Artist Paul Madonna just created a new book called Spirits of San Francisco: Voyages through the Unknown City, written with Gary Kamiya. The book features vignettes of the history and topography of 16 different locations in the city. 

Madonna's drawings of San Francisco range from a well-known views spanning over the Embarcadero, to more obscure corners of the city like Calhoun Tower in North Beach on Montgomery and Union. As he draws en plein air—from real life rather than photographs—Madonna had to find just the right time of day to depict his subject. Sometimes, he and Kamiya even found themselves in places they weren't really supposed to be for the good of their project.

Go to MuniDiaries.com to see photos from Spirits of San Francisco. Got a story idea for us? Our inbox is always open: muni.diaries.sf@gmail.com. 

We invite San Francisco Examiner transit reporter Carly Graf to talk about this year's ballot measures that can change the landscape of public transportation as we know it today. Though the pandemic has severely reduced ridership and budget, public transit was already in trouble with the proliferation of Lyft and Uber. We chat about Prop 22, Prop B, why you should get to know the BART board of directors, and more.

What do you think of their take on the transit-related props on the ballot? We want to hear from you: email us at muni.diaries.sf@gmail.com. And if you haven’t done your early voting, now is the time!