SF Transit Riders Union

This is the second installment of our series from the August and September members’ meeting. John Avalos came and addressed our membership during the August meeting. So here we go…

Introductory Comments

I represent a part of City that’s not very transit rich. I’m running with a citywide perspective, but with a southern neighborhood that doesn’t get its fair share of transit options. I have the advantage of a viewpoint about how to make it more equitable. Also am raising two kids in SF.

We have so much to work with in SF—system that needs love and care but doesn’t get it. Funding has been cut; made it difficult to make Muni more reliable. What I see every day is a Muni bus on the back of a tow truck. As mayor, want to make Muni a daily issue. Not going to make any false promises the way Willie Brown did about fixing Muni in 100 days. It was clear Willie Brown didn’t get on transit; maybe a cable car because one by his house.

We have a transit first city policy, but not a transit-first system. To make it transit first, we need to make sure options run the gamut of every neighborhood in SF.

As for the SFMTA Transit Effectiveness Project, we need to implement it, but not in a way that cannibalizes our neighborhood routes. It works by eliminating routes through neighborhoods. Want to move forward, but not eliminate routes.

We have a system that doesn’t treat all people equally. Want to have a system that has youth free. Thirty-three kids in classroom; that costs a lot. How can we make sure that all youth use Muni for free. Want to make sure seniors on fixed income don’t have increase in fares. Willing to look at tradeoffs. Have more fines on cars before imposing higher fares on riders.

Also a big bicyclist. Cycling since ’92. Want to make sure we have more options and a network.

Question: Explain in more detail your position on SFMTA’s Transit Effectiveness Project.

Part of the TEP were implemented, but not the whole thing. Eliminating 26-Valencia bus route was a horrible thing. If you have a wheelchair, have to go all the way to Mission or Glen Park.

That’s what I mean about not eliminating neighborhood-serving routes.

Question: A lot has come out about mismanagement at Muni—maintenance, broken buses, holes in the schedules. What are you going to do to clean up Muni?

The easy answer is that Muni top heavy. Often management is in competition with each other. Difficult for neighborhoods to have capital improvements. Balboa Park station—fought tooth and nail. I like Ed Reiskin as director of SFMTA, but SFMTA didn’t do a thorough job of finding a new manager for the department. Muni wastes a lot of money on contracting software engineers, etc. Maybe we can use more open-source methods.

Question: Congestion affects Muni, and development can cause congestion. In some parts of the City, an increase in housing units requires a minimum of one parking space per unit. Other organizations have supported a policy of 0.5 parking spaces per unit; are you willing to do that?

We’re beyond the time of having one-to-one parking rations. It’s much more expensive to build housing that includes parking. We can maximize affordable housing goals, and meet statewide standards on sustainable communities, by eliminating parking requirements.

Question: Will you set a goal for the percentage of City staff that takes transit to work?

Great idea; not sure if can legally require them to take transit. I’ll make all the incentives needed.

Question: Since pilot implementation of SFPark parking meters, rates have been adjusted based on demand. Despite this, on Valencia, there are still no available spots on nights and weekends. Would you support enabling SFPark on nights and weekends, with a starting price of $0/hr, and using the funds toward neighborhood transit?

Open to doing that. Willing to re-look at having parking meters on weekends. But it was very unpopular when tried in the past.

 Question: If we were to implement all-door boarding, how do we implement fare inspectors in an equitable way?

I don’t want to have police officers do fare inspection. Dangerous, especially in communities of color that don’t have trust with police. We can probably figure out how to have fare inspection system that will work. Many cities face this issue, so there’s got to be a model that works.

At our August and September general meetings we invited all the mayoral candidates to come and talk exclusively about what they would do to make Muni better. David Chiu, John Avalos, Tony Hall, and Phil Ting attended the August meeting and Terry Baum came in September.

We will be posting each candidate’s opening statements and their responses to our questions. Our first post will be from David Chiu. We will follow up in the next days with the rest of the group.

Introductory Comments

Every candidate will tell you they want a transit-first city. I’m only major mayoral candidate without a car. I’m on transit more than other candidates in race. Bike, car, City Car Share, taxi.

Most extensive record, as well as ideas for going forward.

First: Rejected budget from Newsom that would have in 2009 cut services and increased fares dramatically. Due to negotiations, secured additional $25 million for SFMTA. Prevented worse service cuts, and blunted most difficult fare increases. Reversed 60 percent of Newsom’s cuts.

Leading candidate for bicycling. Goal for 20 percent of trips by bicycle.

