May 13, 2013

 From: Meter Madness

City Supervisors suggest a change in priorities at the SFMTA.  The crowd Cheered!

   Supervisor Malia Cohens Open Letter                          Supervisor Mark Farrells Public Statement

(District 10)                                                                      (District 2)



D2 Supervisor Mark Farrell: " I also want to be very clear. I am very much against expanding parking meters into our residential neighborhoods...... I have also made it very clear about my opposition to what is now Sunday parking meters here in San Francisco. Supervisor Mar has called for a separate hearing on that. I look forward to being part of that hearing."

D10 Supervisor Malia Cohen:  “I’m looking forward to, Ed Reiskin saying, ‘I quit, you won, we’re not going to be doing parking meters, " drew a thunderous round of applause.



Thank you District 10, Supervisor Malia Cohen, District 2 Supervisor Mark Farrell, District 6, Supervisor Jane Kim, and District 9 Supervisor David Campos for supporting the aging and disabled, small businesses, and working families in your districts.



Thanks to everyone who showed up at the May 2 Hearing on Parking meter expansion into San Francisco neighborhoods. Thanks also to everyone who wrote letters and comments and those who spoke at out at the podium. We have done a good job of impressing the Supervisors. Most of them are on our side and ready to call a halt to parking meter installations. Ed claims he has no plans to continue more meters in the city in the near future. He admits the Muni needs more of his attention. WE NEED TO HOLD HIM TO IT. SFMTA NEEDS TO FIX THE MUNI FIRST.

May 2 Public Hearing on Parking – on-line Recording (click on the 130155 bullet point)

In opening statements Supervisors Mark Farrell and Malia Cohen left no doubt as to how they feel about the SFMTA’s misguided parking and traffic management policies, and suggested that perhaps a change in priorities is needed. The SFMTA needs to fix the Muni first. They feel that SFMTA’s first priority should be to make the Muni a safe, reliable public transit system.

Mark Farrell voiced his position against Sunday parking meters and expanding the meters into neighborhoods. He is particularly concerned about families with children and those who depend on cars, being pushed out of the city.

"I also want to be very clear. I am very much against expanding parking meters into our residential neighborhoods... I have also made it very clear about my opposition to what is now Sunday parking meters here in San Francisco. Supervisor Mar has called for a separate hearing on that. I look forward to being part of that hearing."

David Campos got the most laughs when he said, “it would be nice if Muni buses were as efficient as meter maids swooping down on expired meters with tickets. To which Reiskin replied, “That is a good benchmark for us to use.”

The results of the hearing were positive for those of us who object to the proliferation of parking meters, but. we need to continue to push back against parking restrictions at all the neighborhood meetings and insist that SFMTA concentrate on fixing the Muni. When asked whether any more meters are planned for any other neighborhoods, Ed said “No.” He sees no more meters in the near term.

 

Additional Supervisor Comments from the hearing:

 

D10 Supervisor Malia Cohen: 

"Both my self and Supervisor Campos have had the luxury of dealing with this issue last year, and I'd also like to include Supervisor Kim. All three of us have been dealing with this... It's no secret that I have previously articulated many of the significant concerns that I have with MTA's current approach to parking management on behalf of my constituents... Fundamentally I believe that as it relates to the neighborhood that I represent, that the MTA is completely, frankly on the wrong track. My biggest frustration stems from the fact that that was no comprehensive approach to neighborhoods from MTA. Instead of looking holistically at what neighborhoods need in terms of transit, enforcement, and parking management, all these different divisions seem to be moving in conflicting directions."

D9 Supervisor David Campos: Campos:

"As representative for district 9, we have been dealing with this issue for quite some time... First I want to thank all the members of that community and the entire city that have been involved in this issue. I know that it has taken a lot of time and energy and it has been quite something to see the level of engagement and organizing that has taken place. Groups like ENUF and others and I really want to thank my residents for that level of activism.

I do also want to acknowledge that with Director Reiskin that there has been responsiveness on the part of the MTA, especially around the process, and what was the mission about a year ago was something that would have led to a very quick action being taken by the MTA Board of Directors. Because of the community involvement, and working collectively, with Supervisor Cohen, Supervisor Kim, the MTA has taken time to really hear what the community has to say, and let me be clear, I believe that we should continue to push for our transportation first policy and I do believe that it is possible to do that while at the same time addressing the needs and the concerns of these neighborhoods.

One of the questions I have as the Supervisor who represents one of the first parts of the city where this is being tested, where this is being implemented, is, what are the criteria that were followed in deciding where to begin this process. I know there has been a lot of reference to the Eastern Neighborhoods plan, lets make sure we are following the principals that are embedded in the Eastern Neighborhoods plan, including the very important policy consideration of protecting PDR businesses that many believe is not done with the current plan that the MTA has presented."

D10 Supervisor Malia Cohen:

"Each of our neighborhoods are unique and have different challenges, particularly in the South Eastern part of the city. I see the convergence of a number of things that makes MTA's current plan... if I may be frank, just unattainable. First we have had a historical lack of transportation.... Transportation is not reliable."

 

D2  Supervisor Mark Farrell:

"It is my belief that residents and merchants alike deserve to have an appropriate and adequate input about the draft plans that MTA has, and how it does potentially effect our quality of life here in the city. I do think it is important that we have a policy discussion here at City Hall about the potential impact of these plans so that we can do what is right for our neighborhoods. I want to be sure that moving forward we have a comprehensive parking plan for those first effected neighborhoods that work toward the city policy goals but also works for our neighborhoods and our residents and merchants that live there on a daily basis."



Statement from ENUF attached:

 

Muni’s job is to get us where we need to go, not tell us how to get there. The Supervisors need to take control of the SFMTA. Citizens are calling for a ballot initiative.

We have a number of problems that are becoming hard to ignore that are well-documented by the media:
The SFMTA is not doing the job it was set up to do. The SFMTA has taken on too much and is doing nothing well. Regardless of what the limitations of power are, the public has a right to weigh in on the priorities of all government entities.

SFMTA was authorized to fix the Muni system and balance the Muni budget. Transit first means fix the Muni first, not disrupt traffic and eliminate parking. No one is going to take a bus that never arrives. The number one job is to get the buses operating for the people who need to rely on them, not to coerce people to change their lifestyles.

SFMTA should not be enforcing parking meters, or any other parking restriction during the times when there is no reliable Muni service, such as nights, weekends, and holidays.
The ticketing appeals process needs to be fixed. We have admissions from SFMTA officials that the process is not designed according to law, but is designed to control us. Where is the separation of powers when the agency that benefits from issuing tickets handles the ticket appeals process?

To add insult to injury, there is evidence that the SFMTA, parking management contractors, and bicycle coalitions share a PR firm and lobbyists who work in concert to shape the laws to further their goals. We appreciate the efforts some Supervisors have made in attempts to curtail SFMTA’s bad spending and contract-signing habits when these matters have come through committees, and request that this denial of contracts be continued to include all non-Muni operations expenditures, to give the public an opportunity to weigh in on SFMTA’s priorities.

After cutting back service for years, and blaming everyone for the state the Muni is in, SFMTA officials now claim that they can’t fix the Muni. Why are we paying them when they admit they can’t do the job they were hired to do?

All neighborhoods complain about commuters who drive into town, park, and take public transit to their final destination. The obvious solution is to establish Park and Ride Transit Hubs around the city or on the periphery near freeway exits. Instead of having to transverse the city to pick up all the commuters, people can get themselves to a hub using whatever means they need to, and connect with a direct line to the center of town using whatever means of transport they want. This would not only work for all public transit vehicles, it would reduce traffic congestion and parking problems, and people would know where to go to catch a ride when they need to get somewhere fast.

 

- Mari Eliza, ENUF

sfenuf.org

 

Link to the hearing: http://sanfrancisco.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=164&clip_id=17412  (click on 130155, the third bullet point.)

Our summary on metermadness: http://wp.me/p2aXEz-13G

If you are pleased with the Supervisor's comments let them know: http://wp.me/P2aXEz-Uu

Write letters to the editors:  http://signon.org/tools/lte.html?id=12001-5432338-ny5g0w
 

Sign the Petition To STOP SFMTA

 

Tags

San Francisco Parking Meter Hearings, Supervisor Mark Farrell, Supervisor Malia Cohen, ENUF, Mari Eliza, 



---

Posted:  May 22, 2013

 

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary



"Stop listening only to the bike people

and start listening to the rest of us"

 

Supervisor Farrell

 

A commenter to a previous post referred to the May 2 meeting of the Board of Supervisors' Neighborhood Services Committee and the parking item:

 

It took a while but I think the bike coalition's influence at the SFMTA and SFCTA is about to come to an end. Viewing of the May 2nd Board of Supervisors meeting will show you that the vast majority of citizens are fed up. The loudest applause was for the gentleman who said "stop listening ONLY to the bike people and start listening to the rest of us."

 

The hearing on the MTA's aggressive expansion of parking meters in the neighborhoods---activating parking meters even on Sundays---was called by Second District Supervisor Farrell, one of several supervisors concerned about parking in their districts. The neighborhood pushback against an imperial MTA and its anti-car policies annoys the anti-car, pro-bike Bay Guardian and Streetsblog, but that's the thing about district elections---it makes supervisors sensitive to what people in the neighborhoods are actually concerned about. (District elections also allows leftists, who could never win a citywide election, to get elected, which is why they like this system. Ranked Choice Voting, another prog "good government" policy adopted by San Francisco, also distorts the democratic process.)

 

Meter Madness provides a link to the SFGTV video of the hearing and recommends starting at 130155, when the parking agenda item begins. But if you want to skip Ed Reiskin's boilerplate PowerPoint presentation on MTA's need to "manage" parking in the neighborhoods, skip to around 02:15:30 for the more interesting public comments.

 

Labels: Anti-Car, Ed Reiskin, Muni, Neighborhoods, Parking



 

---

 Posted:  May 19

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

 

City Hall's Campaign

Against cars

 

 

 

From: Howard Chabner
Sent: Friday, May 17, 2013
To: Mayor's Disability Council

Subject: MDC 5-17-2013 Meeting, Accessible Parking, Item #7

 

           
Dear Co-Chairs James and Wilson and MDC Members:

 

Last week I had a delicious lunch in Dogpatch, and I picked up a copy of the Potrero Dogpatch Merchants Association Business Directory. The welcome letter from President Keith Goldstein says: “Here, you will find that the weather is sunny, the people are friendly, and that we even have abundant, free parking.

 

MTA can’t do anything about the weather, but if MTA has its way, parking in San Francisco will be neither abundant nor free, not for disabled people nor for the general public.

 

On the one hand MTA never misses an opportunity to remove street parking spaces, and in their environmental documents they claim that removing parking has no impact because, in response to fewer spaces, fewer people drive.

 

On the other hand MTA adds parking meters, expands payment hours, requires payment on Sundays, increases prices and increases fines, all in the name of demand management because they say demand is too great and there is shortage of parking.

 

Of course placard fraud should be punished and eliminated, and the DMV should only issue placards to those who are truly eligible. For example, placard renewals are sent out automatically. I have had one since 1982, and after I submitted a doctor’s note to get my first one, the renewals have come in the mail automatically every two years. I could have moved away or died (or my medical condition could have been cured!) many years ago and the renewal placards would probably still keep coming. 

 

But accessible parking policy can’t be looked at in a vacuum---it must be considered in the context of San Francisco's campaign against cars, including removing parking spaces altogether, installing meters in residential neighborhoods, and eliminating many spaces (unmetered and metered) that have been de facto accessible, even though not designated as such (for example, the recent elimination of three blocks of parking spaces on Oak Street, and the reduction of de facto accessible spaces on JFK Drive).

 

To learn more about MTA’s campaign against cars, please visit:

Save Masonic: www.savemasonic.com

Save Polk Street: www.savepolkstreet.com

District 5 Diary: http://district5diary.blogspot.com/

Meter Madness: http://metermadness.wordpress.com/ 

Eastern Neighborhoods United Front: www.sfenuf.org

SF Park Info: http://sfpark.info/

Thank you for considering this e-mail.

Cordially,

Howard Chabner



---

 

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Posted:  May 8

 

Bike to Work Day: You're paying for it

 

Most people think that the Bicycle Coalition pays for Bike to Work Day, but in fact city taxpayers do, as City Hall pays the Coalition $50,000 a year to organize the event:

 

The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition hosts the most robust Bike to Work Day event in the Bay Area with over 25 Energizer Stations, urban bike safety classes and workshops, parties, raffles and giveaways leading up to the event to celebrate biking in San Francisco.

 

All those "giveaways" at 25 stations are paid for by city taxpayers. It's a lot like those TV ads for the Marines: city taxpayers are in effect paying to be propagandized by the Bicycle Coalition, a pro-bike, anti-car special interest group. 

 

Note that on it's website the coalition is still pushing the bike lanes on Polk Street. Like religious fanatics, they keep coming at us, but at least we don't have to pay the Jehovah's Witnesses as they go door-to-door in our neighborhoods.

 

You also paid the Bicycle Coalition $300,000 for the "community outreach" done on the Bicycle Plan, even though that was improper, since it had a stake in the outcome of the process.

 

 

 

Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, Parking, Polk Street

 

---

 

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary



The Polk Street survey

 

 

A reader sends this in:

 

Rob,

I see Streetsbloggers are unhappy that MTA proposed new designs for Polk St. MTA did a survey on Polk St., Tuesday, Thursday, SaturdayThe statistics are very interesting.

410 people were surveyed in 42 hours. 56% of the people surveyed live in the area of the Polk St. project.

How survey respondents arrive on Polk St:
 

• 5% by bicycle
• 15% by car
• 17% by transit
• 58% by foot.

Since 56% of respondents live in the area, no wonder they all travel on foot!

 

If you read sf.streetsblog.org they say again and again that 85% of people do not arrive by car on Polk St. That's true, but it's a distorted statement.

Streetsblog fails to emphasize that 5% travel by bicycle. That means bicyclists do not play a large role in Polk St. traffic. Therefore bicyclists should not be given a disproportionate representation in the Polk St. design by having dedicated bike lanes.

This is something to repeat over and over again, that 5% of bicyclists cannot be equated with 85% of traffic on Polk St.

Rob's comment:

That most shoppers/visitors on Polk Street get there on foot is why the city deployed the pedestrian safety lie to justify taking away all that street parking to make bike lanes.

 

The survey is really an attempt to reassure the small businesses on Polk Street that removing all that parking to make bike lanes will be good for business. Not surprisingly, those business owners think they know better than Streetsblog, the Bicycle Coalition, and Ed Reiskin---who makes $294,000 a year---about what's best for their businesses.

Reiskin and other MTA employees---there are more than 5,000 of them---don't have to worry about parking for their customers or about street "improvements" that could reduce their incomes. And if the MTA board fires Reiskin, he'll get six months pay going out the door!

 

Labels: Muni, Polk Street



April 22, 2013

From Meter Madness 

Public Hearing on Parking

  "every potentially affected neighborhood deserves a chance to speak."

                                                                                         - District 2 Supervisor Mark Farrell

 May 2 at 2:30 PM in the Board Chambers – room 201

The Supervisors have heard our complaints, comments, and requests for relief from parking restrictions in our neighborhoods. Please spread the word and get the message out to your friends and colleagues. Everyone is invited to attend, and give testimony at the hearing. FILL THE HALL. Raise your flag and wear your colors. Bring a written statement for the clerk and prepare to speak for around 2 or 3 minutes at the podium. If you don’t want to speak, your presence is appreciated as we need to fill the hall. Stay tuned for updates. Don’t forget to text and tweet on the day. You did it before. You can do it again. 

and Thank you District 10, Supervisor Malia Cohen, District 6, Supervisor Jane Kim, and District 2 Supervisor Mark Farrell for supporting the aging and disabled, small businesses, and working families in your districts.

                                                  Supervisor Mark Farrells Public Statement

                                                                        (District 2) 

      Supervisor Malia Cohens Open Letter                            Supervisor Jane Kims Public Statement 

 (District 10)                                                                             (District 6)

April 26, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary



More lies and anonymity from Folks for Polk

Labels: Polk Street



April 22, 2013

From The Santa Monica Daily Press

Key Accomplishments: San Francisco

March 4, 2013  

Editor:

I joined what appears to be many other Santa Monicans in examining the resume of parking consultant Jeffrey Tumlin (“Community groups demand consultant’s job over comment,” Feb. 27). Since I spend a lot of time in San Francisco and am familiar with its issues, I focused on the section called “Key Accomplishments: San Francisco.”

Once past the self-important hyperbole, Mr. Tumlin states that two of his plans together “help accommodate over 10,000 residents without an increase in traffic, largely by making walking more delightful, bicycling safer and transit more efficient and reliable.” Sounds pretty good, no? I heard his same rap before the Planning Commission, describing it as the perfect solution for building Santa Monica 2.0.

And exactly where is this new nirvana? Nowhere. It exists on paper only. He is referring to the Bayview-Hunters Point redevelopment, a projected 20-year process of rebuilding 1,300 acres (over 2 square miles) of a former industrial land pocket in the southeastern corner of the city. Partially occupied by mostly lower-end housing, it is well served by freeways, but future funding for the project is sketchy at best. Candlestick Park (home of the 49ers) is also located there.

Only a consultant would consider his fancy (and expensive) how-to plan as an “accomplishment,” when there are zero tangible results, nor any results-based metrics to judge it on. Based on his blue-sky projections, the city of Santa Monica bows at his feet, and is gambling that millions of square feet of new development are just what we need while already overwhelmed with traffic. What the hell kind of planning is that? Is anyone even considering the disastrous downside if Tumlin’s “accomplishments” are simply wishful thinking? It’s no surprise that private developers continue eating the lunch of our naive politicians.

Robert Scura

Santa Monica

So who's been looking out for the citizens interest? Its certainly not the seven-member SFMTA Board of Directors. 

The USDOT Office of Inspector General (OIG) maintains a hotline to facilitate the reporting of allegations of fraud, waste, abuse, or mismanagement in U.S. Department of Transportation’s programs and operations. Their phone is 1-800-424-9071. 



April 22, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Scott Wiener's lie about the Bicycle Plan

posted by Rob Anderson @ 11:33 AM   0 comments links to this post

April 22, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Committee hearing on CEQA Monday

Labels: CEQA, David Chiu, Scott Wiener



  April 20, 2013

Disability Rights Advocates to Mayor Ed Lee and Supervisors: Please Reconsider the $21 Million Masonic Bike Lane Project

Dear Mayor Lee, Supervisors Breed, Farrell and Mar, MTA Board President and Members, Mr. Reiskin, Ms. Lombardo and Ms. Chang:

I’ve lived on Fell near Clayton since 1988.  I cross Masonic as a pedestrian in my electric wheelchair at least twice weekly, and frequently roll along Masonic between Fell and Geary.  Personally, I don’t feel unsafe.  I also ride along and across Masonic several times a week as a passenger in my minivan. 

Please reconsider the Masonic bicycle track project (the “Project”).  As currently envisioned and as approved by the MTA Board, the Project would be dangerous to drivers and cyclists, increase congestion and pollution, create a hardship for residents, visitors, businesses and employees, jeopardize public safety by slowing emergency response time, and be a poor use of $21 million of taxpayer money.  The parking loss would especially harm disabled people and seniors.  Adequate studies have not been done about many aspects of the Project.  The Project is unlikely to solve the safety concerns cited as justification for it.  Masonic can be improved with more limited, targeted measures.  A better bike route can be created using Baker.  Finally, neighborhood residents were not given fair, detailed advance notice about the Project and a meaningful opportunity to express their opinions, and the Project doesn’t have “overwhelming community support.”

Collision Danger.  There are dozens of driveways along Masonic.  The Project would increase potential conflict between cyclists and drivers pulling out of driveways.  Drivers’ ability to see cyclists will be limited.  Also, cars pulling out of driveways on a busy street such as Masonic can only do so when motor vehicle traffic is stopped by a red light.  Some cyclists don’t obey traffic signals, and vehicles could be pulling out of driveways when they don’t expect any traffic, only to hit an unexpected cyclist.  Because many cyclists don’t use lights, this will be even more dangerous at night. 

            Instead of encouraging more cyclists to use Masonic, one of the busiest North-South streets in San Francisco, a safer alternative would be to create a bike route that includes the existing bike paths on Baker, which has much less volume, slower moving traffic and no buses.  Many cyclists already use Baker.

Congestion.  Motor vehicle traffic on Masonic was over 32,000 vehicles daily in 2010, per MTA.  Yet the Project would eliminate the extra travel lanes at rush hour, reducing the number of travel lanes to two in each direction at all times.  There is already gridlock at rush hour (for example, there is major Southbound backup on Masonic around Grove, Hayes and Fell during evening rush hour); the Project would make this even worse.  And because of the bus boarding platforms, only one travel lane will be moving when buses stop to load/unload passengers.  Consider how this will impact traffic when several passengers are getting on and off - vehicles will pile up behind the bus, and some will hastily and dangerously try to go around it.  The delay and congestion will be even greater when the lift is deployed for disabled passengers, which can sometimes take several minutes.

Not only will Masonic become more congested, so will the side streets, both because of the reduced traffic capacity of Masonic itself and because drivers will have to circle further and longer to find parking.  Over many years I’ve spent a lot of time on Hayes, Ashbury and Clayton; they are pleasant, safe and uncongested but are unlikely to remain that way if the Project is implemented.

Importantly, MTA did no analysis of the cumulative impact of the Project combined with the loss of parking on nearby Fell and Oak streets, and the reduction in travel lanes on Oak during morning rush hour, that are part of the Fell/Oak bike lane project.  These cumulative impacts will increase congestion.

With the new Target store at Masonic and Geary, traffic volume will increase significantly.  But MTA admitted, in response to a Sunshine request, that it didn’t do any studies on the impact of the Target store on the Project.  (Not only was there no study about Target’s impact on the Project, there was no study about the traffic impact of Target at all.  Per an e-mail dated August 31, 2011 from Jerry Robbins of MTA to other MTA staff, received in response to a Sunshine request, “There was no transportation impact study on [sic – Chabner note - “on” probably should be “or”] environmental review for Target as it was not a change of use (former retail use to new retail use).”)

Besides the overall increased traffic volume Target will generate on Masonic, one of the potential specific traffic impacts of Target is that, because the store has several separate, disconnected parking lots, getting from one to another requires exiting the lot and driving on the street.  According to an MTA staff e-mail received in response to a Sunshine request, “We really won’t know how the public will choose to park each of the lots and what issues this may raise on city streets until Target opens.  … We will have to do post opening observations and analysis.”  (E-mail dated August 31, 2011 from Ricardo Olea of MTA to other MTA staff.)

With increased congestion will come increased pollution.

Parking Loss.  The loss of all street parking on Masonic from Fell to Geary - at least 167 spaces - would be a major blow to the neighborhoods.  Large numbers of residents, visitors, employees, businesses, students and service providers rely on street parking.  The hardship would be at its worst at night, when parking is scarcest.   My wife and I don’t have a garage, so we know from personal experience how difficult it is to find parking in our neighborhood at night, especially on weekends.  We know firsthand that all of the street parking on Masonic from Fulton to Fell is usually occupied at night. 

According to MTA documents received in response to a Sunshine request, MTA didn’t study overnight or weekend parking.  (Also, it appears from the documents that most of the parking study was conducted on one day.)  Moreover, the on-street parking analysis in the Masonic Avenue Street Redesign Study Final Report dated January 2011 (the report on which the MTA Board based its approval of the Project) is seriously flawed in what it does cover.  It aggregates data for the entire length of Masonic from Geary all the way to Fell, disaggregating only the East and West sides.  But the Project area includes more than one neighborhood, each of which has separate conditions.  The area from McAllister to Fell is more purely residential and denser than the area North of Turk, which includes single-family homes with garages on Ewing Terrace, and institutions that are closed at night, including schools and a blood bank.  This presentation vastly understates the parking shortage from McAllister to Fell.  It’s also important to recognize that removing all street parking will have a major impact even in an area that may have less than 100% utilization, because all capacity will have been removed, not merely “excess” capacity.

Regarding parking near the Target, staff e-mails provided by MTA include statements such as “The assumption is that Masonic will not be significantly impacted.” [by the Target].  (Emphasis added; e-mail dated September 1, 2011 from Ricardo Olea to other MTA staff.)  Also, “We really won’t know how the public will choose to park each of the lots [at Target] and what issues this may raise on city streets until Target opens.”  (E-mail dated August 31, 2011 from Ricardo Olea to other MTA staff.)

People with mobility disabilities and seniors rely heavily on automobiles, so we would be even more impacted by the parking loss than the general public.  (I’ve written an analysis of this issue and will send it separately.)  Many people with mobility disabilities and seniors are limited in how far they can walk or roll, so the parking loss caused by the Project not only will make it harder for us to find parking, but will require us to expend more energy getting from a parking space to our home, workplace and business, and to the stores and restaurants we patronize.  It’s also relevant that San Francisco has fewer blue zones than legally required, and there are very few blue zones in the Project area.  The parking loss will also make it more difficult for us to have home visits from therapists, caregivers, wheelchair repair companies and service providers.

