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San Francisco's new Presidio Tunnel Tops project could serve as a case study for women in project management and construction roles

2022-09-07T18:53:00-04:00

By any count, Presidio Tunnel Tops had an unusual number of women in construction and project leadership. They say there are good reasons for that.

Led by Kerry Huang of James Corner Field Operations, the recently-opened new addition to San Francisco’s public parks portfolio was in the works for the better part of 30 years before being completed in July.

As Landscape Architecture Magazine highlights, the number of women employed in leadership positions was uncommon and created an atmosphere that could serve as a case study for an industry that is (to its considerable detriment) sadly still beset by systemic occupational challenges and a prevailing misogynistic work culture.

“We’ve all worked so harmoniously together,” Rania Rayes, a senior project manager for the Presidio Tunnel Trust, said of the benefits of working on such a diverse site. “Having many women on the team may make that possible. We’re very patient, we have some great communication skills…. I just think that these are attributes that a lot of women have, and they want to be team players.”

San Francisco's Presidio Tunnel Tops attraction gets an opening date

2022-04-16T10:00:00-04:00

The much-awaited debut of San Francisco's Presidio Tunnel Tops is now set for July 17th, according to a recent announcement from the city and design partner James Corner Field Operations.

The new attraction has been in the works since at least the early 90s when San Francisco’s seismically-untenable Doyle Drive was declared unsafe in its present form, and a plan was hatched to submerge the highway section into tunnels with a connector on top to give the park an unencumbered layout for the first time.

Image courtesy James Corner Field Operations

Situated above the highway to the Golden Gate Bridge, the Tunnel Tops’ design was the product of hundreds of hours of input from more than 10,000 community members and a whopping $118 million public-private investment.

Image courtesy James Corner Field Operations

The 14-acre park now includes a comprehensive network of hiking trails, picnicking areas, a visitors center, and a meadow with 180 different...

Uncompromising design part of newly disclosed reasons for why Lucas museum didn't go to SF

2015-05-05T15:34:00-04:00

When the Presidio Trust announced last year that it was rejecting George Lucas’ bid to build a museum at Crissy Field, its leaders didn’t reveal that three days earlier they had been prepared to grant the “Star Wars” creator the land he sought. [...] if he agreed to change the look of his desired museum, a mock-classical temple that at one point had four ceremonial domes. [...] Five months later, Lucas was bound for Chicago.