Amazon’s signature smiley blue logos are spreading across southeast San Francisco’s industrial landscape. And not everyone is happy about it.

The second most valuable company in the world, Amazon has been gobbling up space throughout the southeast corner of the city, taking advantage of zoning meant to preserve blue-collar jobs in a market in which housing and office space has typically generated higher revenues.

At 888 Minnesota St., at the foot of a slow street and across from Esprit Park, Amazon has established an UltraFastFresh logistics center. A half-mile southeast at 435 23rd St., just to the south of the Potrero Power Station, a large sign outside a 75,000 square foot warehouse says “welcome Amazonians.” And further to the south, at 749 Toland St., Amazon has a 112,000 square foot delivery hub.

But Amazon’s biggest and most controversial incursion into San Francisco is a proposed 725,000 square foot delivery hub at 900 7th St., a six-acre rectangular parcel in Showplace Square Amazon bought for $200 million. For decades that site was home to garbage trucks, a fleet of 300 that each morning would rumble out onto the streets of Showplace Square at an hour the streets were still dark and most city residents still in bed.

Now the trash trucks are gone — the garbage company Recology relocated them to Brisbane — but a proposal from the new property owner is causing consternation from neighbors who say that a heavy industrial use no longer fits in a creative neighborhood that has evolved into a mix of housing, design and artist spaces, light “advanced” manufacturing and an expanding California College of the Arts campus.

Amazon plans to expand into San Francisco by turning this location at 900 7th St., and others, into facilities for the company.

Samantha Laurey/The Chronicle

David Meckel, senior adviser to the president at CCA, said three daily shifts of 400 workers would generate 2,800 car trips, in addition to the 70 Amazon trucks that will be coming and going from the facility. The traffic could create a pedestrian nightmare for CCA’s 1,600 students as well as for residents at 888 7th St, a 224-unit that overlooks the future Amazon site.

“To me it’s not about Amazon, it’s about the intensity of the use,” said Meckel. “I’d have the same concerns if it were FedEx or UPS. For me it’s about urban design.”

Will Roscoe, who lives at 888 7th St., said the pollution and traffic would worsen air quality in a neighborhood in which freeways and Caltrain already generate high levels of particulate matter. About a decade ago, Roscoe, who works for a nonprofit, was evicted from a building in the Western Addition. He feels like the Amazon project will once again force him to move.

“Hundreds of people now have come in to make this their neighborhood and this just really turns the clock back to a massive usage that is antithetical to a livable neighborhood for people with children, seniors,” he said. “It’s contrary to that.”

But while a busy distribution center may feel out of sync with Showplace Square’s current vibe, it is in fact just what city zoning calls for. And Recology only decided to sell the site after neighbors had rejected an earlier 2018 plan to build about 1,000 units of housing there.

At a pre-application meeting at the site on June 27, 2019, a packed room of Dogpatch and Potrero Hill residents lambasted the idea of ​​building housing on the site. One called it a “a land grab and giveaway to developers.” Another resident said San Francisco suffered from a “PDR crisis” — PDR stands for production, distribution and repair — and that the property should remain zoned for industrial uses. One attendee called it “a bad project,” while another argued that “housing is not needed in the neighborhood.”

If the vocal opposition was intended to give Recology cold feet, it worked. Recology first cut the number of proposed units in half. Then, facing an uphill approval process that was likely to drag on three or four years, not including delays from environmental lawsuits common in San Francisco, the rubbish company gave up and sold the six-acre site to Amazon.

“We received an offer and determined it was in Recology’s interest to accept it,” said Eric Potashner, the Vice President & Senior Director of Strategic Affairs at Recology.

While the housing plan would have required a series of zoning changes and conditional use authorizations, Amazon’s proposed 57-foot high warehouse is consistent with the Eastern Neighborhoods land use plan adopted in December of 2008 after a decade of debate. The site is part of a block of parcels roughly bounded by 7th Street, Division Street, Potrero Avenue and 16th Street, that were zoned for industrial uses.