Emergency Response.  In an emergency, one minute of additional response time can literally be the difference between life and death.  The congestion described above will slow down emergency vehicles, especially when buses are present.  The bus boarding platforms will present obstacles.  The five-foot wide median strip will make it impossible for emergency vehicles to drive on the opposite side of the street, as they sometimes do now for brief but critical moments, and harder to execute fast left turns.

Lack of Fair Notice and Outreach.  I never received notice from MTA (nor from the Planning Department or any other City department or agency) about the Project - no notice of community workshops or any MTA Board meetings or hearings, or of any other meetings.  I learned of the MTA Board’s approval from SF Gate, after it happened.  I’ve spoken with dozens of people in my neighborhood, and almost none of them (and, on my block, literally nobody with whom I’ve spoken) received notice.  Yet MTA claims the Project has “overwhelming community support.”  At a meeting at City Hall on March 13, 2013 with Ahmad El-Najjar (Supervisor Breed’s Legislative Aide), James Shahamiri (an MTA engineer working on the Project) and a group of neighborhood residents opposed to the project, Mr. Shahamiri went so far as to claim that notice and outreach to the neighborhood not only were extensive and fair, but were the “gold standard” for MTA projects.  His statement shocked those of us present, most or all of whom received no notice.

In fact, however, MTA outreach and notice were deficient, and skewed heavily toward supporters and likely supporters.  Documents received in response to a Sunshine request confirm that MTA coordinated with the SF Bicycle Coalition and Fix Masonic in conducting outreach.  One of the only people I know in my neighborhood who received notice is a member of the SF Bicycle Coalition and a strong supporter of the Project.

I requested from MTA all documents regarding the geographic scope in which notice was given and the geographic scope in which notice was required to be given.  But MTA didn’t provide any documents regarding the geographic scope of notice.

It is just wrong and undemocratic for a major project that will affect the daily lives of thousands of people for decades to come to be imposed without fair notice to those people and without providing them a meaningful opportunity to be heard before decisions are made. 

If it truly believes the Project has “overwhelming community support,” MTA should agree to a vote (with one person-one vote, and voting to be conducted by an independent third-party) by notifying all residents, in writing, within a specified area of Masonic about the Project and giving them an opportunity to vote on it.  The vote could be binding or advisory.  (There is precedent for such a vote - in 2004, the Department of Parking and Traffic (MTA’s predecessor) held a nonbinding vote about the Page Street traffic circles.  Residents opposed that project 77% to 23%.)  I’m not being rhetorical here - I’m seriously asking MTA to stand behind its repeated claims and put them to a fair test.

Alternatives.  $21 million is a huge amount of taxpayer money to spend on a project that has not been adequately analyzed and will have so many harmful consequences.  Many of the collisions on Masonic occurred at night; lighting along Masonic should be improved.  Some cars ran into fixed objects; this can be mitigated by redesigning and/or moving street furniture and signal poles.  MTA should analyze whether left turns off of Masonic should be further restricted, and should consider how to improve traffic signal timing and configuration.  One of the two fatalities frequently cited in support of redesigning Masonic was caused by a drunk driver; the Project will not prevent deaths and injuries caused by drunk driving.  It also must be recognized that many of the collisions were the fault of the pedestrian or cyclist, and that collisions will occur when people act carelessly, especially on a major thoroughfare.  This is not to argue that Masonic can’t and shouldn’t be improved, but to recognize that there is a limit to what can be accomplished by street and traffic design.

Many of the bus stops on Masonic need new shelters.  The street surface is in terrible shape and desperately needs fixing.  Many of the corners in the Project area have steep, dangerous curb ramps that are in poor condition, lack textured domed warning surfaces, and are only on one side of a corner, forcing disabled pedestrians into the street.  I, and perhaps others, requested new, legally required curb ramps at these intersections years ago.  All of these improvements should be made ASAP, and they can all be done without implementing the Project and without spending anywhere near $21 million.

*****

            Please don’t experiment with our neighborhood and our daily lives.  In 2003/2004, MTA’s predecessor DPT installed traffic circles along Page Street without thoroughly analyzing the particular conditions and without fair notice to the people affected.  DPT engineers insisted, and insisted again and again, that these would calm traffic, but the opposite happened.  Fortunately, the traffic circles were temporary, inexpensive and easy to remove.  But with the Masonic Project, the collateral damage from the trial and error method won’t be so easy to reverse. 

            Thank you for considering this e-mail.

            Sincerely, 

           Howard Chabner - Disability Rights Advocate

April 18, 2013

From The San Francisco Examiner

Before asking for more money, transit agency needs to fulfill promise of Proposition A

"Of the $31 million in Prop. A funds appropriated this fiscal year, $23 million will be used to pay for transit agency employees including custodians, plumbers, gardeners, secretaries and general laborers, among others. More revenue will go toward a new dump truck and 50 of the small vehicles used by parking control officers.”

                                                                                                                                   Continue Reading the Full story Here

April 15, 2013

From Meter Madness 

Muni’s mismanagement of

Prop. A may hurt future funding tries

Will Reisman : SFExaminer – excerpt

San Francisco voters in November of next year will likely be asked to approve about $590 million in tax increases and bond measures for transportation improvements in The City. If the initiatives have any chance of passing — no certainty with high thresholds for approval — advocates of the plans will have to convince a skeptical public that they’ve learned their lesson from the last time they asked voters for money.

In 2007, the Board of Supervisors, led by then-President Aaron Peskin, backed Proposition A, a ballot measure intended to give the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency more control over revenue collected from parking meters and off-street lots. The initiative was projected to generate $26 million a year and help the agency toward its long-sought goal of fiscal solvency.

On the 2007 voter pamphlet, supporters of Prop. A said, “San Francisco can have the clean, safe and reliable transit system our world-class city deserves. This Charter Amendment is the next step.”.
On the 2007 voter pamphlet, supporters of Prop. A said, “San Francisco can have the clean, safe and reliable transit system our world-class city deserves.  This Charter Amendment is the next step.”… (more)

Posted in Anti-car tax, Bad Ideas, Fix the Muni, MTA Complaints, Muni, Protest, Public, Public debt, Public outrage, save muni, SFMTA budget, SFMTA Complaints, Transit First | Tagged Charter Amendment, Muni mess, Prop A, public debt, SFMTA | Leave a reply 

 April 15, 2013

From Meter Madness 



Where the SFMTA’s

Prop. A money has gone

By: Will Reisman : SFExaminer – excerpt

Prop. A, five years later: The second part in a two-part series explores where funding from Proposition A has gone since voters passed the initiative in 2007. It was intended to give the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency more control over revenue from parking meters and off-street lots to put toward the Transit Effectiveness Project. It appears that money has been put toward other uses.
From aging equipment to a lack of qualified bus drivers, problems with Muni are well-known to the hundreds of thousands of passengers who use the service daily. That’s why many residents would probably question how spending $130,000 a year on a plumber helps fix the transit system’s entrenched issues…
However, funds have been directed to areas that seemingly have ambiguous links to transit service, according to records obtained by The San Francisco Examiner…
“We gave the SFMTA and its commission unparalleled authority and took away oversight from the Board of Supervisors,” Peskin said. “But it has been a failure because the SFMTA has simply not used the money properly. I think it’s time to put oversight of the funds back into the elected officials who represent Muni riders.”
Quentin Kopp, a retired Superior Court judge and also a former board president, called the expenditures an expropriation of taxpayer funds.
“These are parochial and nonintended uses,” Kopp said. “The intent of this initiative was clearly not to pay for gardeners and plumbers.”…
The transit agency is expected to place a general obligation bond on the November 2014 ballot that would provide the Transit Effectiveness Project with $120 million, although that cash influx would not fully fund the project… (more)

Posted in Anti-car tax, Bad Ideas, Fix the Muni, MTA Complaints, Muni, Protest, Public, Public debt, Public outrage, save muni, SFMTA budget, SFMTA Complaints, Transit First | Tagged Charter Amendment, Muni mess, Prop A, public debt, SFMTA | Leave a reply 



 April 12, 2013



From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary



Walk to Work Day: Paid for by city taxpayers?

 

 

Here's a message I sent to Walk San Francisco:

 

Walk San Francisco:

 

Does your organization get city money to stage Walk to Work Day? As you know, the Bicycle Coalition gets $50,000 from the city to put on Bike to Work Day every year. Do you have a similar city contract? If so how much in taxpayers' money do you get to promote your organization?

 

Regards,

Rob Anderson

Walk San Francisco responds:

From: Natalie Burdick
natalie@walksf.org

Hi Rob,

Thank you for reaching out to us.

This event was not funded by the city. Walk SF organized the event, recruited corporate sponsors for the event and staffed with volunteers (as there are only two employees here). The SFMTA and the MTC did both make small inkind donations however (along with several other corporate donors like Ritual, FunCheapSF, etc.). They provided ad placements on a total of 15 buses and 500 Clipper cards.

Did you walk to work today? Or do you in general? SF is a very walkable city, but sadly 800 people are hit every year by cars (about 3 a day). This year, seven people have already lost their lives due to car crashes---these deaths and injuries are preventable by and large, and Walk SF is working to advocate for the changes needed to reduce pedestrian collisions in the city. Feel free to visit www.walksf.org to learn more.

Thank you, Natalie, for your prompt response. No, I didn't walk to work today, since I'm retired. But I don't own a car and walk and take Muni to get around the city, which, as you say, is a very walkable city.

Could you provide some specific dollar amounts for the SFMTA and MTC donations?

Your organization's support for City Hall's anti-car bike projects on Fell and Oak Streets and on Masonic Avenue is particularly galling, since those projects will result in eliminating more than 200 street parking spaces in a part of town where there's a limited supply of parking for people who have to drive but don't have garages to park their cars. Not to mention that none of these streets has a bad safety record. These projects aren't going to make those streets safer; they're just going to make traffic congestion worse. But that seems to be part of your organization's agenda, which seems to be the same as the anti-car Bicycle Coalition's agenda.

Yes, it's sad that people get hit by cars and die in traffic accidents. But, like the Bicycle Coalition, your organization is pushing its agenda by creating the impression that there's some kind of safety emergency on city streets, a bloodbath that can only be stemmed by making it more difficult and expensive to drive in San Francisco.

The facts are otherwise, as reported in the city's latest Collision Report that puts the city's traffic accidents in historical perspective. The city's streets have actually been getting safer for everyone since 1990 (pages 4, 5), though injury accidents to cyclists are up, evidently because there are more people riding bikes in the city. It should be noted, however, that, according to the SFPD's reports, cyclists are responsible for half their own injury accidents due to their own recklessness (page 24, 25): "Fault for collisions seems to be evenly split among bicycle riders and motorists according to the SFPD collision reports."

Something similar is the case with pedestrian injury accidents, though the percentage of pedestrians responsible for their own injuries is lower than cyclists. As you can see on pages 19 and 20, pedestrians are responsible for a third of their own injury accidents. But the trend over the years is clear: the city's streets are getting safer for pedestrians. In 2000 there were 32 pedestrians killed on city streets, while in 2011 there were 17 killed, which is indicative of the long-term trend.

In short it seems that the MTA is already making the kind of changes that have been making our streets safer for years. It's disingenuous to pretend otherwise, and we should give credit where it's due.
 

Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, City Government, Masonic Avenue, Muni, Panhandle, Parking, Traffic in SF

April 12, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary



 

 

A reader sends this item for our consideration. Yes, these bike punks are pretty tough hombres, since they aren't afraid to attack women:

 

Rob...thought you might find this interesting ...

While working, i casually listen online to the SFPD radio scanner (www.scansf.com) ...

At about 8:30 this morning[April 11] dispatch put out a call for an "A" priority 240 (assault/battery) in progress on Cesar Chavez in front of St. Luke's Hospital. Multiple 911 callers were reporting a man violently attacking a woman approx 50 yo with gray hair in a car...The man then was seen dragging the woman out of the car into the street and the car rolling away on its on down Cesar Chavez!
 

Originally thought perhaps to be a case of domestic violence, arriving officers quickly determined it was "road rage," cyclist vs. motorist.

At 8:55am, dispatch put out an "all" (citywide)...suspect wanted in a 245 (aggravated assault/assault with deadly weapon) occurred 15 minutes ago on Cesar Chavez at Valencia. Suspect is described as male, 6'4," 35, 210, wearing a long-sleeve purple shirt, black slacks carrying a black messenger-style bag.

He was last seen on a black bicycle heading northbound on Valencia and then east on 25th...

I'm sure your are shocked! lol

 

Examiner: "Let's start with the facts" on Polk Street

Labels: Anti-Car, Examiner, Neighborhoods, Polk Street

 

 April 9, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary



New website on Masonic Avenue!

 

Check out a new website---Save Masonic---to rally neighborhood opposition to the city's plan to screw up Masonic Avenue on behalf of the city's bike people. Welcome!

 

Labels: District 5, Masonic Avenue, Neighborhoods, Panhandle, Parking

City collects from broken parking meters!

Mari from ENUF sends this update:

the City is now saying it won't install parking meters (which is good) but it does plan to put in place 2-hour time limits along Golden Gate, Turk, and Parker, and 1-hour time limits on all of the Terrace streets (e.g., Chabot Terrace, etc.).

If anyone wants longer time limits (e.g., 4 hours along USF and 2 hours on the Terrace streets) or other changes, they should make their voices known to SFMTA and USF as soon as possible.



April 8, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

CEQA is good for California---and San Francisco

 

CEQA is Good for Working California

by Robbie Hunter
President State Building and Construction
Trades Council of California

 

 

April 2013 - Last month this column was dedicated to the history of deregulation and how workers inevitably pick up the tab when business blindly demands deregulation of longstanding protections that were enacted into law and regulation.

 

 

First, what should be asked is, why were these standards put in place? Why were these protections needed? Last month we spoke of the New Deal and the collusion between Wall Street, insurance companies, and banks that led to the Great Depression. In reaction, safeguards and regulations were put in place to protect the public and divide these financial institutions. These safeguards were removed early in the Bush Administration. And before Bush left office, the collusion of Wall Street banks and insurance companies once again almost led to the financial collapse of this nation. Working people, as in the Depression, paid the price.

 

 

When we deregulated the savings and loan industry, led by a company called El Dorado Savings and Loan, it led to the collapse of the savings and loan industry. We the public picked up the hundreds of billions in cost.

 

 

In California, when we deregulated the electric grid, Enron caused and manipulated blackouts to drive up their profits.

 

 

Now, deregulation is back. Special interests, developers and big business are on the march to deregulate the California Environmental Quality Act, commonly known as CEQA. This is the latest campaign in a war to rob California workers of a voice in decisions that affect their families and communities.

 

 

Since last month, the evidence has grown ever more convincing that California Building Trades workers, and working people from all walks of life, benefit from the safeguards and regulations that CEQA ensures them. Last month, a wide coalition of groups formed to defend CEQA from these latest attacks. The coalition includes the State Building Trades and other labor organizations, environmental groups, public health organizations, and elected officials.

 

 

As we descended on the Capitol to make our case to our legislators, we were armed with a landmark new study by University of Utah Economist Dr. Peter Phillips: “The Economic and Environmental Impact of the California Environmental Quality Act.” This study proves conclusively that CEQA has provided tremendous environmental benefits to California, while still serving to facilitate economic growth and construction work. You can find the study online here.

 

 

A news report from KCET in Los Angeles eported, “A new report released this month says that far from hindering the development of a new, greener infrastructure for the state, CEQA may have actually promoted such development compared to states with far less stringent environmental laws.”

 

 

To achieve their ends, the enemies of CEQA have widely circulated their myths: that CEQA causes unreasonable delays, that it somehow destroys jobs, that it allows frivolous lawsuits. None of that is true.

 

 

Consider this: California, with CEQA, has in operation solar power projects that produce over 10,000 megawatts of power. The desert states of Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico---which obviously don’t have CEQA---have a combined total of just 1,801 megawatts. Obviously, if anything, CEQA is facilitating, not deterring, solar power development.

 

In 2000 and 2001, I spent 14 months as an ironworker erecting the structural steel on La Paloma, a four turbine, 1,124-megawatt natural gas combined cycle power plant in Kern County. This plant was built using a wet-cooling process, which utilized water in the evaporators to cool turbines. The consumption is 7,000 gallons per minute for the next 50 years. The State Building Trades has taken issue with this old technology, when more air-cooled technology is available. We did this because all large construction projects in California must, by law, identify a source of water in order to proceed. At the rate water would be consumed by the 62 proposed power plants, new construction in California could be brought to a complete halt. So because of the scarcity of water, the Building Trades has pressed for air-cooled technology on power plants, and we’ve done this through CEQA. If La Paloma was built today using air-cooled technology, it would have a consumption rate of 150 gallons of water a minute, rather than 7,000. We should have used CEQA sooner. We’d have conserved more water to allow for more construction work.

 

 

CEQA has been accused of stopping construction projects in large numbers by the threat of a lawsuit. Of the 1.1 million civil lawsuits filed each year in California, CEQA accounts for less than 200, or 0.02 percent. The majority of this miniscule amount have been filed by neighbors adjacent to projects when a developer or public entity has refused to take communities’ concerns into account. These cases can only move forward if there is merit and a state statute imposes a $10,000 fine for litigation that has no merit. Again, the majority of these cases are settled within months with minimal impact on these projects.

 

 

CEQA has been accused of hindering infill. But an EPA nationwide study of infill projects from 2000 through 2010 in large metropolitan areas, found that three of the top four cities for infill development are in California. Yet another untruth.

 

 

CEQA has protected our health without harming our economy. We cannot afford more blind deregulation.

Labels: CEQA, Scott Wiener

posted by Rob Anderson @ 11:49 AM   0 comments links to this post

Saturday, April 06, 2013

The Valencia Street lie

What the city wants to do to Polk Street

Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, David Chiu, Neighborhoods, Polk Street



April 5, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Big Lie on safety

pushes anti-car agenda

 

It's important to understand that the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition and Walk San Francisco are special interest groups with an anti-car agenda. Some people seem think that the Bicycle Coalition is a city department. That confusion is understandable, since City Hall and the MTA treat it like one, including giving it lucrative city contracts to stage Bike to Work Day ($50,000 a year!) and other events. 

 

These organizations deliberately foment a sense of emergency about the safety of our streets to push "improvements" to city streets that are only designed to make it harder and more expensive to drive in San Francisco. The SFBC's Leah Shahum has been explicit about waging war on cars to make it safe even for children on bikes: "Imagine streets moving so calmly and slowly that you'd let your six-year-old ride on them." The only way that can happen is by creating gridlock on the streets of this major American city, a notion that doesn't bother Shahum, who had her life-changing bike epiphany during Critical Mass, the monthly demonstration by the city's bike people that deliberately snarls traffic for people trying to get home from work on the last Friday of the month. (Critical Mass also costs city taxpayers $125,000 a month for a SFPD escort.) 

 

Well, are our streets getting more dangerous, and are more people getting injured by those wicked motor vehicles? No, and that increased safety has nothing to do with bicycle lanes and other "improvements." In fact the city's own studies show that over time our streets are actually getting safer, for which we should be grateful to the MTA, which is doing something right. It's carefully studying dangerous intersections and streets to figure out how to make them safer. See the latest Collision Report that puts current and past traffic accidents in SF in context.

 

The Bicycle Coalition and Streetsblog are now whipping up indignation about the city's delay in creating the protected bike lanes on the Panhandle by citing an alleged safety emergency. 

 

That's simply a lie, which you would only know by reading this blog. The rest of the city's media act as megaphones for the MTA and the Bicycle Coalition. A good example is the Examiner's Will Reisman, who might as well be on their payroll:

 

Repeated setbacks to bike-related projects on Fell and Oak streets might delay the final completion of the plans until the end of this year, further angering cyclists and community groups. After years of contentious debate, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, which manages traffic policies in The City, approved the projects in October. Along with adding bike lanes---separated from street traffic by physical barriers---55 parking spaces would be removed and pedestrian safety enhancements like reduced crossing areas would be made.

 

In this pseudo-objective account about the project's alleged "safety enhancements," Reisman talks only to supporters of the project, even though there was substantial opposition in the neighborhood to removing all that street parking---actually more than 100 spaces, not 55---which is in short supply in this area.

 

As I documented during the run-up to the city's approval of this project, it's all about making cyclists "comfortable" riding their bikes on Fell and Oak Streets. The safety angle was nothing but an afterthought to justify a completely unnecessary project. Why anyone with any sense would even want to ride a bike on these streets is an interesting question, since Page Street and Hayes Street are safer nearby alternatives.

 

 

The Bicycle Coalition is pleased that Supervisor Breed, who's turning out to be Ross Mirkarimi in drag, is on board for this foolishness:

 

A central element to the project is the physical separation between fast-moving vehicular traffic and the people using the new bikeways. Supervisor London Breed recently recognized physical separation as a matter of public safety by emphasizing that everyday that passes without it exposes people walking and on bikes to undue danger.

 

No evidence is required for Breed to get on the phony "safety" bandwagon.

The Bicycle Coalition "demands" that the Panhandle project be completed by Bike to Work Day! Like the way the Bicycle Coalition and the city rolled over small businesses on Market Street in 2006 to make bike lanes in time for Bike to Work Day.

Elizabeth Stampe of Walk San Francisco cranks up the propaganda machine every time a pedestrian is killed in the city, regardless of who's at fault. The city's latest Collision Report (pages 20, 21) tells us that, like cyclists, pedestrians are responsible for many of their own injury accidents.

 

An added hazard is the increased use by pedestrians of electronic devices, which, like distracted driving, is causing a growing number of injuries.
 

Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, Critical Mass, Cycling and Safety, London Breed, Masonic Avenue, Muni, Neighborhoods, Panhandle, Parking, Polk Street

 April 5, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

The Bicycle Coalition

knows best

Labels: Bicycle Coalition, Polk Street



 March 29, 2013

Uninvestigated Conflicts of Interest will Bleed Taxpayers of $200+Million

New information has surfaced that would indicate that certain ethical rules may have been violated.

It is alleged that paid consultants for the SFMTA may been working with bicycle lobbyists at the state level to enact  legislation that would allow them to financially benefit from the placement of parking meters in San Francisco. The larger ethical issue is that these private consultants may have been passing themselves off as SFMTA employees while promoting parking meter placements that will ultimately make more money for their private employers (along with the City). In addition these private consultants and their employers may have been influencing decisions to put in place new policies, legislation, and parking meters that will continue to make money for their employers in the future. 

It is alleged that one transportation planning consultant may have cashed checks from up to four separate organizations (including a bicycle lobby) who all stand to profit from the placement of parking meters in San Francisco. According to the Santa Monica Coalition for a livable city this consultant has shown himself to be incapable of providing an objective analysis of their traffic and parking problems. It is also alleged that this consultant provided zero tangible results, nor any results-based metrics to judge his theories on.

Researchers must be able to design and conduct their studies in an unbiased and objective manner that is free from conflicts caused by significant financial involvement with the commercial sponsors of the research. In this case, the only sure safeguard is for the investigator to have absolutely no financial relationships with entities that support his or her research. If you piece these individual narratives together we encounter multiple conflicts of interests among the organizations who all stand to profit from each others actions (see May 8, 2008 - Thursday, 12:30 to 1:30 p.m).

Coincidentally, in 2008 a meeting took place in Portland, Oregon that involved members of the Bicycle Club and City Planners. In this recorded meeting they outlined their plans to acquire Federal Funding by advocating, and promoting a car-free movement.   Their plans included congestion pricing schemes and removing parking spaces from city streets. Many of their plans have been incorporated into the SFpark Program City Halls Anti-Car legislation. Is it Radical, Rich Kid Rhetoric, or a Conspiracy to Defraud Taxpayers? Decide for yourself. These uninvestigated conflicts of interest will put taxpayers on the hook for Millions of dollars and increase the cost of parking for every citizen / visitor in San Francisco.

Some people say the Bike Club has accomplished the goals they set back in 2008:

"I am working to get the city's Bicycle Program an extra few million per year to spend." 

Fast forward to 2013 and the MTA's 5 year strategic plan has allocated millions of dollars in deficit spending for bicycle projects that only 3% of the city will ever use. 



Mission Accomplished!  The Bicycle Club gets lucrative contracts from the city and operates as if it's a city agency. The anti-car lobbying group even got a $279,000 contract to do "community outreach" on the Bicycle Plan, even though, it had a stake in the outcome of the process. 

Highlights from The Battle for San Francisco

(July 3, 2008) Recorded Podcast

Download Full Podcast as  Single File

Skip Ahead to the time in the Podcast to hear the following comments

• 20:38 - "We are looking at $500-600 Million dollars a year from the US Government. There were earmarks galore for bicycling. I mean we know how to work the system."

•  20:20  “we need to extend to a car-free movement."

• 62:45 "Yes, if you are a contractor and you have to drive your truck to do jobs your costs will go up and that will cause inflation in the costs of getting someone to lay a floor.  It will increase costs for doing business and that's appropriate, and thats ok."

The installation of Parking Meters and Bicycle Lanes appear to be muddied by uninvestigated conflicts of interest. What Else is the SFMTA hiding from the Public? Are these uninvestigated conflicts of interest just the tip of the iceberg?  The Board of Supervisors, if it has any hope of restoring public confidence in City Hall, must audit every dollar the SFMTA is spending on programs, projects, and personnel. This process should immediately begin with public hearings and an ethics investigation. 

