Muni

In the lead up to the November 3, 1999 election, more than a year after a massive Muni meltdown and with ridership low, Proposition E was sold as a way to make Muni more accountable and set higher enforceable standards for service. It was also meant to improve street management and put more detailed transit-first language in the city charter. Voters agreed to create a new Municipal Transportation Agency, a "coordinated transportation system," merging the Department of Parking and Traffic and Muni into a single entity.

How hard is it to fix the most important street in San Francisco, one that is vital to transit, that is the spine of the bicycle network, and that could be the crowning jewel of the city, a Champs d'Elysee or a newly pedestrianized Broadway?  Without Mayor Gavin Newsom spearheading the process, it doesn't bode well.

Though Chronicle Watch can at times be interesting, today's post is misleading, even oxymoronic. The headline "Muni Buses Delay Traffic at Intersection" implies cars are more important, though San Francisco's Transit First policy mandates the MTA and other agencies prioritize the movement of buses, light rail vehicles, bicycles and pedestrians before motorists.

Though David Brooks might argue in his New York Times column that Americans want to live in small towns and suburban dreamscapes, the fact is more and more of us live in metropolitan areas, and discussions about what we want should have to do more with the context of those metropolitan areas.  Brooks should be looking at the quality of the public spaces where people live, and the walkability and ease of transit in those neighborhoods.

Transportation and social justice advocates packed the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) board meeting today to demand that the agency not spend a proposed $70 million of federal stimulus money on the Oakland Airport Connector (OAC) project.  MTC commissioners heard testimony for over two hours from some of the more than one hundred members of the public who were mostly opposed to the OAC, claiming it would take money from the operations of AC Transit and other transit operators. 

Bashing Muni, an agency that has been historically underfunded, is a San Francisco pastime. Riders are used to break downs, delays and general unreliability. Could all that be about to change?

California transit advocates have begun organizing a strategy to move legislation through Sacramento that would dedicate a steady, long-term state revenue source for public transit and prevent future budget writers from raiding it.

With overwhelming approval for the Proposition K half-cent transportation sales tax in 2003, San Franciscans  signaled they not only wanted to maintain a state of good repair and operational solvency for their transit system, they were willing to dedicate more than 25 percent of the tax to expansion, including a network of transit preferential streets and Bus Rapid Transit (BRT).  The first two BRT corridors will be on Geary Boulevard and Van Ness Avenue, the latter with a target opening date by Muni's centennial at the end of 2012.

Transit advocates around the state are trying to grapple with the new reality that the budget compromise worked out between Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature completely abolishes the State Transit Assistance (STA) and the $536 million that it dedicated to subsidizing transit operations.