SF Tenderloin affordable meets upscale (1234)

Just a 2 minute walk from "The Wilson" (see nearby pictures) on Turk Street is the Dalt Hotel, the Hotel Metropolis, and more.

This stretch of Turk street used to be a perfect example of the Tenderloin -- hotels that long ago had seen their better days and were now very cheap housing for people who were in some very rough stretches of their lives. For years, all sorts of craziness could be encountered on the streets at any time of day. The area is still one where many of the very poorest in the city live, either on the street or in the older hotels.

On the positive side, the TNDC (Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation), a non-profit, was formed in the 80's to create a better, but still affordable, environment for the residents, and they've been quite successful. The Dalt Hotel is just one example, an older hotel retrofitted to provide comfortable and "affordable housing for extremely low-income working adults, seniors, and disabled persons." (http://www.tndc.org/property/dalt-hotel-34-turk-street/). I

t's not clear, though, that the TNDC is being particularly successful at one of their other goals -- to stave off gentrification. The hotel on the right side of the picture, Hotel Metropolis, is a boutique hotel with rooms starting at $134/night (still quite affordable for an SF hotel).