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All the United States California San Francisco Seward Street Slides

Seward Street Slides

Bring your own cardboard to the slippery slopes of concrete hidden in a neighborhood park.

San Francisco, California

Added By
Annetta Black
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Seward Street Slides   MtnLady / Atlas Obscura User
Seward Street Slides   MtnLady / Atlas Obscura User
Seward Street Slides   Franco Folini / CC BY SA 2.0
Seward Slides   Carnaval.com Studios / CC BY 2.0
  Tre Balchowsky
  jnthnnvk / Atlas Obscura User
  Ben Brown / CC BY 2.0
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About

Signs reading "No adults unless accompanied by a child" accompany two lanes of slippery downhill slides tucked away in a residential neighborhood park.

Built in the 1960s and designed by a local teenager, the slides are actually a triumph of neighborhood activism. In 1963, the land that the Corwin Community Garden and Seward Mini-Park sits on was a vacant lot slated for development. Local residents and growing families from nearby streets organized and protested the disappearance of open space, and fought development for a decade, including staging a desperate bulldozer-defying sit-in in 1966.

In the end, the locals triumphed and turned the lot into a park, which opened in 1973. Their efforts also contributed to changing city legislation now requiring a minimum amount of open space in new development projects.

The slides are surrounded by a small park and California native plant garden.

Related Tags

Slides Activism Playgrounds Parks Monuments

Know Before You Go

Open Tuesday to Sunday from 10 am to 5 pm (Closed Mondays). When it's closed, the slides have locks on them.

Community Contributors

Added By

Annetta Black

Edited By

gopherpt, Michelle Cassidy, jnthnnvk, MtnLady

  • gopherpt
  • Michelle Cassidy
  • jnthnnvk
  • MtnLady

Published

December 31, 2018

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Sources
  • http://foundsf.org/index.php?title=Corwin_Community_Garden_and_Seward_Mini-Park
  • http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2013/02/25/the_slides_of_seward_street.php
  • http://brokeassstuart.com/blog/2010/05/24/the-hidden-secret-of-the-seward-street-slides/
  • http://sftodo.com/blog/2012/01/08/seward-slides-san-francisco.html
Seward Street Slides
Corwin Community Garden and Seward Mini-Park
Seward St & Douglass St
San Francisco, California, 94114
United States
37.757643, -122.440046
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