Scarlett Schroeder (center) and others protest outside San Francisco City Hall Friday after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

They converged on busy streets, in parking lots and outside government buildings, waving cardboard signs and cheering — though some looked solemn, and at times they wept.

In the wake of Friday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, fury erupted across the Bay Area, where residents organized a string of rallies and protests expected to continue well into the evening.

Hundreds of people gathered for rallies outside San Francisco and Oakland city halls. Protesters clogged city streets, and in San Francisco a few hundred people briefly blocked a freeway on-ramp at Octavia Street before California Highway Patrol officers shunted them back to the neighborhood.

In front of San Francisco’s gold-domed building around 5 p.m., four young women stood back-to-back on a concrete barrier, one chanting “keep your rosaries” until her voice grew hoarse as the crowd called back “off my ovaries.”

Later, the crowd shouted “abort the court!” and some roared in rage. Two women stood on the steps of City Hall, one with “hands off” written on her bared belly and clutching the other, who was weeping.

In Oakland, protesters held handmade signs while some delivered impromptu speeches in the amphitheater of Frank Ogawa Plaza, which was packed by 6 p.m. People in the crowd carried dogs and balanced small children on their shoulders. One person handed out condoms.

Christine Chao and Diego Delgado of Oakland rolled in on an electric cargo bike with their daughters, ages 3 and 1. “It’s just devastating news,” said Delgado, lifting his young children out of their bicycle seats. “As progressive as we say we are as a country, this is a total smack in the face.”

A group of four high school seniors from Danville took BART to downtown Oakland, where they began tearing up pizza boxes for signs and writing slogans with Sharpie markers: “love is love,” “save democracy” and “take your hands off my body.”

“It just makes me so mad that people are being forced to have babies,” said Beatrice Wycoff, one of the high school students, as she handed out signs to other attendees.

Protesters listen to speakers talk about their personal experiences with abortion rights at Oakland City Hall on Friday.

Marit Sonstelie of Oakland said she felt compelled to join the Oakland rally so she wouldn’t have to sit at home stewing in outrage and disappointment, “feeling like I’m seeing a world where my 12-year-old daughter will have fewer rights than I had.”

Just after 6 p.m., the protest spilled onto Broadway and marchers headed down 14th Street, a brass band playing Otis Redding’s “Respect.”

San Francisco’s protest began with a march from the Ferry Building up Market Street. Dozens of people chanted and yelled as they took over the westbound lanes for a few blocks, and drivers stuck in traffic honked in support.

“It’s shocking for us to go so far and have less rights than the women did in the past 50 years,” said Lily Gelb, 15, who’d come to the protest from Sonoma County with her mom, Gretchen Johnson-Gelb.

Protesters gather by the Ferry Building in San Francisco Friday in response to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Gelb said every young woman she knows graduating from her high school had considered which states may soon ban abortion when deciding where to go to college, knowing the ruling was imminent.

Johnson-Gelb, a nurse practitioner and former midwife, wore a shirt that read, “Abortion is healthcare,” and held a sign that read, “I will aid and abet abortion.”

Jon Sax and his partner Rosy Corado marched holding hands, and he hoisted a sign above his head that read, “Men of quality stand for equality.”

“I’m furious. I won’t say I’m shocked,” Sax said. “The right for women to have bodily autonomy is fundamental to human rights. We are supposed to be one of the most developed countries in the world and we just went back in time 150 years ... when women were considered less than full human beings.”

Protesters march by the Phillip Burton Federal Building in San Francisco Friday in response to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Sax is from Detroit and said his sister is an obstetrician-gynecologist in Ohio. He fears most for lower-income women, especially women of color, in states where abortions are now banned or severely restricted.

“Today did not make abortion impossible, it just made it dangerous for people who don’t have privilege,” he said. “People are still going to have abortions, they’re just not going to have them safely.

“This decision will cause people to die, absolutely,” he said.

Corado said that “as a woman of color, I know it’s a direct attack on poor people and women of color in areas of the country where racism flourishes very overtly.”

Hangers are seen on a pole during a protest in San Francisco Friday in response to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade.

On the lawn in front of San Francisco City Hall, the marchers were joined by several state and city officials. State Assemblymember Matt Haney grabbed a loudspeaker and gave an impassioned speech.

“They call it pro-life, but it’s anti-life,” Haney said about people who oppose abortion. He rallied the crowd to support California leaders’ plan to enshrine reproductive rights in the state constitution, which will be on the ballot in November.

State Sen. Scott Wiener said in an interview that the ruling was “terrifying,” not only for women’s reproductive health but also LGBTQ rights, marriage equality and contraception access.

“They’re trying to take us back to the 1950s,” said Wiener, who is gay. “They’re absolutely going to go after LGBTQ civil rights. They’ll try to resurrect any sodomy laws and attack marriage equality.

Protesters march toward San Francisco City Hall Friday in response to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade.

“We should all be concerned about the future of America as a pluralistic democracy,” he said.

San Francisco Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who is also gay, said the Supreme Court is “off the rails” and that the fight to protect rights is now in the hands of voters. “The only progress will be at the ballot box,” he said.

By 6 p.m. the speeches were wrapping up in front of City Hall, and part of the crowd was splitting off to rally in front of the Philip Burton Federal Building in the Tenderloin.

Planned Parenthood listed hundreds of “we won’t go back” rallies around the country and up and down California, as did Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights.

Here’s a list of when and where protests are taking place in the Bay Area Friday night, and on Saturday in San Jose:

• 5 p.m. City Hall: Rally for Abortion Justice with Planned Parenthood

• 5 p.m. Powell and Market: Supreme Court Overturns Roe v. Wade: Time to Take to the Streets

• 5 p.m. Frank Ogawa Plaza: Decision Day Action in Oakland: We Won't Go Back

• 5 p.m. El Cerrito Plaza in front of Daiso: Abortion rights protest

• 5 p.m. Hayward City Hall

• 4:30 p.m. Safeway Fuel Station, 4000 San Pablo Ave.

• 5 p.m. City County Building.

• 5 p.m. Grassy area next to the Civic Center Post Office: Decision Day Action in Marin: We Won’t Go Back

• 10 a.m. San Jose City Hall: Bans Off Our Bodies

Chronicle staff writers Danielle Echeverria and Nanette Asimov contributed to this report.

Mallory Moench and Rachel Swan are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: mallory.moench@sfchronicle.com, rswan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @mallorymoench, @rachelswan

Mallory Moench is a San Francisco City Hall reporter. She joined The San Francisco Chronicle in 2019 to report on business and has also written about wildfires, transportation and the coronavirus pandemic.

She previously covered immigration and local news for the Albany Times Union and the Alabama state legislature for the Associated Press. Before that, she freelanced with a focus on the Yemeni diaspora while studying at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism.

Rachel Swan is a breaking news and enterprise reporter. She joined the Chronicle in 2015 after stints at several alt weekly newspapers. Born in Berkeley, she graduated from Cal with a degree in rhetoric and is now raising two daughters in El Cerrito.