>> there has been an acknowledgement of the special places around san francisco bay. well, there is something sort of innate in human beings, i think, that tend to recognize a good spot when you see it, a spot that takes your breath away. this is one of them. >> an icon of the new deal. >> we stood here a week ago and we heard all of these dignitaries talk about the symbol that coit tower is for san francisco. it's interesting for those of us in the pioneer park project is trying to make the point

that not only the tower, not only this man-built edifice here is a symbol of the city but also the green space on which it sits and the hill to which is rests. to understand them, you have to understand the topography of san francisco. early days of the city, the city grows up in what is the financial district on the edge of chinatown. everything they rely on for existence is the golden gate. it's of massive importance to the people what comes in and out of san francisco bay. they can't see it where they are. they get the idea to build a giant wooden structure. the years that it was up here, it gave the name telegraph hill. it survived although the structure is long gone. come to the 1870's and the city has growed up remarkably. it's fueled with money from the nevada silver mines and the gold rush.

it's trying to be the paris of the west. now the beach is the suburbs, the we will their people lived on the bottom and the poorest people lived on the top because it was very hard getting to the top of telegraph hill. it was mostly lean-to sharks and bits of pieces of houses up here in the beginning. and a group of 20 businessmen decided that it would be better if the top of the hill remained for the public. so they put their money down and they bought four lots at the top of the hill and they gave them to the city. lily hitchcock coit died without leaving a specific use for her bequest. she left a third of her estate for the beautify indication of the city. arthur brown, noted architect in the city, wanted for a while to build a tower. he had become very interested in persian towers. it was the 1930's. it was all about machinery and sort of this amazing architecture, very powerful

architecture. he convinced the rec park commission that building a tower in her memory would be the thing to do with her money. >> it was going to be a wonderful observation place because it was one of the highest hills in the city anywhere and that that was the whole reason why it was built that high and had the elevator access immediately from the beginning as part of its features. >> my fear's studio was just down the street steps. we were in a very small apartment and that was our backyard. when they were preparing the site for the coit tower, there was always a lot of harping and griping about how awful progress was and why they would choose this beautiful pristine area to do them in was a big question. as soon as the coit tower was getting finished and someone

put in the idea that it should be used for art, then, all of a sudden, he was excited about the coit tower. it became almost like a daily destination for him to enjoy the atmosphere no matter what the politics, that wasn't the point. as long as they fit in and did their work and did their own creative expression, that was all that was required. they turned in their drawings. the drawings were accepted. if they snuck something in, well, there weren't going to be any stoolies around. they made such careful little diagrams of every possible little thing about it as though that was just so important and that they were just the big

frog. and, actually, no one ever felt that way about them and they weren't considered something like that. in later life when people would approach me and say, well, what did you know about it? we were with him almost every day and his children, we grew up together and we didn't think of him as a commie and also the same with the other. he was just a family man doing normal things. no one thought anything of what he was doing. some of them were much more highly trained. it shows, in my estimation, in the murals. this was one of the masterpieces. families at home was a lot more close to the life that i can remember that we lived. murals on the upper floors like

the children playing on the swings and i think the little deer in the forest where you could come and see them in the woods and the sports that were always available, i think it did express the best part of our lives. things that weren't costing money to do, you would go to a picnic on the beach or you would do something in the woods. my favorite of all is in the staircase. it's almost a miracle masterpiece how he could manage to not only fit everyone, of course, a lot of them i recognized from my childhood -- it's how he juxtaposed and managed to kind of climb up that stairway on either side very much like you are walking down a street. it was incredible to do that and to me, that is what depicted the life of the times

in san francisco. i even like the ones that show the industrial areas, the once with the workers showing them in the cannery and i can remember going in there and seeing these women with the caps, with the nets shuffling these cans through. my parents had a ranch in santa rosa and we went there all summer. i could see these people leaning over and checking. it looked exactly like the beautiful things about the ranch. i think he was pretty much in the never look back philosophy about the coit. i don't think he ever went to visit again after we moved from telegraph hill, which was only five or six years later. i don't think he ever had to see it when the initials are

