Scottie follows Madeleine downtown to the rear entrance of a well-known flower shop, Podesta Baldocchi's. The rear entrance, in an alley, was a figment of Hitchcock's imagination since Podesta Baldocchi did not have one. This is an interesting scene in that two different alleys were used and cleverly edited to appear as one. Here's how it was done ...
Madeleine turns from Grant into a tiny alley alongside the building housing the flowershop. Note the green Podesta Baldocchi vehicles on each side of the road.
... and Now, the alley is Ashburton, a short cul-de-sac across from Campton Place between Sutter and Post (location 1 on this map).
Then ... But when Scottie follows her into the alley, this isn't Ashburton - it's Claude Lane, several blocks away, which runs between Bush and Sutter near Kearny Street (location 2 on the same map). Scottie parks and watches Madeleine enter the rear entrance.
... and Now, Claude Lane today is usually a busy alley with restaurants and boutiques but CitySleuth stopped by on a holiday and found it deserted.
But as Scottie gets out of his car to follow her, this is back in Ashburton! That's Grant Avenue crossing behind him.
Then ... and when he follows her into the flower shop, we are back in Claude Lane. Another alley was presumably used because Ashburton, next to the flower shop, was a short cul-de-sac unsuitable for the rest of the action.
... in 2004 ... the first doorway on the left, below, by then bricked up, was the one used for Podesta Baldocchi's rear entrance. This was the back door of the business at 239 Kearny. Sutter Street crosses at the bottom of the alley.
... and Now, the trendy restaurant Gitane has been at this site since 2008. The colorful mural still reveals faint outlines of the original doorway and window openings. (The same drainpipe on the left is a frame of reference for comparing these last three images).
Scottie follows Madeleine's Jaguar on the first of many jaunts across town. This time she is headed for a flower shop, Podesta Baldocchi. Every block traversed is listed and described sequentially. In this sequence an asterisk (*) indicates a route discontinuity, ie a location jump.
In the wee small hours of the morning after the fundraiser and still wearing her evening finery, Petulia is shown, in a flashback, heaving bricks through O'Dell's Pawn Shop window to get at a tuba that happened to catch her eye.
Then ... Across the street is Ginsberg's Dublin Pub
Ginsberg's is still there, located at 400 Bay Street at Mason at the north end of North Beach. This would imply that the pawn shop would be opposite, at 401 Bay Street ...
... from 1968, but the street directory entry reveals that there was a 12 unit apartment building there, not a pawn shop, so O'Dell's was a studio creation with a virtual address of 401 Bay Street. Today Trader Joe's is at that location.
... and Now, After all these years Ginsberg's has finally closed its doors. Here's how it looked in 2015.
The sardonic Inspector Ferris (Robert Keith) interviews Frank's wife Eleanor (Ann Sheridan) in her apartment. He wants her to help the police find her husband Frank, who has gone into hiding out of concern that the killer will come after him. She is somewhat reticent and her demeanor suggests their marriage has been a little shaky.
There is no single location for Eleanor's apartment. No less than five different locations, four in San Francisco and one in Los Angeles, are used throughout the movie to represent where it was. Here they are in the order in which they appear...
Apartment Location 1
Then ... Eleanor climbs onto the rooftop of her building to avoid the police tails posted outside her house. She is joined by a journalist, Danny Leggett (Dennis O'Keefe) who has offered to pay her well for Frank's story if she helps find him. This was filmed in a studio with a real San Franciscan view projected behind them. But that view looks awfully familiar... oh yes, this is the view looking east from the Top O' The Mark hotel; the same view was used earlier in the movie's Opening Credits.
... and Now, it's a very different view today from the Top O' The Mark ever since high rise office buildings invaded the Financial District. But the Bay Bridge and Yerba Buena Island remain constants.
Apartment Location 2
Still on the rooftop, looking in another direction, we see aview not from the Top O' The Mark, but from the other side of Mason Street across from the hotel.
Then ... This is the view from the rooftop of 819 Mason looking south down Mason towards the Victorian styled apartment building on the corner of Pine Street. The neon sign of the Clift Hotel glows in the background.
... and Now, 819 Mason (the yellow house) and the corner apartments are shown here from the courtyard of the Mark Hopkins hotel. The building with the house-like structure on the roof, left of center at top, is the Clift Hotel; the sign is still there.
By now you would be forgiven for concluding Eleanor's apartment is meant to be somewhere on Nob Hill. But wait ...
Apartment Location 3
Another view from the same rooftop ...
Then ... This time though the view is from Bunker Hill in Los Angeles! It looks down South Hill Street, across 1st Street, filmed from the top of the Hill Street tunnel; the same view was seen earlier in the movie in the Investigation scene.
... and Now, Bunker Hill has been flattened - this is South Hill Street from 1st Street today.
Apartment Location 4
Later, Eleanor is dropped off outside her home at night, in yet a different part of San Francisco.
Then ... In the distance the Bay Bridge's central concrete caisson can be seen in a view only possible looking east from Clay Street.
and Now, the identical view down Clay, taken from outside 1265 Clay near Jones where the cab (above, parked on the left) dropped her off. Just a small part of the bridge and caisson is seen from here now, hidden by newer buildings.
Apartment Location 5
Finally, after all these 'views from', we get a good direct look at her apartment house, and of course it's somewhere else again.
Then ... Eleanor climbs the steps of her apartment building. This is 1801 Laguna Street on the corner of Bush in the Western Addition or, more specifically, lower Pacific Heights.
... and Now, the biggest difference is the absence of oil on the road now that the auto makers know how to design cars without leaks.