Research Lab

The Public Life Geodatabase aggregates in a single resource the rich sets of data gathered from numerous Public Life Studies, providing staff, researchers, and the public a comprehensive collection of geographic datasets for a multitude of public spaces in the city.

This study seeks to understand how plazas function in San Francisco. A thorough public life survey of six plazas in San Francisco was conducted, exploring how and by whom they are used.

SF Planning, in partnership with the Street Plans Collaborative and MJM Management group, developed this guide which highlights a national survey of best practices, presented as both a print guide and live website.

Since its inception in 2009, Pavement to Parks has provided guidance and support to dozens of other cities around the world. Click on the map above to see a map of projects and initiatives around the world!

San Francisco Beautiful piloted a monitoring protocol for parklets across the City. Now, the San Francisco Conservation Corps, funded through a grant from SF Public Works, is visiting every parklet on a regular basis.

A thriving laneways (alleyways) culture in downtown Adelaide and Melbourne evolved from landmark shifts in planning and building policies at the local and state levels, resulting in a the Cities' most-touted social, cultural, and economic asset.

The SF Planning Department conducts a wide range of studies that could benefit from the added efficiency of a Mobile Data Collection platform, with potential to cut out the most time-consuming steps from the traditional “paper, pencil, and clipboard” workflow

The Parks Alliance and the Trust for Public Land partnered on a report detailing the economic impact of San Francisco's recreation programs, parks and open spaces; finding that building and maintaining a flourishing parks system is sound fiscal policy."

A group of UC Berkeley students conducted a research study on the perception of parklets as public spaces, comparing sites in the Polk Street and Divisadero Street neighborhoods, each with their differing socioeconomic contexts.

Pavement to Parks launched the first citywide Public Life Surveys of parklets and plazas to evaluate their effect of on street life, public response to these new types of spaces, and how the projects currently serve the needs of users.

Pavement to Parks is strongly committed to creating parklets, plazas, and other experimental open spaces in all neighborhoods; starting from GIS analysis of demographics and park distribution.

In April 2015, Militant civil servants gathered to hear a presentation by Mike Lydon, Co-Founder and of the Street Plans Collaborative and Co-Author of the new book “Tactical Urbanism” who shared lessons learned from practice around the country.

Graduate Scholars from the Harvard Kennedy School tested methods for analyzing how San Francisco's parklets and bike lanes impact their neighborhoods.

San Francisco Greatstreets (a project of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition) organized the first-ever impact studies of parklets and plazas between 2010 and 2012. These early studies looked at groups of projects in four different neighborhoods throughout San Francisco.

From the abstract: "Heuristic Urbanism is a collaborative practice that engages urban design through provisional programs and projects that necessitate innovation within city government through the assimilation of grassroots initiatives."