The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 104

San Francisco at Your Feet Stanton Dclaplane's ostcord A Frank Talk With a Machine f(MmlllMIMfRtUtilttM Euroilpass Days tnifHEN TllE girl the Paris reservation- desk heard my Alliance FraneaU-o French. she shut the wicket. I'm up tlONsHl' sign and sat there sullenly until 1 went away," Some people awear by Eurailpaw. Some swear at it. One month of unlimited train travel iq 13 countries of Europe.

Fu-iKU. rJ'X Hop off la charming vil- Uses. Charm the charming villager. London THE PATIENT sat alone In his doctor's office answering questions during a lengthy case history Interview, "Is your father still live?" was asked, "No," he replied. "I'm nry to hear that," the Interviewer sympathized.

The patient, facing video screen computer display unit and three buttons marked "Yet," "No" and apparently did not stop to consider Just how distressed a computer could feel over his fath-er't death. He waited for the next question to com up on the screen. The patient was taking part in a London experiment to see whether computers could be used to relieve Brltian'i hardprrssed National Health Service doctors of the time-consuming chore of taking case histories. Hop back on again. We sent a savvy, no frills travel reporter 0I this with her husband.

It was an education. UT5EST THING XJabout Eurailpui it you only have to itand la one line: Reservations. Otherwise you line up to buy tickets. Then line up to rt'MTve seat. Ih Wm ilhrtt Pork Presidio boulevard actually is a part of Golden Gatt Park -JUU(ULJL- i uTTTt.

I -1 rCT i i i "If you don't reserve, people already on ill do anything of murder to keep compartments to themselves. They lie acrow three seats and pretend to be asleep or maybe dead. They wag their fingers angrily If you try to open the door. They pile luggage on the seat and tell you the occupant has gone to the bathroom." Where have all the porters gone? Used to be plenty of porters. Now "We saw only ONE porter in a month of travel Figure to carry your bags." If you do get i porter, he will put your bags in your compartment.

But he will NOT come on to take thc-m off. You have to lower the window and throw them out. Hard on luggage if there's no porter to catch them.) are planted In groups. One goes from a grove of contorted IcptosjH'ruium. or "lea trees." reeling and writhing and falling in coils, to stalwart soldierlike pines, to graceful "manna gums." tossing their long limtw like maidens drying their tresses In the wind.

Many are varieties first tested for San Francisco weather In the ider, but shorter Baker to Stanyan street Panhandle. Plantings were designed to thrive within the variations of Presidio parkway microclimate, which differs from one side of the street to the other. clTmInt fl HI ST Hi By tnrjful 1'ntrrmm Ikmm NEXT TIME you want to win a bet, ask someone which part of Golden Gate Park is greater from north to south than from east to west. If your friend says there is no such place, tell him about Section 13, a handsomely planted 23 acre area, originally designated as the Presidio and Park Panhandle. Today, so it will not be confused with the Park Panhandle between Fell and Oak Streets, it is belter known as Park Presidio boulevard.

Nevertheless, it is part of Golden Gate Park, and as the 1910 city map Issued by E.C.D. Price and Company shows, cor- roborating an early Park Commissioner's report, it includes "several blocks of land, each block 600 feet long and 240 feet wide, or nearly one mile extending from the northern boundary line of Golden Gate Park to the south line of the military reservation at a point not far from the old U.S. Marine hospital." When the land was purchased in 1903 at the now unbelievably low price of park commissioners predicted cheerfully, "The new boulevard running through the main body of the Richmond District from Golden Gate Park to the Presidio will open up a new field of park life." It also opened up a desirable place to live on either side of the lush green strip, a bridle path for horsemen cantering from park to Presidio, a traffic-chute and more recently an outdoor museum and test plot of street trees. THE RESULTS were surprising. Many patients appeared more willing to be frank with the computer than 1th a doctor.