Ken Rich, who was project manager at the Planning Department for the Eastern Neighborhoods rezoning, said the city tried to strike a balance between protecting industrial jobs and creating room for new housing. The plan has generated thousands of new housing units in Dogpatch and Potrero Hill. It has also prompted property owners at sites like 1 DeHaro, 100 Hooper and 150 Hooper to build PDR spaces for advanced manufacturing.

The Eastern Neighborhood Plans goal of protecting light industrial jobs on a swath of land that would otherwise have been gobbled up by tech office and housing developers has done what it was intended to do, according to Anne Taupier, director of development at the Mayor’s Office of Economic and workforce development.

“A clear set of rules to play by were established and it really hasn’t changed since then,” said Taupier. “We think it has worked and is continuing to work.”

The opposition to Amazon’s 7th Street plan is motivated not just by land use issues but by the company’s track record of crushing unionization efforts and reputation for grueling work conditions, according to JR Eppler, a board member with Potrero Boosters.

Eppler said that neighbors around 888 Minnesota St. have had success over the last year working with Amazon on issues like traffic, parking and security. Friends of Jackson Park is in talks with Amazon about the company possibly contributing funding to badly needed improvements. But the labor issues are harder to negotiate, he said.

In a recent SF Standard article two San Francisco Board of Supervisor members, Aaron Peskin and Shamann Walton, suggested that the city had been overly receptive to Amazon’s project and less than upfront with residents and other stakeholders about the project.

Taupier said Amazon is at the very beginning of its approval process and there would be ample time for residents and elected officials to shape the project.

“We are going to have conversations with Amazon about supporting our local small businesses, including our brick and mortar retail businesses,” said Taupier. “We will make sure they understand that San Francisco has expectations that if you are going to do business here you are going to be part of the community.”

In the meantime the empty rectangular lot feels like an island in a neighborhood that has moved on. To the north is the condo building at 888 7th St., which houses many senior Chinese immigrants. To the south on Hooper Street is headquarters for Adobe and a new SFMade building that houses a roster of manufacturing businesses including robotics groups, a distillery and a fabricator of everything from drapes to bags to hydrogen tanks for the automobile and industrial markets.

Scott Mason, a San Francisco commercial real estate broker who specializes in industrial properties, said Amazon is among a select group of well-funded users who qualify for PDR sites but have far deeper pockets than the typical family run auto body or plumbing supply company. He said mom and pop PDR companies needed to make a city like San Francisco function can not compete in a market dominated by Amazon.

“Your every day smaller company in San Francisco is having a tough time,” he said. “The venture-backed tech-driven company can pay more per square foot because they are not working off a regular balance sheet.”

Stephen Maduli-Williams, Amazon’s manager of economic development policy, said construction at the old Recolgy site would not start for 18 to 24 months. He said there would be retail at the site and Amazon would work with local residents and businesses to determine what sort of goods might be sold. He said the company is looking into how Amazon could support Jackson Park.

“We intend to use this time to listen to and engage all of our neighbors and stakeholders, with the goal of reaching a shared vision not only for the project, but to also create long lasting partnerships” he said.

For Dogpatch and Potrero residents there is an increasing sense that Amazon “has the neighborhoods surrounded,” said Eppler. Roscoe said he is concerned that some neighborhood groups will successfully squeeze Amazon to fund various needs, leaving residents to live with the trucks with the blue smiles coming and going.

“Nobody speaks for our building,” said Roscoe. “We don’t want it. Nobody I’ve talked to is like, ‘Oh yes, good idea.’ The others in the coalition are going for community benefits — but what community benefits could they give us? Free gas masks? Lifetime cancer screening? The benefit we need is to not be subjected to traffic and pollution.”

JK Dineen is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jdineen@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @sfjkdineen

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January 29, 2019, 11:23 am | Updated: February 1, 2019, 9:48 am

Pocahontas.

Image: Disney

Since Pinocchio touched the hearts of every Academy member in 1940, Disney has won a whopping 13 Academy Awards for best original song.

The 91st Academy Awards are fast approaching, so let’s take a look back at some of the top musical winners from Disney films.