Click here to learn more about the uninvestigated conflicts of interest.

March 28, 2013

From Meter Madness 

San Francisco’s Transportation Authority Sacrificing CEQA Car Congestion Standards for Developers Money

By George Wooding

San Francisco’s Transportation Authority wants to stop utilizing car congestion and delays as a traffic measurement.

Buried deeply inside San Francisco’s California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) transportation regulations is a traffic measurement called “Level of Service” (LOS).  LOS was developed in 1970 as the fundamental building block of San Francisco’s transportation. The Transportation Authority is advocating for a change to CEQA regulations.

The chief function of LOS is to measure the delay each car experiences at a particular intersection.

LOS is a simple measuring system of how new real estate developments and transportation plans impact car usage in San Francisco.  Car congestion and delay measurements are rated on a scale of “A,” being good traffic flow — to a low of “F,” which means unacceptable congestion.

Under current CEQA interpretations, LOS is a quality measure describing operational conditions within a traffic stream, generally in terms of such service measures as speed and travel time, freedom to maneuver, traffic interruptions, and comfort and convenience of transportation.

The City, its Transportation Authority, Planning Department, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, and the Department of Environment all complain that LOS does not do a good job measuring environmental impacts.

These agencies believe that the LOS-based system needs to be replaced, as it supposedly will cause roads to be widened, sidewalks to shrink, crosswalks removed, dangerous bicycle lanes added, traffic lights to be re-timed, and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions levels increased.

In 1973, the City adopted a “Transit First” policy that gave planning priority to modes of transportation other than the automobile.  The City’s Transit First policy expressly states that decisions related to streets and sidewalks “shall encourage the use of public rights-of-way by pedestrians, bicyclists, and public transit.”

The “Transit First” policy was the first step toward demonizing car usage, blaming cars for GHG emissions, and for steeply increasing fees to own cars.

Now that the Transportation Authority will be trying to replace the LOS system in the November 2014 general election, car congestion and delay will become a second-tier priority.  Greater car congestion and delay is inevitable — and the City doesn’t care.

The San Francisco Transportation Authority —  the City department that serves as the designated Congestion Management Agency (CMA) for San Francisco under state law — is trying hard to get rid of the old LOS system used by CEQA, by creating a new CEQA transportation measurement system called Automobile Trips Generated (ATG.)

ATG is based on measuring 1) The number of new auto trips a new real estate development might generate, and, 2)  Charging developers throughout the City an arbitrary Transportation Sustainability Fee (TSF).

According to the Transportation Authority’s data, automobile travel still represents 56% of San Francisco’s daily trips, bicycles and pedestrians represent 26%, and public mass transit represents 18%.  Further analysis shows that automobile usage would be even more dominant if the length of trips were taken into consideration, because motorized trips are longer on average than bike and pedestrian trips.

The TSF used to apply primarily to just large downtown developers to help subsidize the huge transportation costs of bringing workers downtown.  Now, every developer throughout the City gets to pay an extra transportation fee.

For example, residential builders of housing and condominiums will now be charged a TSF of $5.53 per square foot for residential buildings.  Over a 20-year period, the Transportation Authority hopes to collect $138.8 million in residential fees and $493.8 million in nonresidential fees — for a grand total of $632.6 million in TSF fees.

The current LOS system requires an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) in cases when an initial study of a project indicates that removing an automobile lane in favor of a bicycle lane, or a transit lane, would likely delay private automobile traffic below a specific threshold.  These EIRs were very costly and time consuming.

The many potential lawsuits from changing from a LOS system to an ATG system will represent substantial legal and cost risks.

The new ATG system will almost never require an EIR, because the TSF money collected by the Transportation Authority is considered to be a traffic mitigation charge.  How clever:  The Transportation Authority is abandoning environmental impacts on car congestion and delays, so they can charge developers for transportation money.

The Transportation Authority now believes that any reasonable measurement of transit sustainability will satisfy CEQA requirements.

If ATG replaces LOS, the Transportation Authority has the right to do whatever it wants with San Francisco’s streets.  There is no person or agency in City government fighting for the rights of automobile drivers and their passengers.  Slower car speeds, delays, and congestion will not be as important as wider bus lanes, bicycle lanes, sidewalks, and limited parking.

There are currently 379,898 cars registered in San Francisco, 61,755 trucks, 20,144 motorcycles and 8,536 trailers, for a grand total of 470,333 registered vehicles.  And — no surprise here — only 320,000 legal parking spaces, and that’s before vehicles registered in other jurisdictions flood into San Francisco daily, competing for parking spots.  Will developers next be required to pay Transportation Sustainability Fees for the cars from other jurisdictions that flood into San Francisco annually?

 “Technical Review of San Francisco’s 2010 Municipal GHG Inventory Report,” ICF International, May 8, 2012.

Cars certainly cause their share of congestion and delay, but they have been unfairly maligned and blamed for San Francisco’s GHG levels.

Cars are constantly blamed for high greenhouse gas emissions by San Francisco transit agencies and the Department of Environment (DOE).  Yet according to the DOE’s own commissioned 2010 Municipal GHG  Emissions study by ICF International, gasoline-using cars represent only 9% of San Francisco’s GHG.

DOE Director Melanie Nutter stated in a November 19, 2011 Mayor Lee press release — which  announced that San Francisco’s GHG reductions were 15% lower in 2010 than in 1990 — that, “our citywide carbon reductions are the equivalent of taking 128,000 cars off the road, or avoiding the burning of 1.5 million barrels of oil every year.”

The reason that the 128,000 cars Nutter refers to is so high, is because the 9% greenhouse gas emissions for cars is so low. 

Additionally, why was Nutter so quick to blame cars for the reduction in Citywide GHG emissions?  According to DOE records, when the fossil fuel plants at Hunters Point closed in 2006 and the Potrero plant closed in 2010, the City’s GHG level plummeted by 11.6%.

As a corollary, if 11.6% — fully three-quarters, or 77.3% — of the 15% GHG reduction over a 20-year period that Nutter boasted of is attributable to the closure of the two power plants, this suggests that only 3.4% of the GHG reduction came from other efforts across those 20 years, including curtailing driving.  Is this the best San Francisco, and Nutter, can do without further punishing car owners?

Adam Stern, the DOE’s Climate Program Manager, forwarded another transportation graph which shows that DOE creatively combined cars and trucks into one category, and stated that the two combined categories represented 40% of San Francisco’s GHG.  Stern conveniently stated that the DOE couldn’t delineate between the percentage of cars vs. trucks using gas until 2014.  Does this mean that car owners are going to be scapegoated and bear the brunt, since the City won’t know until 2014 how much trucks are contributing to San Francisco’s GHG?

At a recent Transportation Authority meeting regarding the 19^th Avenue Corridor, one citizen declared “that he did not care that cars would be delayed.”

San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency Director (SFMTA) Director, Ed Reiskin recently stated, “While I think most San Franciscans believe in the principles of the transit-first policy, when you start talking about changing traffic, parking, or transit, it quickly becomes very personal for people.”

Car owners and local businesses are already starting to fight the SFMTA’s transit first proposals.  The SFMTA’s plan to add bike lanes and eliminate 320 parking places between Union and McCallister streets was opposed by hundreds of outraged citizens who live in the Polk Street area.  The SFMTA has shelved the plan for the time being.

Before the 30% of  non-car-owning citizens rejoice at the proposed attempt to replace LOS with ATG, let’s take a look at the good things that gas powered automobiles give San Francisco:

• Approximately 33% of MUNI’s revenue is generated by car fees. Transit First and MUNI could not even function without the supportive revenue from cars. Can either Nutter, or the Board of Supervisors, seriously believe it’s prudent fiscal planning to cut out 128,000 cars on the street — fully 27.2% of San Francisco’s 470,333 vehicle licenses — and doing so will actually help Muni’s budget woes?  Are the Board of Supervisors prepared to cut nearly 30% of Muni’s car fee-generated revenue (which represents 33% of its budget)?

• Cars reliably transport people to and from their destinations

• Cars give us the ability to cheaply travel long distances.

• Cars provide jobs for the local economy.

• Cars allow families more mobility.

Car fees are the driving force [no pun intended] behind almost every attempt to keep MUNI well maintained and solvent. There are currently 28,063 parking meters in San Francisco.  The SFMTA has an option to purchase an additional 10,000 parking meters.  Sunday parking was just implemented.

The SFMTA will issue over $100 million in parking tickets in 2013. [Another corollary is that chopping 27.2% — 128,000 cars — may chop $27 million from Muni’s income (27% of the $100 million) generated by parking ticket revenue. Just saying.]

In 2011, Joy Houlihan, Deputy Director of Enforcement for the MTA stated publically that MUNI revenues were down, so parking officers should issue more citations and bring in more money. 

State Senator Mark Leno’s SB1492 became effective on January 1, 2013.  This bill will allow San Francisco to increase its vehicle license tax (VLT) by 2%.  The Board of Supervisors is desperate to pass the VLT, since it will increase San Francisco’s general fund revenue by $72 million annually.

Under the new VLT rules, a motorist with a vehicle valued at $30,000 will see their annual license fee increase from $195 to $600 if the 2% VLT is approved.

Now let’s take a look at what MUNI is giving us:

• Averaging only 8.5 miles per hour, MUNI is already one of the slowest transit systems in the United States.  Remember, the 8.5 mph is a blended average between MUNI light rail and surface buses. How slow is a surface bus really going?

• As MUNI maintenance funds are constantly being siphoned-off by the Board of Supervisors for social projects such as free rides for children, the bus system is deteriorating rapidly. Just look at all the broken and inoperable escalators to Muni underground the length of Market Street. Apparently it’s better to have broken escalators so children can ride free.

• A recent Transportation Agency report said MUNI was on time on just 59% of its runs in October, which falls far below (by almost 25%) the 1999 voter-mandated goal of an 85% on-time rate.

MUNI’s slow service and unreliable scheduling make San Franciscans want to get off of the bus, not on the bus. Meanwhile, San Francisco’s mainstream media recently reported that Muni’s plan to reduce passenger congestion inside its own vehicles is to encourage riders to walk, instead, which any sixth grader can calculate will reduce Muni’s revenue. It appears Muni’s own advice to its riders is to get off the bus, too, lost revenue be damned.

Cars are one of San Francisco’s biggest cash-cow sources of revenue. If the Transportation Authority replaces LOS with ATG, car drivers’ reward for living in the City will be higher costs, more congestion, slower ride times, and less parking. For the price they are paying, drivers deserve a much better deal.

Car owners should strongly oppose changing CEQA from a LOS-based to an ATG-based transportation measurement system by contacting your elected legislators and representatives.

George Wooding, Coalition for San Francisco Neighborhoods

<END OF LETTER>

<Comments from Meter Madness below>

Thank you George. You did an excellent job of explaining the how’s and whys of CEQA reforms. Hopefully enough people will get the message and contact their Supervisors.

You also proved why the SFMTA plans to remove cars from San Francisco make no financial sense.

We all must insist that city officials get out of the planning business and deal with present realities. As people are starting to point out at public meetings, Every city agency doesn’t need to hire a mini planning department. The economy runs on the people who are here now.



March 27, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

flim-flam and bullsh*t: District 5 Diary

Calls out the SFMTA on their tactics

Bike people counterattack on Polk Street

The LA Times:

Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, David Chiu, Ed Reiskin, Leah Shahum, Parking, Parklets, Polk Street



 March 27, 2013

From Meter Madness 

Russian Hill and Polk Street businesses oppose SFMTA road safety plans

By: Paul Skilbeck : examiner.com – excerpt

Business owners and residents on San Francisco‘s Polk Street see cyclists as typically culpable in accidents with cars, scoff at the notion of global warming, and are strongly opposed to the SFMTA’s suggestions for improving their neighborhood.
This was the tone of a public meeting organized by the Middle Polk Neighborhood Association at the Old First Presbyterian church, Monday night March 18th.
View slideshow: Saving Polk Street…
The Middle Polk Neighborhood Association has aligned itself with a movement called Save Polk Street, which has opposed the SFMTA plan in a poster campaign.
MPNA chair Dawn Trennert repeatedly had to appeal to Save Polk Street supporters in the crowd to show respect for pro SFMTA speakers. Mr. Reiskin was loudly booed and shut down while attempting to outline his plan for pedestrian and bicycle safety improvements along the stretch of Polk Street from Union Street in the north to McAllister in the south…

Continue reading →



Added comments from SFpark.info.

According to ABC News local Polk Street Mechants are already circulating a petition to recall District 3 Supervisor David Chiu. 

We shouldn't really be surprised. This online resource says that the District 3 Supervisor, "introduced and successfully passed a resolution to encourage city departments and agencies to adopt a target for 20 percent of all trips in San Francisco to be made by bike by 2020". He is also committed to "Expanding Our Bicycle Network and Infrastructure" and "a strong supporter of SFpark technology that is currently in place in about a quarter of the City’s meters, and would push to expand the program city-wide."

At some point The Polk street merchants need to get on board with the news that their City Supervisor has been working to promote the interests of his friends at the Bicycle Coalition. Why else would he introduce legislation to close Market Street to cars? Its hard to imagine anyone who loves bicycles more than the District 3 Supervisor.Hey, isn't that the District 3 Supervisor on Polk street with the Director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition? It would seem that the Bike Network Expansion Is Transportation Priority #1 for District 3 Supervisor David Chiu. 

Maybe our pandering politicians should read a few comments from the citizens petiton to stop SFMTA. 

#1915          Mar 19, 2013     San Francisco, CA
SFMTA is implementing policies pushing families like mine with our 2 young daughters out of San Francisco. They have taken away 100 parking spaces in my hood to put bike only lanes on Oak/Fell with barriers. They are taking away 167 spaces on Masonic to make bike only lanes. They are trying to take away 200 spaces on Polk to make bike only lanes. They are doing the same on 2nd street. Those are just the ones I'm aware of. Why are they not listening to and working with residents, neighborhoods and merchants? So weird what is going on in our city. 

#1906          Mar 19, 2013     SF, CA
SFMTA is accountable to no one.... By making SFMTA independent it has become arrogant, nonresponsive to the citizens. It is constantly looking to increase parking fees and residential parking stickers because it can't/won't balance its budget, while at the same time giving out millions in free passes to students it can't afford while the bus maintenance program falls further and further behind.....They are clueless and radical in their agenda. These days they also seem to be nothing more than a mouthpiece for the SF Bicycle Coalition.....look at the proposals the SFMTA drafted for the Polk St. Demonstration Project: all radical proposals meant to benefit bicyclists and not the general public and neighborhood. We need a ballot proposition to put SFMTA BACK UNDER CITY CONTROL ! 

Better visit your favorite stores on Polk street before the Business Killing Bicycle Plan goes into effect. Clearly, the non-profit bicycle activists know more about the traffic on Polk street than the residents and merchants do.  

The rest of us are just a bunch of  NIMBYS!

ABC News covers the story Here read more about the bike lanes that are Killing Business in Manhattan.Join the SAVE POLK STREET MAILING LIST

March 23, 2013

From Meter Madness 

Updated Mission Parking Plan overwhelmingly Rejected by 93% of those in attendance

The following letter from Sylvia, who spoke out at the NE Mission Meeting

My sincere thanks and appreciation to ENUF for keeping all of us on the same page!.

Tonight (March 21) was full of miracles!

Residents, neighboring community activists, neighborhood small business owners, families and friends came together to defend and preserve our San Francisco way of life from the SFMTA’s sustainable streets staff and their highly paid consultants.

Although their highly paid consultants tried to convince us to believe their incredibly well written piece of fiction as Reality(?) it was overwhelmingly rejected as truth by 93% of those in attendance.

Even Supervisor Campos and his aides clearly saw that we were not going to buy the lie!

I tell everyone to take the time to follow the money as to who really stands to benefit from all this proposed madness.

The miracle that occurred was that all stakeholders, small business owners, their employees, friends, residents, neighbors, families, neighboring Polk Street business owners and activists came together and bonded in this fight against a social and economic cleansing of our working class neighborhoods by the SFMTA dictating to us how our quality of life will now be redesigned!

It now seems that City and County department staff feel empowered to dictate to us how we will live without being asked to do so!

We are the taxpayers who pay their salaries to do what we want them to do. They are our civil servants, not the other way around.  Civil servants are here for your service – not the other way around.

We all must all join and support each other in keeping our way of life that truly benefits the neighborhood and small business owners to avoid being economically run out of town. We must take over our communities so that we all can live as supportive and caring neighbors. This is not a fantasy – it happened tonight!

We need to gather together and discuss strategy before taking further action to defend our

present way of living. We all need each other to make this happen

To that end, I encourage everyone to keep in communication through SF ENUF.

ENUF is indeed a blessing to the San Francisco community. You questioned who really was being called to the table to discuss these proposed plans and the process. You asked who were the gatekeepers and how they stood to benefit from all this. One answer is the SF Bike Coalition – it is alleged that they are being paid by SFMTA as their consultants????  Conflict of interest?  You wonder why so many bike lanes??

Bikers should be licensed and ticketed just like car owners!

I am copying everyone who was generous enough to give me their contact information so that we all may continue to be in full communication.

Thank you all for letting me be part of a great event where many people stood up and fought against being thrown under the bus for the sake of corporate greed – remember – follow the money!!!

Sylvia

<end of letter>

<comments from Meter Madness below>

Thanks.  I was struck by the fact that I heard no mention of Muni or the pubic transit system at the meeting by either the public or SFMTA staff. This is pretty appalling given that SFMTA is supposed to be championing pubic transportation, not designing streets and disrupting traffic. This is what is wrong with Muni. The SFMTA and the public have given up on it.

This is why ENUF is calling for a moratorium on all non-Muni expenditures until the Muni is fixed and functioning. Take the billions of dollars that are going to bike lanes and street closures and FIX THE MUNI FIRST.

We don’t need a $5 million dollar party for a bridge that everyone will hate the next time they get caught in a traffic jam on it. We need reliable public transportation for those who need it.



Revised parking approach to Northeast

Mission still draws the ire of residents

By Will Reisman :  SFExaminer – excerpt



San Francisco transit agency vows to revise Polk Street plan following heated community meeting

By: Joshua Sabatini : SFExaminer – excerpt

After hundreds of merchants and residents gathered this week to blast a proposal to remove parking spaces along Polk Street in favor of bike lanes, the head of San Francisco’s transit agency agreed to go back to the drawing board.
Amid the show of solidarity, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency transportation director Ed Reiskin said he would return with proposals “that would have significantly less parking loss.”
Reiskin had a bumpy ride Monday night. When asked for specific removal numbers, he admitted to not having them — which prompted laughter and booing from the crowd. The agency had proposed eliminating parking from one side of Polk Street and partially from the other side to make way for dedicated bike lanes.
Merchants had spent weeks drumming up opposition to the proposal, even posting signs on their shop windows saying “Save Polk Street.” Business owners worry that loss of parking will mean loss of business.
“We really count on parking,” said Dan Kowalski, owner of the furniture store Flipp on Polk and Green streets. Any parking removal “we just think is wrong,” Kowalski said, adding that “Polk Street’s different; it’s different than Valencia Street.”… (more)



March 21, 2013

 SFMTA's "Delphi" Plan to Hijack streets from Mission Residents

The next meeting: Community NE Mission / SFMTA Meeting
Thursday, March 21, 2013, 6:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
John O’Connell High School auditorium, 2355 Folsom Street



The SFMTA will be returning to the Mission this evening to discuss their plans to Bleed more money from low income, working class residential neighborhoods. In the past the SFMTA has used a phony public participation strategy called the Delphi Technique to try and justify adding parking meters to the Mission. The Delphi Technique is very valuable in manipulating ANY meeting toward a predetermined end. There are variations in the technique but in general the SFMTA doesn't stray from their formula. 

In the past the SFMTA contracted with a facilitator to lead or “facilitate” meetings in the Mission. Supposedly, the job of the facilitator is to be a neutral, non-directing helper to see that the meeting flows smoothly. Actually, he or she is there for exactly the opposite reason: to see that the conclusions reached during the meeting are in accord with a plan already decided upon by those who called the meeting. They will tell you that that the conclusions, reached at the meeting, are the result of public participation but your choices have always been predetermined. Ask yourself if you, or any of your neighbors were ever given an option to opt-out of parking meters? No, you were not. There was never an option for you to choose "none of the above" or "other".

The San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency (SFMTA) recently posted a 5 year strategic plan that outlines a 1.7 Billion Dollar structural deficit. The SFMTA also recently signed a 5 year 43 Million dollar contract with the same private company that is managing Chicago's parking meters.  Under this contract, the company will provide parking meter operation support services for meter management systems and infrastructure, and the daily collection and reconciliation of parking meters. In other parts of San Francisco  the SFMTA has already started throttling parking meter prices, extending parking meter hours, and operating meters on Sundays.

Basically, the SFMTA is planning on using you good people like ATM machines to pay for their spending. At some point they will turn the meters over to a private company and screw you left, right, sideways, and center until the end of time. This evening they are going to try and tell you that you had a part in formulating the parking plan. Now, we all know thats a big bag of Bullsh*t because the SFMTA has been lying to all of us since day 1.

Your residential property taxes paid for building and maintaining the streets in the Mission. The SFMTA is trying to hijack your streets to pay for their overspending.  Use your first amendment rights and tell them how you feel about that at the meeting tonight. Tell the SFMTA that you do not want their Job Killing Parking meters in your neighborhood. 

Townsend Street was once a thriving mixed residential / retail neighborhood for businesses that employed middle class workers. The neighborhood has become toxic since SFpark installed their Job Killing meters. SFparks anti-business policies are very clearly killing the neighborhood here. How much sales tax revenue is being lost due to these parking tax machines? 



Many residents say, the city is using the meters as a tool for Land-Banking. (The clearing out of residents and small businesses to make room for big new developments). This is often used by city planners for Urban Renewal purposes. Depress the local economy, degrade the property, and pick it up on the cheap. Townsend street is a cautionary example of how reckless public policies end up destroying a neighborhoods vital fabric. Tell the SFMTA that you will not be run out of your homes and businesses. Tell the MTA that you do not want their Job Killing Parking meters in your neighborhood. 

March 19, 2013



Business Killing Bike Plan Threatens Polk Street Stores 

We heard it was a knock down, drag out, Jerry Springer sh*t show at the Polk Street Merchants meeting last night.  The Business Killing Bicycle plan was not well received by local residents and merchants who are concerned about losing business from the motorists who normally drive to the neighborhood. According to ABC News local Polk Street Mechants are already circulating a petition to recall District 3 Supervisor David Chiu. 

We shouldn't really be surprised. This online resource says that the District 3 Supervisor, "introduced and successfully passed a resolution to encourage city departments and agencies to adopt a target for 20 percent of all trips in San Francisco to be made by bike by 2020". He is also committed to "Expanding Our Bicycle Network and Infrastructure" and "a strong supporter of SFpark technology that is currently in place in about a quarter of the City’s meters, and would push to expand the program city-wide."

At some point The Polk street merchants need to get on board with the news that their City Supervisor has been working to promote the interests of his friends at the Bicycle Coalition. Why else would he introduce legislation to close Market Street to cars? Its hard to imagine anyone who loves bicycles more than the District 3 Supervisor.Hey, isn't that the District 3 Supervisor on Polk street with the Director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition? It would seem that the Bike Network Expansion Is Transportation Priority #1 for District 3 Supervisor David Chiu. 

Maybe our pandering politicians should read a few comments from the citizens petiton to stop SFMTA. 

#1915          Mar 19, 2013     San Francisco, CA
SFMTA is implementing policies pushing families like mine with our 2 young daughters out of San Francisco. They have taken away 100 parking spaces in my hood to put bike only lanes on Oak/Fell with barriers. They are taking away 167 spaces on Masonic to make bike only lanes. They are trying to take away 200 spaces on Polk to make bike only lanes. They are doing the same on 2nd street. Those are just the ones I'm aware of. Why are they not listening to and working with residents, neighborhoods and merchants? So weird what is going on in our city. 

#1906          Mar 19, 2013     SF, CA
SFMTA is accountable to no one.... By making SFMTA independent it has become arrogant, nonresponsive to the citizens. It is constantly looking to increase parking fees and residential parking stickers because it can't/won't balance its budget, while at the same time giving out millions in free passes to students it can't afford while the bus maintenance program falls further and further behind.....They are clueless and radical in their agenda. These days they also seem to be nothing more than a mouthpiece for the SF Bicycle Coalition.....look at the proposals the SFMTA drafted for the Polk St. Demonstration Project: all radical proposals meant to benefit bicyclists and not the general public and neighborhood. We need a ballot proposition to put SFMTA BACK UNDER CITY CONTROL ! 

Better visit your favorite stores on Polk street before the Business Killing Bicycle Plan goes into effect. Clearly, the non-profit bicycle activists know more about the traffic on Polk street than the residents and merchants do.  

The rest of us are just a bunch of  NIMBYS!

