The Mayor is now apparently willing to consider Sunday metering. Photo by Bryan Goebel.

The mayor is open to charging drivers to park at meters on Sundays because he said merchants have told him it helps car turnover near their shops rather than allowing people to park all day long for free.

That's also what an MTA study on extended meter hours found, and what we've reported extensively. San Francisco lags behind many other cities in this regard. Los Angeles, Long Beach, Glendale, Pasadena, Montreal and Princeton, New Jersey are examples of cities that have implemented parking enforcement on Sundays.

Unfortunately, on weekday evening metering, Newsom remains spooked by Oakland's experience.

"Just look at the East Bay and the revolt," he told Knight. A vocal group of Oakland business owners and residents protested vigorously when their city council changed meter hours last year, but the parallel is a shaky one since Oakland's meter hour changes were far less targeted than the MTA proposal. The agency has done a considerable amount of outreach to merchants and community groups.

In response to complaints from Muni riders that they're getting hit harder by the MTA's budget deficit than drivers, Newsom repeated the same argument he made to us last year: that drivers have had a threefold increase in parking meter rates downtown over the past five years, and there's some "amnesia" over the issue. "I know there's an exuberance to keep driving up parking meter costs, but there's another constituency that needs to be factored in," he told the Chronicle. Nevermind, of course, that the city's official policy is Transit First.

The total cost of riding transit has arguably increased at a far greater rate than the total cost of driving in recent years. Muni riders face a ten percent reduction in service under current budget proposals, and have seen the price of a monthly fast pass rise by a third or more in the past year.

Newsom made the comments to the Chronicle following an address to a regional after-school conference at Balboa High School today. He gave similar remarks to The Appeal at the Hall of Justice. Phone calls to Newsom's communications director, Tony Winnicker, were not returned.

The sudden about-face on Sunday meters makes us wonder: Is the Mayor communicating with his own staff? Just yesterday we heard through sources that Chief of Staff Steve Kawa was telling MTA directors the Mayor is still flatly opposed to extending meter hours, even on Sundays. Why didn't you say so before, Mr. Mayor? We hope you stick to your word.

Stormy skies are ahead for Muni. Flickr photo: fmosca

More than 45 members of the public spoke at the meeting, decrying the cuts and fare increases. Many focused on a staff proposal to increase monthly discount passes to $30. The passes are available to seniors and people with disabilities, and are already set to increase from $15 to $20 in May.

Aside from service cuts and a request to the San Francisco Country Transportation Authority for $7 million, the discount pass increase would make the biggest dent in the MTA's $16.9 million end-of-year deficit. The agency could reap an extra $1 million from the increase, but it's not likely to be popular with the Board of Supervisors, who will vote on any fare increases.

Dozens of speakers testified against the measure, including Bob Planthold of the Senior Action Network, who called the idea "a war on the disabled and seniors."

"You're leaving money on the table by ignoring the parking meter experiment," said Planthold. "That's cowardice."

The ARC of San Francisco, a service and advocacy organization for people with disabilities, organized a large group to speak at the meeting. 

Ernestine Patterson, a Muni rider who is visually impaired, told the Board the changes would affect her independence. "Doubling the amount we pay for fast passes truly removes the wonderful feeling of independence I have always enjoyed, to be able to get on the bus to go when I want and how often I want," she said.

MTA Executive Director Nathaniel Ford prefaced the meeting with an assertion that the MTA has limited options. "At this point we can only provide the service we can afford," he said.

Still, the public testimony left several of the directors wondering if there weren't other options to be explored. "It's hard to hear a lot of these comments without pressing for some alternative," said Director Malcolm Heinicke. Like many of the directors, Heinicke expressed particular concern about the discount pass hike.

He also added his voice to the list of MTA directors interested in revisiting an extension of parking meter hours. MTA staff had initially set out to meet with businesses and identify a corridor where a pilot meter extension program might be welcomed. Ford said there are individual businesses that are amenable to the idea, but none of the neighborhood business groups have expressed an interest.

Despite pressure from the Mayor to kill the parking plan, Heinicke joined Directors Cameron Beach, Jerry Lee, and Bruce Oka in pressing MTA staff to at least identify a corridor for a pilot program.

Each of those directors has reportedly been told to keep quiet on the parking proposal, but Oka reasserted his independence today. "I said at the last meeting everything has to be on the table," he told his colleagues. "I'm not backing off from that."