They revealed intimate details of their sex lives. Alcoholics among them were more willing to talk about how much they drank, according to a report in the Journal General Practitioner. "Do you hate your husband?" the computer would ask. and then after such a personal query often add. "I hope these questions are not putting you off." Such conversational gambits led many patients to report that they felt as though they were talking to the doctor himself, while one patient even thought the doctor was running the machine from the next door.

The equipment, linked expensively into a time-sharing system with a master computer, was programmed to follow patients' leads, getting deeper into areas suggested by patients answers. Questions followed previous answers logically, giving the system a great advantage over written questionnaires. In fact, the NHS bad sent a psychologist to sit In on one doctor's consultations for three months, learning about his Interviewing style. The computer was then programmed to mimic this style. The interviews, which averaged 90 minutes, were also an educational experience for the patients, forcing them to pin-point what they wanted to talk to the doctor about and giving them some terms with which to dicuss it, General Practloner said.

CASRIU0 ST ON THE good side: "The trains are GREAT If they're the famous TEE Jobs. (Trans Europ Express. The Mistral between Paris and the French Riviera. The Scttebello from Roma to Milan. The Edelweiss from Amsterdam to Italy.

The Rosenkavalier Express between Munich and Vienna, "When you're not on a TEE, brace yourself." tT17E WERE drinking caffe espresso topped with almond whipped cream at the hotel in Rapallo when the waiter told us all Italian trains were being struck at midnight. Decided we'd better head for France. "Rushed to the station. Hauled baggage down the platform looking for first -class. Finally got on second-class, planning to work our way to first.

"Even in winter, second-class is jammed throughout the aisles. Burping babies. Bundled belongings. Knots of soccer fans. Conductor said we were on right train but rong car.

This one splitting for Milan." (European trains constantly take off cars to Join other trains. 1 lost my glasses getting off a train in Germany. The entire railroad system couldn't trace here that car wenU fULTONlt PARK GOLDEN AS YOU walk north, landmarks are Sutro school, the classic columns of a Christian Science church, the striking colors of Congregation Beth Sholom (west side of Clement and I4thl. Congregation Anshey Sfard. which means Men of Spain, is also nearby.

So are White Russian. French. Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Slo-vakian and German colonies. If It is an average day, at corners, especially on the major shopping streets, California, Geary and Clement, walkers ill have to detour to stoplights to cross. As you do.

chin out nearby street tree labels. Especially interesting near Cabrillo are two big Italian stone pines, some Brazilian pepper trees and the bronze-leafed dodenla. There are shlsh kebab eucalyptus near Balboa. Near Anza, the big naked gum trees are eumtypiu viminali. Monterey cypress near Geary are native Californians, as are the California pepper trees near Clement.

A bridle path linked the park and Presidio Better than any nursery could, because they are living unprotected, the trees show homeowners and other prospective tree planters how different varieties of trees hold up in our climate. Real estate men now estimate that each street tree planted in front of a house adds as much as $2000 to Its resale value. OUR REPORTER finally made the ngnt car by jumping off at stations, running forward a few cars and leaping on again. "We did this three times. Scary because doors close electrically.

And the train stops only a few minutes. "If you want to wrinkle-proof vour travel, lake only TEE trains. And you MUST have reservations: 24 hours in advance is safest. Then you must find a town large enough to merit a computerized reservation machine. And one that isn't broken." We've decided the best way is to make ALL reservations before you go.

And the best way is by reading "Eurail-Guide How To Travel Europe By Paperback sells for $5.95 in bookstores. Gives a complete how-to-do-lt. Get educated before you go. On-the-job training is for heroes. WALK 20 feet farther west Into the older, gnarled trees, and look north to see a growth of lawn struggling to obscure the red rock bridle path which meanders gracefully through the east side of the park.

