"These hills are HELL on heels: 6" Stillettos or 4" cowboy boots - downhill slides are tough, especially when cocktailing." My good friend, Strange de Jim once told me...
I can count the number of times I've been in the Tonga Room, including a brief walkthrough during my date's Senior Prom in 1974 - I was a junior growing up in Marin - wearing sensible shoes... So the local cause de jeur of saving the Tonga Room at the Fairmont Hotel is a mere shadow of the center of change afoot in the Nob Hill neighborhood of San Francisco.
It's all about Live Nation's grab of the Masonic Temple Auditorium, adding more than 20+ full service bars, 300 seats (chew your knees) and no additional parking. Frankly it's rare I'd say NO to a cocktail, but if I had a vote, I'd say an emphatic NO to something so silly and it's not even in my neighborhood! Why not grab the Billy Graham Auditorium closer to BART and MUNI???
I've loved love loved the Tonga Room as an institution not unlike Sears Fine Foods on Powell Street off Union Square, but perhaps it too may have seen its time. We finally retired the Doggie Diner across from the SF Zoo, so why can't we put the Rain Barge "on a stick" like we did with the 'head' of the Doggie Diner by Ocean Beach??? Or perhaps better yet - moor the Barge on Stow Lake, having a band play there on a weeknight. Perhaps a night a month in Spring and Fall (more pleasant than SUMMER!) Just on the off-chance it could even be romantic with night lights, paddle boats and the famous Tiki Barge with a local playing an era's hit favorites - a small festival around the lake. Is there something wrong with that?
Perhaps with some 'real citizen' input - we might get a chance to remake our own two City landmarks adding even more homegrown SF lovin' and attention: The Bill Graham Civic Auditorium and Stow Lake in Golden Gate Park!
Is Tonga Room tiki bar in S.F. worth saving? www.sfgate.com
The future grew a bit dimmer for the Fairmont Hotel's landmark Tonga Room Wednesday as members of San Francisco's Historic Preservation Commission couldn't agree on whether the aging tiki bar was worth saving. "I'm not...
Michael Ackerman - Zephyr Real Estate
ABZ@ZephyrSF.com
www.Zephyr-RealEstate.com
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