Matthew Roth

This morning much of the nation's news outlets are devoted to the demise of General Motors, which represents the fourth largest bankruptcy in U.S. history and the largest of any industrial titan. Perhaps most entertaining of all the articles is P.J. O'Rourke's onanistic fetish piece about horsepower and the "masculinity" emblematic in the growl of American muscle cars, in which he bemoans the passing of the automotive giant as the emasculation of the American Dream. 

GM, Once the World’s Biggest Automaker, Files for Chapter 11 (NYT, NYT)(SF Gate) PJ O’Rourke Pines for Days When Driving Made Him Feel More Powerful Than Genghis Khan (WSJ) What Will Happen to America’s Appetite for New Cars? (NYT) Examiner Argues Union Work Rules at BART and Muni Outdated and Too Expensive MTA Board Looks … Continued

At a ribbon cutting ceremony on Geary and Arguello Boulevards in the Richmond District yesterday, Mayor Gavin Newsom, MTA Chief Nat Ford and representatives from Clear Channel presented the next iteration of the city's bus shelters, the first of 1100 new shelters that will be installed between now and 2013. The shelters combine innovative solar technology with a design that is meant to evoke both a seismic wave and the hills of San Francisco.

All morning I've been asking myself (and some others) why kids riding bicycles to school is a pressworthy event. Don't kids always ride bikes to school or have we become so car-dependent that even this sancrosanct part of being young and carefree is a thing of the past?  Unfortunately, the latter is the case, as no school in San Francisco sees even 5 percent of walking and bicycling trips to school.

In the past few weeks, Stanford University students have built support for a proposal to reduce parking, widen sidewalks, and eventually close eight blocks of University Avenue in Palo Alto to motor vehicles. The Palo Alto Pedestrian Mall (PAPM) started out as an assignment in a "Creating Infectious Action" class at the design school at Stanford and has since garnered support among transportation committee members of the city council and businesses along the avenue, many of them restaurants that want to take advantage of extra sidewalk seating. 

The San Francisco County Transportation Authority (TA) has released a survey of nearly 1400 shoppers in downtown San Francisco that found less than one-fifth drive to shop, and that they spend less money in aggregate than shoppers using other transportation modes (PDF). The study indicates drivers spend more each trip than transit riders, but visit less often and account for far fewer total visits and therefore spend less total.

When Mayor Gavin Newsom dedicated the trial pedestrian plaza at 17th Street and Castro last week, he took a significant stride toward improving his record on livable streets issues. He demonstrated engagement with local community groups and advocates by taking symbolic and institutional steps that incrementally nibble away at the paradigm of streets that gives primacy to the movement of cars.

The Port of San Francisco last week installed the first 8 of more than 100 new multi-space meters along the Embarcadero from the Ferry Building south to AT&T Park in what will become San Francisco's new pilot in dynamic parking management, SFPark. The Port meters are the first of what will be a year and a half trial with 6,000 curbside spaces and 11,500 garage spaces in seven pilot areas around the city, most of them downtown and in heavy-traffic tourist destinations (see map below).

When tens of thousands of people come out to the first of two Sunday Streets in the Mission on June 7th, they will find a route that winds through some of the densest pedestrian streets in San Francisco, a route that at just over two miles is half as long as previous events and should lend to casual strolling perhaps more than cycling.

SFBC Program Manager Andy Thornley had the sinking feeling, following an MTA Traffic Engineering meeting last Friday, that the agency was not serious about its commitment to moving as many of the priority 56 bicycle projects forward as it should. According to Thornley, at least three projects were moved off the green light list pending further review by traffic engineers, for little more than minor and tired complaints about losing curbside parking spaces.