A day without power: bad traffic, big losses, some frustration

Traffic was a mess, and restaurants and other businesses lost a sunny day’s worth of revenue while many workers were sent home during Friday’s big San Francisco blackout.

The power failure affected almost 90,000 Pacific Gas and Electric Co. business and residential customers, leaving Union Square, the Financial District, the outskirts of Chinatown and several other neighborhoods without electricity just after 9 a.m.

The blackout turned a bright spring day a little dark for retail stores and other businesses and resulted in minor tragedies, including the two large pans of uncooked bacon that went to waste at one Kearny Street cafe.

By noon, ice cream was puddling in stores.

But Ed, who goes only by Ed, arguably had it worse than most.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - APRIL 21: A sign is posted on the door of a Chipotle restaurant during a citywide power outage on April 21, 2017 in San Francisco, California. Nearly 100,000 Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) customers in San Francisco are without power due to a fire at a PG&E substation. Street lights and public transportation that is powered by electricity are also out of service. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) less SAN FRANCISCO, CA - APRIL 21: A sign is posted on the door of a Chipotle restaurant during a citywide power outage on April 21, 2017 in San Francisco, California. Nearly 100,000 Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) ... more Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images Image 1 of / 47 Caption Close A day without power: bad traffic, big losses, some frustration 1 / 47 Back to Gallery

As he sat in a lights-out Laundromat at Larkin and Post streets around noon, he eyed a barber shop and a travel agency just across the street with power and cursed his luck and the load of wet, soapy laundry in the washing machine. He had put them in three hours earlier, minutes before the power went out.

“I just put them in and it finished the prewash and it was just starting the wash cycle,” he said. “I didn’t think I was going to spend the day in the Laundromat, but what else can I do?”

As irked Ed waited, Johnny Sadoon, owner of Sutter Fine Foods on Nob Hill, sat against a register eating vanilla ice cream from a Häagen-Dazs carton. He figured he had but a few hours before he should start to worry about the food going bad and the ice cream melting in the freezers.

He had kept the store open despite the blackout and a few customers perused the darkened aisles, but because the credit card machine doesn’t work without power, sales were few and far between.

“No one pays cash anymore,” he said, spoon in hand as a siren wailed outside. “I’m angry. I’m annoyed.”

Not everyone was annoyed about the lack of electricity, though. Justin Bates, 31, had been sent home from his downtown job at Premier Staffing and opted to set up a temporary workstation at “Coffee in the Sun,” where he had his headphones on and a glass of beer on his sun-drenched table.

“I’m working from home,” he said with a laugh.

On the streets around him, drivers were less amused. City officials said there were no traffic collisions caused by the blackout, at least as of midafternoon, although there were many near misses as pedestrians, bicycles and cars sometimes played chicken through intersections left without working traffic lights.

Steve Coleman, a 56-year-old driver from Belmont, knew better than to stay on the road.

When the traffic lights went out throughout San Francisco and traffic became a gridlock, Coleman said he decided it was time to park the car and walk over to the Tenderloin bar Aces.

“I won’t be getting back on the road,” he said as he swirled a glass of vodka and grapefruit juice near the back of the bar.

Nearby, at A.P. Giannini Plaza, the power failure was foiling a field trip. A team of scavenger-hunting students from Washington High School scoured a list of renowned locations across the Financial District and South of Market neighborhood as part of an economics class outing.

Could they get to the third floor of a hotel on Market and Montgomery streets or the 11th floor at a building in the South of Market to take the required group photos? They debated before choosing the third-floor stop, hoping to take stairs.

“We didn’t plan for this power outage,” student Vinson Mak said before heading down California Street.

Neither did Nabil Fara, a part owner and chef at Yemen Cafe and Restaurant. He’d arrived for work at 7 a.m. to prepare a big afternoon delivery order of lamb, rice, bread and more delicacies for 35 people.

As soon as he put the lamb into the oven, the power went out. He lost a couple thousand dollars on that order alone, he said.

On a normal Friday, the restaurant would bring in close to $10,000, Fara said, including lunch and dinner through online delivery services.

Many restaurants had handwritten “power outage” closed signs in the window, but Fara managed to keep his place open, limiting the menu to a few items and cash-only purchases.

Normally, Friday is the restaurant’s busiest day because its customers go to the mosque on Sutter and Polk for prayer and come in afterward for a meal. On Friday, only a few of his friends were slumped on bar stools, chatting.

“The restaurant is empty,” said Shadhi Fara, the restaurant manager.

By 4 p.m., the lights were back on in many of the commercial establishments.

For Nabil Fara, it was too late.

“A lot of stuff I’m going to throw away,” he said. “I cannot use it now.”

Sarah Ravani and Jill Tucker are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: sravani@sfchronicle.com, jtucker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @sarravani, @jilltucker