The thrill of S curves
Vermont is perhaps the city’s most anonymously famous street. It runs south from the design district in SOMA, along the slopes of Protrero Hill, past a delightful little park on the summit called McKinley Square, through a series of seven S turns—a vehicular paradise, albeit on rough cement—then jumps Highway 101 by way of a narrow pedestrian bridge and ends in the Mission District at Cesar Chavez Street.
The street has two claims to fame: It’s the most crooked street in the city—the hairpins are even tighter than on Lombard Street, its manicured and better-known cousin—and it has been used in several films, notably Magnum Force, made in 1973 with Clint Eastwood, and Bullitt, made in 1968 with Steve McQueen.
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Address Vermont Street between 20th Street & 22nd Street, San Francisco, CA, 94107 | Public Transport Bus: 10 (23rd St & Vermont St stop) | Tip Stop at the neighborhood grocery store Chiotras at 858 Rhode Island Street for a morning latte or a delicious sandwich.
In the latter, a B-movie cult classic and forever a San Francisco signature piece, McQueen plays a cynical lone-wolf cop named Frank Bullitt who becomes attracted to a femme fatale played by Jacqueline Bisset. At one point her character says, “You’re living in a sewer, Frank, day after day. With you, living with violence is a way of life.” And with that, McQueen is off again in his 1968 Ford Mustang, tires screeching and smoking, chasing another iconic muscle car of the era, a Dodge Charger, with bad guys in it.
That particular chase was shot in several parts of the city, particularly on Protrero Hill, but also on Vermont Street between 20th and 22nd, where the classic rules of road racing don’t apply; there’s no time to aim at a point on a curve and let centrifugal force bring you around. The trick is to imagine yourself as a skier carving down the mountainside, punching the brakes just like planting a pole.
Almost needless to say, it’s a downhill race for the imagination only.
The more nuanced qualities of the street are to be found in the park at McKinley Square. Once there, the views of the city are compelling, particularly at sunup or sunset.
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