Commentary: The Muni Bike Ban is Even More Absurd than You Think
Barack Obama was starting his first term as President. Gavin Newsom was mayor. The Giants had yet to win a World Series in San Francisco.
And Streetsblog San Francisco first launched.
It was 2009. It was also the year the San Francisco Municipal Railway was charged with establishing a policy for allowing bicycles on its LRV trains.
From that year’s San Francisco Bicycle Plan, which is nearly 200 pages long:
Off-peak commute hours should first be explored in a trial allowing bicycles on LRVs, with possible exceptions for allowing bicycles on LRVs at all times between the Castro Street and West Portal Stations
Action 3.4 Create an SFMTA policy that allows bicyclists with disabled bicycles to bring them aboard SFMTA transit vehicles, interior space permitting and at the vehicle operator’s discretion.
And it recommended that:
Muni establish a policy providing for the accommodation of bicycles on the Third Street light rail vehicles.
There are more details in the plan, but it’s crystal clear Muni rail should be allowing bicycles at this point on the T Third train and other lines depending on location and crowding. Otherwise, why does San Francisco do these studies in the first place?
Last Friday, the San Francisco Chronicle‘s Rachel Swan wrote a piece inspired by a Streetsblog SF video and a post about efforts by advocates to get Muni to lift its bike ban. In it, the San Francisco Transit Rider’s Dylan Fabris said that “We’re in the information-gathering stage… We want to talk to SFMTA and understand why the policy is the way it is now.”
But the answer to “why the policy is the way it is now” seems simple: Muni is managed by transportation troglodytes who resist change.
17 years have passed since that 2009 bike plan, but no pilot was ever done. In fairness, at least folding bikes were permitted starting in 2011 (hallelujah!). But there’s been no movement on regular bikes, which is what the vast majority of cyclists ride. In fact, the agency spent money to put bike-ban stickers on its new fleet of light-rail vehicles, even though they have spaces by the door intended for bikes, wheelchairs, strollers and large luggage.
What SFMTA management really needs is a good swift kick in the ass: about its bike ban, about signal priority, about ignoring its “transit first” mandate for half a century now, and a whole lot of other things. And it needs governance reform because clearly its structure, with a supposedly independent board, *just* *doesn’t* *work.*
For now, the mayor needs to ask SFMTA director Julie Kirschbaum to send a memo out to all personnel to stop enforcing the bike ban unless the train is truly too crowded. Kirschbaum includes a line about bike-transit synergy in her speeches; it’s time for her to make good on that. And, Mayor Lurie, please don’t insult our intelligence by claiming such policy changes have to originate from the agency. In practice, you know very well that’s not how it works.
Muni needs to be fully funded. It’s essential to the economic well-being of San Francisco. But it’s just as important that Muni management demonstrates it puts the rider first. Lifting its retrograde bike ban is the place to start.
Special thanks to advocate Bruce Halperin, who tracked down the 2009 study.
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