MTA Board Chairman Tom Nolan related a meeting called by Mayor Newsom this Tuesday to prod all city chairs to act fast on budget dilemmas. "We've all pointed out things we don't like," said Nolan, encouraging the Board to deal with the deficit without delay. "But this Board is going to have to make a very tough decision, because it is our obligation to manage the budget, to balance the budget."

Nolan did criticize the plan to reduce overnight owl bus service to once per hour. That prompted Ford to explain that with such low service frequencies, Muni would actually publish schedules for routes that run less than every 20 minutes - something it hasn't done in years. By running at hourly intervals, MTA staff hopes the owl schedule will be easier for riders to memorize.

Even with a few of the directors grumbling about the service cuts, and the Board of Supervisors posturing about opposing fare increases, the MTA appears to be rolling toward approving the majority of the deficit proposals, with few modifications.

That isn't settling well with many of Muni's riders.

"The reason why we have boards like this is to have intelligent conversations on transportation policy," said Eric Chase, author of Transbay Blog. "It would be a shame for this Board to simply adopt and rubber-stamp Mayor Newsom's extremely poor understanding of the Transit First policy in this city."

There will be several town hall meetings before the Board votes on service cuts on February 16. They will be held on February 6 and February 9 at MTA headquarters, One South Van Ness Avenue. You can also let the Mayor and MTA Board know what you think of the cuts by emailing them at gavin.newsom@sfgov.org and mtaboard@sfmta.com.

SFBC's Leah Shahum, the MTA's Oliver Gajda and SFBC Board Member Dan Nguyen-Tan in the freshly painted green bike box on Scott Street at Oak. Photo by Bryan Goebel.

"The good news is we didn't wait until today to get started. The injunction was [partially] lifted last week and already the folks you see behind us have been hard at work," said Newsom. "They've been out there putting in some new bike lanes and we're going to be putting in bike racks every single day."

Newsom said that San Francisco is going to try a series of innovate treatments, such as the green bike box, taking cues from European cities that have become world-class bicycling cities. And like Valencia Street, he said, the MTA will begin changing the signal timing on some streets to better accommodate bicyclists.

"We're going to be trying some things that candidly we wished we were doing for the last three years that are things that are being done around the world, particularly in Copenhagen and Amsterdam, that are being proffered and exampled in places like Portland and other municipalities," Newsom said, adding that the plan is to add six new miles of bike lanes in six months and increase the city's existing 23 miles of sharrows by 326 percent.

MTA Chief Nat Ford and Mayor Gavin Newsom paint the bike box green. Photo by Matthew Roth.

"We're going to make it exciting, we're going to make it fun and we're going to make it funky," said Maxwell.

Mirkarimi, whose District 5 encompasses the new green bike box, thanked city officials and the SF Bike Coalition "for making this day possible."

"We are all unified in the mission statement of making San Francisco bike friendly," said Mirkarimi, who announced a plan to install on-street bicycle parking in front of Mojo Bike Cafe on Divisadero "that will help commemorate this end to the injunction and to help signify what a major artery like Divisadero means."

Dufty, whose District 8 includes a portion of The Wiggle, said "we still have a long way to go" but that it was exciting to see so many things going up this week as a result of the partial injunction lifting.

The event coincided with new figures released by the SF Bike Coalition from a David Binder poll showing that more than half of San Franciscans "say that would ride if streets had bike lanes and were more inviting for bicycling."

The survey of 400 San Francisco voters asked six questions, including: What would make it more likely for you to ride a bike in San Francisco? The results:

• Feeling less threatened by cars while biking: 57 percent
• More bike lanes along my route: 51 percent
• Smoother surface on the roads and few potholes: 50 percent
• More secure bike parking at my destinations: 49 percent
• Knowing how to avoid hills: 45 percent

Seventy seven percent said they think the number of bicyclists helps ease traffic congestion in the city.

Today's event came on the same day MTA crews installed the city's first physically separated bike lane and were out striping new bike lanes on Beale and Kansas Streets, painting sharrows on 5th Street and racing to complete the remaining projects approved by a judge last week. Tuesday they installed the city's first bike lane in three years -- a left-turn bike lane on Scott Street between Fell and Oak.

At a press conference tomorrow, Mayor Gavin Newsom and MTA officials will announce a number of "innovate design treatments" allowed under a judge's order issued last week, including plans to install safe-hit posts on an existing bike lane creating a physically separated lane on Market between 9th and 10th Streets. The posts are similar to the ones now in place in the bike lane at Market and Octavia. It was still unclear, however, if the project would include both east and westbound bike lanes, or just one.

