A story about vision, perseverance and triumph that everyone should know
The heavy lifting has been done. Now it is time to share the story with the world.
TUNNEL MAGIC (working title) is a documentary film that will tell the story of an urban miracle, the creation of San Francisco’s Presidio Parkway and tunnel top parks, one of the most remarkable urban transformations in 21 st century America.
We have recorded over 30 hours of interviews beginning in 2016 with the creators of this miracle, including landscape architect Michael Painter (1935 - 2018) who provided the vision for this amazing endeavor.
We have written a book to celebrate the opening of the tunnel top parks.
We also created two short films to provide glimpses of this project, A Parkway for the People and Presidio Parkway Musings, all of which are featured in the Presidio Visitor Center.
We’re now asking for your financial support to complete this film!
A Freeway People Love…
The Presidio Parkway now looks so natural and elegant. However early on it was viewed as a radical unrealistic approach that would waste public funds and not meet critical safety standards.
It took more than two decades to develop, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars, extreme good will, passionate leaders, talented collaborators, hundreds of exceptions to the standard freeway codes, and a bit of luck and serendipity. This is a story as winding as a country lane. It is a 26 year epic that teetered toward failure on too many turns, required a sequence of miracles, and tested the meddle of many.
It’s evidence that good ideas and imagination can win the day, against all expectations — that a coherent design can unite disparate views, and that a wide range of individuals with different talents can effectively collaborate to accomplish complex endeavors when there is a persistent guiding vision.
A Park for Everyone
The crowning glory of the Parkway Project are the tunnel top parks. When these beautiful places opened in 2022 hundreds of thousands of people from across the city and the world immediately embraced these parks as their own.
Developed primarily with private funds, with intense involvement by local communities, these parks offer inspiration and activities for everyone, as is appropriate for a national park in an urban area. These congenial areas provide a playground for young children, a field station focussed on the natural environment, picnic benches for large family gatherings, a campfire, and more, all for free. They are places where diverse populations can mingle in the context of their everyday lives near where they live.
COMPLETING THE FILM IN 2024!
$300K Fundraising Goal
The development of this film began in 2016, beginning with interviews with Michael Painter (1931-2018). Before the pandemic stopped development in 2020, more than 24 hours of on-camera interviews were completed, predominantly pro-bono.
Then, in 2022 in anticipation of the openings of Battery Bluff and the Tunnel Tops parks, priorities shifted to the creation of a book to tell visitors the remarkable stories behind the design of these dazzling new urban spaces. Almost $100K was raised to publish the book, A Parkway for the People, now featured in the Presidio Visitor Center and sold through the Conservancy’s on-line store. In addition, two 7- minute short films were produced for use in public presentations as well as in the Presidio Visitor Center and at two different SPUR Forums. These projects were supported by SPUR and SFCTA as well as generous individual contributors.
The filmmakers are seeking $300,000 to complete the film.* The funds are needed for additional shooting - including additional interviews and drone footage - , “before and after” animation sequences, editing and post-production, and expenses associated with placement and promotion at film festivals as well as development of other avenues of distribution.
*Clarity Films, a 501©3 is the fiscal sponsor for the film (clarityfilms.org). All contributions over $500 are tax deductible and will be acknowledged in the completed film. With full funding, the film will be completed in 2024.
Early film clips
These two 2022 film clips were created to celebrate the opening of the Tunnel Tops and Battery Bluff parks. These clips are being shown in the Presidio Visitor Center. Now that the parks are completed we have gathered additional interviews and images of these parks to expand this story in our final film, to show the amazingly popular results of this amazing decades long project.
About the filmmakers
Kristina Hooper Woolsey (Executive Producer/Co-Producer) served as the Project Director for the relocation of the Exploratorium from the Palace of Fine Arts to Pier 15 on the Embarcadero. She was also a Distinguished Scientist at Apple, in recognition of her pioneering work in human interface and multimedia design, and was a Visiting Faculty Member at MIT in the Architecture Department. She holds a Ph.D. in cognitive science, with an emphasis on visual spatial representation of places.
kristina.woolsey@gmail.com 415 497 3856
Wendy Slick (Director/Co-Producer) is an established Bay Area film producer, director, writer, and editor. She has produced a wide range of films over the last decades, establishing herself as a talented and sensitive filmmaker who is effective in multiple roles and a variety of contexts. “Passion and Power — a women’s rights film” — garnered a successful run following a Lincoln Center premiere. Her work for American Playhouse, PBS, Lucasfilm, Disney, Showtime, and Apple has been honored with Emmy and ACE nominations. She recently produced and directed “A Love Poem to My Friend Ethel” — a portrait of a longtime activist in her 80’s that premiered at the 2016 Mill Valley Film Festival.
wendy.slick@gmail.com 415 383 6023
David Lawrence (Media Consultant/Designer) is a designer, producer, researcher and media artist with over 30-years of expertise in all aspects of digital media. His early work at Lucasfilm Ltd. includes pioneering research, design and production of innovative multimedia projects that launched the interactive digital world we take for granted today. He is an associate and co-founder of Public Matters, a multidisciplinary nonprofit with expertise in public art, education, new media, community building and youth leadership development, and a foundation board member of the Wisdom VR Project.
dhl@well.com 415 341 6283
Charlie Pearson is a published author and veteran script writer for non- fiction film and television. His work has been seen on PBS, BBC, HBO, Showtime, and Discovery. His credits include “Keeping Score”, “The Promise of Play”, “The Digital Divide”, “Africa’s Children”, and all of Don Briggs’ award winning Grand Canyon films. He has also taught script writing at San Francisco State University.
cpscribe@gmail.com 415 259 8191
Become a Sponsor.
Donations of $500 or more are tax deductible through our fiscal sponsor Clarity Films https://clarityfilms.org/donations.html
Your donation is critical in making sure that this inspirational story is told. Early Sponsors will be listed directly on the film.
If you have any questions or want to connect directly with us to discuss this opportunity, please complete this form, and we will get back to you.