Ferry Building, San Francisco

It was late October weekend last year. Mr. Man had some works in San Francisco. My son and I tagged ourselves with him and went to Ferry Building in San Francisco. As he went for his works we had nothing to do beside sauntering around the building. First we went to a book store. After shuffling few books, we went to the back of the building where we could see the boats, the ferries, and a whole bunch of seagulls who always search food. We had been standing beside the water and arguing whether ferry service were closed on weekends or not. While arguing we saw a beautiful blue-white ferry was coming from Sausalito to dock at the ferry Building.

One ferry is coming keeping the Bay Bridge on back

After watching few of the ferries we again came inside the building.  Then we went inside the building. Kiddo started getting  restless, as he had nothing to do. I got a chance to read all the plaques inside the building which never got. Also tried to engage him reading those plaques. The history of the building was written there. It was very interesting to read.

Over the past 100 years the design, use , and relationship of the historic building to San Francisco evolved with the changes in transportation, and business. Once it was one of the busiest ferry communication, but its needs rapidly abated after f Golden Gate bridge, Bay bridge were built. Then, after the Embarcadero freeway was built the connection between Market Street and free building was totally severed.The busy building lost its glory, and left without care.  However ,after the earthquake in 1989, the freeway was removed and again Ferry building was revived. 

Early 2000 the ferry building was completely restored after ten years of planning, and designing came back to its grandeur.The tall Ferry building’s clock tower is the symbol of San Francisco waterfront. This strong clock tower survived the deadly earthquake of 1906  with significant damage.  It is very fascinating that I came to know from one of the plaques that the time stuck on 5:16 a.m. on that fateful day before restoring  after one year. The sandstone tower subsequently changed into concrete tower. 

The original clock was designed and built in 1998 by the Howard Clock company in Boston. This 900 pounds (yes, 900!!) Pendulum clock needed to be wound every seven days . The original clock was kept intact during the process of restoration, only the mechanical system was replaced by a motor system. 

The design of the building was conceived as a resourceful system to move passenger and luggage across the bay. Originally the second floor was used by passenger while the first floor was for goods. Now the ferry building is a grand market place, a beautiful place to hang out on sunny days. The children like my son love the place as they can see the ferries are coming and departing from the dock. 

As the time changes, the purpose of the Ferry building evolves. Once the grand structure stood with its all glory as a sole way of transportation now still standing with same glory. Only the purpose of the building has changed. Today the 600 feet long Grand Nave with beautiful skylights supported by steel structures serve as a Grand Marketplace which attracts tourists worldwide.