Muni

Two weeks ago, Streetsblog did a Q&A with San Francisco Supervisor Jane Kim. Kim was on a trip to New York and arranged to do the interview by phone. Unfortunately, the connection was intermittent, there was some miscommunication, and the interview had to be cut short. A few days later, Kim asked Streetsblog if we could continue the conversation. Fair enough. (Since Kim is in a tight race for the California State Senate seat for District 11 with Supervisor Scott Wiener, Streetsblog will do another interview with him as well).

Sunday from 11 to 4 p.m. it was the Tenderloin's turn to enjoy its streets free of car traffic. The route followed Fulton St. between Hyde and Larkin, Larkin to Ellis St., Ellis to Jones St., Jones to Golden Gate Ave., and Golden Gate back to Larkin St. The streets were filled with various activities and opportunities, including a "kid's bike swap" with the San Francisco Yellow Bike Project, seen above, where families could bring their children's bikes to have them repaired or, if necessary, replaced for free (or with a donation).

Supervisor Jane Kim represents San Francisco's District 6, which includes the Civic Center area, Mission Bay, South of Market, and the Tenderloin. Kim also sits on the SF County Transportation Authority’s Vision Zero Sub-Committee, where last week she took SFMTA to task for not moving fast enough to install safety measures that might have saved the lives of Kate Slattery and Amelie Le Moullac, two cyclists killed in her district on a route she cycles herself.

The deaths of Heather Miller and Kate Slattery highlighted the obvious: San Francisco is not on track to Vision Zero, a commitment to eliminating all traffic deaths by 2024.

The deaths of Heather Miller and Kate Slattery, two more people killed riding on San Francisco's dangerous streets, has left the entire safe-streets community rattled and heart broken. Cycling advocates took San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee and SFMTA head Ed Reiskin to task for a tone-deaf press conference held Thursday about the carnage. The mayor said he was "outraged" at the deaths. Reiskin said to the Examiner that “the best bike infrastructure in the world would not have prevented these collisions.”

Editor's note: it's positively numbing that I can't finish writing a piece about two cycling deaths in 24 hours, when a third cyclist is killed, this morning, this time in Pleasanton. 

Earlier this week, the SF Bike Coalition announced it is tapping its development director, Brian Wiedenmeier, as its new executive director. Wiedenmeier takes the reigns from Margaret McCarthy, who had served as the organization's interim director during a search to replace Noah Budnick, who resigned last year.

Roberto Hernandez, the "Monarch of the Mission," didn't put down the microphone when his two minutes were up. Heavy set, with his trademark fedora, he had already gone several minutes past the cut-off alarm, shouting about how someone with seven children can't possibly ride the bus, reminiscing about riding a bike before there were bike lanes in San Francisco, and generally cursing SFMTA and the Mission Street transit-only "red lanes" that he connected with the ills of gentrification. At least, that seemed to be what he was saying, in addition to something about lowriders. It was difficult to understand, thanks to all the boos, hisses, and cheers, with roughly half the crowd shouting, "your two minutes are up!" or "cut off his mic" and the other half shouting, "Let him speak!"

This morning from 7 to 10 am BART officials, consultants, and even a legislative aide for Supervisor John Avalos's office answered questions and heard comments from the public about plans to modernize Balboa Park Station, one of the busiest in both BART and Muni's networks.