"San Francisco's first attempt at a physically separated bike lane is a really great step forward. Separated bike lanes are a great way to get novice cyclists who are uncomfortable riding in traffic more used to riding on the street," said Marc Caswell, the SFBC's program manager. He said the SF bike lane will be similar to early physically separated bike lanes in New York City, which were improved under Janette Sadik-Kahn, Commissioner of the NYCDOT.

The protected bike lane will help eliminate conflicts between drivers and bicycle riders on that portion of Market Street where drivers often fail to respect the bike lanes. "A physically separated bike lane is a great way to make sure the bike lane is a clear and safe way to travel without any obstructions," Caswell said.

Tomorrow's press event, expected to be attended by several other electeds and the SF Bike Coalition, will culminate with the painting of a green bike box on Scott Street at Oak, which is believed to be the first green bike box in California, according to the MTA. In addition, tomorrow DPT crews will install bike lanes on Beale and Kansas Streets, paint sharrows on Hayes Street and begin three days of sharrow painting on 5th Street from Market Street to the freeway, according to the MTA's Bridget Smith, head of the agency's Livable Streets implementation program.

Earlier today, crews installed a bike lane next to the right-turn lane on Howard Street at 9th, which has been a trouble spot for bicyclists. They also installed two blocks of bike lanes on Mississippi Street between 16th and Mariposa near the Guardian building. Crews did not have time today to paint bike symbols in the lanes, but that work will be completed tomorrow, according to Smith.

The DPT crew on Mississippi Street was jovial and excited to be installing the city's first major bike improvements in awhile. It took them a few hours to complete the work, using a tension rope to first mark the stripes, and then rolling over the mark with a striping machine that releases warm thermoplastic that dries in thirty seconds. A DPT worker then follows, sprinkling glass beads over the thermoplastic and wham, there's your bike lane! 

The latest work followed Tuesday's installation of the city's first bike lane in three years, a left-turn bike lane on Scott Street between Oak and Fell on The Wiggle.

More photos in our Flickr pool.

Tomorrow's press conference will take place at Oak and Scott Streets at 1 p.m. We'll be staffing and tweeting. Follow our Twitter feed here.

The DPT crew marks a stripe on Mississippi Street. 

New Howard Street bike lane at 9th St. Photo by sfbike.

"It feels really great to have some fresh bicycle paint down on the streets," said Andy Thornley, SFBC Program Director, who lit a cigar in celebration. "We have waited a long time and I think I speak for all bicyclists present and all those yet to bicycle in the city that this is an historic day."

The MTA paint crews found themselves caught up in the excitement of the moment on Scott Street, posing for pictures with bicycle activists and smiling and nodding at the thumbs up from passing cyclists in what Thornley described as "a little street party."

"You guys deserve this," said a member of the MTA paint crew who didn't want to be identified. "You've been waiting too long." He added that he was also a bicyclist but had been grounded by a recent injury.

Thornley said the left-turn bike lane on Scott will greatly improve safety for the daily throngs who ride the Wiggle. Indeed, within minutes after the fresh paint had dried, dozens of northbound bicycle riders began using the lane as if it had already been there.

"It's definitely the way that I move around that part of town so I'm looking forward to being more comfortable and dignified and having a more delightful ride through the Wiggle," said Thornley.

The crew stripes the bike lane. Flickr photo: dustinj

Crews prepare to install a left-turn arrow in the new Scott Street bike lane. Photo by Bryan Goebel.

Crews also installed three bike racks at the following locations: Yoga Garden at 286 Divisadero, in front of Phuket Thai at 248 Divisadero and at Pacific Primary School at Baker and Grove. An additional nine bike racks will be installed tomorrow on Duboce, Waller and Haight Streets.

A temporary bike corral in front of Bean There Cafe. Photo by Bryan Goebel.

The MTA's Bridget Smith, director of the agency's Livable Streets Program, said crews would paint new bike lanes tomorrow on Howard Street, Mississippi and Claremont Boulevard.

The Scott Street bike lane, sharrows and bike racks were among 10 Bike Plan projects approved by a San Francisco judge last week in a partial lifting of the bike injunction. While those projects will only amount to a meager 3.7 miles of new bike lanes in the city, the MTA will be allowed to go forward with its plans to install hundreds of bike racks and sharrows.

Thirty seven additional Bike Plan projects will remain on hold pending the outcome of a hearing in June to determine whether the EIR fully complies with CEQA.