From firm family favorites Mary Poppins and The Lion King to the lesser-known Song of the South, you’ll find all of the Oscar-winning Disney films here.

1. Pinocchio (1940)

   ‘If you wish for a star’ by Pinocchio was Disney’s first Oscar win in 1940. The original version of the song was sung by Jiminy Cricket in the opening credits and in the final scene of the film. Pinocchio also won the Oscar for best original music that year.

   The song’s iconic status was really cemented when Disney began using it alongside the Walt Disney Pictures animation at the start of all Disney films.

2. Song of the South (1946)

   The film itself may be a bit behind, but Uncle Remus’ (James Baskett) Oscar-winning number ‘Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah’ has long outlived the popularity of animation and continues to be a popular tune. We challenge you not to tap your toes …

   Here are all of the 2019 Oscar soundtrack nominations>

3. Mary Poppins (1964)

   From ‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’ to ‘Step in Time’, Mary Poppins was packed with iconic songs – but that was it ‘Chim Chim Cher-ee’, Bert’s masterpiece that won an Oscar for best original song.

   The happy melody about the life of a chimney sweep was written by the Sherman Brothers, who also received an Oscar and a Grammy for the score.

4. The Little Mermaid (1989)

   ‘Under the sea’, composed by Alan Menken, won the 1989 Oscar for Original Song and put Sebastian the Crab’s catchy ‘Kiss the Girl’ on the post.

   Menken also received an Oscar for best original music that year.

   

   The Little Mermaid (1989).
   
   Image: Disney

5. Beauty and the Beast (1991)

   The animation Beauty and the Beast, composed in 1991 by Alan Menken, was another success story for the film composer when he won the awards for Original Score and Original Song (for ‘Beauty and the Beast‘).

   Originally recorded by Angela Lansbury (Mrs. Potts), Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson are known to record a second version of the song for the film’s credits.

6. Aladdin (1992)

   The love duet between Aladdin and Jasmine ‘A Whole New World’ won the Oscar for best original song at the 65th Academy Awards, another win for Alan Menken – and songwriting partner Tim Rice.

   Sung by Robin Williams as a genius, “Friend Like Me” was also nominated for the award – and the film itself won the Oscar for Best Original Music.

7. The Lion King (1994)

   ‘Can you feel the love tonight’ composed by Elton John with lyrics by Tim Rice, received the 1994 award for Original Song – on ‘Hakuna Matata’ and ‘Circle of Life’.

   Amazingly, the complete score is Hans Zimmer’s only Oscar win to date.

8. Pocahontas (1995)

   ‘Colors of the Wind’, written by composer Alan Menken (what a career he had!) and lyricist Stephen Schwartz, was named Best Original Song in 1995.

   Pocahontas also received an Oscar for best original music, a Golden Globe for best original song, and a Grammy for best song for a film.

   

   Pocahontas (1995).
   
   Image: Disney

9. Tarzan (1999)

   If you’ve never cried before ‘You will be in my heart’, you lie. Unforgettable sung by Phil Collins, it beat the other Disney & Pixar animation contestants “When She Loved Me” from Toy Story 2 to Oscar fame at the 72nd Academy Awards.

   

   Tarzan (1999).
   
   Image: Disney

10. Monster, Inc. (2001)

    Played in the credits of the Disney / Pixar hit Monsters, Inc. “If i did not have you” earned Randy Newman his first Oscar.

    Played by John Goodman and Billy Crystal as Monster Sulley and Mike Wazowski, it’s a light-hearted favorite in Oscars history.

    

    Monster, Inc. (2001).
    
    Image: Disney

11. Toy Story 3 (2010)

    ‘We belong Together’ was Randy Newman’s second Oscar win, this time from the third installment of the most popular Disney / Pixar franchise Toy Story.

    

    Toy Story 3 (2010).
    
    Image: Disney

12. The Muppets (2011)

    In an Oscar first ‘Man or muppet’ was the first human puppet duet to take home an Oscar.

    It is from the movie The Muppets, which featured both Muppets characters and live actors, and was the third song from the Muppets franchise to be nominated for best original song – but the first to win.

