The dust has settled, and the WFH tech workers have triumphed over the hard-working people who deliver their food and same-day Prime purchases. Prop K — which closes the Great Highway and replaces it with a new park — has officially passed. Now, its neighbors, who fought to keep the Highway open, are watching as the victors prepare to enjoy their spoils on a beautiful new park. (Maybe, more on that later.)

While Pirate Wires recommended a ‘No’ vote on Prop K (EDITOR’S NOTE: on grounds all evidence indicated most people actually living in the neighborhoods impacted wanted to keep their access to the road (and also the biker YIMBY people are just kind of annoying as Hell no offense)), I chose not to vote at all — not out of apathy, but out of principle. I don’t live in the Sunset, and I didn’t feel it was my place to reshape its residents’ daily lives. Ironically, if moderates had simply refrained from putting Prop K on the ballot, they might have secured total victory. Instead, by pushing it forward, they handed progressives an unexpected advantage for years to come.

For those unfamiliar, the Great Highway — the road Prop K will replace with a park — is a four-lane roadway skirting San Francisco’s western edge, vital for daily commuters, surfers, and anyone looking to escape the city’s gridlock. The proposition’s advocates liken its closure to that of the Embarcadero Freeway after the Loma Prieta earthquake, which gave the city newfound access to the waterfront, spurred a boom in new businesses and restaurants, and contributed to a surge in property values near the bay. People already enjoy the weekend closures of the Great Highway, so why not close it permanently and create an epic park? It sounds like a win-win, right?

Well, not so fast. The people who actually rely on the Great Highway have legitimate reasons to oppose Prop K: it will cause traffic nightmares, increased commute times, and the diversion of countless cars onto local streets where kids and the elderly live. They’re understandably miffed that people who don’t even live in the area are dictating changes to their daily lives, and they’ve long seen the Highway’s current weekend closures as the best compromise. (On a technical note, Prop K only guarantees the road will be closed; it doesn’t require the city to build or fund a park to replace it. Maybe former Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman, who donated $300k to pass Prop K, will put up another $25 million to get it done? That was the bill for Francisco Park, which took almost ten years to complete.)

In addition to almost certainly handing a victory to progressives, the timing of Prop K couldn’t be worse. With the lower Great Highway closed due to erosion, Highway One likely next, and now the upper Great Highway cut off by Prop K, Sunset residents might as well be living in LA. Stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic, their anger is bound to find its target in the supervisor behind this mess: Joel Engardio, the poster child for how Prop K became a political lightning rod.

In 2022, Engardio, the supervisor of District 4 — the Sunset — and a moderate favorite who wasn’t even on the ballot this year, shocked the city by unseating incumbent Gordon Mar, marking the first time in two decades a sitting supervisor was defeated. Unfortunately for moderates, he’s also the chief architect of Prop K, and his constituents are so furious they’re considering a recall — every precinct voted against the measure, at an average of 70% opposed.

If Prop K had never been proposed, Joel would be a lock for re-election in two years. Instead, he’s at risk of being replaced by another progressive, eager to spotlight this misstep. “Between this and the Gaza vote, I don’t know anyone who worked on Joel’s campaign who’d volunteer for him again,” one insider told me. Joel won largely on his ground game; he’d better start mending those bridges if he wants to keep his seat.

The fallout from putting Prop K on the ballot goes beyond District 4 — it puts the flourishing moderate movement in San Francisco on shaky ground. If Joel loses his seat in the next election, moderates would lose a critical foothold. Instead of being within striking distance of a majority on the Board of Supervisors, they might find themselves slipping backward.

Let’s crunch the numbers. The Board consists of 11 seats. Currently, moderates hold 4 seats, progressives have 4 seats, and there are 3 swing votes. The balance of power hinges on these swing votes.

If Joel loses his seat due to the backlash from Prop K, moderates would drop to 3 seats, while progressives would get 5, tilting the Board decisively in favor of progressives and making it significantly harder for moderates to influence policy.

Prop K is a simple example of political overreach. A perfect storm of looting, drugs, and literal shit on the streets set the stage for moderates to clean house, and the people are ready for change. Even if the Great Highway park would be great for the city, the moderates should have listened to the locals most affected, realized it wasn’t the time, and shelved the proposition for later. Instead, their lack of restraint may have fast-tracked San Francisco back into the clutches of dysfunctional progressive governance sooner than any of us would like.

— Kartik Sathappan