SEC. 5. STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE.
The San Francisco Civic Center possesses a unique place and significance in the areas of architecture, history, and environment worthy of protection as an historic district.
The land on which the Civic Center stands was declared a City Hall Reservation as early as 1870. Portions of that reservation land were sold to raise funds for City Hall construction, and
Old City Hall - located on the site that had first been used as the Yerba Buena Cemetery, approximately where the present library stands - was erected between 1871 and 1897, in a lengthy
project marked by the now well known City government corruption of that time.
In 1899, B.J.S. Cahill, with the encouragement of Mayor Phelan, proposed a grander vision for the area, with the dual goal of clearing up land titles clouded by the dubious practices of
the promoters of the Old City Hall and, at the same time, of creating an imposing setting for the entire area. This plan envisioned clearing out smaller structures and visually uniting the
remaining monumental structures - Old City Hall, the Main Post Office, the Hibernia Bank building, and other larger structures - and setting them off against new open spaces (such as a
planned extension of the Golden Gate Park panhandle to Market Street). Conflicting new developments were blocked for a time, but the plan eventually failed, in large part because of
general distrust - bred of experience, perhaps - of large government projects.
Undaunted, former Mayor Phelan soon led the formation of an Association for the Improvement and Adornment of San Francisco. In 1904, the Association invited Daniel Burnham to
design a grand plan for the City, with B.J.S. Cahill providing a design for the Civic Center. This produced two visions of the Civic Center: Cahill, with the practicality borne of personal
and local experience, proposed using existing structures and City-owned land to create a central plaza, surrounded by major buildings, and, again, connected to a Golden Gate Park
panhandle extension; Burnham proposed a grander Civic Center, with buildings connected by a generally circular series of boulevards and grand open vistas. The Burnham Plan, though
politically impractical, fired the public imagination and was submitted to and adopted by the Board of Supervisors on September 27, 1905.
Following the 1906 earthquake, the public desire to rebuild and reclaim what had just been lost confirmed in practice what Cahill had perceived before: that political expediency set limits
to the definition of the Civic Center. Competition continued between the different views of Burnham and Cahill of what the Civic Center might become, but by 1912 the Board of
Supervisors had endorsed the Cahill Plan as modified in 1909. The momentum of growing civic pride and the Civic Center development effort - spearheaded by then-Mayor Rolph and the
coming of the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition - was focused into the general outlines sketched by Cahill.
Mayor Rolph, a reform candidate, saw the Civic Center as a central civic improvement, the symbol of a new unity of the people under a new and honest political era and a permanent
expression of the grandeur and vitality which the 1915 Exposition would exemplify on a temporary scale.
The World Columbian Exposition in Chicago, in 1893, was the source of inspiration for the "City Beautiful" movement which emphasizes formal plan and composition of monumental
scale, neoclassical style buildings fronting plazas, boulevards and grand public gathering spaces. The order, harmony, cleanliness, and grandeur of the exhibition, called "The White City,"
was in sharp contrast to the rapid, chaotic growth that most U.S. cities had experienced in the preceding era of rapid immigration and industrialization.
Several world's fairs were held throughout the country in the later 1800's, spreading the ideals of classical architecture, Beaux Arts forms, and the concepts of planning and cooperation for
ensemble effect in design. These planning and design schemes were an important influence for forty years, with their primary manifestation coming in designs for cities, parks, and civic
centers. Numerous City plans were commissioned in the early years, but only Cleveland and San Francisco implemented a portion of their plans, with San Francisco more nearly reaching
completion.
The historic significance of the "City Beautiful" movement lies in the manner in which it reformed and refocused architectural vision, contributing to something of a national style of
architecture; and, on a practical level, in the formation of City Planning Departments and schools or courses devoted to City Planning.
The design of the San Francisco Civic Center is an example of the development of those significant contributions. More particularly, the San Francisco Civic Center is an expression of a
nation ready to display its new international importance in an architectural statement. At the time it took form, geography and historical events had made San Francisco the center of
western America. Monumental classical architecture for the City's central public space expressed this consciousness, as well as the accompanying belief that such inspiring surroundings
should be democratically available to all, not just a privileged few.
