For 150 years, San Francisco’s Chinatown, the oldest in the US, has sheltered waves of immigrants. It is the birthplace of Chinese America, and to some extent, the broader Asian America.
Now, Chinatown faces powerful economic and demographic challenges as the city undergoes an unprecedented boom in tech jobs.
Rising rent elsewhere in the city has entrepreneurs eyeing Chinatown for offices, entertainment and housing. A US$1.6 billion subway set to open in 2019 could provide an economic boost, but it also brings development pressures in a neighborhood coveted for its location.
At the same time, many Chinese-Americans have scattered across the Bay Area, reducing Chinatown’s customer base.
Some civic leaders said traditional values and zoning regulations should protect the neighborhood of 15,000 to 18,000 people against too much development.
Others said younger generations of property owners might take the money from the rising land values and run.
“The battle has always been to limit growth,” said Howard Wong (黃健權), a founder of a group opposed to the subway construction.
“A huge transit development will make that situation worse,” he said.
Chinatown leaders do not agree on what the district should be, other than a gateway for immigrants and destination for tourists.
Take 1920c, a co-sharing business launched in April that offers work space to freelancers and to socially conscious start-ups. The influential Chinatown Community Development Center protested the business.
The center’s policy director Gen Fujioka said the neighborhood “is not intended for tech offices.”
The company’s co-founder Jenny Chan, a 25-year-old who moved from Hong Kong 15 years ago, objected to the idea that she is callously gentrifying the neighborhood.
“They accused me of not fitting into the fabric of Chinatown,” Chan said. “My sign downstairs is in Chinese.”
Long-time merchant Betty Louie said Chan is exactly what Chinatown needs: young professionals who can inject vibrancy to the place.
“I want our ABCs to come back and be proud of their roots,” Louie said, using the shorthand for American-born Chinese.
“Really, for some of them, this is their Chinese village,” she said.
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