49-Mile Scenic Drive

49-Mile Scenic Drive sign

The 49-Mile Scenic Drive (also known as 49-Mile Drive or the 79-Kilometer Drive) in and around San Francisco highlights many of the city's major attractions and historic structures.

Opened on September 14, 1938 as a promotion for the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition, it features views of the then-newly-built Golden Gate Bridge (opened May 1937) and the Bay Bridge (opened November 1936). Then it terminated at the fairgrounds on Treasure Island. Originally the drive measured 50 miles (80 km) but that was quickly changed to 49 miles (79 km), a more meaningful number for a city of 49 square miles (130 km²)^{[citation needed]} that owes its early prominence to the gold rush of 1849.^{[citation needed]}

Points of interest

City Hall Coit Tower Golden Gate Bridge Palace of Fine Arts Cable Car climbing Nob Hill. The Conservatory of Flowers Bay Bridge from The Embarcadero Ferry Building Lombard Street's famed twists

The Drive is marked by blue and white signs that lead one through the city. It all begins at the intersection of Hayes Street and Van Ness Avenue, near City Hall:

• Civic Center
• Asian Art Museum
• Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)
• Japantown
• Union Square
• Chinatown
• Nob Hill
• Russian Hill
• Cable Car Barn
• Transamerica Pyramid
• North Beach
  • Washington Square
  • Coit Tower
• Pier 39
• Fisherman's Wharf
• Alcatraz
• The Cannery
• Ghirardelli Square
• Aquatic Park
• Lombard Street
• Marina Green
• Crissy Field
• Palace of Fine Arts - (Exploratorium)
• The Presidio
  • Letterman Digital Arts Center
  • Battery Chamberlin
• Golden Gate Bridge
• Fort Point
• Baker Beach
• Legion of Honor
• Richmond District
• Lincoln Park
• Sutro Baths (ruins)
• Great Highway
  • Cliff House
  • Seal Rock
  • Ocean Beach
  • The San Francisco Zoo
  • Lake Merced
• San Francisco State University
• Golden Gate Park
  • Strybing Arboretum
  • Japanese Tea Garden
  • de Young Museum
  • Academy of Sciences
  • Conservatory of Flowers
  • AIDS Memorial Grove
  • Kezar Stadium
• Haight-Ashbury
• Twin Peaks
• Castro District
  • Castro Theatre
• Mission Dolores
• AT&T Park
• Bay Bridge
• The Embarcadero
  • Ferry Building
  • Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
• Financial District
• Moscone Center

In popular culture

In the movie Quick Change, Randy Quaid is driving Geena Davis and Bill Murray through one of the boroughs of New York City. They get completely lost and begin looking for any type of sign that may help them find out where they are. Quaid's character eventually does discover one, a "49-Mile Scenic Drive" sign, which doesn't help him or his passengers find out where they are at all.

Route maintenance

Since 1955, seagull-emblazoned '49-Mile Scenic Drive' signs have been provided to guide travelers through the entire route, especially for turns.^{[citation needed]} Many of the signs have gone missing over the years, presumably due to theft.^[1]

External links

San Francisco Bay Area portal

• Official Route of 49-Mile Drive
• Map of 49-Mile Drive (PDF - 21MB)
• Map of original 1938 route
• More detailed driving map from Google
• Mapping/GPS files of the 49-Mile Drive, with very slight modifications/improvements
• Article in The SF Chronicle on the history of the 49 Mile Drive.
• Watch a 3D walk through of 49-mile drive on Google Earth and download the GPS data.

Notes