San Francisco Neighborhoods: The Financial District
People who aren’t from San Francisco arrive here for the first time and they can see a spot of the city which they sometimes call “Downtown”. This area, located north of the SoMA and adjacent to Chinatown, is where San Francisco’s skyscrapers peak out above the city, creating a portion of the skyline that tourists may see from some of the peak viewing places. This is San Francisco’s Financial District, the area of the city where the people with important things to do are hustling and bustling about in their suits and ties, making money move and decisions get finalized in conference calls and lunch meetings.
Sometimes nicknamed FiDi or FinDi, San Francisco’s Financial District is an interesting location because it is one of the few places in the city which virtually empties out on the weekends. Having to be in the area once on a Sunday morning in order to take an exam, I wandered for quite some time in search of any place that was open and could sell my coffee. An interesting conundrum since the Financial District is a San Francisco neighborhood where there is a Starbucks, a Peet’s Coffee or a local one-place-only coffee spot on at least every corner. In fact, it was pointed out to me when I first moved here that “people don’t normally leave their buildings to go get coffee”, because most buildings have a coffee shop in the lobby.
What people do leave their offices to go do in the Financial District is to grab lunch with others. Grabbing lunch seems to be one of the most common social activities that I know of in San Francisco, second only to grabbing cocktails. This is particularly true of strangers who know each other from online, because the lunch date affords enough time to get to know someone new but a reasonable excuse for leaving rather quickly if the date isn’t going well. All across San Francisco’s Financial District, the lunch hour is filled with first dates. And who wouldn’t enjoy those first impressions by San Francisco 9-5ers who are all dressed up in their business, or at least their business casual, wear?
San Francisco’s Financial District stays busy, but it also has something of that laidback San Francisco attitude to it. Yes, people are moving about and getting things done, but the buildings are beautiful and people appreciate the beauty of the area as they move about their days. Bordered on the east side by the bay, the Financial District includes The Embarcadero shopping center which is something between an open air market and a standard shopping mall. One of the most common reasons for me to be in this neighborhood is to check out of the off-the-beaten-track movies playing at the Embarcadero Theater.
The Financial District has some spots to grab drinks, but this is really the business person’s world, so if you’re looking for real nightlife, you’ll want to go somewhere less quiet than this place tends to get at night. And if you’re looking for housing, the Financial District is only for you if you’ve got some money to spare and interest in being in the heart of what most people would call a “downtown”. Incidentally, although travelers mistake this area for San Francisco’s downtown, our downtown is actually further west, in the area of the Civic Center. And that, my friends, will be the subject of a future post profiling San Francisco’s neighborhoods.
