In the past, the Southeast Waterfront has been dominated by industry, which provided essential jobs, but was often detrimental to the human and environmental health of the adjacent communities. The decline in industry provides an opportunity to rethink the balance of activity along the waterfront and to bring it into alignment with the values we now have about environmental justice and our increased knowledge and technological options for many industrial processes.
Many visions exist for how the Southeast Waterfront will transform, which can be found by navigating the links above. The challenges include the cost and extent of environmental regeneration necessary to reuse many of the areas along the waterfront as well as the importance for these projects to benefit local communities which have been historically marginalized in San Francisco rather than to displace them.