The Exposition Auditorium, the Central Plaza, and the Powerhouse were completed before the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition, and the new City Hall was completed in late 1915. The
library was completed in 1916; the State Building in 1921; and the Public Health Building in 1932 and the Old Federal Building in 1936. The present Opera House and Veterans Building
expanded the Civic Center to the west in 1932 and 1933, respectively, much in the manner the original proponents envisioned. The original plaza was excavated in 1956 to add the
underground parking garage. At this time the ground level details were changed into the present reflecting pool and semi-park. United Nations Plaza, which opens the vista to the east of
City Hall in a manner consistent with the original vision of the Civic Center, was created in the mid-1970's.
It is an exemplary City Beautiful complex in the best of the American Academic Beaux Arts tradition. Designed and built in the revival of classical style, stemming from the Chicago
World's Fair of 1893 that has been called the "American Renaissance," it succeeds in making a strong impression of Civic dignity and pride. The San Francisco Civic Center Historic
District consists of a principal aggregation of monumental buildings around a central open space, with additional buildings extending the principal axis at either end. It includes all or part of
the fifteen City blocks. There are eight major buildings, a group of secondary buildings, three unrealized building sites, and a large plaza within the Historic District.
Each building in the Civic Center was faced with the problem of providing modern, functional facilities in a classical idiom. The classical Beaux Arts style was deemed suitable as the
traditional style of American governmental buildings, and was amenable to City Beautiful ideals of harmony among many buildings on a grand scale. The formal composition of "City
Beautiful" architecture, plantings, street embellishments and plazas was meant to be an expression of civic authority and pride - intending to impress and overawe. The classical style aptly
expressed the mood of a nation eager to redefine its newly achieved international importance in architectural terms. It reflected a mood and an existing state of affairs as much as an
inspiration to dominance. In San Francisco, it represented the city's emergence as a regional center of national importance, and within the City, it symbolized the united efforts of a
population recently divided along many lines.
In terms of "democratic" architecture, or architecture for an ever larger segment of the population, monumental classical architecture uncompromisingly demonstrated the enhanced
concern for the general public. Only a few years earlier, such splendor was exclusively reserved for the rich and the privileged few. To this day, no greater public interiors have been built in
the United States than those influenced by and representative of the City Beautiful Movement, including among the very finest, the San Francisco City Hall.
Within the scope of turn of the century classical architecture in the United States, the San Francisco Civic Center contains several fine examples of the mode and one superlative example
in its City Hall. The other buildings in the group, although less interesting individually cannot properly be evaluated in the same way. In particular, the State Building, the Federal Building,
the Health Building and the War Memorial group would probably appear rather dull compared to City Hall, as if they were missing an essential ingredient. But seen in the context of the
Civic Center as a whole, and in relation to City Hall, all the buildings together achieve distinction.
The criteria on which the buildings are judged, then, must be the degree to which each enhances the group without distracting from City Hall. These qualities are achieved through a
harmony of color, material, scale, size, texture, rhythm and style. Within these constrictions the buildings achieve individual interest through the imaginative manipulation of the elements.
The historic Civic Center buildings are unified in the Beaux Arts classical design. They are organized into horizontal bands of vertically proportioned elements, with the grand order of
the facade displayed on two or three floors above a usually rusticated base of one or two ground and partially sub-ground floors. Civic Center Historic District contains standard features
such as overall form, massing, scale, proportion, orientation, depth of face, fenestration and ornamentation, materials, color, texture, architectural detailing, facade line continuity,
decorative and sculptural features, street furniture, granite curbing and grille work.
The Civic Center is designated as both a National Historic Landmark District and a Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places, the former designation occurred on
February 27, 1987, the latter, October 10, 1978. These designations offer recognition that certain properties within the Historic District are worthy of preservation and alterations
undertaken both in the local and federal districts shall comply with the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties. Said Standards were adopted by the
Landmarks Preservation Advisory Board at its Regular Meeting of October 2, 1985, the amended Standards were readopted by the Landmarks Board at its Regular Meetings of February 6,
1991 and August 3, 1994.
(Added by Ord. 413-94, App. 12/23/94)