Inextricably
linked to the growth of the Pier 70 Shipyards, the new Potrero Police Station (1) was designed in 1912 by City
Architect, John Reid, Jr. in an effort to cope with the expanding population of
the Potrero District. Located at the southwest corner of Kentucky and 20th
Streets (2300 3rd Street) on what had been an ungraded 60’ outcropping of
serpentine rock, the site links Dogpatch to Pier 70’s historic core.The neighborhood needed its own police station to cope with the increasingly transient and often quarrelsome shipyard laborers, most of whom were single males. The two-story police station is a hybrid essay in the Mediterranean Revival Style, with its scalloped parapet, stucco walls, and Spanish tile roof.
Three years later Mr. Reid designed a similarly detailed public hospital
for the southern portion of the same lot (2310 3rd Street). The Potrero
Emergency Hospital (2), as it was called, was deemed necessary to cope with the
larger number of injured shipyard workers who had little recourse beyond the
company dispensary.
Both are contributing buildings to the Dogpatch Historic District.
