The Sidewalk of Morality

I am extremely fortunate because I've been able to live in San Francisco, California for the past year. The City by the Bay is a truly amazing place. It is by far the most unique city I have ever been to. Just a few blocks from where I live, I can hop a ferry to Alcatraz Island or walk to the end of Pier 39 to watch the sea lions play. I can drive down the "crookedest street" in the United States or ride the world's last manually operated cable car. I can bike across the Golden Gate Bridge or through an urban park consisting of over 1,000 acres of beautiful landscaping. I've seen the wild parrots of Telegraph Hill on my walk to work, as well as group of goats hired for weed control. The list goes on and on. I've explored the city as much as possible in the last year and there are still things I haven't seen here. 

All of these things have been documented countless times, I'm sure. However; one of my favorite things in San Francisco, you can only read about here. I call it the Sidewalk of Morality. It lies on Sansome Street between Green and Filbert, right across from the Levi Plaza. On the west side of the street there is a walking path sandwiched between a fence and a series of parking blocks. This path is just wide enough to fit two people comfortably, and this is precisely why it makes the perfect test of morality. 

View Larger Map

Since it is on my route to work, I have taken this path many times. I've taken it so many times that I have noticed a large variety in the way that people handle walking past others. My love for philosophy has caused me to find a lot of ways to find out the character of a person, but this is definitely the simplest version I have found so far. The path is long, so one would have plenty of time to judge how much room they and another person would need to pass each other. 

The really good hearted people get as far over to one side as they can, leaving plenty of room to walk by casually. A larger group of people stay to one side, making sure you have enough room to pass but also making sure they have at least half of the path for themselves. Sadly, the largest number of people move slightly to one side, leaving just enough room for you to walk by with a lean. Some people will even go so far as to purposely take up the entire path, forcing you to jump over the parking blocks just before you pass them when they clearly have plenty of room to move over. Yes, these people exist and aggravate me more than I can say. Of course, judgement gets a bit more complicated when there are groups of people, but you get the idea. I enjoy trying to guess who will move over and to what degree. Which group would you be in?