On Thursday, a green bike box will be installed where the current bike box is located on Scott Street and Oak following a press conference by the MTA and Mayor Gavin Newsom.

While the improvements are paltry compared to what's happened in cities like New York, where they've added approximately 200 miles of bike lanes over the past two years, the scent of fresh paint in the air made many infrastructure-starved bicycle riders giddy.

"It's about time," said Brian, a bicycle commuter and recent transplant from Pittsburg, who was stopped at a red light on Scott and Oak.

See more photos from sfbike and Dustin Jensen. 

Bicycle activists pose with the MTA paint crew. Photo by dustinj

Gavin Newsom is running for President, er um, I mean Governor (you gotta take these things one step at a time). Maybe he’ll make it, maybe something will wreck his chances. It’s an interesting drama from the point of view of recent American history, as he follows in the footsteps of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, and has surrounded himself with a retinue of advertising professionals… you know, those people who do nothing useful for society but are extremely well-paid to craft lies and deceptions and help the powerful stay on top. Newsom is a vacuous politician with no rudder or internal gyroscope grounded in any values other than what will get him on to the next stop of his political ambition. His advertisers (do they advise? I think they just advertise) are shrewd enough to keep associating the Newsom Brand with the innovative thinking and practices that are practically boiling out of political sight in San Francisco. But we cannot and should not think of him as an ally since his track record is demonstrably empty when it comes to doing what he says.

Newsom got a bunch of local press last week when he announced that he was directing his department heads to examine their city-owned surplus real estate holdings for the potential to kick-start a serious effort at locally grown urban agriculture. As a person who has—even here—promoted the idea of “One Lane for Food” I am of course glad to see the idea of urban agriculture gaining traction. But having Gavin Newsom using the idea as the buzz-of-the-week in his gubernatorial campaign is simply aggravating.

Alemany Farm below Bernal Heights, June 2009

San Francisco has a flourishing urban horticulture amidst over 100 community gardens. The Alemany Farm just south of Bernal Heights is a 4.5-acre productive farm, run largely by volunteers who have brought it into production after it almost collapsed a few years ago. Elsewhere, the SF Glean group are out picking plums and loquats and anything else they can find in front yards, sidewalk medians, and even some backyards and public lands. Another similar effort called Produce to the People is dedicated to getting the food already growing in the city to the hungry people who can best use it.

Flourishing plum tree at Mullen and Franconia on Bernal Heights.

Did Newsom think to salute these efforts or offer city support for them? Is he proposing to use City resources to support the dozens of community gardens and thousands of gardeners, who are the obvious backbone of any move towards urban agriculture? Did he even throw his support behind the Victory Gardens program launched a year ago with much fanfare during the Slow Food Nation gathering? You all know the pathetic answers…

Heavily laden loquat tree on south side of Bernal Heights, June 2009.

There are a lot of examples of Newsom’s vacuity and hypocrisy, but one that he's not even that directly responsible for leaped out at me last Friday. I was going to the Inner Sunset to lunch with a friend, and took a detour through the Golden Gate Park Concourse. Those of you who have been around for a while will remember the intense fight that erupted over the rebuilding of the DeYoung Museum and the Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, especially with regard to building a parking garage under the concourse. After much ado, including a hotly contested election, a number of lawsuits, and then the construction of the garage with entrances inside the park violating the original proposition, it’s all finished now. The main promise of the garage proponents is that it would allow the Concourse to become a pedestrian oasis, with space for walking, cycling, and no parking or cars, which would be kept below ground.

Newsom wasn’t personally involved much in that original fight. He came to the Board of Supervisors from the Pacific Heights district where the monied interests who backed him had been the financiers of the campaign for a garage. Those same interests promised that the underground garage, with its entrance directly to the museums, would preclude the necessity of having cars driving through the Concourse. Once built though, there was a road put back to the front door of both museums, at the behest of the museums and their wealthy benefactors, so people could get “dropped off” at the door.

The so-called pedestrian oasis, ringed by busily trafficked roads.

