Citywide Historic Context Statement
The Citywide Historic Context Statement forms SF Survey’s foundation for decision-making by providing a comprehensive framework for identifying and evaluating San Francisco's historic and cultural resources.
San Francisco’s Citywide Historic Context Statement, begun in 2020, forms the foundation for future fieldwork and decision making for SF Survey. It builds upon the Department’s past historic context and survey efforts and incorporates recently completed and in-progress historic context statements.
According to the California Office of Historic Preservation (OHP), “historic context statements are intended to provide an analytical framework for identifying and evaluating resources by concisely explaining what aspects of geography, history, and culture significantly shaped the physical development of a community or region’s land use patterns and built environment over time, what important property types were associated with those developments, why they are important and what characteristics they need to have to be considered an important representation of their type or context.”
San Francisco’s Citywide Historic Context Statement aims to determine the significance and rarity of properties across San Francisco. The in-progress Citywide Historic Context Statement consists of contexts, sub-contexts and themes which are organized within four broad categories of Architectural, Cultural, Thematic, and Geographic contexts. Components of the Citywide Historic Context Statement will be completed over the next several years and can provide important historical information about properties and sites across San Francisco. Consult the How To Use The Citywide Historic Context Statement as a guide to using the Citywide Historic Context Statement. To track progress on the Citywide Historic Context Statement, please visit the In-Progress and Completed tabs of this webpage.
Details of this Timeline are the same as for SF Survey.
SF Survey
Supporting Information is available on the SF Survey program webpage.
Event information is available on the SF Survey program webpage.
The following historic context statements are currently in progress. Links will appear as drafts become available:
Cultural
- African-American Citywide HCS
- Chinese-American Citywide HCS
- Pan-Latino Citywide HCS
- Russian-American Historic Context Statement
- American Indian Historic Context Statement
- Counterculture Historic Context Statement
Geographic
- Inner Sunset HCS
Thematic
- Gardens in the City - Residence Parks in San Francisco, 1906-1940, HCS
- Developer Tracts: Streetcar Suburbanization (1880-1920)
- Developer Tracts: Auto Suburbanization (1920-1950)
- 1906 Earthquake and Reconstruction
- Early Residential Development (1848-1899)
- Large Apartment Buildings (1915-1978)
- Commercial Development & the Automobile (1848-1979)
- Public Art & Monuments
Architectural
- Architecture, Planning, & Preservation Professionals: A Collection of Biographies
- Early Residential Development Styles 1848-1880
- Modern & Postmodern Architectural Styles (1960-2000)
- Bay Area Tradition Styles (1880-1970)
Geographic
- Duboce Triangle Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2022)
- North Beach Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2022)
- Mission Dolores Neighborhood Historic Context Statement & Survey (Adopted 2022)
- Corbett Heights, San Francisco (Western Part of Eureka Valley) Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2017)
- Eureka Valley Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2017)
- Central SOMA Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2016)
- Historic Context Statement of the Oceanside: A Neighborhood of the Sunset District, San Francisco (Adopted 2012)
- Transit Center District Survey (includes HCS) (Adopted 2012)
- Showplace Square / Northeast Mission Survey (Adopted 2011)
- South of Market Area Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2011)
- Bayview Hunters Point Area B Survey Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2010)
- India Basin Survey and Context Statement (Adopted 2008)
- San Francisco’s Parkside District: A Historic Context Statement, 1905-1957 (Adopted 2008)
- City Within A City: Historic Context Statement for San Francisco’s Mission District (Adopted 2007)
- Market Octavia Plan Area Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2007)
- Inner Mission North Historic Context Statement (2004)
- Central Waterfront Survey and Context Statement(Adopted 2001)
- Market & Octavia Area Plan Amendment (formerly The Hub)
- Better Market Street
Cultural
- Citywide Historic Context Statement for LBGTQ History in San Francisco (Adopted 2016)
- The Development of Sexual Identity Based Subcultures (Adopted 2004)
- LGBTQ+ Cultural Heritage Strategy (Published 2020)
- Japantown Cultural Heritage and Economic Sustainability Strategy (“JCHESS”) (Adopted 2013)
- Supported by Japantown Historic Context Statement (as part of Better Neighborhoods Plan effort, not adopted)
- Filipino Heritage Addendum to South of Market Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2013)
Thematic
- Earthquake Shacks Theme Document (Adopted 2021)
- Sunset District Residential Builders, 1925-1950 Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2013)
- Van Ness Auto Row Support Structures: A Survey of Automobile-Related Buildings along the Van Ness Avenue Corridor Architectural (Adopted 2010)
- Carnegie Branch Libraries of San Francisco (Adopted 2001)
- Neighborhood Commercial Buildings, 1865-1965, HCS (Adopted 2022)
- Flats and Small Apartment Buildings (1915-1978), HCS (Adopted 2023)
- San Francisco New Deal – Rebuilding the City: 1933 to 1943
- The Panama-Pacific International Exposition and the Development of the Marina District
Architectural
- San Francisco Modern Architecture and Landscape Design, 1935-1970 Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2011)
- A Context Statement and Survey of Unreinforced Masonry Buildings (UMB) 1850-1940 (Adopted 1991)
- Victorian Era Styles (1870-1910) (Adopted 2022)
- Progressive Era & Early Revival Styles (1890-1930) Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2023)
- Modernistic Styles (1925-1965) Historic Context Statement (Adopted 2023)
Please email CPC.survey@sfgov.org or leave a voicemail at (628) 652-7573 if you’d like to contribute information or to learn about contexts and themes under development.