What the Mid-Market area needs is a giant inflatable gorilla with "CRACK" written across its stomach

I'll freely admit I'm not the smartest guy in the world and I don't have a degree in urban planning or anything, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what's going on with the Mid-Market area.

For those of you not in the know, the so-called "Mid-Market" is Market Street in San Francisco from about 5th Street to about, what are we saying, 10th? Maybe 10th. It's characterized by boarded-up storefronts, a few janky camera shops, crackheads, and a couple of sad-looking strip clubs. Like the Market Street Cinema:

From Yelp: "This place is absolutly horrible! My girlfreind worked there for a lil bit, she quit when she found out that all the bitches there are prostitutes and will do anything for 200$! hah too bad they lost the baddest bitch they will ever have! nasty ass ghetto bitches!"

So there you go. A little slice of the Mid-Market. I would avoid the Market St. Cinema, as it seems they have lost the baddest bitch they will ever have.

ANYWAY, for as long as I've lived here people have been talking about how to clean up the Mid-Market and what to do with it and everything. There has been talk of Pedestrian Malls and Special Shopping Areas and European Style Whatevers, but I have never heard anything as crazy as the new plan to Save Mid-Market Via Ginormous Light-Up Billboards and Dancing Inflatable Men. To wit:

The Mid-Market corridor's been riddled with strip joints and empty storefronts for decades now, and the man who fancies himself a sort of Wayne family to Mid-Market's Gotham is David Addington. He owns the Warfield Theater— if you'll recall also the future home of a three-level Foreign Cinema sibling restaurant— and has gourmet sausage resto Show Dogs already under his belt. To top it off, he's signed Blick's Art Supplies away from its current spot on Van Ness, and is spearheading a proposition on this November's ballot to allow Mid-Market signage ranging from "dancing inflatable men" to digital billboards.

THAT SWOOSHING SOUND YOU HEAR IS THE SOUND OF PROGRESS.

I'm not sure exactly why someone would think that a sane person would travel to a dangerous and dirty area at night to look at some billboards and some advertising gimmicks usually found on used car lots and tire stores, but I will give him this: those giant inflatable men will SCARE THE FUCK out of the crackheads.