New mountain and sink hole | Another day in "Constructionville"

The view from Kathy Looper's backyard is very different than it was
before Mount Construction rose from the landscape. Photo: Footprints

Last Wednesday, Revere Avenue neighbors discovered something new about the place they live when a part of their street suddenly fell into space they didn't know existed underneath it.

A crew fills the "sink hole" on Revere Avenue.
Photo: Footprints

A liaison with the construction team building the new Willie Brown Academy school in the Silver Terrace area of Bayview told neighbors that the "sink hole" was connected to the removal of a huge cistern that had been excavated from the building site. A crew of workers began fixing the hole in the street right away.

While area history unexpectedly emerged, a mountain of dirt pushed further toward the skyline. After construction on the new building had begun, foundations of houses and other structures demolished decades ago were discovered buried beneath the old school grounds.

That long-forgotten layer of Bayview history surprised the engineers who used Google Earth to do research. A 1938 aerial view of the area helped them map debris remaining beneath the surface of today's Silver Terrace.

Building on top of old foundations, no matter how far down they are buried, is not allowed by Code. So contractors dug further than they intended, sifting out the older construction, and creating a series of terraces and a dirt mountain.

A 1938 aerial view of the Silver Terrace area. Photo: Google Earth

The mountain is temporary, until problems closer to the foothills can be worked out, and the excavated earth is moved back. Neighbors, in this place where construction can be found at most every turn, are taking it all in stride.