SFW Thruway bus

Amtrak Unlimited Discussion Forum

Help Support Amtrak Unlimited Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

KmH

Engineer
Joined
Dec 6, 2014
Messages
2,055
Location
Is this heaven? No. It's Iowa.
Last edited by a moderator:
The CZ route schedule says SFW is Fisherman’s Wharf, Pier 39, which are 2 separate places, since Fisherman's Wharf is Pier 45.

Does one get on the Amtrak Thruway Bus at Pier 39 in front of the Aquarium by the Bay?

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8083322,-122.4096711,3a,75y,10.48h,90.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNqw4mfrrWma7PHhd8xTQzA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
Yeah Pier 39 is where it stops. However, Fishermans Wharf is technically not just Pier 45. It's a neighborhood with several blocks including a few piers. Pier 39 is definitely part of Fishermans Wharf.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Fisherman's+Wharf,+San+Francisco,+CA/@37.80811,-122.4253858,15z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x808580fa79aee3b9:0xd0ce5b8bf914906a!8m2!3d37.8079996!4d-122.4177434

I think the description would be more like saying "Midtown Manhattan, Penn Station".
 
The CZ route schedule says SFW is Fisherman’s Wharf, Pier 39, which are 2 separate places, since Fisherman's Wharf is Pier 45.

Does one get on the Amtrak Thruway Bus at Pier 39 in front of the Aquarium by the Bay?

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8083322,-122.4096711,3a,75y,10.48h,90.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNqw4mfrrWma7PHhd8xTQzA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
Yeah Pier 39 is where it stops. However, Fishermans Wharf is technically not just Pier 45. It's a neighborhood with several blocks including a few piers. Pier 39 is definitely part of Fishermans Wharf.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Fisherman's+Wharf,+San+Francisco,+CA/@37.80811,-122.4253858,15z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x808580fa79aee3b9:0xd0ce5b8bf914906a!8m2!3d37.8079996!4d-122.4177434

I think the description would be more like saying "Midtown Manhattan, Penn Station".
Fisherman's Wharf is definitely a different place from Pier 39. But they abut one another, so the stop is for both places, even though it's right in front of Pier 39.

You can StreetView the Amtrak bus stop sign, although it's a bit high up on the pole.
 
The CZ route schedule says SFW is Fishermans Wharf, Pier 39, which are 2 separate places, since Fisherman's Wharf is Pier 45.

Does one get on the Amtrak Thruway Bus at Pier 39 in front of the Aquarium by the Bay?

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8083322,-122.4096711,3a,75y,10.48h,90.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNqw4mfrrWma7PHhd8xTQzA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
Yeah Pier 39 is where it stops. However, Fishermans Wharf is technically not just Pier 45. It's a neighborhood with several blocks including a few piers. Pier 39 is definitely part of Fishermans Wharf.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Fisherman's+Wharf,+San+Francisco,+CA/@37.80811,-122.4253858,15z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x808580fa79aee3b9:0xd0ce5b8bf914906a!8m2!3d37.8079996!4d-122.4177434

I think the description would be more like saying "Midtown Manhattan, Penn Station".
Fisherman's Wharf is definitely a different place from Pier 39. But they abut one another, so the stop is for both places, even though it's right in front of Pier 39.
You can StreetView the Amtrak bus stop sign, although it's a bit high up on the pole.
Actually, Fishermans Wharf includes Pier 39. Its more an area than a location and it extends from about Ghirardelli Square to the cruise terminal.

Im actually in Fishermans Wharf right now.
 
the SFW buses pick up and drop off in front of the Aquarium. Usually, there are others present who are also taking one of the buses. For the morning pick ups to either Emeryville or Oakland (two different buses) you and others boarding will be about the only people on the sidewalks.
 
I see it now. It's the highest sign on the pole. I was expecting a bigger sign & an Amtrak logo.
I can't tell if it's the Google image processing or if the sign is actually faded (or a little of both), but it's supposed to have the Amtrak California logo on it. This is a better photo of a more pristine installation located elsewhere:

N14Dqyh.jpg
 
The CZ route schedule says SFW is Fishermans Wharf, Pier 39, which are 2 separate places, since Fisherman's Wharf is Pier 45.

Does one get on the Amtrak Thruway Bus at Pier 39 in front of the Aquarium by the Bay?