scratched into everything and people had literally destroyed the lower half of everything. >> well, in my view, the tower had been pretty much neglected from the 1930's up until the 1980's. it wasn't until then that really enough people began to be alarmed about the condition of the murals, the tower was leaking. some of the murals suffered wear damage. we really began to organize getting funding through the arts commission and various other sources to restore the murals. they don't have that connection or thread or maintain that connection to your history and your past, what do you have? that's one of the major elements of what makes quality of life in san francisco so incredible. when people ask me, and they ask me all the time, how do you get to coit tower, i say you

walk. that's the best way to experience the gradual elevation coming up above the hustle and bustle of the city and finding this sort of oasis, if you will, at the top of the hill. when i walk through this park, i look at these brick walls and this lawn, i look at the railings around the murals. i look at the restoration and i think, yeah, i had something to do with that. learning the lessons, thank you, landmarks meet landmarks. the current situation at pioneer park and coit tower is really based in public and private partnership. it was the citizens who came together to buy the land to keep it from being developed. it was lily hitchcock coit to give money to the city to beautify the city she loved of the park project worked to

develop this south side and still that's the basis of our future project to address the north side.

>> started in 1990. the citizens of the marina district came to the fire department and asked for a program to survive for 3 days. there is a 70 percent chance we will have a 6.5 earthquake. 71 large fires. 40 major rescue operations.

[inaudible]. rescue operations there were 34 structure fires we need 275 engines to handle this. we have 41. you will be on your own and we should be prepared. we will go over the merge training program. part of the training program is helping you make the decisions that will save lives. in this situation this person carrying a pail of water to put out the fire will not put out the fire. how many people have used a fire extinguisher before. >> may be 10 percent of you. by the end of the week you will be putting out a fire with a fire extinguisher. you don't want to learn out to house an extinguisher when

they big fire is in front of you. when you turn off your natural gas and water. hazardous materials will be talked about next week. 35-40 percent of you. you will find out that all of you have hazardous material in your home. the third week is disaster medicine. you, going into a room spending 45 seconds on one person into 3 life saving techniques. by the fourth we we will teach you as search and rescuers how to keep yourself safe by identifying safe and none safe building to go into. sometimes objects are too heavy for you to liftoff of a body.

we will teach you privying which will use anything you have, wood or cement blocks so you is see that people can lift heavy objects off of people. now, you have to have a plan. every program needs to have a plan. we can't say, here are your skills. class 6, after half an hour we will split you into teams of 10 people each. putting out the fires. you will go into a dark room and doing a search. you will be treating people with injuries on them. be doing privying. lifting heavy objects off of a doll and giving iv and turning off utilities. we are building you up to the

hand's on scenario. >> what do you do? let's say you feel a tremor and it's going to shake, what are you going to do? all right. 40 people said -- >> where we going to go? >> under a table. >> [laughter]. >> going to be survival of the fitef. fittest. if you have a table go under the table. look above you, what's going to fall. what's going to hit your head. most of the chairs decent. if you are in a movie theatre or stadium what do you do? the same thing. these chairs are not heavy dutiy but covering your head is most important.

if it's an empty room go against the wall and cover your head. a lot of cut in disaster heads and arms will get cut. those you can control the bleeding where as the head injury is harder. cover your head, the most important thing to do. we cover, beaware. 15 seconds. in the marina people said it felt like a minute. if you are covering yourself under the table and it's shaking what will happen in 30 seconds? you look up, where's the table. hold on to the table. if you are inside, stay in don't go from the known to the unknown. if you are downtown in an office building or shopping at macy's, do you run in the middle of the street? no. you stay where you are.

how much time do you have? seconds. you have to make a decision within seconds. if you run to the street what will happen? >> get hit by a car. you have windows, glass to fall on you. high rise. if you know where you are, stay there than to go somewhere you don't know what's there. once it's shaking between 30 seconds to a minute and once it's over, things will fall and tip over. give it time to move around. of course, if there is danger coming to you, you want to move.

so, picture these buildings. against the wall. will i go behind this wall? lean against it, cover my head? no. the pictures frames. if they come off and hit me on the top of the head, more injuries. be aware of that target. look behind you before you lean against the wall. sometimes wrong place at the wrong time there is no way to get down this way. try to find a [inaudible] place if you can. get next to something that's sturdy that will block up against you. how much time do you have? short. >> this picture, what's a good spot? round ones.

