The Marina Green in San Francisco, California, is a 74-acre (300,000 m2) expanse of grass between Fort Mason and the Presidio. It is adjacent to San Francisco Bay, and this location provides good views of the Golden Gate Bridge, Angel Island, Alcatraz Island, and parts of Marin County. Houses built mostly in the 1920s and 1930s line Marina Boulevard, the southern boundary of the Marina Green. Many of these houses have large bay windows, and Herb Caen, the late San Francisco newspaper columnist, often made references to the immaculate furnishings behind these windows. In the past, a railroad track along the southern edge of the Marina Green allowed the San Francisco Belt Railroad to serve the Presidio. Adjacent to the Marina Green is a marina, home to the St. Francis Yacht Club and the Golden Gate Yacht Club.
Prior to the 1906 earthquake, this area was a tidal marsh. After the earthquake, much of the resulting rubble was dumped here. Later, to provide land for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition, this site and the adjacent neighborhood (now the present day Marina District) was filled in. A nearby remnant of the Exposition is the restored Palace of Fine Arts.
For a short time Marina Green served as an airfield and was the terminus of the coast to coast air mail route.
The San Francisco Parks and Recreation Department currently administers the Marina Green.
Famous quotes containing the word green:
“By many a legendary tale of violence and wrong, as well as by events which have passed before their eyes, these people have been taught to look upon white men with abhorrence.... I can sympathize with the spirit which prompts the Typee warrior to guard all the passes to his valley with the point of his levelled spear, and, standing upon the beach, with his back turned upon his green home, to hold at bay the intruding European.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)