As these photos illustrate, this has proven to be a lie. Granted, it’s a small issue in the scheme of things, but it’s a perfect example of the kind of politics and baiting-and-switching that brought us Gavin Newsom in the first place. Today there are signs at either end of the Concourse saying it’s closed to through traffic, and that only drop-offs are allowed (why they can’t loop through the underground garage to drop off passengers has never been explained). But on Friday, first around 1, and then later when I took these photos around 3 pm, there was a steady flow of private cars streaming through the park, not making drop-offs, but just using it as a shortcut between the Inner Sunset and JFK Drive, just like they always have! Add the many taxis and the 44 Muni line that runs through, and the promised pedestrian oasis is a joke. As Park Ranger Rodriguez told me, it’s always like this, and as much as she tries to block cars from driving in the bike lane, she’s given up worrying about enforcing the “no through traffic” rule.

Cars drive through against the "no through traffic" signs. Park Ranger Rodriguez stands in road trying to keep traffic moving.

It’s aggravating, but twice so when you consider all the blather about a crisis in city finances. Why not set up some officers at either end of the Concourse and generate a few tens of thousands of dollars per day on scofflaw motorists driving through? Why were they trying to charge entrance fees to the Arboretum (thankfully abandoned now) when there’s a huge revenue source in enforcing existing promises and rules a few yards away? Gavin Newsom doesn’t want to ruffle the feathers of all his wealthy benefactors, who for all their tolerance of green rhetoric (good marketing after all), can’t bear the idea of not being able to drive wherever they want, whenever they want, including right to the front door of their museums, past promises be damned.

Are there museums here? Who knew? And where was that pedestrian oasis?

Drivers often take advantage of Golden Gate Park's free on-street parking. Flickr photo: morganthemoth

The first is a measure to begin charging for on-street parking in the eastern half of Golden Gate Park, where many of the park's most popular attractions are located. The plan will turn over responsibility for on-street parking in Golden Gate Park from the Recreation and Park Department to the MTA, which will install meters and charge for some street parking in the park for the first time.

The Rec and Park department, the MTA, Board of Supervisors President David Chiu, and Supervisors John Avalos and David Campos expressed support for the measure on public policy grounds, since charging for parking may lead to reduced driving and increased walking and biking in the park, and is consistent with the city's transit first policy.

Given the impact on transit riders of recent Muni fair hikes, Campos said drivers should "share the pain" of balancing the budget.

The meters will be a financial boon for the MTA and the park department, with the MTA collecting citation revenue and the park department collecting meter fare revenue. Once the meters are installed, as early as next April, they're projected to bring in $500,000 in the fiscal year ending June 30 and $1.4 million in the second year for the park department. The MTA will bring in a net profit of about $379,000 per year.

The area affected is bounded by Stanyan Street, Crossover Drive, Lincoln Way, and Fulton Street, and includes just over 1,800 spots. To limit the visual impact of the new meters, the MTA will use meters that cover 10-15 spaces each, with about 130 meters total.

The mayor has expressed more qualified support, reversing his previous opposition to charging for parking in Golden Gate Park only recently, in light of the budget crisis. Supervisor Carmen Chu, who supported the measure, also expressed reservations, especially regarding parking pricing, and the installation of the meters.

The parking measure ultimately gained the support of the full committee, and appears to have most of the full Board of Supervisors' support, and the support of the mayor.

The second proposal, which Streetsblog San Francisco wrote about last month, is a $368 million bond measure to create a one-time fund to pay for streetscape enhancements, including enhancements to sidewalks and bicycle infrastructure. This measure also had the strong support of the full committee, and Supervisor Avalos was confident it would pass next week at the full Board of Supervisors meeting. If it does pass, it will go before voters in November, and funding would be distributed over the next five years, with each issuance requiring Board of Supervisors approval.

Next of up for both measures: Board of Supervisors meeting, Tuesday, July 14, San Francisco City Hall, Room 250.

The entire family of San Francisco city agencies responsible for maintaining its streets made an unconventional decision to close a portion of a street to cars and convert the new space into a simple, yet elegant, public plaza.  The project combines all the important elements of plaza creation that have been successful in New York City and elsewhere: take space from cars, use simple treatments to convert the space into a pedestrian sanctuary, including movable furniture and leftover granite blocks from city salvage yards, and engage commercial interests around the plaza to help maintain and care for the new public realm.

Though some neighborhood constituents voiced skepticism that the plaza would be empty at best, or filled with miscreants and vagabonds at worst, the plaza's success is hard to dispute. In fact, so many people are using the new space and enjoying the tables and chairs, the businesses around the plaza have contemplated leaving the furniture out later than sunset, which was the initial closing time agreed upon between them and the Castro/Upper Market Community Betterment District. 

