A bicycle shop on San Francisco’s Market Street will likely close after a driver doing donuts crashed into the storefront early Monday morning, its owner told The Standard.
Market Street Cycles owner John McDonell said police notified him of the crash around 3:30 a.m. McDonell has run the business at the intersection of Market and Page streets for 13 years.
“It’s fucking nuts,” McDonell told The Standard. “It is probably going to do it for me as far as this business is concerned.”
McDonnell said an employee had viewed security camera footage showing the driver performing donuts before crashing into the shop. The Standard has not been able to obtain the footage. According to the employee, the driver attempted to flee but was assaulted and robbed by individuals on the street. Police did not confirm the assault or robbery.
In a video posted to Reddit, the car’s rear lights blink as onlookers gather outside the storefront’s mangled security gates.
Officers responded to Market and Franklin streets shortly after 3 a.m. in response to a report of a vehicle crash with a building and arrived to find damage at a business, a San Francisco Police Department spokesperson said. Paramedics also responded, treating the driver for minor injuries. Impairment due to drugs or alcohol did not appear to be factors, police said.
SFPD’s plan to tackle reckless driving and sideshows has been widely criticized as a failing effort. Although the department created a special response unit to address roving stunt-driving exhibitions, it has been hampered by limited staffing, with many of the incidents happening on weekends. The focus on disruption and dispersion contrasts with other Bay Area police departments, which cite participants and tow vehicles en masse.
The Market Street incident highlights ongoing challenges faced by businesses in the area, including declining foot traffic due to reduced downtown commuting and persistent problems with drugs and homelessness. McDonell said his store’s operations were under strain even before the crash.
“The city talked a lot about the Mid-Market revitalization. My shop is where it is for the downtown commute. We’re at the confluence of three bike lanes: Valencia, Market and Page streets,” he said. “But there’s no downtown, there’s no commute anymore. There’s less than one-third of the traffic there used to be going past the shop every day.”
The shop posted images of the crash damage on social media Monday morning, and construction crews were en route to secure the damaged storefront.
“The tweakers are probably going to do a backflip to get in there, but I don’t think they can yet,” McDonell told The Standard over the phone.
McDonell said the neighborhood’s condition means staff must be prepared to defend themselves against theft attempts. He recounted personally tackling someone who attempted to steal a bicycle two weeks ago, adding that he didn’t bother to call police.
“I have to wear shoes that I can fight in to go to work because of the neighborhood,” McDonell said. “I’m 57 years old, and I’m too old for this shit. You couldn’t even work at my shop if you couldn’t defend yourself, because you would just get robbed.”
Correction: This story’s headline has been changed to clarify that the crash was caused by an act of stunt-driving, not by a sideshow, defined by the SFPD as a street takeover involving multiple vehicles.