Is San Francisco Ready?

Taking a cue from Katrina, a West Coast mayor exhorts his citizens to sharpen their disaster skills

By J. Madeleine Nash Monday, Sept. 12, 2005
    • ARNOLD GENTHE / GETTY

    1906: Crumbling buildings line a street and smoke rises in the background after the San Francisco earthquake

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    Work is under way to secure vital infrastructure, including the San Francisco-- Oakland Bay Bridge and Bay Area Rapid Transit system's tracks, stations and tunnels. The San Francisco public utilities commission, for its part, has embarked on a major renovation of the aging system of reservoirs, pipelines and canals that bring water to some 2.4 million Bay Area residents. Reservoirs inside the city are being reinforced so that it will have a locally available reserve. In 1906, it was not the ground shaking that destroyed so much of San Francisco but the fires that raged afterward, because fire fighters lacked water to quench them.

    That's the good news. The bad news is that those efforts will take years to complete. In the meantime, other critical projects that haven't even been started are taking on more importance. The San Francisco General Hospital, for example, is in such poor condition that it could collapse during a major quake. The mayor is considering a proposal to rebuild it. And after Katrina, the megamillion-dollar bond issue that is needed should be an easier sell.

    When the next Big One strikes, the people of San Francisco and the structures around them will be tested up to--and in some cases beyond--their limits of endurance. "I'm certainly not waiting for Air Force One," says Newsom, adding that residents of San Francisco should not wait for assistance from overwhelmed police and fire fighters either. For Katrina has underscored the truth that disaster managers have long tried to hammer home. In the first hours and days after a major catastrophe, a city and its citizens can expect to cope with the horror alone.

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