This film, shot and edited by Paul Jaffe and produced by Streetsblog SF editor Bryan Goebel, takes an in-depth look at the construction of the plaza with some of the agencies responsible for it, and includes some entertaining man-on-the-street interviews.

Flickr photo from 2005: snikolhaus

"Yes and no. I'm about to have a baby so you'll see me getting training wheels out, and I've got a couple of years. But I grew up like so many, on a bike. But it was a very different town when I was growing up in San Francisco. We didn't have any bike lanes when I was growing up."

He touted his meager pilot bike share program, something he'll be able to implement once the injunction is lifted, saying that he hopes it will get infrequent bicyclists like himself to ride more. "That's actually something I would legitimately use, especially on weekends, when I'm not running to 13 events and I'm late everywhere I'm going."

On another note, Newsom said he hopes to push for federal stimulus dollars to help fund the Bicycle Plan, which would speed up its implementation. The MTA has so far identified about $6 million of the $15 million it would take to put the plan into action, but lots of questions remain about where the remaining funds will come from.

“We’ll continue to advocate for more federal funding, stimulus dollars, and we’ve got a lot of competitive grants out there," he said. "We are very blessed to have Speaker Pelosi and other friends in Congress, and I’m confident that these are in line with the administration’s environmental goals and alternative transit goals and I think there’ll be plenty of categories of funding."

A free parking meter in San Francisco. Flickr phto: .dru

"I don't support Sunday parking. I don't think that was part of the budget and...I support the budget as passed.  I don't believe in it," Newsom, a former parking and traffic commissioner, said yesterday following a press conference to unveil a new Muni bus shelter. 

Newsom's fervent opposition comes despite a change of heart by several politicians and organizations, including some that have traditionally opposed increasing parking enforcement. As Supervisor John Avalos explained at a recent BOS meeting "times have changed" and "there’s a different feeling about moving forward on revenue from parking that didn’t exist before." Except, of course, from the politician with the most power over the MTA.

Even the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce likes the idea of Sunday metering: "We favored Sunday enforcement because that will turn over parking for merchants just like it does on Saturday," said Jim Lazarus, the chamber's senior vice president.

As we've written, other cities that have managed street space with market-rate pricing and curbside vacancy targets, and have invested additional revenues in pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure improvements, have seen a rise in business, not a drop. There was further proof of that this week, with the release of a TA study noting that most shoppers in downtown San Francisco don't drive.

But with Newsom opposed, the Sunday measure is not likely to be added back in, even if a study favors it, because, as the MTA and its Board proved during this latest budget cycle, it is not independent, instead taking orders from the Mayor.

Ford told Streetsblog after this week's BOS meeting that "it would be premature" to assume the Mayor would oppose stronger parking enforcement after a study, but talk of penciling it in now seems like lip service or insincerity. Even if stronger parking enforcement is resurrected, such as evening metering, it will most likely be watered down.

Ford did indicate that the MTA's current 90-day study on parking enforcement might include outreach to merchants.

"My concern is it’s seen as simply automobile users versus transit users. That’s not the exact equation. There’s also the small businesses that are suffering out there, and we wanted an opportunity to go out there and explain to them that from a parking standpoint, it may mean more turnover, which may mean more business for them."

Supervisor Bevan Dufty, a likely mayoral candidate who is also opposed to Sunday and evening metering, said Castro merchants might be open to an experiment of either Sunday enforcement or evenings but they don't want both.

“Small business people are almost more passionate about parking than almost any issue but health care in this city, and so I just want to be sensitive to that and to talk to them and bring them into the process,” he said.

Flickr photo: andreil

Why is San Francisco -- considered by many around the world to be a “progressive” and “green" city with a Transit First policy -- still debating whether to extend meter hours and parking enforcement, even in the face of a crippling Muni budget deficit? Didn't we merge Muni with the Department of Parking and Traffic precisely so policy decisions about management of the streets would benefit the operations of transit, bicycling, and walking?

Some politicians, including the Mayor, apparently can't stop viewing these issues from behind the wheels of their SUVs. They can't see past the myth that raising parking fees will drive away business, thus perpetuating an erroneous stereotype that most urban shoppers drive. My colleague Matthew Roth wrote a great piece debunking that popular fallacy, noting that the majority of shoppers don't drive to shop in areas like North Beach and that in aggregate, transit riders, cyclists and walkers spend more than drivers. Other cities that have managed street space in accord with Shoupian market-rate pricing and curbside vacancy targets, and have invested additional revenues in pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure improvements, have seen a rise in business, not a drop.

