Videos like this on the internet are very, very rare.

It's amazing how something so mundane in '84 could be so enjoyable in 2021

This is how I remember 1984, lots of cars from the 70s still on the road.

This was filmed exactly the time I left SF for Denmark! In SF I drove cab operated by a Chinese family who managed 11 medallions. My cab was Pacific Cab 422. I played in a punk band and lived in North Beach, Columbus near Broadway, and in Mission Dolores. Great City.

I wish it was still the 80's

Whenever I pull out my camcoder (I mean a real thing, not those crappy and shaky cell phone videos) and record car rides or plazas with shots of people eating lunch or drinking coffee, someone comes up and ask why would I do that? I just say that I want to keep the feeling of this very moment and that very place. They do not understand. Watching this now 33 year old footage of something I just know from film sets and video games just shows me I am good with all the hours of footage of my hometown I was recording. One day, people will appreciate it.....

If only whoever was filming this knew how historical it would be just 5 years later (not to mention now) after the Loma Prieta earthquake it was demolished.

I'm not sure which is more striking... seeing the Embarcadero Freeway still there or seeing the giant billboards for cigarettes... definitely don't see those anymore.

I was born in October, before the earthquake. Living in SF now, this blows my mind that there used to be a freeway there. I wish I knew someone who took pictures of this so I could see it then and now in comparison. I love the history of San Francisco's development.

The cars, the music, the decor... All which made us, Europeans, dreaming about America :)

It's so rare to see images of a drive on the Embarcadero Freeway. I remember looking down on the pier facades from a school bus on the lower deck and flying over the city on the top. The waterfront area is way more pleasant now without the freeway, gentrification aside, but I wouldn't mind another chance to ride on this road.

A lot of fond memories of the skyline, the music, and the era!

4:36 White Lines by Grandmaster Flash & Melle Mel playing while they drive past Hospital Curve on Southbound 101. CLASSIC!

The video was shot in mid July, 1984, I am sure of the time period because the Democratic Convention was going on that week.

I was a 13-year-old girl who was very excited about the upcoming Summer Olympics in Los Angeles at the time. "The Dukes of Hazzard," had finished its 6th season. Wow! What a time!

I love watching these films from the past. It is a time gone that we can can never get back. Only in memories.

I can’t believe I’m never going to see America like this 😥

This is great, I remember all this stuff living as a kid in s.f. in the 80's. Crazy times for me as a youngster. Thank you Thank you. The embarcadero freeway and the Unocal 76 tower. This video is really clean also for how old it is. Plus the driver and the radio soundtrack is bad ass!

Used to love this drive when I lived in the City. I would take Lombard to Van Ness, then on to Broadway and the Embarcadero freeway to the Bay Bridge. Took this route many a time to go to A Day on the Green in Oakland. Was not yet 21, so my friends and I would go drinking and dancing at the Enlisted Club on Treasure Island. I have great memories of the Bay Area.

Thank you for the vintage video. The Embarcadero exit onto Broadway was the ticket to Mabuhay Gardens, On Broadway, the Stone, the Old Waldorf, and Wolfgang’s. Great rocking music and weak drinks: Flipper versus Wire Train.

I love this film. It was so easy to get in and out of the Chinatown area when the embarcadero freeway was there, now it takes so much longer and you sit in traffic, going from one traffic light to another. People walking between cars and bikes everywhere. Everybody likes the freeway gone now, but it had it good side too. I think everyone was safer with it there.

This video begins when "The Streets of San Francisco" guest star credits in the Broadway tunnel ends. The top part of the Embarcadero Freeway is where Dirty Harry drove with Hal Holbrook pointing a gun to his head in "Magnum Force". The lower level is when Alan Arkin and James Caan drove off and crashed into an apartment building in "Freebie and the Bean". My family drove on it to visit relatives in Oakland after picking up my grandparents from Chinatown in the 70s & 80s. Great memories!

That looks glorious, I wish that road still existed. How amazing to go sailing over the city like that.

I drove the Embarcadero Freeway just a couple of times before it was put out of commission by the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989. The freeway was an awful eyesore, but the view FROM it was fantastic, especially at night.

gosh i love these vids its the only type of time travel in my age 1970-2000 best years this world has ever seen

What a great video -- RIP the mighty Embarcadero. Love the 80s hits on the car radio!

I love watching this. 1984 was the best year of my life and the last year I spent in the Bay Area.

Wow...a color video camera, with zoom, back in 1984, you guys must have been rich.

This was the year I graduated high school! Love these videos frozen in time!

Look at all those American made cars!

I was 76 years old in 1984. good memories of that year

Every now and then I remember having gone through the Embarcadero Freeway when I see photos/videos of it. Gives me chills thinking back to 1989 and what happened. What I remember mostly was all the pictures on the wall swaying back and forth and couldn't figure out what was going on. That and I was watching Small Wonder.

I was born in San Francisco in 1984❤️

Wow. Borned and raised in San Francisco this brings back memories. I was 10 years old in 84. Thanks for this. Hope you can post more videos during this era.