ABC News covers the story Here read more about the bike lanes that are Killing Business in Manhattan.Join the SAVE POLK STREET MAILING LIST



Posted on March 19, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

City Hall and the Bicycle Coalition

versus the neighborhoods

Photo by Anna Latino for the SF Examiner

From the SF Examiner's story on Monday night's Polk Street meeting:

Labels: Bicycle Coalition, Leah Shahum, Neighborhoods, Polk Street

 March 18, 2013

 

Is City Hall Paying Any Attention to us "NIMBYS"? 

Hey all you San Francisco "NIMBY's out there!  Remember the "facilitator" the SFMTA hired to do a "robust evaluation" of the SFpark’s impacts. You know, the one who was supposed to help us understand the true benefits of the SFpark Pilot?

Looks like he is persona nongrata in the city of Santa Monica. Turns out the residents in the City of Santa Monica did not appreciate him proposing ideas that will only benefit real estate developers, such as taking away parking and supporting more and greater density development.  Instead of collecting the data that might have helped City Hall make proper decisions it is alleged that this consultant gathered only what was needed for the city to jump to their own preordained conclusions. 

From The Santa Monica Coalition for a Livable City

City listens to residents and fires consultant Jeffrey Tumlin for disparaging remarks about Santa Monicans.

SMCLC's Letter Urging City to Fire Jeffrey Tumlin ... read

Residents' Open Letter to city to fire Mr. Tumlin signed by over 600 residents ... read

Jeffrey Tumlin's resume calling Santa Monica residents NIMBYS ... read

Lookout News on firing in response to residents ... read

SM Daily Press "Tumlin Out" ... read

SM Patch ... read

"Making matters worse, Mr. Tumlin's transportation proposals favor developers. He is proposing ideas that will only benefit developers, such as drastically reducing the amount of parking in new projects while supporting more and greater density development.  The fact that his proposals would make developers more money (by allowing them to build less parking) and residents more miserable, tells us that he is out of touch with Santa Monica"

The Santa Monica Patch

Has anyone in San Francisco City Hall checked the resume posted on the website Santa Monica Coalition for a Livable City?.

The SFMTA and the U.S. Department of Transportation were supposed to have conducted a thorough evaluation of the SFpark Project at the conclusion of the Federally sponsored demonstration Pilot.So, where are the results of the evaluation?

So who's been looking out for the taxpayers interest? Is City Hall Paying Any Attention to us "NIMBYS"?



to learn more



 March 18, 2013

Is SFMTA Misappropriating Public Funds to pay back Political Favors? 

Citizens are gathering this evening to discuss the City Halls Plan remove car parking from Polk street. One of the troubling details of the polk Street plan relates to the fact that the SFMTA is proposing to use Prop B General Obligation Bond Funds to fund this project.

While it is unfortunately the case that the language of Prop B does seem to include this sort of thing (the city cleverly added language to cover this sort of project, even though that wasn't front and center in how the bond measure was promoted), I think it is also fair to say that the average person understood the main purpose of Prop B to be, and probably the reason why most voters approved it, was to cover the very basic function of repairing the very poor condition of San Francisco's streets. And, of course, the reason that San Francisco streets are currently in such a poor condition is that the City didn't perform basic maintenance and repair over time but used tax money for other purposes. Is City Hall Misappropriating Public Funds to pay back Political Favors?  

One of the primary arguments about this project is that the City should FIRST use the bond money towards the basic goals of repairing the condition of San Francisco's streets and that, only after all of SF's streets have been brought up to the appropriate standard of repair, should the City consider more exotic uses of these funds. The fact that the City is engaged in this sort of planning instead of being focused on the basic function of repairing City streets explains why our city streets are in such poor condition.

Streets are being repaved, lanes and parking are being removed to make way for bike lanes. Thus, money that motorists approved because they thought they would get better streets are now being used for pedestrians and bicyclists. 



Are public funds being misappropriated to pay back political favors to special interests? Learn more today at the: 

Save Polk Street Public Meeting

 MARCH 18, 2013 6:30 PM - 7:30 PM

at Old First Presbyterian Church

1751 Sacramento Street between Polk & Van Ness

Join the SAVE POLK STREET MAILING LIST



 March 14, 2013

Were Private Consultants passing themselves off as SFMTA Employees? 

More information has surfaced that would indicate that certain ethical rules may have been violated. Evidence would suggest that certain Serco employees should have filed the appropriate statements with the city. The larger ethical issue is that private consultants may have been passing themselves off as SFMTA employees while promoting parking meter placements that will ultimately make more money for their private employer (along with the City).

In addition, the privatization of a public resource aided and abetted by the disguised outsourcing of public functions to a private company that not only makes money off its consulting function but which influences decisions to put in place new policies, legislation, and meters that will continue to make it more money in the future. 

The installation of Parking Meters continued to be muddied by uninvestigated conflicts of interest:

• With respect to Serco employees who implement parking management proposals that put new meters into the City.:

(screenshots -  from documents obtained under San Francisco's Sunshine Ordinance)

• List of Serco employees  from 2008-2012 and the employment dates.

•  List of Serco Job Descriptions

(Information -  from documents obtained under San Francisco's Sunshine Ordinance)

City and County
of San Francisco
Tuesday, February 05, 2013

I'm happy to start out my report with special recognition awards for a small number of those staff that we want to honor today.

So, first I'd like to ask our cfo Ms. Bose to come forward with lauren [Speaker not understood].

Lauren is a principal administrative analyst on the sf park team.

She's been a member of that team since November 2009. She has led the planning implementation of difficult and complex parking policy efforts including policies related to city and sfmta employee parking as well as various neighborhood parking management proposals, all of which have been very popular. Her general responsibilities include acting as project manager for on street parking pricing policy and implementation which is really at the core of sf park.

She is the coordinator for the neighborhood parking management proposals, including all the technical work and outreach.

and let me just say I've been able to witness firsthand in both small community meetings and large that she really has I think an exceptional ability to deal with what can be a very difficult and contentious issue and a very professional and responsive and open way.

But I think even those who may not be convinced of the merits of what we're talking about, I appreciate the professionalism and the openness with which she approaches all this. So, because of that she has helped advance the parking management policies that we see as essential to implementation of the strategic plan and she's done so and helped make those policies more coherent, transparent, and helped establish that clear linkage to the strategic plan.

She works across the agency, very much with the sustainable streets division with the enforcement folks and does that well. and I guess basically is I think a model of the professional thoughtful next persistence required to get even difficult to get projects done.

Happy to honor you and would invite [Speaker not understood] To say a few words. >>

good afternoon. I'd really love to say a few words. First I want to have everybody

stand up who is here to appreciate lauren. We love her so much. [Laughter] >> you see lauren has a big cheering section because she

provides that much value. Unlike me, I'm forbidden to go to community meetings. [Laughter]

>> I don't have the sense of professionalism and style that lauren does. Lauren really has been key to advancing all of the parking projects. And as Mr. Reiskin mentioned, it would be pretty controversial out there and very personal and negative towards the mta, both individually.

Lauren has been able to, in her way, diffuse that and calm people down. So, she has a skill set that I think will make her an incredible leader no matter what she does going forward.  I'm extremely proud of her and she really believes in the mission of the mta which is even more better. So, with that, lauren, a few words of thanks for everything you do. >> thank you on behalf of the board of directors and the entire agency for your outstanding work. And thank you for all your friends who came to support you and your colleagues. Great testimony to you. Love to hear a few words from you.

>> I really appreciate the award. It's really such a treat to have a job where you get to do relevant and interesting work every single day.

most of the crew who just stood up back there, the rest of the sf park, they're very talent and had a pleasure to work with. It's also great to have a chain of command that creates an atmosphere where you really can do the best work pottion every day. So, I very much appreciate that. And thank you for the honor. >> thank you.

Applause:

>> Mr. Reiskin? >> you're all free to leave at  any point so we can resume parking management. [Laughter] >>

<END OF TRANSCRIPT>

"The larger ethical issue is that private consultants may have been passing themselves off as SFMTA employees while promoting parking meter placements that will ultimately make more money for their private employer (along with the City)." 

What Else is the SFMTA hiding from the Public? Are these uninvestigated conflicts of interest just the tip of the iceberg?  The Board of Supervisors, if it has any hope of restoring public confidence in City Hall, must audit every dollar the SFMTA is spending on programs, projects, and personnel. This process should immediately begin with public hearings and an ethics investigation.

Read more about the Allegations of Fraud and Misuse of Federal Transportation Funding.



  March 7, 2013

SFMTA Documents Uncovers a deliberate attempt to hide Information from Citizens 

For over a year now we have been reporting that the SFMTA has not been transparent with the public about their plans to expand parking meters program into San Francisco neighborhoods. Time after time, citizens complained that the SFMTA did not provide them with any notice of public meetings. New evidence obtained through San Franciscos Sunshine act exposes a deliberate decision to not do extensive outreach or seek feedback on the proposed metering plan. 

See attached internal SFMTA email from Jay Primus to other SFMTA decision makers regarding the SFMTA's parking management policy document that provides the SFMTA rationale as to how it supposedly makes decisions on where to put meters.


Note the following:

Jay Primus says "Because this is simply documenting existing policy/practice, early on there was a deliberate decision to not do extensive outreach or seek feedback as we are not attempting to revise or update policy." (emphasis added)

He goes on to say "However . . . we've long planned to very publicly release the document the day it goes to the SFMTA CAC . . . Actively communicating will help to shape the message and be in front of any coverage."

"The larger ethical issue is that private consultants may have been passing themselves off as SFMTA employees while promoting parking meter placements that will ultimately make more money for their private employer (along with the City)." 

More information to come.  Until then...........Read more about the Allegations of Fraud and Misuse of Federal Transportation Funding.

Please sign the Petition to

Stop the SFMTA



 March 6, 2013

From The Marina Times.com

 Beware of parking meters in our residential neighborhoods

By Supervisor Mark E. Farrell, (District 2)  on March 1, 2013

Everyone in San Francisco is keenly aware of our city’s parking meters and the inherent need to constantly feed them or suffer the fate of sky-high tickets courtesy of our Department of Parking and Traffic.

Most of us also expect parking meters in common-sense locations, such as merchant corridors, major thoroughfares, and at our most visited destinations citywide. I, along with the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), agree that parking meters in these locations serve to help our small business community, fund a portion of SFMTA’s budget, and move further toward establishing San Francisco as a transit-first city. However, the SFMTA is currently moving forward proposed plans to expand parking meters into our neighborhoods and residential areas – it is already in the process with five neighborhoods in the southeast sector of San Francisco, including SOMA, Mission Bay, and Potrero Hill.

On top of their now established Sunday parking meter plan, which I continue to fight against in City Hall, these actions are starting to seriously impact the quality of life in our neighborhoods.

I recently met with many of our District 2 leaders, including the presidents of each of our neighborhood organizations, and among their top concerns were rumors about parking meters potentially moving into our neighborhoods. Areas that were discussed included residential areas surrounding the world-famous “crooked” portion of Lombard Street, Union, Chestnut, Sacramento, the Marina, and even portions of Presidio and Laurel Heights.

As early as February 2012, the SFMTA was nearly ready to implement its parking meter expansion program beginning in San Francisco’s southeastern neighborhoods. However, due to public outcry, the SFMTA agreed to delay the proposed plans in order to gather additional data and more input from the affected neighborhoods. In November 2012, the SFMTA provided an update to its “Neighborhood Parking Planning” schedule, and community outreach to the northeast Mission is currently underway, with outreach to Potrero Hill in March 2013, Dogpatch in spring 2013, and western SOMA in spring/summer 2013.

I strongly oppose the expansion of parking meters into our neighborhoods, and even though the initial proposed neighborhoods are not in District 2, I feel it is critical in my role as supervisor to be on the forefront of decisions that could ultimately affect our district before the potential problems begin to occur.

Therefore, on Tuesday, February 12, 2013, at the Board of Supervisors meeting, I introduced a hearing request to demand the SFMTA clearly articulate its parking meter expansion plans and programs into San Francisco’s neighborhoods. The neighborhoods in the southeast currently affected were outraged at the limited notice and public input given by the SFMTA before being told about the incoming parking meters, and I don’t want us to get caught by surprise in District 2. Specifically, I asked SFMTA to provide the policy rationale behind its decisions, statistics driving the parking meter expansion, the revenues the SFMTA anticipates from these new meters, and a specific update on future SFMTA plans and projects that include parking meter expansions into our neighborhoods. I believe that the policy discussion regarding SFMTA’s proposed parking meter expansion plans should start here in City Hall, and that this hearing will build and improve upon the public dialogue about SFMTA’s proposed plans.

I fully understand that SFMTA’s parking policies are designed to encourage travel by public transit and sustainable modes of transportation, and I support the majority of them. I further understand that SFMTA’s management of the City’s parking situation is done in good faith and has intentions of doing what is best for the transit priorities of our city. However, I have always believed that a “transit first” policy should not also punish those of us who drive. Even situations and plans handled in good faith often can have unintended consequences, and in this instance I fear that SFMTA’s plans may have negative consequences for our neighborhoods and residents across San Francisco.

In my May 2012 Marina Times column, I expressed sentiments that the SFMTA should reconsider its plans to increase revenue through Sunday parking on the backs of residents until it can get its own overtime costs and financial house in order. Those sentiments still hold true. City residents should not be asked to bolster SFMTA’s expenses by feeding parking meters in residential areas. Sunday parking meters are already a bad idea – let’s not follow suit with potentially one more.

(end of article)

How to contact Supervisor Farrell

City Hall
1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place, Room 244
San Francisco, Ca 94102-4689
(415) 554-7752 – voice
(415) 554-7843 – fax
Mark.Farrell@sfgov.org
http://www.sfbos.org/index.aspx?page=11506



March 6, 2013

Dear Supervisor Farrell, 

Thank you for supporting the aging and disabled, small businesses, and working families in San Francisco. We encourage you to scroll down this page to view a rough timeline of parking meter related events.

As you can see the SFMTA has not engaged the public in a meaningful way. 

San Francisco taxpayers have had enough of the parking policies enacted by the SFMTA. Making parking more difficult is not an acceptable method to control traffic congestion and finance Muni.

We do not trust a public transit agency that has no realistic vision of the streets of San Francisco, only plans for its budget, refuses to respond to the needs of the citizens who live and work here now, and piles on more public debt to finance a new controversial system before fixing the one the public relies on. San Francisco needs a balanced, unbiased, public transportation agency that works for everyone. 

We believe that there has been some level of deception on the part of SFMTA officials as well as  uninvestigated conflicts of interest.  The SFMTA has bled hundreds of millions of dollars out of San Franciscos economy and increased the cost of doing business in every part of the city. The Board of Supervisors, if it has any hope of restoring public confidence in City Hall, must audit every dollar the SFMTA is spending on programs, projects, and personnel.  This process should immediately begin with an Ethics Investigation, and Public hearings. 

Sincerely,

The Coalition

February 25, 2013

USF / Lone Mountain  Residents Outraged

by Proposed Parking Meters are Mostly Ignored

(pictured above) Thursday, February, 21, USF / Lone Mountain Community Residents raise their hands to vote against the SFMTA's plans to expand parking meters in their neighborhood. The primary complaint from many USF/Lone Mountain Residents is that the SFMTA did not perform adequate outreach to area residents before the parking meter plan was formulated.

"We were completely blind sided by the SFMTA's plans." said one resident who learned about the meeting a few hours before he arrived at USF. Other residents found out about the meeting through word of mouth from neighbors who live near the University. There was no mention of this meeting on the SFMTA's website and no official notices appear to have been sent out from the SFMTA.

In a rage that crossed economic and cultural lines, the message from USF residents to the SFMTA was clear.

Do not install parking meters in our Neighborhood!

A message from the University Terrace Association:

<end of message>

“We need to send a message to the Mayor and the City Supervisors to end this travesty” said Mari Eliza, who heads up ENUF, the powerful grassroots coalition of Eastern neighborhoods who opposes the expansion of parking meters into San Francisco neighborhoods. "ENUF has widespread support from the Eastern Neighborhoods and now we will be working with the USF Lone Mountain residents to stand up and fight back against the city’s parking meter expansion.

Eliza went on to say, "San Francisco taxpayers have had enough of the parking policies enacted by the SFMTA.  Making parking more difficult is not an acceptable method to control traffic congestion and finance Muni."  Concerned USF/ Lone Mountain residents should sign the StopSFMTA Petition which asks for the SFMTA to be accountable to all the citizens of San Francisco. 

Howard Chabner, Disability Rights advocate spoke out against the SFMTA's plan, "The SFMTA has not had a truly inclusive outreach effort. many people with mobility disabilities rely heavily on private vehicles." 

Many residents have asked aboutfiling Federal civil rights complaints because the SFMTA did not conduct outreach to minority, low-income, and limited English proficient communities in the USF / Lone Mountain area. 

Residents may file civil rights complaints with the following Federal contacts listed below.

August 29, 2012 

Mission Local Original Story

Business Owners: No More Parking Meters

By: Noah Arroyo | August 29, 2012 – 7:30 am 

Businesses in the northeast Mission have started organizing against a plan to increase the number of parking meters around 17th and Folsom streets. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) will meet with the community in September to discuss its parking management plan for the area.

When Angela Sinicropi, vice president of public affairs for the Northeast Mission Business Association (NEMBA), heard about the plan to add meters, she thought to herself, “You can’t do that, you’ll put us out of business.”

SFMTA first unveiled its parking meter plan for the eastern Mission in January, but the overwhelmingly negative community response sent the agency back to the drawing board. It’s not clear at this time whether SFMTA’s new plan includes more parking meters, according to agency spokeswoman Kristen Holland.

Even so, northeast Mission businesses are rallying preemptively through NEMBA, fearing that new meters could drive business away, make their employees’ lives more difficult and even put them out of business.

Parking occupancies in the area are some of the highest in the city, according to Holland, and open spots will become even more scarce when the lot at 17th and Folsom closes in the summer of 2013. A new community park is slated to be built on the site, removing roughly 250 parking spots.

Gwen Kaplan, NEMBA’s founder and the owner of Ace Mailing at 2757 16th St., said the organization stepped up its membership efforts because it knew that without more political bargaining power, neighborhood merchants wouldn’t stand a chance.

Since the beginning of the year, NEMBA has doubled its membership, now at 20 businesses. New members have joined largely because they expect parking meters would have a negative effect on their businesses.

“SFMTA has a lot of trouble accepting that people need these vehicles, but my clients wouldn’t be able to do work here if they couldn’t park their vehicles here all day,” said Sinicropi, who owns Sintak Studio, a rentable studio space for photographers, filmmakers and designers.

Other northeast Mission business owners worry about their employees.

Hans Art, who owns Hans Art Automotive at 3121 17th St., stepped up his involvement with NEMBA earlier this year when he heard about the plan to add meters. Art provides off-street parking for his employees but can’t accommodate all of their cars. If new meters go in, his staff will have to pay to come to work.

His employees drive to work because almost all of them have young children, Art said.

“When the school calls and something’s up with your kids, you’ve got to go. Waiting for a BART train just doesn’t work.”

Charlie O’Hanlon, new to NEMBA and owner of Charlie’s Place motorcycle repair shop at 3084 17th St., said the meters might just shut him down.

During business hours, O’Hanlon uses one street parking space and his shop’s driveway to park motorcycles awaiting repairs. His shop is too cramped to keep them all indoors. Earlier this year SFMTA said that seven parking meters would be installed in his single spot, because that’s how many motorcycles can fit in the space, O’Hanlon told Mission Local. Now he’s waiting to see whether the agency’s updated plans still include those meters.

O’Hanlon, who thinks he already pays the city too much in taxes and fees, said the meters just represent another tax — one that might push him over the edge.

“[The meters] will eventually make me either change my business or leave this city,” he said.

The parking situation also makes Mike York, who has owned Ocean Sash and Door at 3154 17th St. since 1966, cringe. Although he’s not a NEMBA member, he agrees that the meters would be yet another complication.

York sells items that are often too large to take on Muni or BART: windows, doors and various building materials. His customers need to be able to park their cars near the store’s entrance.

“Right now they can come here and park in the parking lot,” said York, referring to the lot at 17th and Folsom.

“Once that’s gone, parking spots on the street are going to be worth the price of gold.”

With this in mind, York is currently applying for two commercial parking spots in front of his business. If SFMTA approves them, he’ll provide them to customers.

Even if he gets the spots, York worries that the dearth of nearby parking will make his staff into “parking system monitors,” chasing away drivers who want to take advantage of open spaces.

“So all of a sudden we become the bad guys in the neighborhood,” he said, adding that he already has to kick drivers out of his two-car lot, which he reserves for customers.

Despite the number of northeast Mission businesses opposed to new meters, NEMBA president Doug MacNeil isn’t optimistic that they will get their way.

“SFMTA’s attitude seems to be, ‘We hear you, but we’re not going to do anything.’ My belief is, the parking meters are a done deal,” he said.





Mission Bay Original Story

Mission Bay SFMTA Meeting,

April 19, 2012 – Overview

Notes taken by Mari Eliza

City officials in attendance: Ed Reisken, Executive Director of the SFMTA; Bond Yee of Livable Streets; District Supervisor Jane Kim; Lauren Mattern of SFPark; and David Beaupre, Senior Planner at San Francisco Port Authority.

Ed started the meeting by explaining his agenda and introducing city officials.
Bon explained that SFMTA is installing meters to head off a future parking crisis.

They envision a very dense mixed-use that includes retail, offices, homes, and a ballpark with special events needs. For this meeting, they want to focus on Mission Bay proper, the area East of 7^th St., North of Mariposa, and south of the park.

Based on a DOT grant they received, SFMTA started to experiment with a parking management plan in 2008. Mission Bay was one of the first pilot projects. SFMTA has not yet determined the proper hours for meters enforcement, or the charges for the extended hours during special events, even though people are getting ticketed while they are figuring it out.

Mission Bay residents let them know that they were not there to talk about the future or special events. They were there to get some relief from the parking meters SFMTA planted in front of their homes that have turned their lives upside down.

The meeting changed course when a Bluxome Street resident spoke up and asked, “Do you only plan to discuss the special-events parking plans, because we are here to talk about parking problems residents have today. Residents are only mentioned twice in that plan. We want to apply for a residential parking permit. I gathered all the residents’ signatures. I was told that because the meters had already been put in, and we had no say in the matter, that they could not be removed.”

Complaints and comments

1. Lack of notice of the meeting and the venue
2. Request for mixed-use Residential Parking Permit
3. Objections to meters hours and rates
4. High-priced meters are pushing residents into other neighborhoods
5. No response from city officials
6. Smart meters are impossible for some people to figure out and use
7. Complaints about smart meters that are not charging the rates stated on the meters and signs
8. Signs conflict and/or confuse people.
9. Some signs are too high to read. mounted 7 to 12 ft above ground.
10. Request for parking handbook. No clear parking rules.
    
11. Mission Bay is poorly served by public transitN
12. No off-street parking options in the plans
13. Plans don’t account for the present residents’ needs
14. No conflicts with ballpark events prior to the meters
15. Conflicting time limit information
16. Maritime issues

General areas of complaints:

Residents complained about the lack of notice of the meeting and the venue. First complaint was about the poor job SFMTA did informing the neighborhood about the meeting. Second complaint was about the choice of a venue in an area not well served by Muni. The third complaint was scheduling the meeting during working hours so that many could not attend.

Everyone wants a new kind of mixed use Residential Parking Permit. The call for residential parking permits was repeated throughout the evening. A resident claimed, “We need another form of residential permit program for the mixed use areas. Right now your RPP program is designed for the Sunset and the Richmond. It was not designed for neighborhoods that are part commercial and part residential. You may need these parking meters in some places, but the residents in those areas should be allowed to park by their houses.” Other areas of the city have residential parking permits. Mission Bay does not. Even an interim RPP would suffice. There is some resistance from officials, suggesting residents may rely on the RPP solution if it is temporary.

There are objections to meters running from 9 to 11 at night for special events, including Sundays and holidays. “Why are we basing the parking on ballpark needs when the ballpark is a small percentage of the use and residents live there 100% of the time?”

High-priced meters are pushing the residents into other neighborhoods and do not solve the parking problem in Mission Bay.  Many people complained about the high-priced meters, and “the whole price manipulation scheme” that is creating havoc with residents all over the city while leaving empty meters all up and down the streets.

Many people claim they get no response from city officials after repeated attempts. People complain that their attempts to contact SFPark’s Lauren Mattern and other SFMTA officials have been in vain.

The smart meters are impossible for certain classes of people to use and/or figure out. The smart meters are too difficult for short people, disabled people and people with bad eyesight to deal with. The combination of the signs and the meter instructions are also confusing and often contradictory.

The smart meters are changing event rates for some non-event time periods. There are many complaints that the meters are not accurately following actual event schedules. They are going up when there are no events. People are ticketed anyway. “There is a difference between having meters and enforcing them.” Ed admits there are programming problems with the smart meters. There should be a way of forgiving these tickets. See notes below.*

Signs conflict and/or confuse people. Street signs are not consistent with the meter and/or parking lot signs. Some of the signs are over over 8 feet high and are impossible to read. Is a sign that is illegible and/or positioned in such a manneras to be impossible for a person to see considered proper notice? Is there a legal height limit requirement for street and parking signs?

