Building Defies Gravity, Wreckers

It has been a real cliffhanger.

A stubborn Art Deco apartment building, poised on the edge of Telegraph Hill, has captured San Francisco’s attention for the last two weeks as it slides slowly toward its doom.

The classic 1937 structure, once home to the noted San Francisco Chronicle columnist Charles McCabe, has defied gravity and the wrecking ball. But on Thursday, as hundreds watched from below, crews wielding chain saws and crowbars tore apart the building piece by piece, hoping to dismantle it before it could tumble over the 165-foot cliff.

“It’s an incredible, complicated circus going on out here,” said San Francisco Chief Building Inspector Laurence M. Kornfield, who has been besieged by the media since he ordered that the building be demolished.

Standing in the shadow of Coit Tower, the five-unit building is in one of the city’s oldest neighborhoods, where homes line narrow alleys and long staircases take the place of streets on the steep hillside.

The apartment building, with a panoramic view of San Francisco Bay, began sliding over the edge of Telegraph Hill on Feb. 15 after a torrent of rains created fissures in the unstable shale cliff below. Eight days later, the building had fallen so far that its entryway and staircase were suspended in the air. When they crashed to the ground below, the city stepped in and began demolishing the building.

But finishing off the structure is proving to be tougher than city engineers thought. The four-story building was so solidly constructed that a crane armed with a clam shovel did little damage. The streets of the old neighborhood turned out to be too narrow to provide room to swing a wrecking ball. After the first two full days of demolition, only the penthouse where McCabe once lived had been torn down.

Over the last week, droves of people have gathered on the streets below to watch as a little piece of San Francisco’s history slips away.

“It’s a beautiful old apartment building,” said Eunice Vogel, a manager at Pacific Telesis, who has been coming several times each day to view the action. “It’s very tragic it’s meeting its demise in this fashion.”

But at least one bit of the past was salvaged. Granting a last-minute reprieve, Kornfield saved McCabe’s toilet seat, which will go on display in a local restaurant.

The spectacle has received such widespread interest that Kornfield has set up a phone line to deliver regular reports on, as he put it, “The building that wouldn’t die.”

Dozens of workers swarmed around the building on Alta Street, trying to shore up the cliff as well as destroy the structure. On top of the wreckage, workers wearing lifelines and respirators hacked at it with picks and hammers, now and then throwing boards over the side that fell to the base of the cliff.

At the current rate, the city predicted it could be days before the building comes down, putting workers in constant jeopardy and risking further damage to the cliff if a new storm arrives before the work is done.

“With all the tools we have, we’re pretty darn puny when Mother Nature decides to do her thing,” said Edna Smith, who traveled with a group of senior citizens from the Concord area to watch the demolition.

With extensive news coverage of the event, people have been calling from all over the state with off-the-wall suggestions. One caller proposed installing an inflatable dome to hold it in place. Another suggested setting fire to it. Many others promised that they could stabilize the cliff with unique new patented systems.

Frustrated with the slow pace, the city began working on a new plan of its own Thursday to cut the building into thirds, wrap a cable around each section, and yank them from below. Late in the day, workers began cutting the building away from the foundation in preparation for the big pull.

“It’s really built,” Kornfield said.