Parking

The corporate shuttles that whisk tech workers from the highly-valued urban habitat of San Francisco down to the burgeoning suburban campus job centers of Silicon Valley are the newest additions to San Francisco's streets. But while it's become convenient for critics to point the finger at this increasingly-visible symbol of gentrification as the cause of everything from skyrocketing rents to blocked Muni stops, that anger is misdirected.

Cars littered on San Francisco's sidewalks are a painfully common sight. The problem is perhaps most prevalent in outer neighborhoods like the Sunset and Bayview, where, for decades, homeowners with residential garages have paved over their front yards. The pedestrian environment on these streets is left degraded, with swaths of dead space where families and people with disabilities are often forced to walk around an obstacle course of cars and driveway ramps.

In San Francisco's Chinatown, removing car parking is great for business.

Since the Fell Street buffered bike lane was partially implemented in November, drivers have continued to block it. Mostly, they seem to be customers using Bank of America's sidewalk ATM and truck drivers from Ted and Al's Towing.

The folks at SF Weekly seem really upset about the end of free car parking on Sundays. The shock is apparently severe enough that Erin Sherbert put up a post yesterday directing readers to sign the petition demanding an absolute end to the SF Municipal Transportation Agency's expansion of parking meters, launched by the Eastern Neighborhoods United Front (ENUF). (Just a reminder: ENUF's spokesperson won a Streetsie Award this year for "most absurd argument against SFPark meters.")

Updated 4:47 p.m.

Happy New Year, indeed. This Sunday will mark the day when San Francisco finally catches up with the times and runs parking meters during business hours on Sundays, ending the nonsensical weekly tradition of allowing prime parking spots in front of shops to sit occupied for free while drivers circle endlessly around the block.

Buildings in San Francisco would be required to include more bicycle parking under legislation being developed by the Planning Department.

Update 3/5/13: This bill was finally approved by the Board of Supervisors.