I love this! I was only 3 years old in 1984 but it's amazing to see what's changed and what's not changed. I too miss those days. Life seemed so simple.

I'm from France and I visited San Francisco many times around the year this was filmed. It's so awesome to see SF back 30 years ago with all those great cars and quite a good easy flow of traffic. I agree with a few comments saying that was America at its best at that time, united and friendly. Times has changed, sadly

wish I'd been alive when that freeway was around-still believe the 80's kicked ass..

I've watched this video several times before -- such a thrill to see my old stomping grounds back in the day. High praise for keeping the radio on KALX (KUSF would have been fine, too). At that exact moment in time I made a daily commute in my 78 VW Rabbit from my flat in Upper Haight to my job in Embarcadero 2, 14th floor. I parked in the Embarcadero Garage for three or four bucks a day. On the weekends, I'd head back down to the North Beach clubs to catch the great little punk/new wave music scene in all the clubs down there.

Love the metal music at the beginning. Reminds me of being a teen in the mid 90s with my buddy when we would cruise down to LA.

I never this freeway existed until this year. I'm born and raised in San Jose and find the history of America's highways strangely fascinating. RIP CA SR 480

Oh yeah, I definitely remember the 76 sign. Memories...

This is literally a drive down memory lane ! As a native San Franciscan , this brings back so many memories . Thanks for sharing this !

WOW! Virtual time-travel! I like these sort of videos! 4:46 - "White Lines!" OMG! I remember that song! And, here, I'm listening to it as if it were brand-new in a car back in 1984. This is too cool! When you think about it, Movies, Video, Photographs & Audio are, in a way, virtual time travel. How else, would a person living in 2015 be able to see and hear stuff that no longer exists and people who are long dead (as if they're still alive and/or existing....like this freeway for example)?

Thanks for the memories! I was in the city today and was trying to explain to my friend and his mom about the old Embarcadero freeway and they couldn't picture it. What a difference it made though!

Those preview trailers of GTA 6 look sick (SF and the 80s! I can dream)

Who knew that when this was recorded it was going to be a treasure. 🥰

Thank you for posting this! It brought back so many memories of growing up in SF.

Wow, I love that shot with the SoMa skyline at 3:02! The Pac-Bell building looks so graceful standing there by itself, as if it was being pitted against all the concrete boxes on the other side of Market. I was born in 87, so I don't really have much of a memory of what the place looked like without all the shiny condominium towers that are there now. Thanks for sharing this video!

I think that the song everyone's looking for (from 3:10 on) is Dynamite Nitro by Juke Jumpers. I can't find the real version anywhere, but there are a few covers here on KZfaq.

Thanks for the great feedback everyone, glad you liked it!

I was only 3 years old then. Really awesome seeing what SF and the Embarcadero freeway looked like. That would've been a fun drive to do. Alot of people here wish there were more 80's footage... well 30 years from now, somebody will be watching your films made today. So film as much as possible!

A freeway I absolutely miss!

Wow, a great historical record! This gave me a strange feeling...like everything's changed, and yet nothing has changed. This looks like it was a beautiful drive to take! Good music too, on the radio. :-) LOL, I was born 1984, and I was only 5 when the Loma Prieta quake happened (didn't know about it years later---I live FAR away from San Fran). Thanks for posting this!

Thank you for bringing back memories. I used to drive these routes to and from San Francisco State University. Albeit in 1985.

Thank you so much for this. I've always had very fond snippets memories of my early childhood in the City (late 80's). This video brings back very good feelings. =)

Awesome trip down memory lane, thank you for sharing!

Wow does this bring back memories. I lived in the east bay in 1984 and worked at a place called Thomas Irvine Print Shop on Geary. Rode my 1982 Honda V-45 Sabre to work and back; over the Bay Bridge. Remember KMEL radio?

Thank you so much for the time travel. California was a very beautiful place before 2012.

Fascinating. I was only 7 when the earthquake hit, and quite frankly, never did get a chance to go onto the Embarcadero Freeway; always saw it on maps, though. Thanks for posting this.

Thank You for posting this.

I was born in the Bay Area in '82 but left about six months before this was shot. I have no memory of the Embarcadero Freeway but thanks anyway!

Hey, my old apartment at 1:30! I didn't live in that complex until 2011 but can't imagine having that gross freeway right...there. I was ten and living in the East Bay when the earthquake hit. It was scary. Went to school, fifth grade, the next day, and of course it was all anyone talked about. Parents' house had a swimming pool, oriented length-wise east to west, and the water splashed waaay out at each end of the pool. Our area was too far away and too new (60's-era ranch houses) to have any damage other than a few things falling off shelves and crooked pictures, but TV cable was out for at least an hour so we didn't know how bad it was elsewhere until later that evening. I don't remember us ever losing electricity, though, so that was a small blessing. Took a long time but it brought about a lot of changes in SF, too: Embarcadero Fwy torn down and revitalization of the waterfront; Central Fwy extension to Oak/Fell Streets torn down and revitalization of Hayes Valley; forced the construction of three new buildings for museums (de Young, California Academy of Sciences, and The Asian Art Museum); new Central Library when the Asian Art Museum took over the old Central Library building; forced seismic work on a ton of the old buildings...

