Ferry Building, Embarcadero & Market Street, San Francisco, San Francisco County, CA

Significance: Its classicizing Baroque design, with a modified version of the upper part of Sevilee's Giralda tower crowning the center of the structure, accords well with the rather severe character of most public architecture in San Francisco. Commissioned in 1894, it was officially opened in 1989, but not entirely completed until 1903. The present building replaced a large wooden Union Depot and Ferry House which had been finished in 1877. Constructed of native Colusa sandstone over a steel and brick core, the Ferry Building stands on 111 concrete piers joined into a platform approximately 166 x 670 feet. The building is virtually indestructible. It was hardly touched by the earthquake of 1906; and was spared from the fire that followed the quake. As the nerve center of ferry traffic serving transcontinental trains terminating at Oakland and local commuters from the East Bay, it saw as many as 50,000,000 persons in a single year at its heyday. Since the termination of ferry service, the building has been converted to State Offices and a World Trade Center.
Survey number: HABS CA-1910
Building/structure dates: 1903 Initial Construction