The Ferry Building opened in 1898 at the foot of Market Street, with a 245-foot clock tower modeled on the Giralda bell tower in Seville. Before the bridges, it was one of the busiest transit terminals in the world, with tens of thousands of commuters arriving by ferry every day.
The bridges and the automobile made it nearly obsolete, and for decades the Embarcadero Freeway ran directly in front of it, hiding it from the city. After the freeway came down in the 1990s, the building was restored and reopened in 2003 as a marketplace of local food vendors. A farmers market runs in front of it several days a week. The clock tower survived 1906 and still keeps time.