    

    The Muppets (2011).
    
    Image: Disney

13. Frozen (2013)

    ‘Let go’ from Frozen unsurprisingly won the crown for best original song at the 86th Academy Awards. It has garnered over a billion views on YouTube for a reason …

    This is exactly why ‘Let It Go’ got stuck in your head for five years>

14. Coco (2017)

    ‘Remember me’ from the Disney / Pixar film Coco won the 2017 Oscar for best original song. The Mexican-inspired song appears in various forms throughout the film – as a lullaby, upbeat ranchero style, and with a mariachi makeover.

    

    Coco (2017).
    
    Image: Disney

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Ray Cantrell was practically suffocated. Cantrell was hiding in a freezer in the lobby of the RKO Golden Gate Theater in San Francisco in late April 1971 and had spent hours peeking through a small opening in the device, searching the crowd for anyone who resembled the widely circulated police sketch of the most notorious criminals across the country: the Zodiac Killer.

It was all part of an ambitious plan concocted by Cantrell’s friend, a fast food franchisee named Tom Hanson. Hanson had arranged for Cantrell and several other co-conspirators to line up at various locations in the theater during the week-long engagement of Hanson’s low-budget film, aptly titled The Zodiac Killer.

The film, which dramatized the recent murders and the subsequent mockery of the killer through letters to newspapers, was made in just a few weeks for only $ 13,000. Its quality was irrelevant: Hanson’s real intent in making the film was to see if he could lure the Zodiac Killer himself to the premiere of the film, where he had set an elaborate trap to get him out of the audience. If it worked, Hanson would be hailed as a hero. If not, he would be practically broke.

At first it looked like it was going south. Cantrell had limited air in the freezer and was pulled out just in time on one occasion (a minute or two longer and he would probably have passed out). But before the week was over, Hanson believed he’d met the zodiac face to face. At the urinal.

“You know,” said the stranger and opened his fly, “real blood doesn’t come out like that.”

Initially, Hanson had no plans to become the next Martin Scorsese. After moving from Minnesota to Los Angeles in the 1960s, Hanson found his niche owning several Pizza Man franchises and a handful of Kentucky Fried Chicken locations.

“Then my underwriter went broke,” Hanson, now 81, tells Mental Floss. “He was supposed to get us out there. I thought, ‘Well, if I go under, I’ll do what I really want to do, which is make films.'” Hanson had played or worked on half a dozen small film projects in California since arriving , made contacts and friendships with a range of cast and crew members. He knew that the world of low budget filming means working fast, cheaply, with little chance of a breakthrough.

At the same time, Hanson decided to start a production, San Francisco was in an uproar. On December 20, 1968, a young couple was found shot dead in the young man’s car near Vallejo, California. On July 4, 1969, another young couple was shot dead in a car; Darlene Ferrin, 22, was killed while her boyfriend, Mike Mageau, 19, was seriously injured. Weeks later, three major San Francisco newspapers received a handwritten letter attributing the crimes and revealing details only the killer would know. Signing the correspondence with a circle and a cross, the author later introduced himself: “This is where the zodiac speaks”. Before the end of the year, he killed two more people.

As 1970 passed without a break in the case, Hanson had a bold thought. “What if I make a movie and set a trap to catch it? I thought he was going to see a movie about himself. He would have to. ”(In another letter the killer, obviously hungry for the public, even pondered who should play him in a film.)

Filmed in just a few weeks in early 1971 and edited just as quickly, The Zodiac Killer (originally titled Zodiac) is not new territory in the exploitation film genre. Hanson hired a friend, Hal Reed, to play the killer, whom he imagined as a postman by day and a murderous psychopath by night; Paul Avery, the increasingly paranoid journalist who thought he might be targeted by the killer, met with Hanson a number of times to discuss details of the case. “He was waiting in the alley near the restaurant and waiting for me to come in,” says Hanson. “He was really nervous.”

