Fitting for a neighborhood with a seedy past, North Beach will be the proud recipient of the Penthouse Club & Steakhouse, which we told you about in December. Well, now the location has been revealed. And the new Penthouse boob and burgers joint will feature more than just a buffet table and C-section scars. No, this place is going to be fancy-ish. Real nice like. As Grub Street points out, "There will be live performances, of course, but also 'intimate dining booths' and 'four-star dining' via executive chef Juan Martinez, as well as two full bars. The menu will be straight-up steakhouse fare, but made from the 'highest quality ingredients.' " more ›

Tony Gemignani, the pizza genius behind Tony's Pizza Napoletana in North Beach which was recently called "America's best pizzeria" by USA Today, is opening up a second North Beach joint, opening in early 2012. more ›

As part of their ongoing (and some might say misguided) efforts to fix the taxi situation in San Francisco, the Municipal Transportation Agency is fielding proposals for new cab stands spread around town. In North Beach, a small group of business owners see the cab stand plan as an opportunity to stimulate business along their porny/clubby Broadway corridor. more ›

Late updates from the SFPD's investigation in to last Sunday's North Beach shooting that put two innocent bystanders in the hospital: The department is now telling the Chronicle that officers approached Jesus Paredes Rodriguez thinking he matched a suspect description from an earlier crime bulletin, which sort of explains their eagerness to make the simple marijuana bust. They've also updated their story to include a third officer who was on the scene. more ›

Boy, do we love us some Mr. Bing's in North Beach. In fact, it's where we might or might not have gotten into a heated argument recently with the editor of Inside Scoop over the intellect, or lack thereof, of one Miss Britney Spears. (We lost that argument, clearly.) Anyway, the popular-yet-dusty bar hosted a segment today for Anthony Bourdain's new show tentatively titled The Layover. more ›

A 40-year-old woman walking home on Francisco Street near Taylor Street in North Beach ended up in SF General Hospital last night after she was hit in the back during a string of gunfire around 9:45 p.m. more ›

Featuring new fiction from Stuart Dybek, as well as Emily Ruskovich and May-Lan Tan making their literary debuts, the summer issue of Zoetrope features a cover designed by Beck. Yes, that Beck. You should help Francis Ford Coppola celebrate the release of one of the city's best (and most underrated!) literary magazines at Cafe Zoetrope in North Beach on Tuesday, July 19 from 6 to 8 pm. There’ll be cocktails flowing, passed plates of light bites, and presumably groovy music. more ›

Late last night around 12:40 a.m. a 2-alarm fire was reported on Powell Street between Vallejo and Green in North Beach. SFFD responders had the fire under control by 12:55 a.m. according to a Bay City News report, but 25 residents of 1545 Powell Street were displaced by the damage, including three elderly residents who were taken to St. Francis Hospital to be treated for non-life threatening injuries. This morning, police and fire officials determined the blaze to be suspicious, but additional details on what caused it to break out were not immediately available. The Red Cross has been assisting with temporary housing for the displaced. [BCN/Appeal] more ›

Police are trying to figure out why a man died in North Beach last night. After authorities were called to a Mason Street jewelry store, police found the body dead from a bullet. more ›

We almost forgot! Before cementing any plans for the evening, we strongly suggest you head over to Coppola headquarters in North Beach for a choice pop-up dance party to help celebrate the release of Zoetrope's winter '10/'11 edition (designed by Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore!) The issue, we should point out, brims over with works by Etgar Keret, Gerard Donovan, Ryu Murakami, Julian Barnes, and Robert Bloch. more ›

"On Broadway" by Travis Jensen. more ›

A two-alarm fire broke out in a North Beach apartment building early New Year's Day, displacing 48 residents, two-thirds of whom only speak Cantonese and many of them low-income. The fire was reported just before 1:30 a.m., after one of the residents found her bathroom on fire. The blaze spread quickly, and residents had to flee with few belongings. more ›

"To tell an Italian he cannot have opera, let alone amplified music to go with it, is like telling him he cannot eat pasta. It's a sacrilege."

