{"id":452757,"date":"2026-09-04T01:06:24","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T01:06:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/452757\/"},"modified":"2026-09-04T01:06:24","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T01:06:24","slug":"san-francisco-officials-review-fleet-week-plans-to-avoid-crowd-traffic-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/452757\/","title":{"rendered":"\ufeffSan Francisco officials review Fleet Week plans to avoid crowd, traffic problems"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — With San Francisco Fleet Week<\/a> expected to draw more than a million visitors next month, city leaders held a hearing Thursday to review plans aimed at preventing the traffic, transit and crowd-management problems that have plagued other major events in recent months.<\/p>\n

The annual celebration, which includes the Blue Angels air show, returns after last year’s event was canceled because of the federal government shutdown.<\/p>\n

Fleet Week has long been one of the city’s largest events, attracting visitors from across the Bay Area and beyond to watch performances along the waterfront.<\/p>\n

Supervisor Stephen Sherrill, whose district includes the Marina, said the hearing was prompted in part by lessons learned from the Fourth of July fireworks display near the Golden Gate Bridge and the Red Bull Formula 1 exhibition earlier this year.<\/p>\n

VIDEO: Thrill for fans, headache for neighbors: SF Marina reacts to F1 street showcase<\/a><\/p>\n

San Francisco’s Marina District is still buzzing after Saturday’s Red Bull Formula 1 Showrun – but not all of the reaction is positive.<\/p>\n

“Over the past year, we’ve had a few large events that have had some really significant problems,” Sherrill said.<\/p>\n

Sherrill pointed to what he described as major underestimates of attendance at previous events, leading to transportation bottlenecks and overcrowding.<\/p>\n

“The biggest problem was an underestimation of crowd sizes, nearly 50% off how many people the city thought were coming,” he said. “My goal today was to make sure that the planning for Fleet Week was taking this into account.”<\/p>\n

During the hearing, supervisors questioned representatives from the Department of Emergency Management, SFMTA, San Francisco Fire Department and San Francisco Police Department about preparations for crowd control, street closures, emergency vehicle access and public transit service.<\/p>\n

SFMTA Director Julie Kirschbaum said the agency will activate its department operations center and closely monitor conditions throughout the event.<\/p>\n

MORE: July 4 Waymo gridlock in SF after dozens choke streets, some lose power, 1 ran over lit fireworks<\/a><\/p>\n

“We are activating our department operations center, will be monitoring the event, and preparing for uncertainty,” Kirschbaum said.<\/p>\n

Kirschbaum noted that Fleet Week differs from other large events because activities are spread across multiple days and can be viewed from a wide geographic area.<\/p>\n

“It is an event where the same thing happens over three days. It is an event that can be viewed in a large dispersed area, and it’s an event that we have decades of successful experience delivering people to and from,” she said.<\/p>\n

SFMTA plans to boost transit service to waterfront areas and has been coordinating with autonomous vehicle operators, including Waymo, as well as rideshare companies.<\/p>\n

According to Sherrill, city agencies and transportation providers have been meeting for months to discuss traffic management measures, including potential geofencing restrictions for autonomous vehicles and rideshare services.<\/p>\n

MORE: San Francisco seeks tougher robotaxi rules after Waymo meltdown fed holiday traffic chaos<\/a><\/p>\n

“That planning didn’t happen for July Fourth,” Sherrill said. “That planning is happening. I was really glad to hear that there will be geofencing with the app companies and with the rideshares.”<\/p>\n

Fleet Week executive director Louis Loeven said organizers welcome the city’s efforts to review and refine event planning.<\/p>\n

“For us, we really do have 45 years now of experience and have not had a lot of the problems that were identified, but it’s always good to keep fresh with what’s going on around the community,” Loeven said.<\/p>\n

While city officials indicated geofencing restrictions are being considered for areas including Lombard Street, Van Ness Avenue and the Embarcadero, details have not been finalized.<\/p>\n

Any restrictions involving Waymo vehicles would still require the company’s agreement before being implemented.<\/p>\n

\"Now<\/a><\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 KGO-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — With San Francisco Fleet Week expected to draw more than a million visitors next…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":452758,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[178885,101,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":["post-452757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-178885","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=452757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452757\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/452758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=452757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=452757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=452757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}