California Photo Scout

Lombard Street from Hyde Street

Lombard Street fascinates San Francisco visitors and lures large crowds to this cramped section on Russian Hill. With 8 turns in just 412 feet, Lombard Street is not the road with the most switchbacks, but it is the most beautiful, most photographed and most popular sloping road in San Francisco. Postcards and San Francisco travel guides all feature this curiously convoluted crooked road with the charming views and colorful gardens.

How to get there

The Powell-Hyde Cable Car line is the best choice to get here. The cable car stop on Lombard Street takes you directly where you need to be.

The second best choice is to take the car. It is almost impossible to find a parking spot anywhere close to Lombard Street on busy summer weekends. Park in a garage or the Fisherman’s Wharf parking lot and walk up Hyde Street, if you cannot find a parking spot close enough.

GPS position

• 37°48’7.43″N 122°25’8.84″W

How to photograph Lombard Street

Lombard Street is difficult to photograph. The photographers of many postcard shots were standing on a nearby building or found another hard to reach point of view. You can still take excellent photographs here, but you have to work a little harder. The expectation you may have from popular postcards and travel book shots may just be wrong.

There are three good angles to photograph the serpentines.

You can get photos from Leavenworth Street at the bottom of the serpentines, from the top and at the exact center, standing in a driveway.

from Leavenworth

It is hard to get a good photograph from Leavenworth. You need a higher point but there is none. Step back as far as you can and use a moderate telephoto lens (80mm equivalent) to compress the switchbacks. A sidewalk runs straight up the mountain. From the bottom, you can get excellent photographs of the flowerbeds with cars in between them. Use a wide-angle lens to accentuate the foreground. Then start walking up the stairs.

There are several good points going up. One of my favorites is on the small road going off to the side. You can exaggerate the curvature of the street by using a very wide lens to create a beautifully distorted view of the slopes from this point. I used a 12mm lens on a Canon with 1.6x crop factor, which gives an equivalent of around 19mm to create this effect.

From Hyde Street you can get good shots from both sides of the road. I climbed the fenced wall to get a higher point of view. Although many people do this, I must advise against it, as this is dangerous, especially with so many people around pushing and shoving. It is impossible to find an angle on this street that nobody found before you, making your photographs unique, so there is no need to try too hard. From Hyde Street you get an excellent view towards Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower. Use a normal lens to bring Coit Tower closer and a wide-angle lens to emphasize the steepness of the street.

From atop Coit Tower you can get an interesting angle on Lombard Street. You need a telephoto lens of at least 400mm and image stabilization to photograph from there. I do not recall if you can bring a tripod, but the top is cramped and you will photograph through windows.

Using a polarizing filter will greatly enhance the colors of the flowers, but do not overdo it. Deep saturated skies often limit how far you can enhance saturation in post processing before the pictures look “funny”. You can use a filter to photograph from Coit Tower, but you will lose up to two stops of brightness. If you can still hold your telephoto setup with a filter and with reasonably low ISO settings, you are good to use them, otherwise do not.

It is hardly possible to take pictures without cars on the street. Instead, incorporate cars. Let the big SUV pass when you photograph from Hyde Street and wait for a convertible. When you photograph from Leavenworth, wait until the cars line up in a nice pattern with alternating directions.

Best Time of the Day and Best Season

Mornings are best to photograph Lombard Street from Coit Tower or from the bottom (see left) as you will be facing west. You probably already guessed that you should come back during the afternoon hours to photograph in the opposite direction (picture top).

Come around midday if your time is limited to one visit only.

Residents tend to the flowerbeds year round, but winter has much less tourist traffic and is thus the better season to visit.

Time required

You need less than one hour to photograph Lombard Street from all possible angles. Since this is such a popular and well-documented location, you will spend most of that hour waiting for people to move into position or out of your frame.

Equipment

• Wide-angle Lens
• Normal Zoom
• 400mm Telephoto Lens (to photograph from Coit Tower)
• Polarizing Filter

Difficulty Getting There

In summer, the traffic jams heavily on Lombard Street between Van Ness and Hyde. Tourists are standing in line to drive down Lombard Street. This is no fun if you drive a car with manual transmission, as you will be standing on one of the steepest hills facing up. I once had the pleasure with a Ford Explorer with manual transmission and foot brake only. My friends appreciated my efforts but I wished I had not been the driver that day. Park further away and walk here to enjoy the views.

Difficulty Photographing

It is not easy to find a good angle and it is impossible to find one without people.

Close Locations

• Cable Cars
• Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower
• Fisherman’s Wharf
• Chinatown
• Nob Hill
• Union Square
• Pier 39
• Pier 7
• Maritime Museum
• Alcatraz

Useful Resources

• Lombard Street on About.com
• San Francisco Travel Tips

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