There are no clear rules on parking in San Francisco. There are requests for public access to a parking enforcement officer’s handbook since the parking rules change so frequently and appear to be so arbitrary.

Many complain Mission Bay is poorly served by public transit. How are we expected to get around without cars when there is no reliable public transit in Mission Bay?

There are no off-street parking options and no plans to increase them to contain the expected population explosion.  Many complain of a lack of off-city parking options in Mission Bay, and the plans to increase the population without adding substantial public parking options, even though there are already demands for parking which are not being met.

Maritime issues were raised

1. Boat clubs and people who use the public boat ramp have no parking available other than street parking. “Now we have been here 70 years, going on 80 actually. And we are now going to pay a tax of $1.25 an hour on non-special event days to come use our club.”
2. There is major confusion over how the trailer spots are supposed to work and be paid for.
3. Limited parking hours don’t work for maritime use of the city’s only boat ramp.
4. Muni doesn’t work for people who use the ramps.

There were no conflicts with ballpark events parkers until the meters were put in. Over the years the ballpark, clubs and residents worked out the parking issues without a hitch and were getting along prior to the installation of the parking meters. Two-hour limit street signs are deterring use of the new meters. No one understands how to use the smart meters.

Conflicting time limit information – On March 27, 2012, on KQED’s Forum Jay Primus claimed “so time limits are now either four hours or there is no time limit at all.” Ed said that is the plan, not the present reality. Here they go confusing the present with the future again.

The plans don’t meet Transit First parameters in Mission Bay

1. SFMTA is picking and choosing what part of Transit First they implement.
2. No residential plan.
3. No off-street parking plan.
4. No plan for employees parking.
5. No reliable public transit
6. Arbitrary decision to remove street parking does not satisfy other Transit First goals
7. Planning for the future does not satisfy today’s needs
8. Forcing people to pay to park at home all day makes it impossible for them to  take the train or Muni or walk or bike.
   

Ed’s Admissions:

1. There are programming problems with the smart meters, resulting in arbitrarily high rates on non-game days. These should be contested and the tickets forgiven.
2. Tickets resulting from confusing signage should be forgiven as well.
3. There is a problem with the conflicting time limits.
4. There is not sufficient public transit into Mission Bay.
5. There are legitimate complaints that, when filed with the DPT with proper documents proving meter problems and/or conflicting signs during certain dates, should be forgiven
6. SFMTA has no results from analysis or evidence that the smart meter system is working as promised.
7. The web site is awful.

SFMTA promised to conduct another meeting, probably on Saturday and that they would pick a place near public transit next time.

My Notes:

1. The smart meters don’t really operate as promised.
2. People don’t like them
3. You must have a smart phone to use some of the features, such as the ability to add time by paying remotely on your smart phone, which appears to discriminate against people without smart phones, and people who aren’t tech savvy. Even tech savvy people are confused by the meters.
4. Short and disabled people can’t read them.
5. Ed admitted the smart meters have a programming problem.
6. The signs contradict the meters and the actual hours are not properly noticed.
7. Some of the signs, especially on Pier 52, are positioned to high for the average person to read.

Maritime issues were raised

1. Boat clubs have no parking available other than street parking. Now we have been here 70 years, going on 80 actually. And we are now going to pay a tax of $1.25 an hour on non-special event days to come use our club.
2. Major confusion over how the trailer spots are supposed to work and be paid for.
3. Limited parking hours doesn’t work for maritime use of the city’s only boat ramp.
4. Muni doesn’t work for people who must carry a heavy load.

Mission Local Original Story



Residents Outraged by Proposed Parking Meters Are Mostly Ignored

By Rigoberto HernandezPosted January 13, 2012 5:26 pm

En Español.

For nearly three hours, citizens at a public hearing expressed unanimous outrage in their opposition to a proposal to install hundreds of parking meters in the Mission. Afterward, a city transit official said that minor changes would be considered, but recommended that the city approve the new meters.

“Unbelievable. Those three hours were a waste of our time,” said Hannah McFaull of Pirate Press in the Potrero Hill District. “They made their decision after talking for five minutes, without taking our comments into consideration.”

The meters will be placed throughout the northeast Mission and other southeastern neighborhoods.

Hearing officer John Newlin said he made his decision based on the project’s merits.

“It’s not a numbers game,” he said, referring to the number of people who spoke in opposition at the public hearing at City Hall. “It’s doing what’s best for the situation.”

The proposal calls for the installation of hundreds of parking meters from South Van Ness to Potrero Avenue and Division to 19th Street. The meters would have no time limits and would operate Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Newlin and staff from the city’s SF Park project decided to revisit proposed changes on Shotwell from 15th to 16th streets and on 15th between Folsom and Shotwell, because those blocks are residential. Those revisions, which may include residential parking permits, will be unveiled when the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) board of directors considers the proposal in February.

The parking meters were conceived as a way to solve the on-street parking shortage created by the construction of a park on a city-owned lot at 17th and Folsom streets.

Residents and business owners, many of whom took the morning off to attend the hearing, asked the SFMTA to work with them, saying they had only recently found out about the proposal.

They argued that it was developed without taking into account that the northeast Mission and the southeastern neighborhoods include commercial, industrial, residential and other live and work spaces.

“They can install parking meters in their heads for all I care, but we need residential parking permits,” Marc Glom said. “I already pay $12,000 to the city in taxes; I am not going to give them more quarters.”

The news that for the most part the parking meters would not be reconsidered outraged residents. They called the process undemocratic and arbitrary.

“Let’s call it what it is,” one resident said, referring to the new revenue the meters will bring in. “It’s a money grab.”

The parking situation in the northeast Mission is chaotic in the daytime but manageable at night, residents said. It is a favorite parking area for out-of-town commuters who work downtown, people who sleep in their cars, and bus drivers who don’t want to pay for parking at the Muni yard at 17th and Bryant streets. In some areas, the only restriction is for street sweeping once a week.

Jay Primus of SFPark argued that the proposal is consistent with the city’s transit-first policy, which encourages people to take public transit, walk or bike. Furthermore, Primus said, adjusted pricing, which adjusts the price of the meters depending on demand, could reduce the number of people circling around the neighborhood looking for parking.

Ann Colichidas speaks out against a proposal to install hundreds of meters in the Mission.

Primus said that rates would start at 25 cents an hour, and the fact that the meters will not have time limits means that people can potentially park all day.

Some residents laughed at the idea.

“Twenty-five cents an hour sounds good, but how long will that last?” asked Ann Colichidas.

Residents argued that once the parking meters are installed, there will be no going back. Trimark, a kitchen equipment company in Potrero Hill, threatened to leave the city.

Even some who might benefit from a faster parking turnaround oppose the proposal. San Francisco Animal Care and Control (SFACC) on 15th Street, for example, believes new meters could deter people from volunteering, an official said.

Rebecca Katz, SFACC’s director, said the SFMTA should enforce its own rules, such as not allowing people to sleep in their cars and asking Muni drivers to pay for parking.

Residents said the SFMTA is not keeping its end of the bargain when it comes to putting transit first. They argued that Muni service is poor and that for many business and residents, taking transit is not an option.





February 28, 2013

Uninvestigated Conflicts of Interest: SF Citizens Demand ETHICS INVESTIGATION

The installation of Parking Meters and Bicycle Lanes appear to be muddied by uninvestigated conflicts of interest:

• With respect to Serco employees who implement parking management proposals that put new meters into the City.:

• (below) list of Serco employees  from 2008-2012 and the employment dates.

• List of Serco Job Descriptions

(screenshots -  from documents obtained under San Francisco's Sunshine Ordinance)

(Information -  from documents obtained under San Francisco's Sunshine Ordinance)

City and County
of San Francisco
Tuesday, February 05, 2013

I'm happy to start out my report with special recognition awards for a small number of those staff that we want to honor today.

So, first I'd like to ask our cfo Ms. Bose to come forward with lauren [Speaker not understood].

Lauren is a principal administrative analyst on the sf park team.

She's been a member of that team since November 2009. She has led the planning implementation of difficult and complex parking policy efforts including policies related to city and sfmta employee parking as well as various neighborhood parking management proposals, all of which have been very popular. Her general responsibilities include acting as project manager for on street parking pricing policy and implementation which is really at the core of sf park.

She is the coordinator for the neighborhood parking management proposals, including all the technical work and outreach.

and let me just say I've been able to witness firsthand in both small community meetings and large that she really has I think an exceptional ability to deal with what can be a very difficult and contentious issue and a very professional and responsive and open way.

But I think even those who may not be convinced of the merits of what we're talking about, I appreciate the professionalism and the openness with which she approaches all this. So, because of that she has helped advance the parking management policies that we see as essential to implementation of the strategic plan and she's done so and helped make those policies more coherent, transparent, and helped establish that clear linkage to the strategic plan.

She works across the agency, very much with the sustainable streets division with the enforcement folks and does that well. and I guess basically is I think a model of the professional thoughtful next persistence required to get even difficult to get projects done.

Happy to honor you and would invite [Speaker not understood] To say a few words. >>

good afternoon. I'd really love to say a few words. First I want to have everybody

stand up who is here to appreciate lauren. We love her so much. [Laughter] >> you see lauren has a big cheering section because she

provides that much value. Unlike me, I'm forbidden to go to community meetings. [Laughter]

>> I don't have the sense of professionalism and style that lauren does. Lauren really has been key to advancing all of the parking projects. And as Mr. Reiskin mentioned, it would be pretty controversial out there and very personal and negative towards the mta, both individually.

Lauren has been able to, in her way, diffuse that and calm people down. So, she has a skill set that I think will make her an incredible leader no matter what she does going forward.  I'm extremely proud of her and she really believes in the mission of the mta which is even more better. So, with that, lauren, a few words of thanks for everything you do. >> thank you on behalf of the board of directors and the entire agency for your outstanding work. And thank you for all your friends who came to support you and your colleagues. Great testimony to you. Love to hear a few words from you.

>> I really appreciate the award. It's really such a treat to have a job where you get to do relevant and interesting work every single day.

most of the crew who just stood up back there, the rest of the sf park, they're very talent and had a pleasure to work with. It's also great to have a chain of command that creates an atmosphere where you really can do the best work pottion every day. So, I very much appreciate that. And thank you for the honor. >> thank you.

Applause:

>> Mr. Reiskin? >> you're all free to leave at  any point so we can resume parking management. [Laughter] >>

 

• With respect to Serco employees who work at SFMTA and who help them implement parking management proposals that put new meters into the City. Andy Thornley told us a few years ago in The Bay Guardian:

 "We've done all the easy things so far. Now we need to take space from cars."

A short time ago Thornley assured his colleagues that he’ll

 “certainly still be an active, involved member of the SFBC.”



• With respect to the Bicycle Club who gets lucrative contracts from the city and operates as if it's a city agency. The anti-car lobbying group even got a $279,000 contract to do "community outreach" on the Bicycle Plan, even though, it had a stake in the outcome of the process. The Bike Club has been vocal about their plans for some time now. 

"The political support we enjoy is much stronger now than it was in 1990. I am working to get The city's Bicycle Program an extra few million per year to spend."

"We are looking at $500-600 Million dollars a year from the US Government. There were earmarks galore for bicycling. I mean we know how to work the system."

More Information to come.........



February 27, 2013

SFMTA RFP / option for 10,000 New Parking Meters / citizen opportunity to comment



Dear concerned citizen of San Francisco:
 
I wanted you to be aware of an important upcoming opportunity for you and your community to have a voice in the direction that our City takes with respect to the proposed installation of thousands of new parking meters.

Attached is a Request for Proposal http://www.sfmta.com/cms/cmta/documents/10-16-12Item10.4parkingmeterprocurementRFP.pdf by SFMTA which, among other things, gives SFMTA the option to purchase up to an additional 10,000 single space meters and up to 200 paystation meters (which equates to an aggregate total of something like up to 12,000 possible additional metered spaces).

Below is an excerpt from the RFP

This Request for Proposals (RFP) covers the procurement of 25,000 single-space parking meters (also referred to as Meter Mechanisms), 300 multi-space paystations (Paystations) and associated back-end support software systems for each type of parking enforcement device. Software systems will be used in tracking maintenance and revenue, and to program the equipment for variable rate and special event pricing. The Contract will also include the option to purchase an additional 10,000 single-space parking meters and 200 Paystations.

The contract award is subject to approval by the Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) Board of Directors and the Board of Supervisors of the City and County of San Francisco.

The contract shall have an original term of five years. In addition, SFMTA shall have the option to extend the term for a period of up to two years, which SFMTA may exercise in its sole, absolute discretion.



 
How can you provide input to the City?:
 
Once a company is selected and a proposed contract negotiated, it must be approved by both the SFMTA Board of Directors and the Board of Supervisors.  The public should have an opportunity to comment at both of these hearings.
 
No matter which company is selected, you and members of your community may want SFMTA to ask where they plan to put these 12,000 future metered spaces that they are giving themselves the ability to call for.  In addition, before the existing meters are replaced, you may wish to ask the City to evaluate its current parking meter program and reform and fix problems first.
 
Also, since the private company Serco is the current city contractor on most or all of its parking meter contracts, it is reasonable to assume that there is good chance that Serco will be selected.  If Serco is selected, that will give a further opportunity for concerned citizens to voice concerns they may have regarding whether there are as yet uninvestigated conflicts of interest with respect to Serco employees who work at SFMTA and who help them implement parking management proposals that put new meters into the City.  Other citizens may have concerns about the actions that Serco has undertaken in other parts of the US and the world and may want those considered as well.
 
Below is the schedule that was in the RFP.  It contemplates that a company will be selected and a proposed contract negotiated in the very near future and that it would be brought before the SFMTA Board of Directors in May 2013 and before the Board of Supervisors in June 2013.
 
If you are interested in this, you and those in your community should keep track of this process and consider availing yourselves of this opportunity to have the City pause and consider its overall "parking management strategy", including consideration of safeguards against meters in residential neighborhoods.
 


 February 27, 2013

 ACTION REQUIRED

 The SFMTA's War on Cars is about to go before the SF Planning Commission

On August 9, 2012, the Planning Commission approved initiation of the Bicycle Parking Requirements Legislation. This legislation would repeal the existing bicycle parking requirements in the Planning Code and provide new bicycle parking requirements commensurate with the surge in use of bicycles in San Francisco and updated national and international standards for bicycle parking. The Planning Department consulted with stakeholders to understand concerns and address issues in this Ordinance. An informational hearing was held in December 2012 to obtain further comments from the public. The adoption hearing for this Ordinance will be held on February 28th, 2013 before the Planning Commission.

The Planning Department invites you to attend this hearing to express your thoughts about bicycle parking. The case report for this hearing, including the complete proposed Ordinance, can be downloaded from the Planning Commission’s webpage on: http://commissions.sfplanning.org/cpcpackets/2011.0397T.pdf.
 
Please find information on location and time of the hearing here:http://www.sfplanning.org/index.aspx?page=3400.

February 28th, 2013 before the Planning Commission.

Commission Chambers - Room 400

City Hall, 1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place

Thursday, February 28, 2013

12:00 PM

***********************************************************************************************

February 27, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Polk Street fights City Hall

Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, Leah Shahum, Masonic Avenue, Nevius, Panhandle, Smart Growth



February 25, 2013

USF / Lone Mountain  Residents Outraged

by Proposed Parking Meters are Mostly Ignored

(pictured above) Thursday, February, 21, USF / Lone Mountain Community Residents raise their hands to vote against the SFMTA's plans to expand parking meters in their neighborhood. The primary complaint from many USF/Lone Mountain Residents is that the SFMTA did not perform adequate outreach to area residents before the parking meter plan was formulated.

"We were completely blind sided by the SFMTA's plans." said one resident who learned about the meeting a few hours before he arrived at USF. Other residents found out about the meeting through word of mouth from neighbors who live near the University. There was no mention of this meeting on the SFMTA's website and no official notices appear to have been sent out from the SFMTA.

In a rage that crossed economic and cultural lines, the message from USF residents to the SFMTA was clear.

Do not install parking meters in our Neighborhood!

A message from the University Terrace Association:

<end of message>

“We need to send a message to the Mayor and the City Supervisors to end this travesty” said Mari Eliza, who heads up ENUF, the powerful grassroots coalition of Eastern neighborhoods who opposes the expansion of parking meters into San Francisco neighborhoods. "ENUF has widespread support from the Eastern Neighborhoods and now we will be working with the USF Lone Mountain residents to stand up and fight back against the city’s parking meter expansion.

Eliza went on to say, "San Francisco taxpayers have had enough of the parking policies enacted by the SFMTA.  Making parking more difficult is not an acceptable method to control traffic congestion and finance Muni."  Concerned USF/ Lone Mountain residents should sign the StopSFMTA Petition which asks for the SFMTA to be accountable to all the citizens of San Francisco. 

Howard Chabner, Disability Rights advocate spoke out against the SFMTA's plan, "The SFMTA has not had a truly inclusive outreach effort. many people with mobility disabilities rely heavily on private vehicles." 

Many residents have asked aboutfiling Federal civil rights complaints because the SFMTA did not conduct outreach to minority, low-income, and limited English proficient communities in the USF / Lone Mountain area. 

Residents may file civil rights complaints with the following Federal contacts listed below.



Tags

StopSFMTA Petition, USF/ Lone Mountain Community Meeting, SFMTA Parking Meters, ENUF, Mari Eliza, Howard Chabner, Disability Rights, Community Outrage, University Terrace Association, Superviser Eric Mar, ENUF, Eastern Neighborhoods United Front

 Please Sign the Petition to

STOP the SFMTA





 February 19, 2013

Job Killing Sunday Parking Meters are 

Bleeding Millions out of SF Economy

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 -  This is what happens when you "privatize" public streets. Inside sources say that San Francisco may be on a collision course to repeat Chicago's parking meter catastrophe in which thousands of publicly owned parking meters were leased to private investors. 

The SFMTA has bled hundreds of millions of dollars out of the economy and increased the cost of doing business in every part of the city. At these Job Killing parking meters (Pictured above) .25 Cents =  5 minutes of time, $1.00 =  20 Minutes, and $3.00 pays for 1 hour.  No cars, no business, no tax revenue and no jobs. Is this the car free future that City Hall has planned for San Francisco?  

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - I wanted to pick up a few things but decided against it. I'm not going to pay $3.00 an hour every time I want to stop to visit a store in San Francisco.  I'll just go to one on the Malls down the Penisula or in South SF instead. There's plenty of FREE Parking and I wont have to worry about parking tickets.
 

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - Government policies and processes have a major impact on the City’s economic vitality and the resultant welfare of its residents. .25 Cents =  5 minutes of time, $1.00 =  20 Minutes, and $3.00 pays for 1 hour. The SFMTA plans on putting more of these Job Killing parking meters in Mission, DogPatch, Potrero Hill and other parts of the city.  Some people say that North Beach and the Marina could be next.

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - This doesn't look like a Livable City to me.  City Halls path is unsustainable. Is this the future that we want for San Francisco? How many DPT / Traffic enforcement officers are clocking overtime from this latest debacle?  It's disappointing that San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee would endorse parking policies that would hurt small businesses and destroy jobs. 



 Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - And Hey UCLA professor Donald Shoup!  Is this kind of thing what you call “responsible parking management?” 

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - .25 Cents =  5 minutes of time, $1.00 =  20 Minutes, and $3.00 pays for 1 hour. The SFMTA plans on putting more of these Job Killing parking meters in Mission, DogPatch, Potrero Hill and other parts of the city.  Some people say that North Beach and the Marina could be next.

I get all giggly when I think about what else San Francisco City Hall will give us for our good. 

There are almost no businesses open in this area but the city is charges $3.00 an hour to park on these streets.  The parking meters here are driving out families who need their cars to get their children around the city.

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - Please explain how a Parking Meter with a 6 Hour time Limit encourages parking turn over for local businesses?

Sunday Feb 19, 2013 - The Board of Supervisors, if it has any hope of restoring public confidence in City Hall, must Audit every dollar the SFMTA is spending on programs, projects, and personnel. This process should immediately begin with public hearings.

 

Please Sign the Petition to

Stop the SFMTA



February 15, 2013

Supervisor Mark Farrel Leads new era of Fiscal Responsibility and Government Accountability

                                                Supervisor Mark Farrells Public Statement

                                                                         (District 2) 

"every potentially affected neighborhood deserves a chance to speak."

District 2 Supervisor Mark Farrell has always been a vocal opponent of blanketing the city with Parking Meters. He is now leading a NEW ERA of Fiscal Responsibility and Government accountability by calling for hearings into the SFMTA's plans to expand parking meters throughout the city.On Tuesdays board of Supervisors meeting Farrell said, "every potentially affected neighborhood deserves a chance to speak."

Supervisor Farrell has joined District 10, Supervisor Malia Cohen,and District Six, Supervisor Jane Kim in their opposition of the SFMTA's plans to add additional parking meters to area neighborhoods.

                                   

      Supervisor Malia Cohens Open Letter                            Supervisor Jane Kims Public Statement 

                             (District 10)                                                                           (District 6)

Inside sources say that San Francisco may be on a collision course to repeat Chicago's parking meter catastrophe in which thousands of publicly owned parking meters were leased to private investors.

Government policies and processes have a major impact on the City’s economic vitality and the resultant welfare of its residents. The SFMTA has bled hundreds of millions of dollars out of the economy and increased the cost of doing business in every part of the city.  The SFMTA has recently expanded parking meters contracts with the same company that, some people say, has  been price-gouging Chicago's parking market. Street parking in Chicago is now $2.00 per hour for 82% of the city, $4.00 per hour near downtown and $6.50 per hour in the downtown, and the city gets very little of the money. If the SFMTA continues unchecked with their plan the city of San Francisco could soon be at the mercy of private interests when it comes to setting parking rates, collections, and even paying into meters on holidays.

The SFMTA has recently changed their parking policies to match the pricing structure that Chicago currently uses (charging up to $6.00/hr. and  up to $18.00/hr. for special events). In addition to paying for parking on Sundays, the SFMTA has also discussed expanding parking meter hours into the evening. Residents and business owners agree that the SFMTA's path is unsustainable. 

The Board of Supervisors, if it has any hope of restoring public confidence in City Hall, must audit every dollar the SFMTA is spending on programs, projects, and personnel. This process should immediately begin with public hearings. We encourage you to contact Supervisor Farrell and let him know that you support his actions to hold hearings.

 Use your own words or use the message below :

Dear Supervisor Farrell, (Mark.Farrell@sfgov.org)

Thank you for calling for a hearing on a Municipal Transportation Agency proposal to expand parking meters into various neighborhoods in the city. We are most concerned about parking restrictions in residential neighborhoods and expansion of parking meters where people live, and at times when Muni service is unreliable, such as evenings, weekends and holidays.

SFMTA officials are demanding more money while admitting they have lost the public trust and they cannot expand Muni service to meet the demand. They suggest more people ride a bike or walk.

San Francisco needs a Muni system that gets people where they need to go, not an agency that tells us how to get there.

Sincerely,

(Your Name)

Copy your Supervisor and The Mayor

A list of contacts for Mayor and Supervisors:

Edwin Lee, Mayor - MayorEdwinLee@sfgov.org
David Campos , District Supervisor - David.Campos@sfgov.org
David Chiu, District Supervisor - David.Chiu@sfgov.org
Malia Cohen, District Supervisor - Malia.Cohen@sfgov.org
John Avalos, District Supervisor – John.Avalos@sfgov.org
Jane Kim, District Supervisor - Jane.Kim@sfgov.org
Carmen Chu, District Supervisor – Carmen.Chu@sfgov.org
London Breed, District Supervisor – London.Breed@sfgov.org
Norman Yee, District Supervisor – Norman.Yee.Bos@sfgov.org
Eric Mar, District Supervisor – Eric.L.Mar@sfgov.org
Mark Farrell, District Supervisor – Mark.Farrell@sfgov.org
Scott Wiener, District Supervisor – Scott.Wiener@sfgov.org


How to contact Supervisor Farrell

City Hall
1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place, Room 244
San Francisco, Ca 94102-4689
(415) 554-7752 – voice
(415) 554-7843 – fax
Mark.Farrell@sfgov.org
http://www.sfbos.org/index.aspx?page=11506

and Thank you District 10, Supervisor Malia Cohen, District 6, Supervisor Jane Kim, and District 2 Supervisor Mark Farrell for supporting the aging and disabled, small businesses, and working families in your districts.



Do these streets look like they have congestion challenges? Someone made some some money from this fiasco. Too bad its not the local merchants, or the city.  Have we learned nothing from the City of Chicago? Government policies and processes have a major impact on the City’s economic vitality and the resultant welfare of its residents. The SFMTA has bled hundreds of millions of dollars out of the economy and increased the cost of doing business in every part of the city. The SFMTA's path is unsustainable.

Price fixing in the Private sector     = You are Going to Jail
Price fixing in the Government       = You are "Going Green" 



Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - $2.00 an hour on Townsend Street - South of Market. Job Killing SFMTA / SFpark Meters sit empty. And by the way, where are all of the cyclists who want   $200 Million Dollars for more bicycle lanes. 