😃😃😃😃THANK YOU VERY MUCH for posting this👍. GOOD OLD DAYS😘😘😘😘😘

Wow my goodness and hello seat850c, thank you so much for posting this video. I grew up in the Bay Area all my life and I was in San Francisco in 1984 working at my parents restaraunt located on 701 3rd St. near AT&T park which is now occupied by McDonalds. That area was an industrial slum that time now it's an urban professional area filled with yuppies. I live in the Tri-City area across the bay working as a computer sales consultant in the valley and also starting my own business.

1984: Reaganomics, and the Cold War fear of global annihilation hanging overhead. It wasn't all sweetness and light (but they had an artificial sweetener by that name). But I liked the video

The music really brings it together!

Only one thing missing from that time capsule video, KFRC on the car stereo

surprisingly amazing quality for the age of the film! awesome!

I just love the music this dude is playing!

wow...completly out of this world. Like truly truly going back in time...

Wow really good quality for 1984😎

serious flashbacks, great soundtrack.

I was 24. Great to get a glimpse of the Chi Chi Club. Very cool.

Beautiful footage

Nice post, always wanted to know about that Embarcadero Freeway To Nowhere. Saw a plaque for it right at the Ferry Terminal building talking about its deconstruction.

I used to have a Subaru exactly like that one. Best car ever. I liked how the spare tire was under the hood on top of the engine.

Wow at 0:48 Vanessi's on Broadway. It was just like Original Joe's but the cooks would sing loud Italian songs or even opera. Great memories of living & working in the city. I drove a beer truck and my delivery route was North Beach, Chinatown and parts of Fisherman's wharf!!!!

what a fucking awesome video!!!! I lived in SF 84 - 92. I drove on, under, around the Embarcadero freeway all the time. Thanks for this priceless video. You should have played more "White Lines"

Just saw a shot of the Embarcadero Skyway in a Dirty Harry film and thought "what the hell is that?" After a quick wikipedia and KZfaq search, here's my answer. Thanks for posting.

There was a distinct lack of billboards for data storage solutions, weed delivery apps, and routers back in the 1980s. And homeless people.

Long before You Tube, love it. awesome

Best place ever! The view coming from the bay bridge to sf has the same skyline until 2013 when everything became modern in downtown SF and they rebuild the bay bridge. Many things are still the same as in the 80s in SF

Classic! Great archive!

One word: BEAUTIFUL

I remember the Embarcadero freeway when I was a kid i was born in SF in 1979 at general hospital must have been nice to drive directly to north beach in those days.

Wow, this video was shot in 1984? I feel ancient. I love how the song "White Lines" is played on the radio.

This is very cool!!! Two years before I moved there.

I live in the brick building at 0:54. I believe it's been up since the early 1900s. The bottom floor where it says "La Bettola" (or whatever) is now Centerfolds.

Very cool vid, thanks for posting! This music is awesome

@JumpingCookie95 - It was some sort of two-piece VHS portable, with the tape in one piece that hangs from a shoulder strap, and the camera on it's own, plugged into the tape unit. I think it was RCA, but it's been almost 30 years... can't remember for sure.

I remember getting off a 3-11 at Letterman Hospital in the Presidio, my husband picking me up on his R65 for the flight to Berkeley, we were in the R lane of the Embarcadero section, when I made eye contact with a passenger in a car coming over into our lane, fortunately R sped ahead for the save, I really thought we were gonna fly away O glory!

When you can tell the difference between American cars and imports. Today they're all turtle shells on wheels.

I sure do miss the union 76 tower. One of my favorites as a child.

Very cool vid, thanks for posting!

Great video! What’s crazy is that there’s a lot of buildings in the area of where it once stood going off 80 toward the waterfront. That whole area is unstable period. The damage done in places to that freeway makes me think what if another quake of Loma Prieta magnitude or worse hits that area? I don’t think those buildings (especially the way they are cheaply quickly made nowadays) would even stand a chance.

That's a very interesting video, especially I never got to see the Embarcadero Freeway! Oh boy, I now know why that freeway was torn down after the Loma Prieta Quake -- it was a barrier to the already-fantastic views of the city! However, it provided a zippy ride from the Financial District to Oakland. Anyways, this is one stunning video, and I can now see what SF looked like in the 80s (I was born in 1988).

13 years ago I was 3 and in some way I miss 80s like i feel nostalgic

wow this reminds me of the elevated central artery on 93. it's now gone post big dig, but the gridlock still seems to remain.

nice video... this is when MTV played videos and when tab was a drink not a bill. lol

its so weird, this was shot 5 years before i was born.. cool video