By Scott James,
New York Times
05.07.11
There’s an old saying in San Francisco: Market Street is straight, until it reaches the Castro.
Cartographically true, it refers to the city’s famously gay mecca. But these days, there are concerns that the neighborhood is becoming slightly less bent.
A Different Light Bookstore, which specialized in gay and lesbian literature for 26 years, shut last weekend — the latest in a series of closings of longtime businesses that were gay-owned and operated or catered to gay clientele. The neighborhood is littered with empty storefronts.
Amid this gloom, however, there is one burst of excitement that has crowds lining up, drawing visitors from throughout the Bay Area and beyond: Sunday brunch at Lime on Market.
With “bottomless Mimosas,” the restaurant and club has become so popular that it can take weeks to get a reservation. Patrons regularly defy stanchions and block sidewalks as they wait to cram inside where techno pop music blares at rock concert decibels.
“It’s the only place like L.A. in San Francisco,” a British man said last month as he was shooed inside by the bouncer.
The crowd, to a large extent, is straight.
But even in a part of the city known for anything-goes partying, the scene at Lime has soured some residents and led them to ask, What’s happening to our neighborhood?
Scott Wiener, who represents the neighborhood on the Board of Supervisors, said his office had received a litany of complaints in recent months.
“A lot of extremely drunk people behaving obnoxiously loud, urinating in public, vomiting,” Mr. Wiener said, running through a list of concerns from constituents. “A few accounts of homophobic slurs,” he added, but he thought those incidents were rare and asked that they be played down.
There have also been reports of locals’ casting anti-straight aspersions at Lime patrons.
But most of the frustrations seem to center on the idea that outsiders have invaded the Castro primarily for one reason: to get drunk.
Visits to Lime on several Sunday afternoons in March and April documented a number of incidents: patrons drinking what appeared to be alcohol outside the club; customers so groggy they had to be held upright; people staggering from the club and walking directly into moving traffic; and puddles of vomit sullying the block.
“It’s an issue because of the behavior that’s happening as a result of overserving,” said Andrea Aiello, executive director of the Castro/Upper Market Community Benefit District, a neighborhood improvement program.
For $7, customers can consume unlimited Mimosas (bottomless Bloody Marys are $12) — a recession-friendly offering. Lime is one of several establishments in the city now serving alcohol this way.
Such all-you-can-drink promotions are legal, but “definitely a concern, as is anything that promotes intoxication,” said John Carr, spokesman for the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control. “It’s frowned upon.”
The results of this bargain-basement inebriation have overwhelmed some nearby businesses. There have been reports of brawling, and male customers have been spotted relieving themselves on the walls of nearby shops and residences. On Sundays, two businesses have posted “no restrooms” signs to keep tipsy Lime customers away. (The lines can be long for Lime’s restrooms.)
Ms. Aiello said that her organization reached out last month to the club’s owner, Greg Bronstein, to work on resolving the problems, but that he was unresponsive. Mr. Bronstein twice scheduled interviews for this column, but failed to follow through and stopped responding to messages.
Mr. Wiener said he had spoken to Mr. Bronstein and elicited a promise to control customers. On one recent Sunday the club’s exasperated doorman, who looked like a male Grace Jones, was seen struggling to control the crowd to little avail.
The controversy swirling around Lime has hit at a time when the neighborhood is suffering. In addition to the bookstore’s closing, four local restaurants went out of business in recent weeks, and in previous months longtime record and video shops have disappeared. Other businesses are also reportedly teetering on failure.
Bevan Dufty, the district’s former supervisor and a current mayoral candidate, said the neighborhood was in transition. He blamed economics — not sexual orientation.
“This is a fallout from the economic collapse,” Mr. Dufty said, “and the recovery was always expected to be slow.”
Indeed, when the details were considered, each closing appeared to be due to fiscal realities. For example, retail sales of books, videos and music have been affected nearly everywhere by Internet commerce, and some businesses failed when leases expired and parties could not agree to new terms.
Still, the totality of so many losses of established gay businesses has been felt. The Castro has been an enclave for gay men and lesbians since the 1970s.
Harvey Milk, the assassinated gay civil rights leader, set in motion a national movement from a humble camera shop there.
The district has never been exclusively gay (one-third of residents self-identify as gay men or lesbians, compared with 13 percent in the city), but there has been some trouble in the past between residents and visitors. A large Halloween street party raged peacefully for years until it became a popular destination for tens of thousands of revelers — many of them heterosexual — from elsewhere in the region beginning in the late 1990s. Episodes of homophobia and violence followed, and in 2006 nine people were shot and wounded in a melee. The party has since been canceled or curtailed.
In this context the incidents at Lime have become a flash point. Yet change in the Castro seems inevitable. In an age when homosexuals are receiving greater acceptance, fewer feel compelled to live in ghettos as they once did, and that means a more substantial mix of residents is likely, as well as services that meet their needs.
In fact, some establishments have opened in the area and attracted both gay and straight patronage without the drama surrounding Lime. Two blocks down Market, the bar Blackbird is flourishing with just such a mix.
Mr. Dufty hailed Blackbird’s success as a positive example of the neighborhood’s evolution. But he also said that the district’s legacy should not be forgotten and that its gay centricity needed to be maintained.
“You can’t take the Castro for granted. It’s worth fighting for,” he said. “We seek to be inclusive, but it’s essential that we remain anchored in our LGBT heritage.”
J. D. Petras, a businessman with several properties in the Castro, including Cafe Flore, a popular outdoor restaurant, has watched the Castro develop for more than 30 years.
“I’d love to see the Castro be a gay ghetto like it was in the 1970s,” he said, “but we don’t need it anymore. Gay people are everywhere.”
Despite some of the problems that others have reported, Mr. Petras said he welcomed the crowds flocking to Lime. He said the club’s patrons were helping to revive the depressed local economy.
“It’s fun for young kids coming into the big city,” he said. “It’s good for our neighborhood. Who the hell cares if it’s gay, mixed or straight?”
Now, if only they could be potty trained, then perhaps the rest of the neighbors would feel as accommodating.
“I don’t want it to be spring break each weekend,” Mr. Dufty said.
