San Francisco Neighborhoods · Portola
Portola
also the Garden DistrictFog zoneA sunny, working-class corner of southeast San Francisco once carpeted with flower greenhouses, where the multicultural San Bruno Avenue strip still hums with bakeries, taquerias and pho.
- Sunny southeast pocket
- Diverse San Bruno Ave eats
- Historic Garden District
- Near McLaren Park
On the map
Open Portola on the map →The story
In the early 1900s, Italian, Maltese and Jewish immigrants settled the Portola and built greenhouses to grow cut flowers for the city. By the 1920s dozens of family nurseries blanketed the neighborhood, supplying most of the flowers sold at the San Francisco Flower Mart and earning Portola its nickname as the city's Garden District. After World War II most growers moved south and greenhouses gave way to single-family homes, though the Garibaldi family's University Mound Nursery on Woolsey Street kept growing roses until 1990. San Bruno Avenue grew into the neighborhood's Main Street, and today the area is among the city's most Asian-majority, with a deeply multicultural commercial strip.
Things most people don’t know
San Francisco's Garden District
A 2016 city resolution officially recognized the Portola as San Francisco's Garden District, honoring its flower-growing past.
The last greenhouses
The Garibaldi family's University Mound Nursery at 770 Woolsey St grew roses for the SF Flower Mart until 1990; its redwood-and-glass greenhouses are the last of their kind in the district.
The Avenue Theatre
This 1927 San Bruno Ave movie house was famed for its Wurlitzer organ before closing in 1984; the building still stands.
Next to McLaren Park
John McLaren Park, the city's second-largest park at over 300 acres, borders the neighborhood.
A family neighborhood
Portola is a quiet district of low-slung single-family homes that replaced the old nurseries after World War II.
Eating and drinking
Restaurants
- Pho Nation · 2428 San Bruno Ave
- Ming Hing Restaurant · 2550 San Bruno Ave
- Restaurant Pupuseria Ilobasco · 2680 San Bruno Ave
- The Old Clam House · 299 Bayshore Blvd
- Round Table Pizza · 2660 San Bruno Ave
Getting around and getting care
Transit. Muni 9-San Bruno and 9R-San Bruno Rapid run the length of San Bruno Ave; the 8-Bayshore, 23-Monterey and 54-Felton also serve the neighborhood. Bayshore Caltrain station is just east.
Nearest hospital. Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center, 1001 Potrero Ave (about 2.5 mi)
Thinking about Portola?
Send me an address and I will come back with its sun, wind and fog, what is under it, and what has closed on the block.