Time is on its side
The city’s southwestern neighborhoods, flowing across what used to be a vast ocean of sand dunes to the Pacific, share little in common with the Victorian splendor San Francisco is famous for. Stucco row houses and craftsmen bungalows line the windswept streets in these residential enclaves. And yet even “out here,” a taste for the genteel and decorative spirit of the last century is kept alive in a secret park with a giant sundial.
Built in the westward expansion of the city after the earthquake of 1906, Ingleside Terrace was laid out around a popular old racetrack for horses. In 1900, the track even played host to the first automobile race in California. The course later turned into Urbano Drive, and by 1912, more than 750 houses were planned for the loop, with the sundial park as a novelty centerpiece. In an effort to lure families to this new district, a tunnel was blasted through Twin Peaks for easy access from downtown, and a streetcar line was established. At an opening ceremony in 1913, the sundial was dedicated to two great recent building projects, the Twin Peaks Tunnel and the Panama Canal.
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Address Entrada Court, Ingleside Terrace, San Francisco, CA, 94132 | Public Transport Light rail: K-Ingleside (Ocean Ave & Westgate Dr stop) | Tip A drive around Urbano Drive will take you back a century to the first classic car race in California.
Turning off Urbano Drive, a smaller street, Entrada Court, leads like a spoke on a wheel to the circular park, where the giant 28-foot sundial slants elegantly upward. The dial resembles a slide, and indeed, generations of Ingleside children have employed it as such. On a fogless day, one can read the shadows along the clock face, with its Roman numerals marking the hours. Though the decorations on the surrounding “Grecian urns” are fading now, their symbolism representing the four ages of man, the four seasons of the year, and the four times of the day, would have been familiar to the neighborhood’s original homebuyers. It is still a family-oriented community, with the annual Sundial Park Picnic in early fall, when local kids compete in circular “chariot races” on their bikes.
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