Colosseo, one of those North Beach cucinas, hoped to differentiate themselves from the rest of the Columbus Avenue meatball slingers by serenading diners with some live Opera. According to the Chronicle, one of their waiters is a highly-trained Opera singer named Luca (just Luca!) and he would very much like to set the mood during your next dinner of veal scallopini. more ›

You may recall that brouhaha in Noe Valley over the possibility of a street closure to create a pedestrian plaza? Well, the Pavement to Parks Program sponsored by the City has closed up shop with one final set of approvals, and in Noe Valley they decided to back off from a full street closure in favor of two mini-parklets in parking spaces on either side of 24th Street between Vicksburg and Sanchez and between Noe and Sanchez. more ›

Unbeknown to them, a gaggle of tourists went through the city's Street of San Francisco live-action experience on Sunday. See, according to ABC 7, their double-decker bus collided with a vehicle in North Beach, which rattled the wide-eyed crew. more ›

Telegraph Hill resident Bruce Rossignol thought it would be a grand idea to liven things up on North Beach's ho-hum Broadway strip. Bruce Rossignol planned to open up a pot dispensary on near numerous strip joints and bars. Bruce Rossignol wanted to call it The Joynt Collective. Bruce Rossignol wanted The Joynt Collective to feature live jazz and good food. Bruce Rossignol had a phenomenal idea. But, Bruce Rossignol was wrong. See, the city turned down Rossignol's plan to convert the old North Beach Theatre (a former strip club across the street from Larry Flynt's House of Vagina) into a marijuana joint because pot clubs, unlike boobie and booze bars, cannot be located near elementary schools. more ›

A North Beach 'investment consultant' named Joseph "Giuseppe" Viola was indicted in federal court in S.F. yesterday on multiple counts of mail fraud, wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft after defrauding at least 60 people out of $7 million between 2004 and 2010. more ›

Bimbo's 365 is one of the Bay Area's finest music venues, period. Opened by Agostino Giuntoli, who moved it to its current Columbus spot in 1951, the name of the historically textured joint derives from his days as a janitor at The Palace Hotel. more ›

On Saturday and Sunday, that beatnik neighborhood on the other side of Market Street played host to the 54th annual North Beach Festival. Here are several shots that local photogs snapped up from the scene. more ›

Don't blame it on the sunshine. Don't blame it on the moonlight. Blame it on the Bogeyman. The North Beach Bogeymen, that is. New San Francisco resident C.W. Nevius yanks his hair out today over an allegedly vicious group of homeless drunkards in Washington Square. Cretins who croon "How dry I am [hic!]" while intimidating the delicate flowers sunbathing in the park, terror like that. more ›

Be sure to heard over to Fior d'Italia (2237 Mason) tomorrow for veal sauté for a nickel, linguine and meatballs for a dime, and eggplant parmesan for $.20. Why such sanity-free prices, you shout? Because San Francisco's oldest Italian restaurant will celebrate its 125th birthday. From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., the North Beach staple, which survived the Great Quake and dot-com era, will serve its original 1886 menu at original 1886 prices. Check out the menu here. Also, be sure to arrive early. Fior won't accept reservations and the place, presumably, will be packed. [via Broke-Ass Stuart] more ›

You guys have all heard about the Pavement to Parks initiative right? It's something the City's been doing for over a year, transforming sections of streets and intersections into car-free plazas and parks. They're taking inspiration, sort of, from New York City, where sections of Times Square and elsewhere have been cordoned off as "traffic-calming" pedestrian plazas. more ›

The Academy of Art University's famously prickly president, Elisa Stephens, spoke about the recent murder of Luis Armando Prieto, who was killed in North Beach last week be a car fleeing a shooting. more ›

An unidentified man was killed early this morning in North Beach by a fleeing car filled with shooting suspects. The man and his brother were using the crosswalk at Vallejo and Columbus when they were "struck and killed by a car at 2:20 this morning," reports SF Appeal. "The driver reportedly fled the North Beach scene, but was caught by the police and arrested." more ›

Comedy.com complied a list of the 20 worst bars in the U.S. Among them is "Bow Wow’s Cocktail Lounge." Tastefully described as "a Vietnamese whorehouse," the North Beach institute wins a spot on the unsavory list mainly because of the Yelp reviews it's garnered. more ›

After City Attorney Dennis Herrera asked the city to shutdown Heaven Mini Theatre for performing lapdances without the proper permits (not to mention allowing prostitution inside its doors, just like every other SF hoochie-coochie establishment), the club owner is crying foul. Peter Lambertson claims that his North Beach club is being targeted since they're not playing ball with supposed SFPD blackmailing tactics and city-sanctioned kickback requests. more ›