It’s official: The Airport Formerly Known as Oakland International is going to rename itself the San Francisco Bay Oakland International Airport.
The move is many things: confusing for tourists; likely to end up in court; an insult to Oakland. But it also got us thinking. If the Oakland airport can rename itself as a way to pretend that none of its problems exist, why can’t San Francisco rename a bunch of its own less-than-perfect landmarks? Let’s pull a Meta: Don’t revitalize—rebrand.
Here are 16 suggestions for old San Francisco places that could use new San Francisco names.
Old Name: The San Francisco Zoo
New Name: The San Diego Zoo North
What do you mean the SF Zoo is broken? You must be thinking of some other zoo, maybe the one in Oakland. Our zoo is world-class!
Old Name: Market Street
New Name: The Champs Ély-Bay
A blighted, confusing, foul-smelling, empty thoroughfare? No, that can’t be right. This boulevard is just like the one they have in Paris. (Besides, you can’t spell Paris without “pee.”)
Old Name: Jones and Eddy streets in the Tenderloin
New Name: Mid-City Free Trade and Entrepreneurship Zone
It’s not a blighted containment zone of squalor and misery! It’s a dynamic hub of self-regulated economic activity.
Old Name: The Old Clam House
New Name: The New Clam House
Who wants to eat old clams?
Old Name: The Painted Ladies
New Name: The No Cap Skibidi Toilet Rizz Houses
IYKYK, fellow kids.
Old Name: The Salesforce Tower
New Name: The Marc Benioff Needs a Hug Center
Empty offices. Mass layoffs. Hawaiian controversies. Bring it in, ohana.
Old Name: Capp Street
New Name: App Street
One of the gnarliest stretches in the Mission just needs a tech-forward, disruptive, AI-powered rebrand. Long-time Mission residents will love it; they always love that kind of thing.
Old Name: The Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center
New Name: The Chan-Zuckerberg Octagon
Now you (and Zuck) can go right from the MMA ring to the operating room!
Old Name: Cow Palace
New Name: The Plant-Based Meat Palace
As part of this rebrand, the annual Dickens Fair will be renamed the Impossible Turkey Leg and Nonalcoholic Mead Fair.
Old Name: The Speaker Nancy Pelosi Federal Building
New Name: Trump Tower
We don’t like it either, but we’d better get on the dictator’s good side now.
Old Name: The East Cut
New Name: Literally Anything Else
The Big Easty? Eastbound & Down? East of South of the Slot? South North Beach? Just like the actual neighborhood, anything is going to be better.
Old Name: The Marina
New Name: The University of Southern California Bay Area Campus
Snort. No way, bro, you played lacrosse, too? Passes out.
Old Name: The Financial District
New Name: The Bitcoin District
By the time Sam Bankman-Fried gets out of federal prison in 2059, Downtown will be cooking again.
Old Name: The Twitter Building
New Name: The Elon Musk Museum of Fragile Male Ego
Wait, you’re telling us we can’t rename a privately owned building? Well, screw you, we’re gonna spend $44 billion just to prove we can.
Old Name: Fisherman’s Wharf
New Name: Sea Lion’s Wharf
We know who really rules those docks. And if the fishermen and restaurants keep leaving, only the pinniped polycules will remain. It’s time for a #HotSeaLionSummer.
Old Name: Hayes Valley
New Name: Cerebral Valley
Wait, what? That idea is terrible. There’s no way that’s going to stick.