>> make sure there are no windows on top of you. if you go to that one notices sky lights above. they will fall down and hit you. either table is fine. stay away from the windows you will be better. make sure you go between the windows and make sure the glass does not pop and cut you. >> elevators, what do you think? you don't get in elevator? no. you will be stuck there for awhile. if you go down the stair well. if there's an earthquake and you are in a high rise building. ing -- no. if it hadn't collapsed in the disaster chances are it will stay up.

outside, where's an open area? high rise building when glass breaks it floats it with hit 2 blocks away from where it falls. if you are outside, you want to look up and make sure nothing is coming toward you. there is 3-5 feet of glass on market street. top of that you are going to have office furniture and debris falling into the street. even if you are in a car if you are next to large, brick buildings and if collapsed on you there is no safe place to go. how about here. the safety spot is second base. no doubt about it. you have 60,000 people want to go to second base. people get injured jumping chairs. go between the chairs, cover

your head and get your head below the seat. there is a lot of crud down there. the chairs will break the fall. if you stop, someone behind you will hit you. so, slow down, pull to the side of the road. stay with the car until the shaking stops. you need protection for your head. if there are wires near your car, don't get out. don't park under or over an over pass under a bridge, under trees, power lines and next to freeway side walls. you know what freeway side walls are. >> these are the spots you don't want to park.

in the city there are a lot of spots like that. that's pretty common response -- my experience with driving. i was driving going hope. home i had to go 2 miles. it took 3 hours to drive 2 miles. it was my unwillingness to give up my car. i could have gotten out of my car and walked home. i'm driving i thought it would be easier if i had walked. on the freeway? this person out of his truck survived. he got out and waited for help. there are a lot of people who have certain skills will get to them. how about the bay bridge? if you have to drive after, drive slow.

5-10 miles per hour. look ahead to see if the roads are difficult to maneuver. even if you have a motorcycle it's hard to drive around this area. sometimes it's easy to walk than to drive off. the fifth, 11 people died, 6 were here. they were waiting for the family members to get off. it was by a masonry building with glass. have emergency supply kit. at least 3. one for home, work one for the car. emergency supply kit you want one for home you want for 5 days. our old standard was 3.

after hurricane katrina we participate 5 days. for work a lot of work places have supplies. make sure they do. if they don't keep one for yourself and may be your coworkers. a first aid kit a flashlight any pair of shoes in case you are driving you have to get out. water. how much water do you need for 72 hours? if you use the hot water heater you have to turn off the gas. if you don't stop the gas it will light up and cause a little explosion or fire. vegetables. the back of the tank you go up and treat water with bleach.

but remember, it should be a fresh pot of bleach. once you open bleach it looses the effectiveness of the bleach. one capful for a gallon of water. wait 20 minutes. wash your hands. wait a half-hour, to drink it, tastes like pool water but it kills germs. >> what kind of food do you want to keep? open the fridge don't open it too much. eat all perishable food first. you want to save emergency supplies. what emergency supply food do you want to /kaoepl. keep? energy bars. dry food. canned vegetables. can corn, can peas, you can

drain that and drink the water and eat the vegetables. buy can food that you eat normally. and a can opener. first aid kit, have 3. have you a small one in the car, have a nice sized one for home and make sure you have one at work. make sure if you are a diabetic or have a heart condition, something that you normal take have a little supply. have a storage area for this. consider this. if you have a supply kit, make sure you have one that's mobile. mobile meaning, if you have to evacuate a square mile f