February 13, 2013

From The Potrero View - Feb 2013



Navigating Muni in

a Wheel Chair

by Jian Hong

One October morning, at the south corner of Eighth and Market streets, I boarded an uncrowded Muni 19 on my way to interview the new principal at Downtown High School. Facing the windshield, I parked my electric wheelchair at the spot reserved for wheelchair users, and switched it off.

“You’re good,” the driver said, eying me in the rearview mirror. 

I wanted to say, “No, I’m not” but am tongue-tied. I don’t feel secure because she neither strapped my wheelchair down nor buckled me up. “Y-e-s,” I stuttered a few seconds later. 

Securing a wheelchair with straps takes two minutes; buckling a wheelchair takes about ten seconds. If the bus got into an accident, I’d probably fly out of my wheelchair, hit the metal pole in front of me, and break my bones. Months after this incidence I still wonder why the driver didn’t strap my wheelchair down. Perhaps she was being lazy. I’d never had this problem before when riding a bus; not even during rush hour. 

In 2010, one late fall afternoon, after tutoring English at Alameda College, I sped toward the MacArthur Boulevard bus stop, one stop from Mills College just in time to catch the 57 bus. The bus was crowded and stuffy. 

“Where’re you going?” the driver asked. 

“Mills College,” I said. 

“Are you serious?” His cold eyes blinked at me. 

“Yes,” I said, noticing passengers were staring at me. Feeling embarrassed, I clenched my teeth. I didn’t want to cruise the bumpy sidewalks back to Mills. It’d take 15 minutes to get there; by bus, less than a minute. The unhappy driver buckled me up and slammed the metal drawer behind my wheelchair. 

When the 19 lurched forward, the side of my wheelchair joystick unit hit the fold-down seat. My hands pressed against the seat’s edge; I shook until the 19 jolted past Mariposa Street and halted on Rhode Island Street. It was the wrong bus stop, but I didn’t mind getting off one stop too soon, one block from 18th Street; I was early for my interview appointment. At the front door I jerked my head back, seeing that the slope of the sidewalk was about 25 degrees. I trembled, sitting 23 inches above bus floor level. My wheelchair could flip over when I get off the lift. 

I wheeled slowly to the tilted lift, leaning toward my left, and grasped the rail on each side. The driver lowered me to the sloped sidewalk. One, two, three. I wheeled out of the lift into the sidewalk, holding my breath until I reached the stop sign. I took a deep breath to calm down. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency should place the bus stop at the flat northwest corner of Rhode Island and Mariposa streets; it isn’t safe for wheelchair users to get off at a sloped bus stop.

Putting my sweatshirt hood on, I cruised up Mariposa Street, then turned left on Vermont Street. I slowed down on the sidewalk, which has several raised concrete bumps that almost tipped my wheelchair over. I passed 18th Street and headed to Downtown to do my interview.

After finishing my interview an hour later, I sped to 19th Street, turned left on Rhode Island Street, and cruised toward 18th Street. But as soon as I turned right on that street, I couldn’t turn back: I was going down a steep hill. I tried to steer my wheelchair toward the sidewalk, but it wobbled and skipped. I felt nauseated and tense; my stomach twitched and turned. My right fingers barely touched the joystick to steer the wheelchair straight. If I pushed it too hard, I feared that my wheelchair would go down too fast and flip over. My heart raced faster as my wheelchair bumped and moved from side to side. My spastic feet shook on the footrest; my eyes shifted to the bottom of the hill, which seemed unreachable. My stiff elbows thrust against the padded armrests; sinking deeper and deeper into my seat, I wheeled down the hill inch by inch, my breathing shallow. 

Relieved, I reached De Haro Street safely. Phew! I spun my wheelchair around. I will never go up or come down this steep hill again. A minute later I boarded the 19 heading to the Civic Center BART station. The driver, just like the 19’s that morning, without strapping my wheelchair or buckling me up, said: “You’re ready.” 

I still felt sick to my stomach and grew even sicker when he jerked his chin at me and urged me again: “You’re ready.” 

I just want to get back to Oakland as soon as possible. “Yes,” I said. 

I feared that my wheelchair might move from side to side, but it didn’t shift an inch while the bus roared to my stop: Seventh and Market streets. When the driver lowered me to the curb, I realized that I didn’t have enough room to get out: the lift was too close to the curb rail. I sensed that the driver didn’t want to do more work, so I said nothing. I backed up my wheelchair a couple times before I could run it over the lift’s right side guard, like I was flying over a speed bump. My left spastic foot jumped out of the footrest and jerked. My wheelchair skipped to a stop; I flung my hand at my knee to stop the jerking. I sighed. 

I crossed Seventh Street, then stared at the tire on the driver’s side. It was about three feet from the curb. If the driver had parked a foot away from it, I wouldn’t have struggled to get out of the lift. Crossing Market Street, I glanced at the sky, the sun beaming at me. I flickered a smile before wheeling into the elevator to catch the BART train to Oakland.

February 11, 2013

What Kind of Fukkery is This?
$3.00 an hour Sunday Meters

The middle class in San Francisco have been done away with as a result of City Halls tricks and traps, and yes, the game is rigged.

Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - More Businesses completely surrounded by no circling, no double parking, no traffic congestion, and NO CUSTOMERS!  The only thing we see are a few cars and the SFMTA's Job Killing parking meters priced at  $3.00 an hour.  Price Gouging, Market Manipulation, and Artificially Inflating Parking Prices. Its the ENRON model of pricing! How did that work out for you last time California?

Hey California,  remember the ENRON-INDUCED rolling  blackouts some years ago? The SFpark Program  is doing the same thing with your street parking.

Find out How it works.

Over the last two years, The San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency (SFMTA) has made it more expensive and difficult for the public to park in the city. The SFMTA's parking policies include price gouging, market manipulation, and artificially inflating consumer prices. The SFMTA has spent almost 90 million dollars of  taxpayer funds to pay for public worker salaries and other transportation projects that are unrelated to resolving the problems with the citys transit system.

Over 7,000 parking meters in the City also accept credit cards to extract the maximum amount of money from residents. Additionally, several neighborhoods have had time limits eliminated to make it easier for wealthy residents to park their cars.

"Did you hear that VISA just pulled out of  San Francisco and moved to Foster City? Yes, Companies will see an immediate profit just by relocating to the Peninsula because they wont have to pay for City Halls Huge $100,000 Salaries & Lavish, Gold-Plated Pensions. There's Plenty of Free Parking down the Peninsula and companies are using this to attract their workforce."

Please Sign the Petition to

Stop the SFMTA

For information about San Franciscos predatory parking policies click here.

Tags:

SFpark Results, Epic Failure, market manipulation, artificially inflating consumer prices, ENRON Pricing, SFMTA SFPark, Congestion Pricing, Demand Responsive Pricing, SFpark Boondoggle 



From Foghorn online

Posted on 29 January 2013

Traffic Calming by Tightening USF Street

Parking is a Scam to Raise Revenue

By Staff Writer: Thomas Munka

In our near future, the vexatious San Francisco Metropolitan Transit Authority (SFMTA) plans to implement some very undesirable parking restrictions around the University of San Francisco. Parking meters and limits on all-day spots are proposed to be placed on sections of Turk, Parker, and Fulton streets. A two hour parking limit is proposed to be placed on sections of Parker and Fulton streets, and a one hour parking limit is proposed for University Terrace BB parking permit areas. All of these imbecile changes are proposed in an effort to calm traffic in the USF area because, according to a USF Connect announcement, “the perimeter of the USF campus is unregulated and open parking spaces are very scarce, leading visitors to circle for an open parking space, and sometimes leading to poor behavior.”

I have spent long hours at USF and have commuted to and from the university at least five days a week for the last three and a half years. Yes, I have to agree, several drivers search for parking in a rather ungentlemanly fashion; however, I have never seen the San Francisco Police Department clock for speeding on residential streets around USF in an effort to calm traffic. I have never seen USF’s Public Safety officers give warnings to speeding drivers looking for parking, and I can’t recall USF ever sending a message or making an announcement about safer driving practices in the neighborhoods surrounding campus. What I have noticed is a blind eye being turned to asinine driving habits around USF and an increase in mosquito-resembling meter maid vehicles circling USF’s perimeter and stinging parked cars. If the city of San Francisco was truly concerned with poor driving habits around the university, I think this situation would be addressed differently.

"If someone gave me one dollar for every decent person at the SFMTA, I’d have zero dollars. "

Furthermore, I’d like to point out that the traffic proposals will likely not result in more benign driving habits around USF; rather, I predict even more aggressive parking shopping. Areas with 1 hour parking limits will likely receive the worst driving, as car owner will rush to re-park cars more frequently and will be even less considerate of others.

If someone gave me one dollar for every decent person at the SFMTA, I’d have zero dollars. How stupid does the SFMTA think we are? The bottom line is the city is short of money and they need ways to get it. I do not believe restricting parking around the university is the solution to solving parking troubles in the neighborhood; rather, it is an obscure attempt to hand out tickets and collect meter money.



February 8, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Annual reality-check: Transportation Fact Sheet

Labels: Anti-Car, Muni, Parking, Traffic in SF



February 4, 2013

 Sunday Parking Meters:The Latest Job Killing Debacle  from SF Mayor Ed Lee 



Do these streets look like they have congestion challenges? Someone made some some money from this fiasco. Too bad its not the local merchants, or the city.  Have we learned nothing from the City of Chicago?

How the our city government was stolen from us, consolidated into one massive agency under the earlier lie of "Fixing Muni". Its just astonishing the baloney that the SFMTA puts out, parroting from a bunch of white labels (Streetsblog, Livable Cities, Spur, etc) of essentially one US radical anti-car non-profit.  Now that City Halls plans are exposed the residents of San Francisco are already in the process of rooting out these radicals and replacing them with sane people whose job will be to fix our mass transit rather than ruin life for everyone other than rich kids on bikes.

San Francisco City Hall has abandoned the Middle Class, and they are betraying the residents of San Francisco.  Every day, residents faced with layoffs and tough economic times, are forced to use their credit cards to pay for essentials such as food, housing, medical care and now street parking. Mayor Ed Lees Administration is planting these Job Killing parking meters all over Potrero Hill, Bernal Heights, and the Mission District. 

Sorry Eastern Neighborhoods, once your businesses have closed and your property values have been depressed, Real Estate developers will swoop in and buy up all of your property for pennies on the dollar.  The city is building more housing for dot.com millionaires but will that be enough to fund the citys pension fund?. Some people say that this has this been City Halls plan all along.

In 2011 San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee told the SFBay Citizen:

"The financial plight of the city of San Francisco is so dire,  that if around $300 million to $400 million in cuts to employee pension and health care costs are not achieved, the city could face bankruptcy as soon as five years from now."

Well Mayor Lee, it doesn't look like you are going to raise that money from enforcing parking meters on Sunday. How many DPT / Traffic enforcement officers are clocking overtime from this latest debacle? Do any of these neighborhoods (pictured below) look like they need parking management on a Sunday? How about Parking meters that charge $3.00 an hour on a Sunday? Price gouging, Market Manipulation, and artificially inflating consumer prices. SFpark uses the ENRON model for pricing. How did that work out for you last time California?  



Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - Hey there Mission, Dogpatch and Potrero Hill. Ed Lees Administration is coming your way with thousands of these Job Killing parking meters!  (Pictured above)  Parking Meters sit empty Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - on  Bryant Street in the South of Market. How you destroy the economic vitality of a vibrant neighborhood? Well, you can start by charging visitors $3.00 an hour to visit the local residents and businesses.  

Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - $3.00 an hour to park on Bryant Street in the South of Market. The SFMTA wants to extend metered parking late into the night, eliminate residential parking programs and blanket the city with meters, meaning the only people who need a car for work or family will have to be rich enough to have a private parking space can live in this neighborhood. What a great way to keep working class residents disconnected from this part of the city.

Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - $1.00 an hour at Bryant Street in the South of Market. Job Killing SFMTA / SFpark Meters sit empty. SFpark makes it punitive for people to visit this neighborhood.

Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - $2.00 an hour on Townsend Street - South of Market. Job Killing SFMTA / SFpark Meters sit empty. And by the way, where are all of the cyclists who want   $200 Million Dollars for more bicycle lanes.

Sunday Feb 3, 2013 - $.50 an hour on Brannan Street in the South of Market. . This is how you destroy the economic vitality of a vibrant neighborhood. 

Sunday Feb 3, 2013  - $1.00 an hour to park on this street. Its just astonishing the baloney that the SFMTA puts out, parroting from the a bunch of white labels (Streetsblog, Livable Cities, Spur, etc) of essentially one US radical anti-car non profit.

Does these empty streets = a Livable City? What a great way to keep working class residents disconnected from this part of the city. 

Sunday Feb 3, 2013  - The SF Park program is not to replace aging meters with new meters -- that's just a by-product.  The plan is to eliminate residential parking in the city and make it impossible for anyone but rich trust fund babies -- with no kids and faux jobs -- to live here. Job Killing SFMTA / SFpark Meters sit empty while local businesses suffer. And Hey UCLA professor Donald Shoup!  Is this kind of thing what you call “responsible parking management?” 

Sunday Feb 3, 2013  - Please explain how a Parking Meter with a 6 Hour time Limit encourages parking turn over for local businesses?

Sunday Feb 3, 2013  - The middle class in San Francisco have been done away with as a result of City Halls tricks and traps, and yes, the game is rigged.

Mission Local Got it right back in 2010.

"Mission Loc@l surveyed 131 businesses late last week and found 80 percent or 106 out of 131 opposed the idea, 20 were undecided and five approved of the proposal. In a rage that crossed economic and cultural lines, the vast majority of 131 businesses interviewed in the Mission District had this message

Keep Sunday Parking Free

Please Sign the Petition to

Stop the SFMTA



Tags:

SFpark allegations of Fraud, San Franciso Sunday Parking Meters, Job Killing, SFpark Allegations of Corruption, SFpark Allegations of nepotism, SFpark, Federal Highway Administration, Office of the Inspector General, SFpark reported to Transparency International, SFpark reported to California Attorney General, Alleged Misappropriation of DOT Funding, San Francisco City Hall, San Francisco Board of Supervisors, San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Cheryl Brinkman, Andy Thornley, Ed Reiskin, SFMTA Board of Directors, SFpark San Francisco, Council for Citizens Against Government Waste

February 4, 2013

With packed vehicles people opt

for private cars, SFMTA says

By: Will Reisman: sfexaminer – excerpt

From funding shortfalls to aging and inefficient facilities, Muni faces myriad entrenched issues. But the top priority now for the transit agency is dealing with its overcrowded vehicles.

Muni’s capacity problem — particularly its crowded buses — is creating a “vicious cycle” of transportation choices in which travelers eschew public transit in favor of private automobiles, which in turn creates more traffic congestion, according to Timothy Papandreou, deputy director of planning at the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, which operates Muni.

The No. 1 goal is increasing supply and capacity and managing demand,” Papandreou said during the board of directors’ annual workshop Tuesday….

Papandreou said the transit agency is also working hard on promoting bicycling and walking as alternatives to short transit trips. Car-sharing systems, which are more efficient than private automobiles, could be moved into residential neighborhoods as another way to change travel patterns, said Jay Primus, who manages the agency’s parking policies.

Malcolm Heinicke, a member of the agency’s board of directors, said capacity problems have surpassed reliability issues as the top concern among the riders who have contacted him…
Over the next five years, the agency is facing a shortfall of $1.7 billion for bike, pedestrian, traffic and transit improvements. Simply keeping its network in a state of good repair — not accounting for the capacity improvements — requires $260 million a year that the agency lacks…

“We have to face it,” Heinicke said. “We’re not ready now for more passengers.”
(This is the same Heinicke who wants to close Market street to cars.)

… (more)

Is SFMTA admitting they can’t provide enough public transit to keep up with the demand?
Did Timothy Papandreou, (deputy director of planning at the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency), really say, “the transit agency is also working hard on promoting bicycling and walking… and moving car-share programs into residential neighborhoods…”?
We don’t need a new study or training program to teach us how to walk, or a public-financed car-share program to replace our personal vehicles, and undermine the US car industry that is now producing clean cars. What we need are experienced Muni managers that don’t need studies to figure out how to provide public transit for those who need and want it.
The question is, “Is it time to take the training wheels off the SFMTA and throw it under the bus?”



 January 29, 2013

 2008 Meeting of Bicycle

People Alleges a  Conspiracy 

 "We are looking at $500-600 Million dollars a year from the US Government. There were earmarks galore for bicycling. I mean we know how to work the system." 

In 2008 a meeting took place in Portland, Oregon that involved members of the Bicycle Club and City Planners. In this recorded meeting they outlined their plans to acquire Federal Funding by advocating, and promoting a car-free movement.   Their plans included congestion pricing schemes and removing parking spaces from city streets. Many of their plans have been incorporated into the SFpark Program and City Halls Anti-Car legislation.

Is it radical rich-kid rhetoric or a criminal conspiracy to defraud taxpayers?

Click here for Highlights from: The Battle for San Francisco



• "I am working to get the city's Bicycle Program an extra few million per year to spend."

• “We need to extend to a car-free movement." 

•  "Yes, if you are a contractor and you have to drive your truck to do jobs your costs will go up and that will cause inflation in the costs of getting someone to lay a floor.  It will increase costs for doing business and that's appropriate, and thats ok."

•  "Bicycling is more male than female. Three times more men than woman, so that means that people who bike have more power."

• "that's bicycling it’s a white male thing. What can we do to leverage our power?"

January 29, 2013 

 San Francisco Lays out $200 Million in Bike Projects in next 5 years

The City is proposing $200 million worth of changes to its cycling network in the next five years.

Building 12 new miles of bike lanes, upgrading 50 miles of existing paths and installing more than 20,000 new racks are all part of the plan.

                                                              Continue Reading at The San Francisco Examiner

........................................Comments from SFpark.info..............................................

More Politically Motivated Deficit Spending by A

Transit System that is Drowning in Red Ink

 From Pages 78-79 of the 2009 SFMTA CLIMATE ACTION PLAN. 

In 2009 The SFMTA identified Annual capital needs of $600 Million Dollars, resulting in funding shortfalls of as much as $400 Million Dollars a year . City Hall and the SFMTA are now proposing to add $200 Million Dollars to their Deficit Spending and also pay the cost over runs for the $1.6 Billion Dollar Central Subway Boondoggle.

SFMTA and the Bicycle coalition numbers say that almost all the bike riders are white, single, males between the ages of 21 and 30. 90% of bike riding occurs on weekends and is for recreation, not commuting. Of those who commute by bike, 80%  ride to public transit, not all the way to work. Bike ridership drops considerably during winter and when it rains. Even the highest estimates of the number of bike commuters puts them at less than 3% of the commuting population.



From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

 January 29, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Big Lie about a "surge"

in Cycling Lives on



Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, Bicycle Plan, Examiner, Leah Shahum, Media



January 28, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Photo by Castro Biscuit

Follow us on Meter Madness.  Sign up under the (Stop SFMTA) sign at the top of the right column.

All the articles we run on metermadness are linked to the original source.Click on the (more) button and comment on the original source. The more comments the author receives the more likely they are to continue investigating the subject and the more media we have the better for our cause.

Signatures will hit 1500 soon. Forward this to your friends and associates and keep those signatures and parking surveys coming.

If you want to join us, contact ENUF at: contact@sfenuf.org

ENUF, Eastern Neighborhoods United Front
metermadness.wordpress.com



Please Sign the Petition to

Stop the SFMTA

January 23, 2013

CBS 5 News Tests the Ridiculous SFpark App

"After fruitlessly trying to use the app to find a spot for 45 minutes, she eventually gave up and found one the old fashioned way."

Click this LINK to watch the Full Video 

 ******************Highlights from the Video*********************

"We drove around for 45 Minutes and struggled"

"We are lost"

"Trying to use the phone while you are driving around"

"In the end we found our own spots"

"The device didnt help us"

"I dont know that I need an app for this, an app would be great if it worked."

"It makes more sense to drive around and look for a parking space" 

"As for finding street parking, It was very cumbersome, it didnt work for us" 

"In the End we found our own spot. 

            The Device didn't help us."



Read the full story: SF Collectively Mocks SFpark App here

January 17, 2013

sfenuf.org

Thanks for supporting our efforts to curtail the authority of the SFMTA and for spreading the word. As of today we have 1420 signatures on our petition.

SFTMA is conducting a "community meeting" this Saturday, January 19, 2013, 9:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.John O’Connell High School auditorium, 2355 Folsom Street

SFMTA writes:  “There won’t be a fixed program, no presentation and no overall draft proposal. We are making ourselves available for questions and discussion and input... (We are not sure how you can comment on a plan without seeing it first.)
Link to the upcoming meeting with the MTA in case they change plans again.
http://www.sfmta.com/cms/pnews/NPP_NEMission.htm

We are encouraging people to come and watch the SFMTA in action. This is what you can expect in your neighborhood soon. They want feedback so come and let them know what you think about their restrictive parking policies, Sunday parking meters, parking tickets, disruptive streets, bicycle paths, etc.

***

http://www.sfenuf.org

ENUF has heard from a number of Supervisors who are following ENUF's efforts and looking for feedback from their constituents. Please let us know which districts you live and work in so we may get an idea of how best to get them that information, and help you find support for your issues.

If you have a particular concern, let us know.

So far we have the following issues:

1. Restrictive parking policies
2. Parking Meters
3. Parking tickets, tows, and enforcement issues
4. Residential parking permits
5. Sunday parking enforcement
6. Elimination of Muni lines and service

OUR SINCERE THANKS!

ENUF

http://signon.org/tools/lte.html?id=8290-5432338-Bl2D72

ENUF, Eastern Neighborhoods United Front
metermadness.wordpress.com



Please Sign the Petition to

Stop the SFMTA



January 15, 2013

SFMTA DID IT AGAIN! Called a Meeting, and then Changed the Schedule and the Format

(Pictured below ) Townsend Steet in Mission Bay one year after San Francisco  City Hall installed their "Job Killing"  SFpark  Meters. 



January 10, 2013

Market Manipulation Prompts  Residents to File Complaints with CA Attorney General

Lets hear it for Price Gouging,  Market Manipulation, and Artificially Inflating Consumer Prices. Angry Mission Bay Residents have had enough of the SFpark Program and will be filing complaints with the California Attorney Generals Office over the artificially induced parking "blackouts" that are happening in the area. Parking prices on both sides of 5th street / Brannan have been $3.00 an hour for nearly a year. The city of San Francisco is really CASHING in on Taxpayers.



San Francisco  City Hall has abandoned the Middle Class,  and they are betraying the residents of San Francisco. The evidence is all around us. Every day, residents faced with layoffs and tough economic times, are forced to use their credit cards to pay for essentials such as food, housing, medical care and now street parking. Our politicians have shown us how willing they are to be owned by special interest groups that will buy votes, buy a campaign, or just buy them off.  The decline of the middle class is no accident. 

The middle class in San Francisco have been done away with as a result of City Halls tricks and traps, and yes, the game is rigged. San Francisco has become a bad carnival game where the rich always get the grand prize and the average citizen walks away empty-handed. The "demand based" SFpark performance parking model is ostensibly "gaming the market" by exploiting the rules of supply and demand.

Simply stated: 

If you can cause a parking shortage in one part of town, you can CA$H in on it somewhere else! 

Here's how it works :

1. Create a parking shortage by Rescinding residential parking permits all over the city 
   
2. Increase the parking shortage by installing thousands of new "smart parking meters" in areas that were never metered before.  
   
3. "Artificially inflate" prices at the meters and in City owned parking garages (to create a parking blackout)
   
4. High prices at the meters push the traffic to adjacent neighborhoods, and newly metered parking garages so that it looks like the program has relieved traffic congestion.
   
5. Build a ridiculous, and buggy smart phone app to keep people focused on the technology and "greenwashing" of the project. 
   
6. Cherry pick the results of the pilot data, plant some deceptive stories in the press, and ignore the will of the people.
   
7. Once you are raking in the cash from the meters you can use the taxpayers like an ATM to the end of time.   
   



Brought to you by The San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency and San Francisco City Hall.

 Don't forgot to thank the Mayor and your city Supervisor on Election Day!

 And Hey UCLA professor Donald Shoup! Is this kind of thing what you call “responsible parking management?” 



Tags:

SFpark allegations of Fraud, SFpark Allegations of Corruption, SFpark Allegations of Nepotism, SFpark, Federal Highway Administration, Office of the Inspector General, SFpark reported to Transparency International, SFpark reported to California Attorney General, Alleged Misappropriation of DOT Funding, San Francisco City Hall, San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Ed Reiskin, SFMTA Board of Directors, SFpark San Francisco, Council for Citizens Against Government Waste



January 9, 2013

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

citizennopa@gmail.com

January 4, 2013

CA$HING in on Taxpayers

2013 brings new parking restrictions and meter enforcement to the streets of San Francisco.  Say goodbye to free Sunday parking.  The SFMTA claims they will post warnings in January and hand out tickets in February. New efforts in Sacramento and Washington are underway to further restrict parking and raise taxes, fees, and fines, but,  sfenuf.org plans to track the legislation and keep you informed.