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8083322,-122.4096711,3a,75y,10.48h,90.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNqw4mfrrWma7PHhd8xTQzA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
Yeah Pier 39 is where it stops. However, Fishermans Wharf is technically not just Pier 45. It's a neighborhood with several blocks including a few piers. Pier 39 is definitely part of Fishermans Wharf.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Fisherman's+Wharf,+San+Francisco,+CA/@37.80811,-122.4253858,15z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x808580fa79aee3b9:0xd0ce5b8bf914906a!8m2!3d37.8079996!4d-122.4177434

I think the description would be more like saying "Midtown Manhattan, Penn Station".
Fisherman's Wharf is definitely a different place from Pier 39. But they abut one another, so the stop is for both places, even though it's right in front of Pier 39.
You can StreetView the Amtrak bus stop sign, although it's a bit high up on the pole.
Actually, Fishermans Wharf includes Pier 39. Its more an area than a location and it extends from about Ghirardelli Square to the cruise terminal.

Im actually in Fishermans Wharf right now.
Let me mansplain this to you....

The Cruise Terminal is not in Fisherman's Wharf. You don't say that you're going down to Fisherman's Wharf and then hang out at the plaza in front of the Cruise Terminal.

You also don't say that you're going down to Fisherman's Wharf and then go to Pier 39 or Aquatic Park or Ghirardelli Square or Fort Mason. These are all separate places. Just because they are near one another doesn't mean that they are the same place.
 
The CZ route schedule says SFW is Fishermans Wharf, Pier 39, which are 2 separate places, since Fisherman's Wharf is Pier 45.

Does one get on the Amtrak Thruway Bus at Pier 39 in front of the Aquarium by the Bay?

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.8083322,-122.4096711,3a,75y,10.48h,90.75t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNqw4mfrrWma7PHhd8xTQzA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
Yeah Pier 39 is where it stops. However, Fishermans Wharf is technically not just Pier 45. It's a neighborhood with several blocks including a few piers. Pier 39 is definitely part of Fishermans Wharf.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Fisherman's+Wharf,+San+Francisco,+CA/@37.80811,-122.4253858,15z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x808580fa79aee3b9:0xd0ce5b8bf914906a!8m2!3d37.8079996!4d-122.4177434

I think the description would be more like saying "Midtown Manhattan, Penn Station".
Fisherman's Wharf is definitely a different place from Pier 39. But they abut one another, so the stop is for both places, even though it's right in front of Pier 39.
You can StreetView the Amtrak bus stop sign, although it's a bit high up on the pole.
Actually, Fishermans Wharf includes Pier 39. Its more an area than a location and it extends from about Ghirardelli Square to the cruise terminal.

Im actually in Fishermans Wharf right now.
Let me mansplain this to you....

The Cruise Terminal is not in Fisherman's Wharf. You don't say that you're going down to Fisherman's Wharf and then hang out at the plaza in front of the Cruise Terminal.

You also don't say that you're going down to Fisherman's Wharf and then go to Pier 39 or Aquatic Park or Ghirardelli Square or Fort Mason. These are all separate places. Just because they are near one another doesn't mean that they are the same place.
Let me explain this to you with real, verifiable information. Your post reminds me of an SNL skit where it was a game show called "Common Knowledge" where the "correct answer" was from a survey of American high school students, and the motto of the show was "It's not what you know, but what you think you know."

As someone who has lived in the Bay Area and been going to Fisherman's Wharf since the early 70s, I can say with certainty that it absolutely includes Pier 39 and Ghirardelli Square. Aquatic Park and Fort Mason - no. So maybe you need to tell the City and County of San Francisco's Office of Economic and Workforce Development that they should redraw their map of Fishermans Wharf since it includes both Pier 39 and Ghirardelli Square. Pier 39 is that section surrounded by all the boating berths on the upper right, and Ghirardelli Square is the 2nd from the left yellow block.

Exhibit%204%20-%20CBD%20-%20Fisherman%27s%20Wharf_0.jpg


Or perhaps the Fisherman's Wharf Community Benefit District.

http://www.visitfishermanswharf.com/attractions/

http://www.visitfishermanswharf.com/about-the-wharf/

San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf is a world famous tourist attraction and a thriving and vibrant local neighborhood and commercial area. Home to world-class dining, shopping, hotels and endless entertainment opportunities, the Wharf is truly the place to start your San Francisco experience.

As the home of San Francisco's fishing fleet, docked along Jefferson Street, Fisherman's Wharf is the important center of our city's historic fishing industry. Along our neighborhood's "Fish Alley" you can still see fishermen at work, which is always a fun and unique San Francisco experience. The Wharf area is also the launching point for Bay cruises and charters.

