Muni

SFMTA Director of Transportation Ed Reiskin told the agency's board of directors yesterday that the earliest Muni could implement a system wide all-door boarding system would be sometime in the first half of next year.

Last Saturday, a standing-room only audience of 750 people turned out at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, Georgia to pay their respects to Emily Dunn, the 23-year-old woman killed by a Muni driver on August 19 while she was walking in the Castro. Dunn, who had just moved to San Francisco to start a new life, was just a step away from the curb when she was run over at Hartford and 18th streets.

Her name was Emily Dunn, and over the weekend, a steady stream of friends and people who never knew her brought flowers, candles and photos of her to the site in the Castro where the young woman was killed Friday afternoon by a Muni driver. A grief-stricken friend, who I met Saturday, said Dunn, who was only 23, had moved to San Francisco from Atlanta a month ago and was just beginning a new life.

Monday night's first major mayoral debate contained more political theater than substance, and it's too bad, because the very first question posed to some of the candidates -- who gave no real answers to it -- was a critically important one. The moderator, with a list of questions compiled by the Castro/Eureka Valley and Duboce Triangle neighborhood associations, asked the following before a large crowd at the Castro Theatre:

Two-way access on the east end of McAllister Street has been restored for Muni buses, bicycles, and commercial vehicles, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) announced last week.

The J-Church has emerged as the top candidate for Muni to test all-door boarding as a way to speed up service on its busiest and least reliable lines. San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) Transit Director John Haley said today that it is being evaluated for a pilot program that could lead to a system-wide change in boarding policy.

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) Board of Directors has appointed a regular bicycle and Muni rider to become its Chief Executive Officer, ushering in a new era of leadership that advocates hoped would dramatically improve sustainable transportation in the city.

The future CEO and executive director of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) should be a visionary who can focus on implementing a labor agreement with transit operators, improve Muni reliability, make more taxis available, focus on pedestrian safety and expand bike facilities, Mayor Ed Lee told the Board of Supervisors yesterday.

The grand jury issued a damning report on the planned Central Subway this morning, calling on the SFMTA to redesign the project "to better serve the San Francisco population," and hire an independent auditor to determine whether the $1.5 billion price tag is realistic, given the pattern of increasing estimates, and the fact that city will have to pick up any cost overruns.