Originally much used by horsemen, it now makes a fine promenade for walkers. Follow it north toward Mountain lake, the Richmond district's choice historic spot. A horseman friend told me he used to pretend to be Juan Bautista de Anza. riding toward the night's encampment on the shores of Mountain lake, when he came along this way. Horsemen could ride this bridle path again, he says, if only stoplights were coordinated at cross streets, to give them better access to the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

As you walk it becomes apparent that the shade trees TO EXPLORE Section 13 on foot, get off a No. 5 McAllister bus at Fulton street and Funston avenue. As you set out along Funston, notice how well the town houses are protected from traffic noise and exhaust fumes by the fine old shade trees growing on the raised berm of earth of the strip. Walk toward the green sign that indicates the direction of Golden Gate Bridge. Behind it, another sign announces the demonstration street tree exhibit, a Joint project of San Francisco Beautiful, the city street tree department, the park department, Bank of America Foundation and Sears Roebuck Foundation, as well as many neighborhood organizations.

The demonstration plantings are the younger trees growing between the sidewalk and the street. Barring vandalism, all are labeled. WHEN YOU reach Lake street, after a rest stop at Mountain Lake park, cross Park Presidio boulevard, then bear south on 14th, here additional street trees have been planted on the west side of Park Presidio boulevard's berm. When the boulevard was first laid out it had only two lanes and much more lawn bordering the interior street, since sacrificed to additional traffic lanes. Ironically, the banished grass, like trees, is one of nature's own green machines.

They consume the gassy hydrocarbons belched out by cars. If It Is a smoggy one can "come in out of the smog" under big old trees, as one "might "come in out of the rain" on wet ones. The air is always cleaner close to trees. THE DOCTORS found to their surprise that there was a high correlation between the number of times a patient used the query button meant to Indicate he didn't know the answer or didn't understand the question, and that patient's need for psychological counseling. If the query button was punched 11 times, it usually meant the patient either was seeing, or needed to see, a psychiatrist, they said.

Patients were carefully Introduced to the computer by the doctor who was to see them later, and only one patient stormed out of his electronic Interview. Earlier tests In history-taking in hospital wards had indicated an acceptance rate of 82 per cent by patients. The researchers said the computer is not a substitute for the doctor, but is a tool, "like a blood-pressure machine, to extend a doctor's usefulness." fouler! MY OWN experience: IF you get a porter, there's a minimum tip. French porters sneer at whatever you give them. Correct you ferociously if it is not up to standard.

Swiss porters give you exact change if you tip more than the right amount. Italian porters weep no matter what you give them. Swear that you are starving their children. TEW RAILROAD people speak anything except their own language. If they can't understand you, they wave you away or shut the window.

So it goes. But the price is right. The Comings and Goings of Ice Sheets The Lockhorns inland Ice is slipping seaward, it could significantly raise world sea levels at some time in the future. South Pole in 1911-1912 and when Dr. Laurence Gould did so in 1928-1929 now seem heavily crevassed and once-crevassed areas are smooth.

This may mean that parts of the shelf are aground that previously were afloat and vice versa. Dr. Terence J. Hughes of the University of Maine believes that if the ice becomes buoyant much farther inland than at present, the entire Marie Byrd Land ice sheet will disintegrate, raising the seas some 20 feet. Sew YiM-k Timt New York EVIDENCE IS accumulating that the ice sheets covering Antarctica, far from being permanent features, wax and wane in ways that at times must cause large changes in global sea level.

Dr. Robert H. Thomas of the University of Maine, who is now making measurements on the Ross Ice Shelf there, reports that where the main stream of ice flows into that shelf from Marie Byrd Land the ice is thickening at a rate of three feet a year. In the heart of Marie Byrd Land, it seems to be thinning at a rate of 16 inches a year. If, in fact, these are indications that the TO ASSESS movements and changes in strain within the ice shelf, which is as large as Spain, air-lifted crews are establishing 85 new survey points in a grid covering the entire shelf.

Dr. Richard Cameron, head of glaciological programs within the National Science Foundation, which funds the program, said conditions within the shelf seem to be changing with remarkable speed. Areas that were smooth when Roald Amundsen crossed It on the way to the Been waiting long? Poge6 S.F. Sunday Examiner Chronicle, Sunday Punch, January 30, 1977.