As we mentioned the other day, some dueling protests are going to converge on Oakland this May Day, tomorrow, possibly reviving some Occupy-level chaos in the city's streets. As ABC 7 reports in the segment above, the Port of Oakland has already scheduled an eight-hour closure beginning Friday morning and they've put the word out to truckers and customers that they'll be on temporary lockdown, and some shipments may be delayed.
The last time protesters successfully shut down the Port was in 2011, at the height of Occupy, when thousands of marchers took over the Adeline Street bridge and disrupted shipping traffic in and out of the Port.
This time, a protest is being led by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) Local 10 and promoted on the extant Occupy website, in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter cause. As union organizer Stacey Rodgers tells ABC 7, the killing of Walter Scott in South Carolina especially hits home for the union, because Scott had family members who were longshore union members. "Our families are affected by the killings," Rodgers says. "Some of our family members in our own local are victims of police brutality and killings."
Meanwhile, businesses in downtown Oakland are bracing for possible vandalism, as has occurred multiple times during events like these in recent years including May Day 2012, when the streets were filled with Occupy enthusiasm. Bar Dogwood, near the Fox Theater, has already boarded up their windows, in preparation for an anti-capitalist "Shut It Down" rally and march scheduled for 7 p.m. Friday beginning in Latham Square, near Oakland City Hall.
And across town, there's another protest scheduled for 7:30 a.m. Friday at the MacArthur BART station where anti-gentrification activists plan to blockade tech shuttle buses that stop there, beneath the freeway on 40th Street.
Yesterday, unionized shuttle bus drivers put out a call pleading with protesters not to impede their commute saying, "Help push for affordable housing. But please don't stop our buses."
It remains unclear whether similar protests will be occurring in SF, but so far the only events scheduled on IndyBay are in the East Bay.
Unionized shuttle drivers to anti-gentrification protesters: stop blocking shuttles & focus on #AffordableHousing #SF pic.twitter.com/ICdCQJYkqM
— Scott Wiener (@Scott_Wiener) April 29, 2015