Oakland

Streetsblog did a survey tour of Oakland bike infrastructure last Friday with Walk Oakland Bike Oakland (WOBO) president Chris Hwang. The group's mission statement, from its web page, is a familiar one for safe-streets advocates: "We want every person who lives, plays, and works in Oakland to feel safe and comfortable walking and bicycling, and that they know how to make their neighborhood a better place to walk and bike."

Members of Oakland's "Mayor's Commission on Persons with Disabilities" (MCPD) are miffed at Motivate and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) for planning Bay Area Bike Share without including bikes for disabled users.

Oakland voters, as with voters throughout the Bay Area and the nation, will have quite a slew of decisions to make on November 8.

SPUR hosted a lunchtime forum today at its Oakland location to discuss the $1.5 billion Brooklyn Basin development. The panel, which was moderated by SPUR's Oakland director Robert Ogilvie, included Mike Ghielmetti of Signature Development Group, Matt Franklin of MidPen Housing, and Patricia Kernighan, who represented District 2 of Oakland during the authorization phase of the "Oak to Ninth" (now called Brooklyn Basin) waterfront housing development.

Jeffrey Tumlin, Principal and Director of Strategy at NelsonNygaard Consulting, has until early next year to put together a Transportation Department, pretty much from scratch, for the City of Oakland.

Tomorrow, Thursday, January 28, the BART Board of Directors will review environmental documents for Phase I of the proposed Coliseum Transit Village, which will bring 110 housing units to a parcel that's in walking distance of the Coliseum station. The hope is construction will start in November of this year, with completion two years later.