“Can you please make sure your folks do not put up any more political ads? This is not good at all.” Earlier this month, some 70 London Breed for Mayor ads popped up across the city, on bus and train shelters. They were eye-catching billboards: The candidate sported a blue blazer against a gold background and flashed a winning smile....
Reporting from Mission Local last year spurred Muni to upgrade hundreds of new buses which were operating without a rudimentary pollution-control device, allowing them to idle for hours on end. Scores of older buses, however, are not being upgraded. And Muni states it has no plans to do so. Seventy aging Neoplan diesel buses the agency hopes to retire in...
The cost of one of Muni’s new diesel-electric hybrid buses approaches three-quarters of a million dollars. That’s roughly twice what a regular old diesel bus costs, but San Francisco is a city that’s willing to pay more. After all, can you really put a price tag on appearing to care about environmental issues? This city is a place easily pegged...
The SFMTA is building a protected, curbside bike lane on Valencia Street between Duncan and Cesar Chavez streets that will be separated from car traffic by parked vehicles. This is San Francisco’s first bikeway to be both elevated and parking-protected. The new lane, scheduled for completion in November, will be six feet wide with a 5-foot buffer next to the...
San Francisco’s transit agency is proposing to roll back some of the traffic changes made along Mission Street when the city installed red bus-only lanes from 14th Street to Cortland Avenue. The Municipal Transit Agency announced on Monday that its board would consider removal of two forced right turns at 22nd and 26th streets in order to give drivers four blocks of through traffic to...
With more than 100 people packed into a sweltering room, tempers ran hot at a three-hour meeting held by the San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency to get feedback on the agency’s new transit lanes and turn restrictions along Mission Street. The changes, which were rolled out in March, include the creation of transit-only lanes, the prohibition of left turns for...
A business owner lambasted the San Francisco Municipal Transit Authority’s Board of Directors on Tuesday, saying traffic changes along Mission Street have cost her business and threatening closures. Neighborhood residents at the meeting called the changes a form of violence. The changes include transit-only lanes and many left turn turn restrictions, plus forced right turns at certain intersections. Eden...
In addition to new commuter shuttle stop zones at Dolores Street between 18th and 19th streets and at 16th and Sanchez streets, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency is proposing to remove two current stops along Valencia Street, one at 24th Street and one at 25th Street, and replacing them with stops at 26th Street. This proposal comes as part of an ongoing effort to...
A not-so-neighborly letter circulating amongst Mark Zuckerberg’s Mission District neighbors entangles the Facebook CEO in an issue that many San Franciscans generally do not take lightly – parking spaces. Some residents of Liberty Hill, where Zuckerberg bought his home at the cross of Fair Oakes and 21st streets for a reported $10 million in 2013, have passed around a letter that accuses his security team...
At a public meeting on Tuesday, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency’s Board of Directors decided to make permanent City Hall’s 18-month pilot program regulating private shuttle companies, many of which carry tech-sector workers from their fog city doorsteps to their desks in Silicon Valley. The board’s decision was unanimous, despite widespread criticism from the meeting’s attendees. SFMTA staff are...
A study of traffic data around Marshall Elementary declared the city’s first “home zone,” established there in 2014 to calm traffic, a resounding success. “This home zone project is a fantastic example of what can be achieved when streets are designed to be family-friendly. Not only was the most dangerous driving behavior addressed — speed — but walking, wheelchair rolling...
When the SFMTA’s new pilot program to regulate tech shuttles starts in August, few will notice much change as the pilot program will shift the location of some stops but will keep close to the same number of stops operating in the Mission. According to a map of proposed stops released by SFMTA, the program will remove six existing tech shuttle stops from the neighborhood, but it...
Today is a big day for Muni. This morning, all but one of the San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency (SFMTA) Board of Directors approved a massive project aimed at improving the efficiency and reliability of the city’s main bus system. The changes will begin this sumer. Called the Transit Effectiveness Project (TEP), the approved proposal will increase Muni’s budget...
To be less irksome to neighbors, they could be smaller and the routes could be restricted to larger streets, but transportation experts say the tech buses between San Francisco and Silicon Valley basically do a good job at what they do — effectively shuttling approximately 35,000 people a day and most likely keeping thousands of cars off the freeway. The...
Monday’s protest that held up one private Google bus brought national media attention to the Mission and further intensified discussion about Silicon Valley’s impact on the Mission District and other San Francisco neighborhoods. For some within the company, the shuttle stop protest struck a personal chord. “We’re not all IPO’d, we’re not all millionaires, the cost of living is a...
