Coffee in the Park

Friday the 13th! Snuggle up to some good Crystal Lake films. The weather looks pretty grim for tomorrow, so I’m officially going to call off Coffee in the Park. But, I’m going to hold coffee at my house tomorrow – let’s shoot for 1pm as I have a great deal of things to do in the morning. I live at 1343 Mcallister Street between Steiner and Pierce. This will loosely be a part of My Hallway series and serve as a good introduction to the project. So bring your ideas and questions.

I’ve spent the better half of this week researching the legal issues regarding running 1300′ of cord from my house to the park, alternative power sources, various other laws, permits, alternative coffee makers; and I’ve talked to the gamut of professions, including but not limited to lawyers, activists, police, gardeners, sustainable living specialists, boating and travel catalog sales reps, and artists.

Here’s the skinny. First off, I talked to the San Francisco permits office to try and get a permit for the 1300′ of extension cord. They gave me the “No”. I then tried the San Francisco Arts Commission Public Artist Program, and they were not able to grant me permission. I then talked to an activist lawyer, Rick Young, whom I met through CIP indirectly. He had some very good points. There a re a couple of main concerns with the cord. 1) If someone were to trip on the cord, I could be REALLY, REALLY SUED, and 2) It is against the law to put things in the street, i.e. the 100′ extension cord that crosses the intersection of Steiner and Fulton. Even though the cord has never moved an inch from the cars that run over it, it “could get stuck in someone’s wheel and cause an accident”. So, what about running up over the street? Then you run into legal issues because of the power lines and trucks crossing, etc. All in all the cord crossing the street is an issue. He said I could just fuck the law and run the cords anyhow. The cops, since they have already reprimanded me could either give me a ticket or arrest me. In which case, I could post bail, no more than $ 2000 and then go in front of the district attorney to pitch my case. The case would be basically laughed out of court due to its nature and the fact that there is some really horrible things that move through the courts that need more attention. As I understand it, I would get my bail back minus court fees. Should I run the cord and get arrested? I never thought this project would come to that question. Rick’s last words were sarcastically put ” proceed with my own risk” and “stay out of trouble”.

Okay, maybe I should talk to the gardener of Alamo Square Park, David (who claimed to be “The King of the Park”) and compromise the 1300′ feet to about 350′ of cord, and run it from the garden house on the hill top. He wasn’t gonna have any of it.

I then decided I should go on a jog to blow off some steam and sweat out the 4 cups I drink a day. I wasn’t two blocks from my house, when I heard my name. I looked around, and sure enough, it was the two police officers that put an end to my 1300′ of fun. They reiterated that the cord was out of the question, and they furthered my dilemma by stating that in order to hand out free coffee in the park I need to obtain a “distributors permit” from the parks and rec department- what the hell is that? So next time you hand someone a $1 in a park or hand your friend a burger that you cooked in the park, remember that you need a permit to do so!!!!! So now I am in need of a distributors permit and a power source!

Right! So I return home and do some research on different types of coffee makers that don’t suck so much juice, so that I can run it off of my 80 amp marine battery, which I have placed so much blind faith in. I looked into coffee makers that you can plug directly into a cigarette lighter, which would work with a $5 unit that I could hook up to my 12V marine battery which I purchased from West Marine. You can buy the 5 buck unit from radio shack – it has two clamps, one negative and one positive, that lead up to cigarette lighter where you would plug the coffee maker into. The problem is that it takes nearly 45 minutes to brew ten cups and it draws 16.5 Amps per hour – this means that on my 80 amp deep-cycle marine battery, I would have 41.25 minutes of brew time, not even enough to get 10 cups off.

So why not just hook up the marine battery to the Mr. Coffee that I have been using? Mr. Coffee draws 900watts/hr, which is one of the most demanding appliances around. As a rule, you can only drain deep cycle batteries by 30% of its capacity. So the 80 amp 12V marine battery that I have can only put out 24 amps before it needs to visit recharchville. That’s not a lot of amps. You throw all this info into a formula, Amps * volts = watts. 24amps * 12v = 288 watts available. The coffee maker drinks 900watts of power an hour and I have only 288 watts available, so that means I can run Mr. Coffee for 288/900 = .32*60min = 19.2 minutes. That may give me 6 cups of coffee.

I called in the specialists. I talked to Vern at this little company in upstate New York called “Creative Energy Technologies” specializing in sustainable living. We talked at great length about renewable and portable power sources. Generators are out of the question – too big, too expensive, and way too loud. Solar power is out – expensive for one and the panels only operate at 21% efficiency, meaning that they only convert 21% of the sunlight that hits the panel. This in turn means you need several large panels to draw enough power out of our shining star to power a 900watt coffee maker for several hours – approximately 9’x3′ worth of panels.

More batteries???? My 80 amp marine battery weighs 49 lbs, so 19.2 minutes = 49lbs, for 4 hours I’d have to lug 12.5 batteries to the park weighing in at 612.5 lbs!!!!!!!! Plus I’d have to lug a 20lb 1000watt hardwired power inverter that costs $ 140. So 13 batteries and an inverter = $ 1180. That’s not so cost efficient to serve free coffee in the park, nor does it make sense to carry around 612.5 lbs of batteries.

I went on an errand with Mary Burnham today and she suggested Cold Brew Coffee. I could do that and lug a few gallons up and heat it on the spot.

In any case, it’s back to the drawing board. Maybe the propane stove and extra table is the way to go, or maybe I should get arrested!