Hanson spent $ 13,000 on The Zodiac Killer, using up most of his savings. He booked a weeklong premiere engagement at the RKO Theater in San Francisco and bought ads in local newspapers. Without letting the authorities know of his plan (“They may have tried to stop him,” says Hanson), the filmmaker hired six friends, including Reed, to monitor the crowd during the screenings.

The plan worked like this: every theater-goer received a competition entry ticket that they had to fill out. The prize was a Kawasaki motorcycle on a podium in the lobby. By inserting the card into a slot, participants inadvertently gave Hanson a handwriting sample that he could compare to the letters published in the newspapers.

“We all had positions that we swapped,” says Hanson. You were actually on the podium where the cards were being dropped and you were evaluating the handwriting in no time. If he saw one that resembled the writing in the published letters, he could flip a switch that activated a light that another team member hiding in the freezer would see. Other men were stationed outside, in the projection room, and in the lobby. With a match, Hanson would try to lock the suspect up and force him into an office to hold him down.

Theoretically a good idea, staking out turned out to be tedious. Cantrell – who also co-wrote the film – almost passed out during a freezer stay. During the confusion, someone had dropped a card that said, “I’m the Zodiac, I’ve been here,” but no one was on the podium to evaluate it in real time.

On the last night of the engagement, Hanson paused his surveillance for a bathroom break. “I stood at the urinal and thought I heard the door open,” he says. “I turned around but saw no one.”

A man appeared silently at the urinal next to Hansons, who noted via a graphic scene in the film that no “real blood” would flow from such a body. “I closed the zipper, turned around and saw the same face as on the wanted poster. Same eyes, nose, mouth, hair, everything. I thought, ‘Son of a bitch, it’s him.’ “

Hanson emphasizes that, as the owner of several restaurant chains, he has been mugged several times and quickly learned to study faces for later identification. Hanson confronted the man in the lobby and led him to a nearby office and let his friends surround him. “I looked him straight in the eye and told him Paul Stine was my brother.” (Stine was a cab driver shot by the Zodiac in October 1969, and the lie was intended to break the suspect’s composure.) “But he didn’t blink.”

In fact, the man appeared to be friends with Hanson’s crew and bond through shared military experience. With no legal authority to hold his suspect, Hanson watched him stroll away. But it shouldn’t be the last time he looked in the face of the man he believed could be one of the most notorious killers of the 20th century.

The Zodiac Killer ended his engagement with the RKO and eventually got booked in a few other theaters, but it was far from a hit. Hanson made another film in 1972, a drug comedy called A Ton of Grass Goes to Pot, before retiring to Wisconsin to try to recalibrate his business operations. When he returned to California in 1974, he decided that the man he saw at the RKO needed to be monitored.

“I had to get back on my feet and take a closer look at this guy,” says Hanson.

With the help of private detectives, Hanson forged a new conspiracy. After receiving his address during the investigation – the man originally gave a hotel address at the premiere – Hanson sent a postcard informing his suspect that he had won an award. When he dispatched the detectives to deliver the price box, they should report a bug and take it back – so Hanson would have his fingerprints on the package. But no prints were found.

“Another time the detective called where he was working, Bank of America,” says Hanson. “They asked for his personnel file and when the bank asked why they said, ‘Well, we think he’s the Zodiac.'” The man was soon fired.

Eventually, Hanson gave up the chase. The killer hadn’t struck since 1969 and hadn’t written a letter since 1974 – and investigators didn’t believe the handwriting samples Hanson collected matched.

But the lure to identify Zodiac has never entirely gone. Today, both Hanson and his grandson are researching the man he first spotted in the RKO toilet and trying to unearth any information that could link him to the murders. Although The Zodiac Killer has largely gone from the public eye after its original limited release, it was recently dug up from the American Genre Film Archive and released on Blu-ray in July. An upcoming book and documentary, Zodiac Man, may include the suspect’s name, which has yet to be publicly disclosed. Hanson will only say that the man is still alive.

If Hanson is right, a quest that has been going on for nearly half a century will come to an end and prove that he will do everything possible to corner his elusive prey.

Well, almost any length.

“I never got into the freezer,” admits Hanson.

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