Transit

San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee released his 455-page budget proposal on Tuesday. It includes $9.6 billion in fiscal year 2016-17  for transportation, police officers, and street cleaning, a $700 million increase in funds. The fiscal year runs from July 1 of this year until June 30 of next year.

Wednesday evening some 130 local residents and other interested parties dropped in at the San Francisco Day School to learn about the construction phase of SFMTAs Masonic Avenue Streetscape Project. To quote SFMTA's own release about the project:

Professor Jason Henderson's "Bicycle Geographies" class wants the ride from Daily City BART to San Francisco State University's campus to be comfortable and fun.

Monday evening the California High Speed Rail Authority, in conjunction with Caltrain, held a scoping meeting at the William J. Rutter Center at UCSF in Mission Bay. They answered public questions and took comment on plans to electrify Caltrain and bring high-speed trains from Bakersfield to San Francisco by 2029.

Last week, Streetsblog brought you an editorial from Katy Tang about the issue of installing concrete boarding islands on Taraval as part of SFMTA's Muni Forward project. This was in response to a headline in the SF Examiner, that declared "Supervisor Slams Brakes on L-Taraval Changes."

San Francisco has come a long way. That was the theme of a rousing speech delivered by Margaret McCarthy, Interim Executive Director of the SF Bicycle Coalition, at a ceremony this morning in front of San Francisco City Hall. "We've seen a 184 percent increase in cycling in the past decade," she said with her trademark ebullience. "San Francisco is a biking city!"

Back in February, Streetsblog reported on one of three meetings about SFMTA’s planned “Muni Forward” improvements to the L-Taraval line. Since then, SFMTA has held various smaller meetings with local stakeholders, confirmed SFMTA.

Monday evening, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition held the second of its first three scheduled "Bike Talks," a series it plans to continue to foster discussion and help shape its advocacy.

If passed by the BART Board this summer, the November ballot will have a $3 billion-plus bond on it to help BART upgrade its infrastructure, including about $400 million for new train controls and signals. BART's communications staff released some graphics to help voters understand exactly how much additional capacity that will buy, and what that will mean from a rider perspective.