Michael Rhodes

The MTA had some good news to announce today about Muni amidst a deepening budget shortfall, service cuts, and fare increases: the agency is launching a pilot program to allow senior and disabled customers unlimited access to BART within San Francisco and all Muni transit services with a single pass. At least during the pilot phase, the pass will cost $15, the same price as the regular Senior/Disabled Pass.

At the MTA Board meeting this Tuesday, MTA staff will present the findings of the pathbreaking parking study [Summary PDF] [Full Study PDF] released earlier this week. It's the only official discussion of the study scheduled for now, and advocates for transit and parking reform will need to attend in force to show the MTA Board there's strong support for the recommendations.

With several well-publicized violent incidents on Muni buses recently, including two brutal attacks and a videotaped fight, security has become a hot issue for the MTA. Though the agency actually reported a slight decrease in crime over the past fiscal year, it hasn't matched the 13 percent citywide drop in the most serious crimes over the first half of 2009. The San Francisco Police Department responded in late September with a one-day sting called "Operation Safe Muni," and the MTA has scrambled to test its onboard camera equipment, which has failed during several incidents, including the stabbing of a young boy in September and the West Portal light rail vehicle crash in July.

The recommendations in the MTA's new parking study, which Streetsblog reported on yesterday, are designed to make it easier for customers to find a place to park when they visit businesses on evenings and Sundays. The study comprehensively examines the demand for parking in all of the city's major commercial districts, aiming to extend meter hours only when and where demand overwhelms the number of available spots. If the MTA doesn't act quickly and strategically to sell the changes to businesses, however, the study's great promise could be overwhelmed by protests from merchants who don't yet see how the plan will benefit them.

An eye-opening report recently released by AARP , Reconnecting America and the National Housing Trust identifies the Bay Area as a national leader in placing affordable housing near high-frequency transit, but also points out that tens of thousands of subsidized units are at risk of being lost in the next five years.

TODs, (quilting) bees and more are all on the livable streets calendar this week, plus a chance to tour the alleys of Chinatown (for free.) Here are the highlights: Tuesday: SPUR Lunchtime Forum: Designing TODs. Architect David Baker explores how transit-oriented developments serve as a mechanism by which residents are able to make changes to … Continued

"Come to the SFBC office for a lively discussion on the trial Market St. changes. The traffic changes will have been in place for two weeks, and we want to hear what it's like to bike on Market St. with fewer cars, and at the intersections with forced right turns. We'll also discuss the other components of the Better Market Street project that will be rolling out in the next 6 to 12 months. We are looking for recommendations to make Market St. safer for bikes now, and in the long term."

The Municipal Transportation Agency and the San Francisco Police Department have launched a new initiative with Supervisor Carmen Chu to improve pedestrian safety around Muni light rail vehicle (LRV) boarding islands. The MTA has added new stickers to the front and back of LRVs warning drivers that they must stop and wait for pedestrians disembarking from the trains, and the SFPD says it will begin enforcing the law more aggressively.

A woman bicycling on Haight Street between Clayton and Belvedere was injured in a crash involving multiple delivery trucks between 9 and 10 a.m. today. Details are still unclear, but according to an eyewitness account, she was taken away in an ambulance, conscious but with apparent injuries to her legs.

More headlines at Streetsblog Capitol Hill