San Francisco could and should do the same, but the MTA -- namely its chief, Nat Ford, and its Board, all appointees who rarely act independently -- has bowed to pressure from the Mayor, and Supervisors Carmen Chu and Bevan Dufty and taken Sunday and evening parking enforcement until 10 p.m. off the table as a much-needed revenue measure to fund Muni. Instead, the MTA is going to study extending it to 8 p.m. Supervisor John Avalos and four of his colleagues on the Board want it penciled back in the budget. Supervisor Sophie Maxwell, who was on the fence, is coming around and might join other members of the Board of Supervisors next week in rejecting the MTA budget if Ford doesn't follow the recommendations of a "Transit Justice Package," and make some changes. As Supervisor David Campos has noted, asking for a $15 million readjustment is not a radical proposal.

Mayor Gavin Newsom, responding to a question from Streetsblog last week, seemed stuck to his windshield perspective. When I asked him what he thinks about the fact that Muni riders are taking a much bigger hit than drivers in this year's budget, he responded: "Look at what we’ve done in the last few years. There have been dramatic increases in parking, fines and fees related to automobile use. So, you have to look at the totality of the last few years and I think assess it in proportion to what’s happened over the years."

Nonsense. How about the last decades? We've bent over backwards to accommodate cars and vehicle ownership while transit service has deteriorated calamitously.

We're supposed to be a Transit First city, but we're not taking advantage of the enormous revenue opportunities that options like metered enforcement represent, and we haven't raised meter rates since 2005. There are an estimated 320,000 on-street parking spaces, of which only 25,000 are metered, and those metered spaces are far from market-rate. If the average parking space is about 200 square feet, that amounts to roughly 60,000,000 square feet of real estate that we're giving away for free or next to nothing so people can store their private property in public. Of the 83,000 residential parking permits (RPP) doled out each year, we practically give them away for $74. How does that make any economic sense?  We need to change the vehicle code that prevents the MTA from raising RPP rates, which are only priced at cost recovery (the amount to administer the program), and we need to charge a fee that approximates private lots and garages.

While SFPark is a great start at better management of the curbside, it will apply to only 6,000 on-street spaces and is not meant primarily as a revenue generator.  The kind of change we need is sea change, a complete transition away from 60 years of externalizing the costs of car ownership.  This kind of political leadership isn't coming from the top and seems fleeting among the majority of supervisors.

Chu and Dufty won't give in on their reticence. Chu, who gets around mostly by car, said in an interview earlier this year that she believes San Francisco has a parking shortage. Dufty was also feeling heat from the Mayor, but said he was also taking into account concerns from some Castro merchants. But really, if Chu wants available parking, she should back stronger market-priced meter enforcement. If Dufty wants more business in the Castro, he should back extended meter enforcement.

From Donald Shoup's book, "The High Cost of Free Parking":

"Market-priced curb parking will reduce traffic congestion, air pollution, and energy consumption caused by cruising and also make curb parking more convenient. Eliminating the need for off-street parking requirements will, in turn, reduce development costs, make the land market more efficient, and improve urban design. Finally, the revenue from curb parking will either improve public services or reduce taxes that distort the economy, or both."

Other cities have already done what the MTA originally proposed last month. Los Angeles, Long Beach, Glendale, Pasadena, Montreal and Princeton, New Jersey are examples of cities that have implemented parking enforcement on Sundays. Pasadena extends its evening meters to 12 a.m. on weekends, and 10 p.m. during the week. But in San Francisco? Most metering ends at 6 p.m.

Source: SFMTA

If the MTA is going to truly be an independent agency, then Nat Ford needs to stand up to Gavin Newsom for once, putting aside his political loyalties. Don't study extending metering hours, just do it! Ford went along with these parking enforcement proposals in the first place. If he doesn't make these changes, we might have to go back to the voters and change the governing structure of the MTA to get the kind of Transit First city we all deserve.

Matthew Roth contributed to this piece.

DPW worker painting around an unused track in the plaza. Bollards in the background on the right and left will be filled with gravel and soil and will have plants growing out of them. Photo: Matthew Roth

DPW crews have been working at a feverish pace to complete the city's first "Pavement-to-Parks" plaza, pouring yellow, slip-resistant road paint over the surface and installing 70 demarcation bollards that will be filled with soil and gravel and adorned with fan palms, yucca jewels and birds of paradise. Crews are installing movable barriers at both ends of the plaza to allow for emergency fire access. Tables and chairs will also be situated around the plaza, and locked at night on a nearby catenary poll. 