Family entertainment is a neighborhood specialty. With our famous sea lions, Ripley's Believe It or Not! Museum, Musée Mecanique, the Aquarium of the Bay at PIER 39, the S.S. Jeremiah O’Brien and the World War II submarine, the USS Pampanito, Fisherman's Wharf is the perfect place to bring the kids. Specialty shops and restaurants line the Wharf--including the PIER 39 and Anchorage Square shopping complexes. The world famous Ghirardelli Square has been converted to an open-air center filled with fun shops and restaurants. Here you can even see the company's original chocolate-making machines.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/561c0052e4b0faa1a2071248/t/57a279795016e15de7c7333e/1470265726333/Fishermans+Wharf+Map+2016.pdf

I did go overboard by saying that the Cruise Terminal were in its limits. That is in fact not in Fisherman's Wharf. My bad.
 
I think that you've confused some politically convenient "district" with the actual location of an identifiable place.

This is just the same as drawing a circle around your whole family and saying that the "Your Mom District" includes your father and sister, and concluding that your father and sister are in your mother.

I don't know where you live in the SF Bay Area, but real folks from the City don't hold your beliefs about what "Fisherman's Wharf" is.
 
So sayeth "Location: ATL". As opposed to "Location: San Francisco Bay Area"

I'll go with "Location: San Francisco Bay Area" and some outside empirical evidence, and call this tempest in a teapot over.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I could say that I live in NY, and most people I think I live in New York City!
default_mad.gif
I live in New York State - much closer to Canada than to NYC.

In fact, people all over the world go to NYC to visit the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island - I have never been to either. I have only been to the United Nations, (the original) World Trade Center (and only in the basement to catch PATH), the Empire State Building And Central Park once. Except to change trains, I do not go to NYC.
 
I think that you've confused some politically convenient "district" with the actual location of an identifiable place.

This is just the same as drawing a circle around your whole family and saying that the "Your Mom District" includes your father and sister, and concluding that your father and sister are in your mother.

I don't know where you live in the SF Bay Area, but real folks from the City don't hold your beliefs about what "Fisherman's Wharf" is.
I haven't confused anything. Fisherman's Wharf is a neighborhood, and that includes Pier 39 and Ghirardelli Square. Everything from the City and County of San Francisco to Google Maps confirms that. Every tourist map indicates that. The Fisherman's Wharf Merchants Association has a definition for voting members.

http://www.fishermanswharf.org/membership-levels.html

Businesses located outside of the Fisherman’s Wharf Merchants Association’s designated boundaries will be deemed members who are not eligible to vote. These boundaries are as follows: That area bounded on the south by the north side of Francisco Street, between Van Ness Avenue and Columbus Avenue, the north side of Columbus Avenue between Bay Street and Francisco Street, and the north side of Francisco Street between Columbus Avenue and the Embarcadero, on the west by Van Ness Avenue, on the east by the Embarcadero, and on the north by San Francisco Bay.

Just stop embarrassing yourself. It's not a good look.
 
As a third generation native son of North Beach (take that however you want :), the Wharf is the wharf. If we were going somewhere near the Wharf, we might say we were going down to the Wharf, because it's a landmark. But we always knew the difference.

Like there's a difference between LA Union Station and Olivera Street. It matters to the locals, but the tourists just want to get something to eat and catch a train. Seems like all the same place to them, and that's fine.

Back in the day -- 50s and 60s -- there were still fishermen using the wharf and the harbor next to it. There was a point to making a distinction. Now it's about the tourists, and local businesses and city hall are happy to accomodate them. So call it what you want and spend lots of money. Win-win.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
As a third generation native son of North Beach (take that however you want :), the Wharf is the wharf. If we were going somewhere near the Wharf, we might say we were going down to the Wharf, because it's a landmark. But we always knew the difference.

Like there's a difference between LA Union Station and Olivera Street. It matters to the locals, but the tourists just want to get something to eat and catch a train. Seems like all the same place to them, and that's fine.

Back in the day -- 50s and 60s -- there were still fishermen using the wharf and the harbor next to it. There was a point to making a distinction. Now it's about the tourists, and local businesses and city hall are happy to accomodate them. So call it what you want and spend lots of money. Win-win.
I'm not that old, but since I was a kid showing visitors around, Fisherman's Wharf was a neighborhood that extended beyond the traditional definition of a "wharf". Things change over time and it's perfectly acceptable to call Pier 39 part of it. If I call a cab (which I rarely do) and ask them to take me to Fisheman's Wharf, I'm going to be asked for something a little more specific. And there are still working fishing boats there. Apparently they can sell off their boats now.

http://www.sfchronicle.com/food/article/Direct-fish-retail-sales-get-the-green-light-at-12194590.php

And North Beach? I was there on Sunday after being in Fisherman's Wharf. That's steadily being annexed by Chinatown. And where exactly is the beach? I guess under all that soil that liquified in 1989.
 
