Shakeup at SFMTA

Tom Maguire, Director of SFMTA's Streets Division, is leaving to take a position with the Valley Transportation Authority. Jamie Parks, Livable Streets Director at SFMTA, is also leaving, in his case to take a job with Oakland's Department of Transportation.

"Tom Maguire will be leaving the SFMTA on October 25th for an exciting opportunity to lead the Valley Transportation Authority’s BART to Silicon Valley Program, one of the biggest, most complex transportation projects in the country," wrote SFMTA's Jeffrey Tumlin in an email to staff. "We are very sad to see Tom go and are grateful to him for leading the Streets Division to deliver innovations like Vision Zero Quick Builds, Shared Spaces, and Slow Streets. During his tenure, he and the Streets Division also brought two of the city’s most transformative construction projects across the finish line: the Central Subway and Van Ness Bus Rapid Transit corridor."

Maguire served as interim director of the agency in 2019 in the months between the departure of director Ed Reiskin and the hiring of Tumlin. Maguire was first hired in 2014 from New York City, where he served throughout the tenure of famed NYCDOT director Janette Sadik-Khan. He was assistant commissioner of project development when he left NYCDOT.

Parks, meanwhile, came to SFMTA in 2015. "I had one goal: build safe streets. And we have. 45 miles of protected bike lanes, 24 Slow Streets, 1,000+ traffic calming devices, daylighting at 2,000+ intersections, 35 quick builds, road diets on nearly every Tenderloin street and half of SoMa, and a whole lot more," he wrote in a Sept. 28 email announcing his departure to staff. "Take a tour of San Francisco on early-vintage Streetview and compare it to today. The transformation is remarkable, and it’s just getting started."

According to his bio on the NACTO page, prior to joining SFMTA, Parks worked as Complete Streets Program Manager for the City of Oakland, where he oversaw the implementation of the city’s complete streets policy including development review, shared mobility and corridor planning.

Park's last day at SFMTA will be October 19. His new role at OakDOT will include hiring, budgeting, and strategic planning.

Despite the rosy statements from Parks and Tumlin, the nearly simultaneous departures come at a grim time for SFMTA's Streets Division. The city committed in 2014 to achieving zero fatal and serious crashes by 2024. But the city's death rate continues to rise, with 39 deaths in 2022 and 16 as of August of this year. A motorist killed a pedestrian last month at the location of the agency's marquee safety project, a reconfigured Valencia street featuring an experimental center-running bike lane.