Will San Francisco’s downtown adjacent Mission Bay neighborhood finally see the school that was promised almost 25 years ago now that hundreds of once hopeful families have fled the city due to the school board’s failure to act?
It’s a topic we covered in a preview video comparing how the Golden Gate city was schooled by Vancouver in making its city center more attractive to families with kids.
Vancouver built schools (and parks, playgrounds, preschools and recreation centers) in and around downtown so that thousands of kids now walk to class each day.
A new Mission Bay elementary school for up to 550 students is now projected to start construction at the end of 2023 to be ready for the Fall 2025 semester.
We’ll continue following this story and are planning to add a third piece about downtown schools for the actual documentary series set in Newark, where a new residential precinct is anchored by three charter schools and 207 units of teacher housing.
And there’s also the popular John Rex School in downtown Oklahoma City, built as a signal to families that they were welcome downtown even before many people lived there, the opposite of what was done in San Francisco.
After watching Saving the City, you will never look at cities in the same way again. And we hope you will be inspired to act and encourage others to act to make a difference in your local communities.
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Meet Karen and Scott Wallace, San Francisco parents who left the City for the suburbs largely because the promised Mission Bay neighborhood school never came to fruition. Watch more videos.