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Aside from Malcolm Heinicke's proposal to tax rental cars at SFO -- which was apparently shot down by legal staff -- no member of the MTA Board of Directors has offered any ideas for generating new revenue, other than toying or saying yay or nay to recommendations presented by staff, to help the agency limp out of the red ink.

According to a "fact sheet" (PDF) released by the Mayor's office Friday, "new operational improvements and efficiencies" have been identified that will amount to $3.5 million in cost savings for the MTA, including giving MTA Executive Director Nat Ford more power over the SFPD's Traffic Company.

MTA Executive Director Nat Ford sat down with Streetsblog San Francisco last week for an hour-long interview. In today's segment, he addresses the funding crisis facing California transit agencies, the long-awaited implementation of the Bike Plan and the internal MTA battle over how to balance the different modes.

You've probably seen this already. It's the latest graphic representation of the nation's proposed high-speed rail corridors, and it's been all over the transportation blogosphere since President Obama stood beside it at a press conference yesterday.

The California Transit Association has submitted a list of recommendations (PDF) to the Commission of the 21st Century Economy, a "bipartisan" panel mostly appointed by Governor Schwarzenegger, that call for establishing a "stable, predictable source of long-term funding" for the state's public transit agencies. 

At the end of March, representatives Henry Waxman and Ed Markey introduced an ambitious federal climate bill. This is the real deal -- the legislative centerpiece of President Obama's effort to combat global warming. Transportation contributes about a third of all greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., so any climate bill will have to green the way we get around to be effective. On that score, however, the draft legislation has some glaring omissions.

At a press event in DC yesterday, President Obama touted the two thousandth transportation project to receive federal stimulus funds. I'm speculating a bit here, but the White House probably had some discretion when choosing which item to highlight for this milestone. So did they pick a refurbished transit station? A new bike route? Perhaps a bridge repair project to signal that we're not going to repeat the mistakes that led to the I-35 bridge collapse in Minneapolis?

Editor's note: While changes appear to be in the works in London on the public space realm (check out our latest Streetfilm posted today), Chris Carlsson got a slightly different take when he visited there last week. 

In 2002, then-mayor of London Ken Livingstone launched the 100 Public Spaces Programme, a campaign to better realize the potential of the city's public realm. With guidance from Jan Gehl, the initiative emphasized reclaiming space for pedestrians and enhancing street life.