Fisherman's Wharf is in North Beach. It's the San Francisco nieghborhood that's bounded by Columbus Ave. on the west, Broadway on the south, and the bay to the north and east. Although we used to separately refer to the area along the waterfront where there was actual shipping as the Embarcadero, and people still do. North Beach is sometimes referred to as Little Italy, but that's just a tourist label these days. The Italians moved to the suburbs. The melding of Chinatown and North Beach is nothing new -- that's been the intrinsic nature of the area for as long as I can remember.

North Beach has meant different things to different people over the years. During the Vietnam War, it meant the strip clubs along Broadway to some. Before that, it meant the coffee and book shops along Grant Ave. to others. Some people identify it as the area around Washington Square -- that was the commercial center when you could conduct business in English or Italian, as you chose. The parish boundaries of St. Peter's and Paul's is another way of looking at it. But it's all North Beach.

And yeah. We used to wonder where the beach was too.
default_smile.png
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Since this is already wildly off topic...I was glancing down the list of posts and saw "SFW Thruway bus." My first thought was, "Is there a NSFW Thruway bus?" My second was, "If there is, it's probably in San Francisco!"
default_smile.png
 
Sir, you win the thread!

Since this is already wildly off topic...I was glancing down the list of posts and saw "SFW Thruway bus." My first thought was, "Is there a NSFW Thruway bus?" My second was, "If there is, it's probably in San Francisco!"
default_smile.png
 
Fisherman's Wharf is in North Beach. It's the San Francisco nieghborhood that's bounded by Columbus Ave. on the west, Broadway on the south, and the bay to the north and east. Although we used to separately refer to the area along the waterfront where there was actual shipping as the Embarcadero, and people still do. North Beach is sometimes referred to as Little Italy, but that's just a tourist label these days. The Italians moved to the suburbs. The melding of Chinatown and North Beach is nothing new -- that's been the intrinsic nature of the area for as long as I can remember.

North Beach has meant different things to different people over the years. During the Vietnam War, it meant the strip clubs along Broadway to some. Before that, it meant the coffee and book shops along Grant Ave. to others. Some people identify it as the area around Washington Square -- that was the commercial center when you could conduct business in English or Italian, as you chose. The parish boundaries of St. Peter's and Paul's is another way of looking at it. But it's all North Beach.

And yeah. We used to wonder where the beach was too.
default_smile.png
I've steadily over the years seen everything change. I remember the Embarcadero Freeway and how it was kind of an eyesore even though it made it really easy to get to North Beach and Chinatown. Just last week I was trying to get on the Bay Bridge and it was ridiculously trying to move at all because of construction at the new Transbay Terminal. Back then there were still railroad tracks all over San Francisco, even though many had been decommissioned. Didn't some SP trains stop right in front of the Ferry Building?

I don't know of anyone who thinks of Fisherman's Wharf as being a section of North Beach these days. And it's basically infill. I know there was some liquefaction in North Beach, but that section of the Marina just turned to goo and those houses sank. This map shows all the infill, although much of it is interior fill and not previously submerged.

updatedliqumap.jpg
 
Just don’t it “Frisco”. It’s “The City” (by the Bay).

Sent from my iPhone using Amtrak Forum
 
Just don’t it “Frisco”. It’s “The City” (by the Bay).
Or "San Fran". Perhaps avoid "SFO" unless you're talking about the airport.

I've talked to my Chinese friends, and they say the phrase to refer to San Francisco is something like "jio jing san" which literally means "old gold mountain". Something about coming during the gold rush, even though that's not where the gold was. The tell me that sometimes they use a more phonetic phrase, which is "san fan siuu". The last syllable is really hard for me to do justice in the Latin alphabet. Some syllables have a unique pronunciation that just doesn't work well. If anything I think it might be closer to if you tried to pronounce "si-uh" quickly as one syllable.
 
San Francisco snobs aren't the only ones who think their City is a cut above the rubes that live in the sticks.

Others that come to mind include, but aren't limited to, New York,Portland,Seattle,Chicago,Denver,Dallas and Austin!
 
Back
Top