Mark Leno is working on SB 1492, described below. PASS THIS AROUND...  Send letters to Leno, Ammiano, Yee, and all the others in Sacramento to let them know how you feel about the bill and the SFMTA. sfenuf.org  will be putting forth ideas for possbile amendments soon, and working on ballot proposals. Send sfenuf.org your suggestions.

Our favorite Quote of 2012:

"The SFpark Program did not create new parking spaces out of thin air.  SFpark took the same spaces that were always available and priced them out of reach for low income motorists. Then, the program created a new generation of $100,000 city workers to manage the whole scheme. 

The government should not be profiting off of citizens. If the city of San Francisco needs money to implement a new project idea, it's their responsibility to go to the citizens with a proposal to be voted on. Robbing taxpayers to pay the salaries and pensions of city workers is criminal." 

We could not have said it better:

Vehicle license fee would generate

$70M-plus for San Francisco 

By: Will Reisman : sfexaminer – excerpt

San Francisco lawmakers and agencies are working to put a vehicle license fee increase before voters in hopes of generating more than $70 million for city coffers.
California Senate Bill 1492 allows local municipalities to put on the ballot a fee of up to 2 percent of a vehicle’s value — the rate before former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger reduced it in 2004.
San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors will have to decide whether to put the fee increase before voters. It would then need a simple majority to pass, and would probably go on the November 2014 ballot.
The board has the option of setting the percentage fee for the initiative — anywhere from its current rate of 0.65 percent to the maximum of 2 percent. Increasing the rate to 2 percent would generate $72 million annually for The City’s general fund, said bill author state Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco. A motorist with a vehicle valued at $15,000 would see his or her annual fee increase from $97.50 to $300 if the 2 percent rate is restored… (more)



December 26, 2012

From The San Francisco Citizen 



Guess which side of this street has brand new parking meters and which side doesn’t? (Yeah, I know it looks like street cleaning day, but it’s not.)  Its another one of those artificially induced parking "blackouts" that are happening across the city.   And hey UCLA professor Donald Shoup! Is this kind of thing what you call “responsible parking management?”

Lets hear it for Price Gouging,  Market Manipulation, and Artificially Inflating Consumer Prices.  Brought to you by The San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency and San Francisco City Hall. Don't forgot to thank the Mayor and your city Supervisor on Election day!

Photo from the SanFrancisco Citizen

DPT SFpark Fail: Expensive Sensors “Bedeviled by Electromagnetic Interference from Overhead Trolley Lines” per NYT

Instead of the SFMTA MUNI DPT SFPark happy talk what you’ve been getting from the San Francisco Examiner, why not check out what the New York Times has to say about San Francisco’s expensive SFPark new parking meter program.

“PLACE “smart” in front of a noun and you immediately have something that somehow sounds improved.”



___________________________________________________________________________

Comments from SFpark.info......

Wow!!! The SF Citizen is right.  Now EVERYBODY repeat after me......

"SMART Phones, Use SMART technology,  a SMART APP and SMART Meters,  to allow SMART Parking and Smart Growth."

WHEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!! We've cracked the code! 

Maybe we can all work for the SFMTA and collect huge $100,000 salaries and Lavish Gold Plated pension benefits!

 December 26, 2012

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

City Planning to Squeeze

City Drivers Again  



December 18, 2012

Don't Give Them a Dime!



GIMME, GIMME, GIMME, FREE MONEY cause I'm a " Transit Advocate" and I want your money to take away parking spaces, inflate parking prices, and slow traffic for cars. 



December 11, 2012

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Send Leah Shahum money now so she can continue to Screw-up City Traffic

From: "San Francisco Bicycle Coalition"
To: XXXX

Dear XXXX,



December 5, 2012

From The San Francisco Examiner 

Free Muni youth passes show

San Francisco's bad Priorities

12/05/12 12:28 AM

I think I’m losing my mind with what’s going on in San Francisco these days, but I still have a much better grip on reality than Supervisor David Campos and his crusaders for free Muni youth passes.

This insanity can’t get much more obvious than when two facing pages in The San Francisco Examiner feature stories about Sunday parking meter enforcement and free passes for the kids who bring loud music, litter, cussing and fighting onto the buses.

As we all know, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency is constantly whining about how cash-poor it is, but at the same time, its board of directors wants to permit even more freeloading while the buses go without maintenance.

Sunday meter enforcement makes the news only because the privileged churchgoers — who have been blocking our streets illegally for decades — fear they may actually have to be careful how they park like the rest of us.

And it is this same Campos who can’t be bothered to lift a finger to bring in more revenue by citing all the cars that park illegally on his district’s sidewalks, making it necessary for pedestrians to risk their lives walking in the middle of the street.

Carl Hoffman
San Francisco

(and speaking of more bad ideas) 

Golden Gate Park bike lanes risky

Bob Planthold definitely got it right on the John F. Kennedy Drive bicycle lanes: “That bike path is simply not safe.”

I ride my bike on JFK Drive every day. The bike lanes are the most dangerous place on the road, and the only safe place to ride is in the center traffic lanes, where I have clear vision of what’s going on ahead of me, and space to get out of the way of obstacles.

Every day, I see the real problems in the bike lanes that pose dangers, including cars parking, people walking, dog walkers, cars and trucks driving, police on horseback, skateboarders and in-line skaters, joggers, small children, and even Department of Parking and Traffic vehicles marking the right sides of tires of the parked cars.

Even your photo shows the problem of improper parking, with several cars parking half their width into the “neutral” zone such that their passenger side doors open into the bike lane.

The concept of the bike lanes being “dedicated space” for cyclists is a fantasy. It is used by anyone and everyone on a whim, and thus poses more danger than ever for cyclists.

Ted Loewenberg
San Francisco

Read more at the San Francisco Examiner: http://www.sfexaminer.com/opinion/letters-editor/2012/12/free-muni-youth-passes-show-san-franciscos-bad-priorities#ixzz2ElrJnvok


 December 8, 2012

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

A Property-Owner Against

the Fell/Oak Project

San Francisco

December 4, 2012

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

 Memo in Support of the Appeal of the Oak/Fell bike Lane Project

Mark Brennan
Howard Chabner
Ted Loewenberg

DATE: December 3, 2012

MEMORANDUM IN SUPPORT OF APPEAL TO THE SAN FRANCISCO BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF MTA BOARD APPROVAL AND SF PLANNING DEPARTMENT CEQA EXEMPTION DETERMINATION OF OAK AND FELL BIKE LANE PROJECT

INTRODUCTION

This is a Memorandum in Support of the Appeal by appellants Mark Brennan, Howard Chabner and Ted Loewenberg ("Appellants") of the October 16, 2012 actions of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency ("MTA") Board of Directors approving the Oak and Fell Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety Improvements project (the "Project") and of the San Francisco Planning Department‟s October 4, 2012 Categorical Exemption of the Project from environmental review.

Appellants filed a Notice of Appeal with the Clerk of the Board of Supervisors on November 2, 2012, and included copies of the MTA Board‟s October 16, 2012 Resolution #12-129 (the "MTA Resolution") and the Planning Department‟s October 4, 2012 Certificate of Determination regarding Categorical Exemption (Exemption from Environmental Review for the MTA Fell & Oak Streets Bikeways Project, Case No. E011.0836E) (the "Certificate").

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The Project is located in a densely populated residential, commercial and tourist area in the heart of San Francisco. The Project would make major changes on Oak, Fell, Baker and Scott Streets. Fell, which is one-way Westbound, and Oak, one-way Eastbound, together comprise one of San Francisco‟s most vital and heavily trafficked East-West thoroughfares, carrying a combined more than 60,000 motor vehicles per day. (Since many vehicles carry more than one person, the number of drivers and passengers affected by the Project will be many more than 60,000 per day.) They are the major thoroughfares leading to (Oak) and from (Fell) the Octavia Boulevard entrance and exit for Highway 101. This is also a major pedestrian area with a large amount of pedestrians traveling up and down Oak and Fell Streets towards Divisadero and downtown, or vice versa to the Panhandle and the Haight. The Project area also includes Divisadero Street, a major North-South thoroughfare and commercial street that includes many stores, restaurants, cafés, a hotel and other small businesses.

The Project would:

Create a bike lane and 5-foot wide buffer strip on the South side of the three blocks of Oak from Scott to Baker, where no bike lane or buffer strip currently exists.

Move the bike lane that currently exists on the South side of the three blocks of Fell from Scott to Baker to the curb lane, where no bike lane currently exists, and add a 5-foot wide buffer strip where no buffer strip currently exists.

In the buffer strips construct concrete raised, planted traffic islands, as close as approximately 10 feet from residential and commercial driveways, and next to abundant moving traffic.

Remove all existing parking lanes on the South side of three blocks of Oak and the South side of three blocks of Fell (in each case from Scott to Baker), resulting in the loss of 88 street parking spaces on Oak and Fell, in addition to parallel parking in front of driveways on those streets which are currently being used as parking spaces by residents of the buildings.

Remove over 100 feet (five metered parking spaces) of yellow zone (commercial loading and unloading) parking on Oak.

Remove certain white zone (passenger loading and unloading) parking spaces on Oak and Fell.

Narrow the parking lane on the North side of Oak.

Construct 12 concrete bulbouts on various corners of Oak and Fell, many of which are double bulbouts.

Result in the loss of 13 street parking spaces on Oak and Fell to make room for the bulbouts.

Reduce the number of travel lanes on Oak during morning rush hour (7 AM to 9 AM) from four to three, a 25% reduction.

Reduce the number of travel lanes on Baker between Oak and Fell from two lanes in each direction to one lane in each direction plus one lane with exclusive left turn pockets.

Convert parallel street parking spaces on one side of certain blocks of Baker and Scott to back-in angled parking (Baker between Fell and Oak) or perpendicular parking.

Change or add various traffic signals at Oak/Baker and Oak/Broderick, and add turn pockets at several locations on Oak.

Establish a left turn only lane on Eastbound Oak at Baker.

(Except for the introductory paragraph, the above descriptions are from the Certificate.)

PROJECT IMPACTS

As described in numerous public testimonies, including comments at meetings and hearings, and in correspondence, the Project will have the following impacts:

Threaten the safety of bicyclists and motorists. Encouraging cycling on high-speed, heavy volume streets such as Oak and Fell is unsafe. Cars and bikes often don‟t remain in their lanes. Many cyclists refuse to use lights at night and are difficult for motorists and pedestrians to see. Cyclists will also be at risk from motor vehicles backing out with poor visibility from driveways and garages on Oak and Fell, plus other motorists using the bike lane to load and unload passengers and packages. All of this will be made more difficult by the raised planters as close as a bit more than 10 feet away from driveways, which will further reduce visibility, making it more difficult to pull out of driveways, and in many cases will force residents to block the bicycle lane while waiting to back out into heavy traffic. Moreover, unlike on low volume streets such as Page and Hayes, cars pulling out of driveways on Oak and Fell are only able to do so when motor vehicle traffic is stopped by a red light. Given the fact that many cyclists do not obey traffic signals, vehicles could be pulling out of driveways when they do not expect any traffic, only to tragically hit (or be hit by) an unexpected cyclist. Currently, Page and Hayes, located just one block from Oak and Fell, respectively, are designated as bike transit streets and are used by many bicyclists each day.

Jeopardize pedestrian safety by concentrating more cyclists in busy pedestrian intersections. Many cyclists go through red lights, don't use lights at night, text or use cell phones while cycling, and disobey other traffic safety laws, yet San Francisco is notoriously lax in enforcing traffic safety laws against cyclists.

Increase traffic, congestion and idling of vehicles because of the reduction in travel lanes on Oak during morning rush hour, the reduction in travel lanes on Baker between Fell and Oak, the left turn only lane on Eastbound Oak at Baker, the numerous bulbouts that make it more difficult to turn, the loss of many street parking spaces, the loss of yellow zone and white zone parking, the conversion of parallel parking into back-in angled parking and perpendicular parking (which takes longer and is more complex than parallel parking), and the changes to traffic signals.

Increase pollution, including greenhouse gases and toxic air contaminants (TAC) emitted by motor vehicles, because of the increased traffic, congestion and idling of vehicles. Fell and Oak are predominately residential in the Project area, and residences are considered sensitive receptors for the purposes of a TAC analysis. But to appellants‟ knowledge, MTA has not done a TAC analysis of the Project (if an analysis was done, it has not been disseminated to the public).

Jeopardize public safety by slowing down emergency vehicle response time. Besides the impact of overall congestion described above in the area, emergency vehicle access, especially for firefighting vehicles, is likely to be impeded by the numerous bulbouts, including double bulbouts. The Project was going to include a bulbout on Broderick and Oak near Falletti‟s Market, but at the MTA Board hearing on October 16, 2012, it was removed from the Project because MTA staff and the Board acknowledged that the bulbout would make it much more difficult, if not impossible, for Falletti‟s suppliers to drive their trucks around that corner. Suppliers would have to drive around the block and approach the building from the other direction in order to avoid the bulbout. If a bulbout would be an obstacle for delivery trucks, it would also be an obstacle for large fire trucks and engines. This would be especially problematic considering the Project would include 12 bulbouts clustered in nearby intersections in a dense, heavily trafficked area. Moreover the Project would make the entire situation more complex and congested, reducing the space for stationing fire vehicles and setting up firefighting equipment, and also reducing the space for civilian vehicles to pull over and get out of the way of fire vehicles.

The loss of street parking would be a major hardship (not an "inconvenience" as MTA staff has characterized it) for residents, merchants, customers and visitors. The existing street parking supply in the area bounded by Scott, Hayes, Baker and Page is approximately 590 spaces. (Certificate, pp. 10, 16.) The Project would mitigate the loss by converting street parallel parking to angled or perpendicular on some blocks of Baker and Scott (which would add 33 spaces), and by eliminating bus stops on Hayes (which would add 13 spaces). However, 11 of the spaces gained are outside the Project area (on Scott between Haight and Waller, and on Baker between Page and Haight). Assuming that these changes do not get reversed after implementation, there will be a net loss of around 11% (66 ÷ 590) of the parking spaces in the Project area; if they get reversed, it would be more. (Some of the angled or perpendicular spaces may well be converted back to parallel because of the increased traffic complexity and additional time required to park. This is especially likely on Baker between Fell and Oak, because the traffic lanes will be reduced, the situation will be made more complex, there will be a higher volume of bicycles, and back-in angled parking is difficult and requires all motor vehicle and cycle traffic to stop.) Even under a narrow view of environmental impact, as the Planning Department has taken in the Certificate, there would be a significant environmental impact of cars circling looking for parking---congestion, idling, pollution, and traffic on the side streets would all be increased.

The parking loss will be an even greater hardship for residents and visitors at night. Street parking is already scarce in this neighborhood at night, and the Project would significantly worsen it. This is not an "inconvenience," but a personal safety risk, especially for vulnerable people---women, seniors, disabled people---who will have to park further from their residence or the place they are visiting. The risk to personal safety will especially increase for residents returning to their homes late at night, and for visitors returning to their cars late at night after visiting friends in the area.

The major parking loss will especially impact seniors and disabled people, who are limited in how far they can walk and how many streets they can cross (even with bulbouts). Some of the side streets South of Oak are steep and difficult for many seniors and disabled people to climb and to park on, which further adds to the impact of parking loss on seniors and disabled people.

Those who use wheelchair/scooter accessible minivans and vans with side ramps or lifts (the most common configuration) will be especially impacted, because in effect, all street parking spaces (except perpendicular and angled spaces, those on the driver‟s side of a one-way street, and, sometimes, those with sidewalk obstructions such as garbage cans or trees in the exact location of the ramp or lift) are accessible spaces. The Project would remove all street parking on the South side of Oak, which means that all of the wheelchair/scooter accessible parking spaces, and even the custom of temporarily pulling up parallel to open driveway spaces for those purposes, would be eliminated for those three blocks. Converting parallel parking into perpendicular or angled parking would also eliminate spaces that are currently usable by disabled people, worsening the parking loss instead of mitigating it. For the disabled and seniors it means that transport vehicles will have to double park and force them upon exiting the vehicle to dodge bicyclists, many of whom are traveling in groups and at speeds equal to those of vehicles.

Loading and unloading will be made much more difficult for everyone along Fell and Oak in the Project area, and impossible for some. Residents, especially those who don‟t have driveways, won‟t be able to be picked up or dropped off in front of their homes. This will be a hardship and safety risk for everyone, but especially seniors, disabled people and families with small children. Some will choose to park temporarily in the bike lane, potentially causing conflicts and even collisions among residents and bicyclists. Merchants will be heavily impacted because they rely on daily deliveries from suppliers. Suppliers will have to spend more time searching for parking, and will have to park further away, making deliveries more difficult and increasing costs. The loss of yellow zone parking will exacerbate these impacts. Merchants will also be impacted by the increased difficulty of their customers being able to find street parking, and by the increased difficulty of customers being picked up and dropped off. The loss of white zone parking will worsen these impacts. The churches will be impacted; churches in the area have objected to the Project.

It will be more difficult, costly and hectic for residents and merchants on Fell and Oak to have construction, maintenance, painting and similar work done on their homes and businesses. Consider, for example, how difficult, costly, time-consuming and even dangerous it would be to set up scaffolding on a building if the scaffolding truck could not park anywhere on the block where the building is located. Having large contractors‟ vehicles circling the neighborhood looking for parking would further increase congestion, idling, pollution, and traffic on the side streets. Or, if temporary permits were issued for contractors to park on Fell and Oak, they would be blocking the bike lane and part of the buffer strip, putting cyclists at risk by forcing them into the adjacent traffic lane or the sidewalk. In many locations there might not even be space for contractors‟ vehicles because of the raised planters in the buffer strip.

Similarly, it will be much harder for residents and merchants in the area, especially those on Fell and Oak, to move in and out. Where would moving trucks park? Consider how difficult, expensive, time-consuming and even dangerous it would be if moving trucks had to park far from the building to or from which they were carrying large, heavy furniture, equipment, inventory and other items. As with contractors, if temporary permits were issued for movers to park on Fell and Oak, this would be dangerous for cyclists because the moving trucks would be blocking the bike lane and part of the buffer strip. Moving trucks are large, so there might not even be space for them because of the planters in the buffer strip.

The likelihood and impacts of double-parking would increase because of the impediments created by the Project. Delivery trucks, cars, taxis and other vehicles will double-park in the remaining travel lanes, causing sudden, unforeseeable stops due to blocking of travel lanes, with traffic having to change lanes to use the remaining travel lanes. It only takes one double-parked vehicle to cause serious back-ups, congestion, and dangerous conditions on major traffic corridors like Fell and Oak. Besides the danger to motorists and cyclists, this would increase pollution, and probably also noise from horns.

The increased congestion caused by drivers circling the area looking for parking, and by people and goods being picked up and dropped off on nearby streets because they can‟t be on Fell and Oak, may also have an adverse impact on the 21 Hayes bus, which is already an extremely slow bus line, and on the 6 Parnassus, 16X, 33 Stanyan and 71 Haight-Noriega. Although eliminating two stops in each direction is likely to improve running time for the 21 Hayes, this is likely to be more than offset by these congestion impacts.

In sum, these likely impacts are significant, individually and cumulatively.

CEQA EXEMPTIONS MUST BE NARROWLY CONSTRUED, AND THE PROJECT’S IMPACTS ARE TOO GREAT FOR AN EXEMPTION

The approval of the Project was an abuse of discretion and a failure to proceed as required by the California Environmental Quality Act ("CEQA") (Public Resources Code Sections 21000 et seq.). The categorical exemptions invoked by the Planning Department under 14 Cal. Code Regs. (the "Guidelines") Sections 15301(c) and 15304(h) do not apply, since the Project: (1) has the potential to degrade the quality of the environment; (2) has possible effects that are cumulatively considerable; and (3) will cause substantial adverse effects on human beings, either directly or indirectly. (Public Resources Code Section 21083(b).) Therefore the Project cannot be classified as categorically exempt. As described above, there is ample  evidence supporting a fair argument that the Project could cause direct, secondary, and cumulative impacts on traffic, air quality, public safety, parking, loading, disability access, transit and emergency services.

The claimed parking loss mitigations do not effectively mitigate the Project‟s impacts, and, in any event, cannot be used to claim a categorical exemption.
 
In McQueen v. Mid-Peninsula Regional Open Space (1988) 202 Cal. App. 3d 1136, the court reiterated that categorical exemptions are construed strictly, shall not be unreasonably expanded beyond their terms, and may not be used where there is substantial evidence that there are unusual circumstances (including future activities) resulting in (or which might reasonably result in) significant impacts which threaten the environment.

THE PROJECT IS NOT CATEGORICALLY EXEMPT UNDER THE CEQA EXEMPTION FOR EXISTING FACILITIES

The Project does not qualify for an exemption under Guidelines Section 15301 (also referred to as "Class 1"), the Existing Facilities exemption. That exemption is for the "operation, repair, maintenance, permitting, leasing, licensing, or minor alteration of existing public or private structures, facilities, mechanical equipment, or topographical features, involving negligible or no expansion of use beyond that existing at the time of the lead agency‟s determination." (Emphasis added.) "The key consideration is whether the project involves negligible or no expansion of an existing use." The Certificate asserts that the Project is exempt under 15301(c) "Existing highways and streets, sidewalks, gutters, bicycle and pedestrian trails and similar facilities…" (Emphasis added.)

There is no bike lane existing on Oak, so the exemption asserted, example (c), could not even arguably apply to Oak.

On both Oak and Fell, the existing conditions in the locations where bike lanes would be installed consist of parking lanes, not bicycle lanes. A parking lane, as defined in California Streets & Highways Code Section 5871(c), is "a paved area adjacent to the curb which is used exclusively for on-street parking. It does not include any portion of the street used for through traffic or as a bicycle lane." (Emphasis added.) The "facility" does not meet this basic definition, since it would completely remove the parking lane and change its use to a separated bicycle lane for exclusive use of bicyclists. (S&H Code Section 890.4(a).) These definitions are mutually exclusive, and the Project involves a complete change of use---far more than "negligible."

The changes the Project would create are not minor alterations. Among other things, it would create bike lanes where none exist; create buffer strips on Oak and Fell with raised, planted traffic islands where none exist; reduce the number of travel lanes on Oak during morning rush hour; reduce the number of travel lanes on Baker between Oak and Fell; remove many street parking spaces; and impose other traffic changes that are cumulatively significant.

The policy entitled "Categorical Exemptions from CEQA" adopted by the San Francisco Planning Commission (Resolution No. 14952, August 17, 2000) lists items eligible for exemption under 15301(c). Item 7 (p.3) is: "Repair and replacement of bicycle ways, pedestrian trails, and dog exercise areas, and signs so designating, where to do so will not involve the removal of a scenic resource. (Creation of bicycle lanes is covered under Class 4(h) below.)"

The Project does not involve repair and replacement of bicycle ways. Even more important, the list explicitly states that creation of bicycle lanes is covered under Class 4(h). (Class 4(h) refers to Guidelines Section 15304(h), discussed below.) Therefore, by the terms of San Francisco‟s own policy, the Project doesn‟t qualify for an exemption under 15301(c).

THE PROJECT IS NOT CATEGORICALLY EXEMPT UNDER THE CEQA EXEMPTION FOR MINOR ALTERATIONS

For reasons similar to those with respect to the Existing Facilities exemption, the Project does not qualify for an exemption under Guidelines Section 15304 (also referred to as "Class 4"), the exemption for Minor Alterations. This exemption consists of "minor public or private alterations in the condition of land, water, and/or vegetation which do not involve removal of healthy, mature, scenic trees, except for forestry and agricultural purposes." (Emphasis added.) The Planning Department has invoked 15304(h): "creation of bicycle lanes on existing rights-of-way." (Emphasis added.) There is no existing right-of-way in the parking lanes on Oak and Fell for bicycle lanes, since the right-of-way in those parking lanes is exclusively for vehicles. (See S&H Code Section 5871(c).)

The Project includes 5-foot wide buffer strips along Fell and Oak, with raised, planted traffic islands, and the exemption asserted, example (h), does not even mention buffer strips or raised traffic islands.

Nor is the Project a minor alteration in the condition of land, water, and/or vegetation. Rather, it is a major alteration and change of use from parking lanes for exclusive use of parking vehicles to bicycle lanes for exclusive use of riding bicycles. It would also create buffer strips on Oak and Fell with raised, planted traffic islands where none exist; reduce the number of travel lanes on Oak during morning rush hour; reduce the number of travel lanes on Baker between Oak and Fell; remove many street parking spaces; and impose other traffic changes that are cumulatively significant.

If the removal of parking lanes or travel lanes and their replacement with bicycle lanes were automatically, categorically deemed a minor alteration that qualifies for this exemption, then it would be possible to remove all parking lanes and all travel lanes, replace all of them with bike lanes, and still qualify for the exemption---certainly an absurd result that is contrary to CEQA and the Guidelines.

THE FAILURE TO CONDUCT ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW OF THE PROJECT VIOLATES CEQA AND ITS PURPOSES

The Project is part of a larger project, the San Francisco Bicycle Plan (the "Bicycle Plan"). If it applies at all, a categorical exemption must apply to the whole Bicycle Plan project, not just one segment. See Association for a Cleaner Environment v. Yosemite Community College District (2004) 116 Cal. App. 4th, 629, 640. But the court has already held in the Coalition for Adequate Review cases, that the Bicycle Plan is not categorically exempt.

