Architecture could finally break out in San Francisco, where "dreams go to die"

When it comes to contemporary architecture, San Francisco is a stubborn town. But could change be coming at last?
 Proposals by high-profile architects such as OMA, Studio Gang and Foster + Partners could bring a more dramatic skyline and a transformed waterfront  if San Francisco's notoriously persnickety planning system and pressure groups let them

"San Francisco culture has always been protective of itself," says Ben Grant, an urbanist with SPUR , a local nonprofit organisation that advocates for smart urban design. "A city like LA has the attitude, hey, we're going to hell anyway, so build whatever you want, and hence all the risky architecture. San Francisco is convinced that it's perfect already."
The city's conservative attitude toward urban design is surprising, given its reputation as an innovator, particularly in the field of technology.
Silicon Valley (geographically based 30 miles to the south, but culturally and financially at home in the city) started as a handful of ambitious entrepreneurs building computers in garages. Now, it's the centrepiece of what the title of a 2011 book about Valley history dubbed The Greatest Creation of Wealth in the History of the Planet.

The city's planning department estimates that the lodestar of new jobs and new technology is now drawing 10,000 new residents to San Francisco every year. This crunch has put the spurs to the city's sluggish development process, and also shaken off a bit of its hidebound attitude about building design.
With a few exceptions, like Herzog & de Meuron 's 2005 de Young Museum, the city has rarely been noted for remarkable innovations in architecture. Local grumblings can quickly scuttle a project if neighbours don't like the looks of it, and San Francisco's infamous permitting process can hold up a project for years.