Muni

Editor's note: The following is being republished from SPUR, the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association. Visit their blog at SPUR.org.

A growing number of low-income youth who depend on public transit in San Francisco are finding it harder to afford the trip to class, but a resolution introduced by Supervisor David Campos this week could pave the way toward providing free Muni passes for the rest of the school year to thousands of students who are regular Muni riders.

Supervisor Scott Wiener, who has pledged to make transportation issues a priority, today called for a hearing to address a growing number of complaints about unreliability from riders on the J-Church line.

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) announced today that it has installed the 100th new transit shelter, representing a new aesthetic for one of the more iconic pieces of street furniture in the city.

When some very vocal Noe Valley residents went Tea Party over a plan to convert street space into a trial plaza on Noe and 24th streets, closing a portion of the intersection to cars, District 8 Supervisor-elect Scott Wiener stood firm in his support for the project despite the risk of losing a few votes.

One of the prevailing questions surrounding yesterday's nomination of Leona Bridges to the SFMTA Board of Directors -- a vacancy the Mayor's Office has struggled to fill for seven months -- is whether she can drum up the six necessary votes on the Board of Supervisors for confirmation, under the current board or the new one in January.

A plan [pdf] to widen the sidewalks and install transit bulbs on Carl Street at Cole and Stanyan is headed to the SFMTA Board after being approved at an engineering hearing this morning, though not without controversy. Even though it would significantly enhance safety and convenience for passengers at all three stops, and improve dwell times, it has drawn vociferous opposition from some neighbors who are upset by the prospect of losing nine parking spaces.

The SFMTA has released a much-anticipated bus stop consolidation plan [pdf] and while it is only in the planning stages and will take a concerted outreach effort to pass, the agency is finally publicly embracing a measure long pushed by transit advocates as an inexpensive way to speed up the system and make it more reliable.