The Environmental Impact Report ("EIR") for the Bicycle Plan did not specifically analyze the Project. The MTA Resolution attempts to skirt this defect by stating that the Bicycle Plan, which included a Long Term project on Oak between Baker and Scott, was analyzed at a programmatic level in the EIR. (MTA Resolution, penultimate preamble paragraph.) Literally, this means that the Bicycle Plan itself (not the Project) was analyzed only at a programmatic level, but even if the Project had been analyzed at a programmatic level, this would not be sufficient. Importantly, the Bicycle Plan EIR predates by several years the essential details of the Project, many of which were only finalized in recent months.

Clearly, the environmental impacts of introducing a bike lane and buffer strip on Oak from Baker to Scott were never studied with regard to Levels of Service at signals, volumes of traffic (both bicycle and vehicle), flows and impacts resulting from bulbouts, parking removal, or impacts on residents, visitors and businesses in the area. In our opinion, such changes constitute major revisions of the status quo that more than warrant a complete and thorough CEQA analysis.

The Bicycle Plan EIR doesn't analyze the Project, but it does make faulty judgments about several issues regarding the segments of the Bicycle Plan that it does analyze, such as parking removal. The impacts of parking removal are described as being of little consequence environmentally, as they are allegedly balanced by changes of habit and transportation modes. This is a terrible assumption, and is essentially repeated in the Certificate. See the discussion of parking in "The Planning Department‟s Exemption Determination is Incorrect and Inadequate" below.

Each of the appellants has attended meetings and hearings about the Project, and has corresponded with MTA about it. It has been clear throughout the process that MTA did not seriously consider any alternatives to the Project, such as proposals by the Haight Ashbury Improvement Association and others for a bike route on Page Street (especially Eastbound) and Hayes Street (especially Westbound). Nor did they seriously analyze mitigation measures such as creating bike lanes for use during the daytime, when bicycle demand is greatest, and allowing street parking at night, when neighborhood parking demand is greatest. By rejecting alternatives and moving forward with design details without conducting environmental review, MTA violated the principles set forth by the California Supreme Court in Save Tara v. City of West Hollywood (2008) 45 Cal. 4th 116, and Laurel Heights Improvement Ass’n v. Regents of the University of California (1988) 47 Cal. 3rd 376. In Save Tara, the Court stated: "Before conducting CEQA review, agencies must not 'take any action' that significantly furthers a project 'in a manner that forecloses alternatives or mitigation measures that would ordinarily be part of the CEQA review of that public project.'"

MTA created the institutional momentum to impose the Project without seriously analyzing its environmental impact or considering alternatives. The Court held in Laurel Heights that "CEQA requires that an agency determine whether a project may have a significant environmental impact, and thus whether an EIR is required, before it approves that project." Further, "A fundamental purpose of an EIR is to provide decision-makers with information they can use in deciding whether to approve a proposed project, not to inform them of the environmental effects of projects that they have already approved. If post-approval environmental review were allowed, EIRs would likely become nothing more than posthoc rationalizations to support action already taken. We have expressly condemned this use of EIRs."

At the MTA/SF Bicycle Coalition workshops about the project held at the San Francisco Day School in 2011, the MTA‟s presentation about the Project at the March 2012 meeting of the Physical Access Committee of the Mayor‟s Disability Council (appellant Chabner was chair of the committee at that time), and the May 2012 MTA hearing in front of an MTA employee, it was clear that MTA was already irrevocably committed to the Project.
 
It is quite possible that MTA‟s haste in implementing the Project was motivated in large part by political considerations. At the May 2012 hearing, and at other times, various elected officials have spoken in support of the project, including Supervisor Christina Olague and a member of Assemblyman Tom Ammiano's staff, who urged MTA to implement the project by November.

It is also interesting that the last week of September 2012 was the 20th anniversary of Critical Mass in San Francisco, an anniversary marked by fanfare and controversy, and the MTA Board unanimously approved the Project on October 16, just two weeks later, and with almost no Board discussion of the concerns raised by residents and merchants at the meeting and in written comments, or of the potential environmental impacts. Project approval was a foregone conclusion for quite some time, and the manner in which it was handled was politically motivated.

CUMULATIVE IMPACTS AND UNUSUAL CIRCUMSTANCES EXIST THAT PRECLUDE A CATEGORICAL EXEMPTION

Guidelines Section 15300.2 provides that categorical exemptions may not be used in the following circumstances (among others):

(b) Cumulative Impact. All exemptions for these classes [including Class 4] are inapplicable when the cumulative impact of successive projects of the same type in the same place, over time is significant. (c) Significant Effect. A categorical exemption shall not be used for an activity where there is a reasonable possibility that the activity will have a significant effect on the environment due to unusual circumstances.

In McQueen v. Mid-Peninsula Regional Open Space, cited above, the court emphasized that categorical exemptions may not be used where there is substantial evidence that there are unusual circumstances (including future activities) resulting in (or which might reasonably result in) significant impacts which threaten the environment.

There is a reasonable possibility that this Project will have a significant effect on the environment due to unusual circumstances; therefore, per Section 15300.2(c), this precludes use of categorical exemptions. As described above, the Project is located in a densely populated residential, commercial and tourist area in the heart of San Francisco. The Project would make major changes on Fell/Oak, one of San Francisco‟s most indispensable and heavily trafficked East-West thoroughfares, the major thoroughfare leading to and from the Octavia Boulevard entrance and exit for Highway 101. There are no comparable alternatives to these streets for motor vehicles going to and from this primary entrance/exit for Highway 101.
 
The Project area also includes Divisadero Street, a major North-South thoroughfare and commercial street that includes many stores, restaurants, cafés, a hotel and other small businesses. The population and traffic density, central location, unique nature of the neighborhood, complexity, and indispensable nature of the corridor to and from Highway 101 together constitute unusual circumstances.

In addition, per Section 15300.2(b), the Minor Alterations exemption (Class 4) is unavailable because the Project, together with the bicycle boulevard project on Masonic Avenue approved by the MTA Board, would have significant cumulative impacts. Masonic Avenue is only three blocks from Baker Street, the Westernmost street of the Project area. The two areas are contiguous and essentially are part of the same neighborhood. (In fact, as part of the Project MTA staff considered removing the 21 Hayes bus stop on Hayes/Central in order to mitigate the parking loss. Central is only one block from Masonic.) The Masonic project would remove all street parking on both sides of Masonic for over half a mile, including through Fell Street, would reduce travel lanes on Masonic, and would make other major changes in the neighborhood. These would have environmental impacts similar to those of the Project, including increasing congestion, vehicular idling and pollution. Because of the close proximity of the Project to the Masonic project, the cumulative impact of both projects must be considered together.

THE PLANNING DEPARTMENT’S EXEMPTION DETERMINATION IS INCORRECT AND INADEQUATE

The Planning Department, in support of its determination that the Project is categorically exempt from environmental review, discusses certain matters in the Certificate, including Level of Service analysis for traffic on Fell and Oak, and potential impacts on transit, pedestrians, bicycles, emergency access, loading and parking. These discussions are incomplete and inadequate, and they ignore or understate the likely impacts of the Project. Importantly, the data and analyses underlying these assertions have not been disseminated to the public for consideration before the October 16, 2012 MTA Board hearing (or at any other time).

In great contrast, if the MTA had commissioned an EIR, the EIR would have been detailed, would have been made widely available for review and comment, and would have required detailed responses to public comments in order to be certified as final. Some information has been made available in response to Sunshine Ordinance requests by appellants and others, but the public‟s right to know the data and analyses supporting the Project, and on which the categorical exemption from environmental review is based, and MTA/the Planning Department‟s obligation to provide this information to the public in a comprehensive, organized and systematic fashion, are not satisfied by responding to Sunshine Ordinance requests.

Traffic Level of Service. The traffic Level of Service analysis is conclusory and inadequate. No information is given in the Certificate about who conducted the measurements, how they were conducted, what instruments were used to measure traffic delay, the dates traffic delay was measured, or how many days traffic was measured. Nothing is stated about who analyzed the data. No explanation is given of how "delay" is defined.
 
Each of us having lived in the neighborhood for many years and driven or been passengers on Oak and Fell hundreds of times, it certainly seems to appellants that the number of seconds stated for delay during peak hours under existing conditions (ranging from 6 to 21 seconds at the various Oak intersections in the Project area, and from 8 to 16 seconds at the Fell intersections, in both cases without the expected impact of the Project) are grossly understated. And then, crucially, no explanation is given for how the expected delay impact of the Project was estimated. The Certificate devotes much of its limited discussion of traffic analysis to estimating delays in the year 2035, concluding for most intersections that the Project impact would be 0, 1 or 2 seconds, which seems an exercise in false precision if ever there was one.

There are no data or analyses of total travel time along Fell or Oak within the Project area, nor for the blocks of Fell and Oak outside but near the Project area, let alone a comparison of these travel times before and after the Project. For example, it would be important to know the impact of the Project on travel time from Oak/Stanyan to Oak/Octavia at various times of day, but the Certificate is silent about this. Nor is there any discussion or analysis at all of traffic impacts on streets besides Fell and Oak, such as Baker, which is losing travel lanes and adding a more difficult, cumbersome, slower parking scheme. Impacts on the other cross streets, and on parallel nearby streets such as Hayes and Page, also are completely ignored. Perhaps this is because the Certificate denies that there will be increased congestion due to parking loss (see below).

Although the Certificate does not state who performed the traffic Level of Service analysis, appellants have been informed that it was MTA staff. Therefore, no independent traffic study was done; the only analysis, inadequate as it is, was performed by employees of the Project sponsor.
 
In contrast, two recent major projects in the area were required to do thorough traffic studies. The Falletti's development, which is in the Project area, performed an extensive traffic  study in support of a negative declaration. The Whole Foods project, near the area, did a full EIR, including two traffic studies, one in the winter and one in the spring. The idea behind performing two studies was that there were likely to be fewer cyclists, pedestrians and vehicles in the winter than in the spring, and it was important to ascertain and account for conditions throughout the year in evaluating the environmental impact of the development.

Transit. The Certificate devotes one paragraph each to a discussion of the impact on the 21 Hayes and 16X bus lines (plus one paragraph each to a discussion of the expected impact in the year 2035; as above, an exercise in false precision). It concludes that the impacts would be minimal, estimating slightly increased or decreased delays (such as 1 or 2 seconds at various intersections) for the 16X, and doesn‟t discuss delays at all for the 21 Hayes. With respect to the 16X, there is no discussion of how the increased or decreased delays were estimated, nor by whom. Asserting increased or decreased delays of 1 or 2 seconds implies a level of precision that is highly unlikely, essentially a rounding error. Because the Certificate denies there will be increased congestion caused by drivers circling the area looking for parking, and by people and goods being picked up and dropped off on nearby streets because they can‟t be on Fell and Oak, there is no mention of possible delays on the 21 Hayes, which is already maddeningly slow. The discussion of the 16X also ignores these impacts.

There is also no discussion of potential impacts on the 6 Parnassus, 33 Stanyan and 71 Haight-Noriega, all of which have stops in the area and would be impacted by diversion of traffic to the nearby streets and by cars circling in search of parking.

Pedestrian. In the three sentences devoted to this topic, the Certificate mentions bulbouts, continental ladder markings and advanced limit lines, concluding that pedestrian conditions would improve. No observations, data, studies or analyses are cited. There is no mention whatsoever of the likely dangers to pedestrians discussed in the "Project Impacts" section of this Memorandum.

Bicycle. In the three sentences devoted to this subject, the Certificate mentions the striped, landscaped buffers on Oak and Fell, concluding that the Project would improve bicycle conditions. There is no mention whatsoever of the likely dangers to cyclists discussed in the "Project Impacts" section of this Memorandum, especially the danger of encouraging more cycling on high-speed, heavy volume, complex streets such as Oak and Fell instead of on slower, lower volume, simpler streets, and the danger of being hit by cars backing out of driveways.

Emergency Access. In the two sentences devoted to this topic, the Certificate states that the project would not close any existing streets or entrances, and emergency vehicle access would not be impeded. There is no mention whatsoever of the likely impact of having so many bulbouts on so many adjacent and nearby intersections in a dense area, discussed in the "Project Impacts" section of this Memorandum. For example, as discussed in that section, if a bulbout impedes delivery vehicles, causing them to go around the block, wouldn't it have a similar impact on large fire engines and trucks?
 
Loading. In the one paragraph devoted to this subject, the Certificate describes the location of the five loading spaces that would be eliminated on Oak, emphasizes that other loading spaces would be preserved, and concludes that because of those other loading spaces and the availability of off-street loading for two gas stations and Kelly Moore Paints, no significant loading impacts would occur. No observations, studies, data or analyses are cited. The discussion ignores the testimony of merchants in the area about the hardship the elimination of the five yellow zone commercial loading spaces would cause to their businesses. It ignores the fact that the area is already congested, and the impact of the net loss of loading spaces and overall large loss of street parking.

Importantly, there is no discussion whatsoever of the hardship and safety issues for residents of Oak and Fell who could no longer be picked up or dropped off in front of their homes, and could no longer load and unload objects and packages in front of their homes. There is also no discussion of the loss of the white zone passenger loading spaces.

Parking. The Planning Department claims that loss of parking spaces is not an environmental impact under CEQA, just a social effect. They acknowledge, however, that parking conditions "may be of interest to the public and the decision makers," and therefore present a parking analysis for information purposes. They state that under CEQA a project's social impacts need not be treated as significant impacts on the environment but acknowledge that environmental documents should address the secondary physical impacts that could be triggered by a social impact, citing CEQA Guidelines Section 15131(a). They state that because the availability of parking changes over time, parking is not a permanent physical condition, and therefore not an environmental impact. (The discussion of parking is at pp. 16 and 17 of the Certificate.)

Appellants do not agree that parking is not an environmental impact. We believe it is. CEQA defines the environment broadly to include "physical conditions which exist within the area which will be affected by a proposed project." (Public Resources Code Section 21060.5.) "Environment" means the physical conditions which exist within the area which will be affected by a proposed project including land, air, water, minerals, flora, fauna, ambient noise, and objects of historical or aesthetic significance. The 'environment' includes both natural and man-made conditions." (Guidelines Section15360.) Many of these things change over time (ambient noise, especially, is ephemeral and fluctuates), yet the law considers them part of the physical environment. Also, the Planning Department conflates the availability of parking spaces at any time (a function of supply and demand at a particular point in time) with the City‟s choice about what uses to assign to specific pieces of land in a project area (for example, travel lanes, parking, bike lanes, open space); those pieces of land, and their uses, are part of the physical environment.

Removing parking spaces and making existing parking deficits worse are significant impacts that must be analyzed and mitigated under CEQA; Land Value 77 v. Board of Trustees of the California State University (2011) 193 Cal. App. 4th 675, 679-680. Traffic analysis that failed to analyze impacts caused by eliminating parking was held inadequate; Sacramento Old City Assn. v. City Council of Sacramento (1991) 229 Cal. App. 3d 1011, 1028. "Traffic and parking have the potential…of causing serious environmental problems," Sacramento Old City.

Loss of street parking "indicated that a finding of significant environmental effect was mandatory," Friends of "B" Street v. City of Hayward (1980) 106 Cal. App. 3rd 988, 1003.

The Planning Department states that the "social inconvenience of parking deficits, such as having to hunt for scarce parking spaces, is not an environmental impact, but there may be secondary physical environmental impacts, such as increased traffic congestion at intersections, air quality impacts, safety impacts, or noise impacts caused by congestion." But after acknowledging this possibility, the Planning Department dismisses it in two conclusory paragraphs full of boilerplate. They claim: "In the experience of San Francisco transportation planners, however, the absence of a ready supply of parking spaces, combined with available alternatives to auto travel (e.g. transit service, taxis, bicycles or travel by foot) and a relatively dense pattern of urban development, induces many drivers to seek and find alternative parking facilities, shift to other modes of travel, or change their overall travel habits." (Emphasis added.)

The Certificate goes on to state: "The transportation analysis accounts for potential secondary effects, such as cars circling looking for a parking space in areas of limited parking supply, by assuming that all drivers would attempt to find parking at or near the project site and then seek parking further away if convenient parking is available. Moreover, the secondary effect of drivers searching for parking is typically offset by a reduction in vehicle trips due to others who are aware of constrained parking conditions in a given area." Because of this, the Planning Department concludes that any secondary environmental impacts resulting from parking shortage would be minor. (The last sentence quoted is circular, and if it were really true, there would be little or no parking-related congestion anywhere because, as parking became scarcer, people would either change transportation modes or stay away from an area altogether, and the area would remain static.)

No factual basis is stated for these conclusory assertions---no observations, no studies, no investigations, no surveys, no data, no measurements, no statistics, no analyses of the particular conditions in this particular neighborhood, no interviews, no testimony of residents, merchants or visitors---just the "experience of San Francisco transportation planners." The time period on which their opinion is based is unstated. The identity, professional qualifications, expertise, experience, and track record of these anonymous transportation planners are not revealed, nor is any factual, empirical basis whatsoever given for their opinion.

Moreover, the statement quoted is internally inconsistent: if drivers seek parking further away from the Project area, then they would be driving further, therefore causing more congestion, more idling and more pollution. The question is: how much? But neither MTA nor the Planning Department has made a factually based attempt to answer it.

In October 2012, pursuant to the Sunshine Ordinance, appellant Chabner requested from MTA and the Planning Department:

"All documents regarding the factual statements, analyses and conclusions in the second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth paragraphs of the section entitled 'Parking' in the Exemption from Environmental Review for the SFMTA Fell & Oak Streets Bikeways Project." [Note---The Parking section has six paragraphs.]

MTA responded: "After reviewing our records, the SFMTA has determined that the agency does not have any records responsive to your request."

The Planning Department responded: "There is nothing to provide since the 'Parking' standard language does not reference any specific document, is not based on a specific study, and is grounded on the expertise of San Francisco transportation planners, as stated in the language."

It's revealing that the Planning Department response to the Sunshine request refers to the "Parking standard language" in the Certificate: they admit that their discussion is mere boilerplate! (This appears to be the same boilerplate used in the Bicycle Plan EIR.) MTA and the Planning Department have no factual basis for their claim that parking impact would be minor and have completely ignored the testimonies to the contrary from residents and merchants referred to in the "Project Impacts" section of this Memorandum.

Most people who own cars are very unlikely to sell them even if forced into longer searches for street parking. Nor are they likely to readily switch to, or increase their use of, a flawed transit system, especially at night even though the parking shortage is worse at night. And for those who rent or own housing that includes off street parking, the presence of increased bicycle traffic that increases safety risks would still not result in major abandonment of the motor vehicle.

THE PROJECT DISCRIMINATES AGAINST PEOPLE WITH MOBILITY DISABILITIES

Accessible transportation, and an equal opportunity to choose among modes of transportation, are essential to living a full, independent life, and are central disability rights. The Americans with Disabilities Act, 42 USC Section 12101 et seq, and California disability rights laws, including California Civil Code Sections 54 et seq, (the ADA and California disability rights laws are referred to as the "Disability Rights Laws") prohibit discrimination on the basis of disability in programs of local government, use of streets and sidewalks, and transportation. California Civil Code Section 54(a) provides that "Individuals with disabilities or medical conditions have the same right as the general public to the full and free use of the streets, highways, sidewalks, walkways… public facilities, and other public places." Title II of the ADA requires local governments to provide people with disabilities an equal opportunity to benefit from all of their programs, services and activities. Sidewalks, streets and parking are programs provided by ADA Title II entities, and therefore are subject to ADA requirements.

Most people with major mobility disabilities are unable to bike, ride a motorcycle, or use a skateboard, razor style scooters, rollerblades or roller skates. Most slow walkers and many manual wheelchair users can go only a limited distance. Although many pedestrians who use electric wheelchairs and scooters are able to go far, some of them, too, can go only a limited distance. Finding a wheelchair accessible taxi is problematic. San Francisco's public transportation system has access limitations, flaws and gaps. Individual circumstances also limit many disabled people's ability to use public transportation. Rain and cold weather also limit the distance many disabled people can walk or roll, and also limit their ability to use public transportation. Therefore, many people with mobility disabilities rely heavily on automobiles for transportation, both as drivers and as passengers.

Many seniors and disabled people rely on service providers coming to their homes, including caregivers, Meals on Wheels, physical, respiratory and occupational therapists, and wheelchair repair companies. These providers typically use automobiles, so when street parking is removed, it becomes more time-consuming and costly to provide these services, and people with disabilities and seniors are impacted.

If he or she owns a vehicle, almost everyone who uses an electric wheelchair, and many who use scooters and manual wheelchairs, have either a lowered floor minivan with a passenger-side ramp or a full-size van. (Lowered floor minivans are also available with the ramp in the rear, but this configuration is rare except in taxis. For full-size vans, a side lift is the most common configuration.) For those with accessible minivans and vans with ramps or lifts on the side, all street parking spaces (except perpendicular and angled spaces, those on the driver‟s side of a one-way street, and, sometimes, those with sidewalk obstructions such as garbage cans or trees in the exact location of the ramp or lift) are, in effect, accessible spaces even though they are not blue zones. In fact, disabled people park in regular street parking spaces far more often than in blue zones because: (a) the number of blue zones is very limited and they are often occupied; and (b) quite often a regular space is available closer to the destination than a blue zone.

Therefore, removing street parking spaces and replacing parallel spaces with perpendicular or angled ones disparately impact people with mobility disabilities.

The Project would remove all street parking on the South side of Oak, which means that all of the effectively wheelchair/scooter accessible parking spaces would be eliminated for those three blocks. The parking spaces on the North side of Oak would remain, but it would be extremely dangerous for people in wheelchairs/scooters to use them because the ramp or lift would be deployed into the travel lane. Converting parking spaces on some of the side streets, which are currently parallel parking, into perpendicular or angled spaces also would eliminate spaces that are currently usable by wheelchair/scooter users, thereby adding to the parking loss instead of mitigating it. (Baker between Fell and Oak, and Scott between Haight and Waller, are flat, and the loss of half the accessible parking on those blocks would worsen the hardship. Baker between Page and Haight is moderately sloped, and there is already perpendicular parking on the East side, so converting the West side to perpendicular would make that entire block off-limits for parking by wheelchair/scooter users.)

Not only wheelchair/scooter users, but people who walk slowly and with difficulty would also be harmed and disparately impacted by the loss of parking spaces on Oak and the elimination of parallel parking on the side streets.
 
As described above, the Project would also make it more difficult, dangerous and stressful for disabled people, including wheelchair/scooter users and people who have difficulty walking, and for seniors, to be picked up and dropped off.

These impacts discriminate against people with disabilities and violate the Disability Rights Laws.

REMEDIES REQUESTED

1. Set aside all approvals of the Project, and the Categorical Exemption.

2. Declare that any future proposal to implement the same project must be preceded by an environmental impact report fully analyzing all impacts and proposing effective mitigations for each of the Project‟s possible impacts on parking, traffic, transit, noise, air quality, emergency services, public safety, and human impacts. Cumulative impacts must be analyzed taking into account all past, present, and reasonably foreseeable projects that will also affect traffic, transit, parking, noise, air quality, and public safety on Oak and Fell Streets and the entire area. Spillover and secondary impacts from removal of street parking must also be analyzed, along with any impacts caused by mitigations, including traffic congestion caused by signal timing. The analysis must include real-time on-ground traffic counts during AM and PM peak periods, taken at a variety of representative days of the week and times of the year.

3. The EIR must propose effective mitigations that eliminate each of the Project‟s impacts, including consideration of avoiding each impact altogether by not implementing the Project.

4. The City must implement effective mitigation before Project implementation.

5. The City must propose a plan to effectively comply with the Disability Rights Laws, provide an opportunity for meaningful input and comment on such plan, and incorporate such plan in a revised Project.

6. Further consideration of the Project must be stayed until the City has complied with CEQA, the Disability Rights Laws and other applicable statutes and regulations.

7. Such other remedies as may be appropriate.

Appellants request copies by e-mail, no later than five days in advance of the hearing on this appeal, of all documents submitted by MTA, the Planning Department, the City Attorney’s office and other city agencies in opposition to this appeal. (The Clerk of the Board of Supervisors has appellants’ e-mail addresses.)

Appellants reserve the right to submit supplemental memoranda, rebuttals and other documents.

DATE: December 3, 2012

Mark Brennan

Howard Chabner

Ted Loewenberg

Labels: Anti-Car, District 5, Divisadero, Panhandle, Parking, Whole Foods

December 4, 2012

From Robert Andersons District 5 Diary

Update on Appeal

of Oak/Fell Project



Nov 29, 2012

Request to Postpone

SFMTA NE Mission Meeting DENIED!

Remember how the SFMTA  ignored Mission Residents last time? It must be Groundhog Day.

City and County of San Francisco

One South Van Ness Avenue, Seventh Fl. San Francisco, CA ­94103
415.701.4720
www.sfmta.com

Nov 28, 2012

Nov 23, 2012

Citizens Request to Postpone

SFMTA NE Mission Meeting



 November 22, 2012

 2008 Meeting of Bicycle

People Alleges a Conspiracy