"The goal of this opening on Wednesday is to show how you can do something really quick, really simply," said Andres Power, an urban designer at the SF Planning Department.

Liz Ogbu, an architect with Public Architect Inc., which has designed the project pro bono, said, "This is a little nuts. It’s sort of forced everyone to have to think out of the box and sort of roll with the punches and just be quick on their feet."

For example, Ogbu said they ran out of paint Sunday and a new shipment was still a day away but "somebody came up with the idea of, well, we can tap the traffic paint, and we were a little skeptical because we couldn’t match the color, but it works well and we’re in good shape.”

Crews have also set up the bollards to accommodate the streetcars and buses that will continue passing through the plaza. Ogbu said plazas with transit ways have worked well in some European cities, including Amsterdam.

"All the Muni drivers have been giving us thumbs up as they’ve been coming through," said Ogbu. "And the business owners who we’ve been back and forth with, they’re in good shape.”

Worker attaching bollard supports to a movable gate that can be opened for emergency vehicles to pass through. Photo: Bryan Goebel

Christopher Gonzalez-Crain, a Castro resident, said he first heard about the plaza on Streetsblog.

“I think this is fantastic. I think that the Castro has needed public space for awhile ever since the community garden was closed down and turned into a private community garden. With this, and in conjunction with the new Farmer’s Market, I feel like both city officials and the local business district have really gotten the idea that we need more public space and it’s wonderful to see. It’s really inspiring.”

Supervisor Bevan Dufty, who plans to attend the opening ceremony tomorrow with Mayor Newsom, said he's heard nothing but positive news too, though he has been told some residents opposed to the plaza might turn out with picket signs.

“I think it’s great. It’s the Castro. There’s always a lot of controversy, a lot of opinions. But you know, the word that I got at the gym this morning... three people gave me a thumbs up and said they were really pleased to see it happening.”

Rob Cox, a resident of nearby Hartfort Court, said he feels like residents were not properly notified. He doesn't like it because he thinks it will attract homeless and create more problems at night when crowds from nearby bars let out.

“It’s a dark quiet corner and so people use it as a bathroom and a place to sleep and this is just going to exasperate it," he said. “I think it’s a great idea to have some great space in the Castro, I really, really do. I just think this is a bad location for it."

But Aiello with the Castro CBD said they're hiring a full-time police officer to patrol the area on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights from 11 p.m. to 3 a.m. Power from Planning added that as a condition of their permit, the Metro Bar, which is opening soon, agreed to provide security.

Join community members, businesses, agency staff, Supervisor Bevan Dufty, and Mayor Gavin Newsom at 10 am, tomorrow, May 13th, for the plaza dedication ceremony. On Saturday, May 16th, from 12:30 pm until late afternoon, the community will celebrate the opening of the plaza with music and performances. Upper Market merchants will also be holding their sidewalk sale that day, so it should be a great chance to enjoy the new space.

The streetcar merging into traffic on Market Street after passing through the plaza. Photo: Matthew Roth

SFMTA Executive Director Nat Ford and Mayor Gavin Newsom. Flickr photo: SFist

At yesterday's Rules Committee meeting at City Hall, as first noted by the Examiner, there was some banter between Supervisor Chris Daly and MTA Board Chair Tom Nolan about MTA Executive Director Nat Ford. They seemed to indicate he was looking to leave the agency.

Daly:  “In your next term, you may have to hire a new general manager or two or three. Can you tell me about what you are going to be looking for as an MTA commissioner for the next Muni general manager? I like Nat Ford. But I think Nat Ford is looking elsewhere."

Nolan: "Well, I have thought about that, in terms of succession planning. I've asked him not to do it on my watch. I think he's done a terrific job. He brings a lot of skills into it in a whole series of areas. And I think what I would like to do  in terms of preparation for it is talk to a lot of people that I respect in the industry about what it really takes."

He added, "I'd like to get somebody like him. I'm not sure how we would proceed with that. We have thought about it. We have talked about it. I've spoken to the Mayor about it as well."

It's no secret that Ford, who was appointed to the post more than three years ago by the Mayor, has been considering other opportunities. The Chronicle reported on rumors he was being looked at for a post in the Obama administration and was approached about the recently-filled executive director position at the Los Angeles MTA.

What do you think Streetsbloggers? Should Nat Ford stay or go? If he does depart, who would be the best person to fill his shoes at the MTA?