SFMTA

An online petition against parking meters in San Francisco has been gathering thousands of signatures ever since it was launched two years ago on MoveOn.org, a website that claims to host petitions that support "progressive" causes. It’s pretty easy to collect signatures from disgruntled drivers who have been stung by parking tickets, and who glance at a petition without being informed about the benefits of demand-based parking pricing. But MoveOn has actually been promoting the petition, helping to get the 4,000-some signatures it has today.

Chris Bowman, a Republican proponent of the Prop L "Restore Transportation Balance" ballot measure, aimed false accusations at the SF Bicycle Coalition and pro-bike SFMTA officials in a panel discussion this week.

When it comes to effectively enforcing parking regulations to make San Francisco's streets work more efficiently, SF hasn't changed much since 1988.

The SFMTA announced that red paint will be added this weekend to the transit- and taxi-only lanes on mid-Market Street, between Fifth and 12th Streets. The treatment, already rolled out recently on bus lanes on Third Street and the Geary-O'Farrell Street couplet, is intended to make it more obvious that private auto drivers shouldn't be in the heavily-abused Muni lanes.

The SFMTA and other city agencies will hold an open house tomorrow to kick off planning for a protected bikeway on the Embarcadero.

The SFMTA says it's impossible for stations on the coming Van Ness Bus Rapid Transit route to have one of the key recommended features of BRT: High platforms, at the same level as bus floors, that allow passengers to quickly step onto the bus. SFMTA planners say that complications with the design of Muni's buses mean there's no practical way to make high platforms work, at least without adding high costs associated with new equipment.

The SFMTA's endeavor to reserve on-street car parking spaces for car-share vehicles has yielded complaints from some car owners who, ironically, decry the "privatization" of space currently used to store private cars.

The purchase of Muni's next metro train fleet took a major step forward today as the SFMTA Board of Directors unanimously approved a manufacturing contract with Siemens.

For a quick preview of what Seleta Reynolds has to offer Los Angeles as the new chief of its Department of Transportation, watch this video of her commendation appearance before the San Francisco Board of Supervisors this week. Reynolds' item begins at 00:43.