more places are made so cater for people who like to spend sometime joyfully in the public space to sit around and hear music, all these events and whatever which is part of the present-day society which is another trend we can see around the place. that would be my answer to that

after. maybe i don't know what the word is. >> i'll give you an old one and a recentñr one. old is yan mentioned he did go into brazil. my first time there was now, what, 30 years ago, maybe more. and -- yeah, ''75. i saw this street that had been turned -- it was the main street of town. main street of central karocheba. they turned it into a pedestrian street and almost with no money and did it in 72 hours over a weekend because they knew that the merchants were streaming and

wouldn't like it so they -- screaming and wouldn't like it so they did it over the weekend and very expensively. the merchants were really pissed and threatened to drive over it the following weekend they were going to drive on it with trucks and cars. and on a following saturday morning, they, they being the city, rolled a long, long, long piece of paper down the center of the street with every half a meter a stick to hold the paper down and they handed out paints and a paintbrush to any kid who wanted to paint on that.

and no one wanted to hit the kids. ñi and within two weeks, everybody thought, hey, this wasn't such a bad idea who the mayor had done. and even more important, today, today every saturday they roll the piece of paper down and they put the sticks and kids come and paint and they're of different economic status. they may not make friends with other people. they see each other, 35 years. they've been doing this 35 years. and that's -- you know, the

socialologists all say you're a damn physical determinist and that's crap. well, i'll buy it. hey, i'm one. okay.ñr and the other is epiphany or other greatness, i still continually learning from and watching itñi grow is the water front of vancouver and what they're doing and have been doing. yan, that's one of the great cities. it really is. >> okay. we're going to have to end this conversation. i'm sorry about that because i know there are a lot of questions. i wanted to make a couple closing remarks and marshal wanted to say something.

our strategy here is going to be simple. in 1909 daniel bourbon produced a plan of chicago. after that plan was produced, a few years later the chicago plan commission was organized and the first head of the chicago plan commission was a man named charles whacker. a were smart guy. he produced the whacker manual which was taken to every high school many the city of chicago and taught as part of the -- of a civic class in high school. and the whacker manual was describing what chicago could be if the city decided to take certain steps. and it was the whacker manual that caused all the money in bond issues to transform the chicago lake front from an industrial commercial railroad district to greater water front that it is today. we're going to borrow on that strategy.

we now have the mayor's support to produce a master plan for thi city streets, these mean streets that allen talks about and we're all agreed it needs to be done. then when we finish that, we're going to have the mayor or keyboard members go out and sell this plan which is going to set standards for redoing the major streets of the city. we're going to sell this to the public and go ask for a bond issue or whatever to have annual program to redo the city streets and bring them up to contemporary standards. that's a simple strategy and we hope it works. we'll talk more about that at one of our next monthly meetings because there's a lot to talk about. i was going to ask these fellows, do they really believe the london congestion feed for the central area of london would work with a city the sc