Leading in area of car sharing. One car-sharing vehicle takes 7 to 12 cars off street. Passed legislation to have city pilot program of car share vehicles on city sheets. Passed legislation to encourage new housing developments to provide car sharing on site.

Have a detailed transportation plan on web site. Want to implement fully SFMTA’s Transit Effectiveness Project. All-door boarding, traffic-signal prioritization, bus-stop consolidation in certain parts of City. I have two Muni stops on my block. Supporter of bus-rapid transit. Supporter for finding additional financing and funds for transit. I’ve pushed to bring back the vehicle license fee that Schwarzenegger cut. Would provide $50 to 70 million a year.

Biking: 5-point plan to connect city with bike network. Tackle issues of parking, thefts, bike education. Making sure it’s safer with traffic signals for cyclists.

Champion of pedestrian safety. At hearing 6 months ago, realized that 12 agencies regulate ped safety. It’s important for our economy, quality of life, and something that will make our city more enjoyable.

Question: Will you set a goal for the percentage of City staff that takes transit to work?

Amazed that the City often doesn’t use quantitative measures. Having a goal of City workers to be encouraged and incented is an appropriate goal.

Question: Since pilot implementation of SFPark parking meters, rates have been adjusted based on demand. Despite this, on Valencia, there are still no available spots on nights and weekends. Would you support enabling SFPark on nights and weekends, with a starting price of $0/hr, and using the funds toward neighborhood transit?

I’m very supportive of SFPark. It ensures there are open parking spaces; otherwise, people must circle when looking for parking spots, causing congestion. Didn’t realize Valencia had that situation. I’m open to expanding the meter operation to nights and weekends, but some merchants are concerned about parking turnover at night.

Question: A lot has come out about mismanagement at Muni—maintenance, broken buses, holes in the schedules. What are you going to do to clean up Muni?

Muni has not been managed well. We have a great opportunity with new leadership [new director Ed Reiskin]. We need to do a far better job of managing middle management. Issue of maintenance is right. Currently, we’re driving buses until they fall apart. Problems with overtime pay. Next mayor has to do far better job.

Question: Congestion affects Muni, and development can cause congestion. In some parts of the City, an increase in housing units requires a minimum of one parking space per unit. Other organizations have supported a policy of 0.5 parking spaces per unit; are you willing to do that?

Absolutely, and already have done that. Last year, in my district, we discovered that homes were being demolished to make garages. Passed legislation to eliminate that practice. Also have legislation working on with Tom Radulovich that would eliminate minimum parking in downtown areas. Further, we are going to have developers put in money to help this. Possibly only candidate with a stand on parking requirements.

Question: Last summer, you were part of a group of Board of Supervisors progressives who were working on a Muni Reform Initiative, which would have included a revenue measure, in addition to labor and structural reform provisions. But in the end, you struck a deal with Mayor Newsom, which resulted in abandoning that initiative in favor of a joint SFMTA/BofS/Mayoral “Service Restoration Task Force.”  But by year’s end, that effort was quietly put on ice, and no one, including your office, either completed the task force report or was willing to discuss the matter further. Why did you walk away from the Service Restoration Task Force you put in place, and where should we should go from here?”

I’ve pushed this issue with Interim Mayor Ed Lee. There hasn’t been motion with this administration. Last year, these proposals were being discussed in context with tough budget negotiations. The mayor said willing to put more if we’re willing to take a step back and study it. That being said, I’m absolutely committed to putting forth structural reform around transit. Happy to author legislation to make sure governance and revenue issues are addressed.

Question: Explain in more detail your position on SFMTA’s Transit Effectiveness Project.

I stand by the TEP. Have been involved with closing $1.4 billion hold in our budget. That’s the short gap. If we had all the money, we would buy more buses and hire more bus drivers. But we are dealing with a fixed fiscal pie. In the end, we have to invest in solutions that will make our system run more efficiently. Some lines are underutilized; some are used all the time but are broken, late. That’s what the TEP is getting at—making sure our system is as efficient as possible with the scarce resources we have. I’ve supported the TEP and am disappointed it hasn’t been implemented.

Question: For people with disabilities, have concerns about the light-rail vehicles running on surface level. People that are visually impaired and blind can’t see the cars coming along the sides of the train. People have almost gotten hit because cars don’t yield to passengers. Is there support to look into the safety issues serving the light-rail vehicles? For example, with school buses, there is the law that cars have to stop when the red flashers are on.

I agree that pedestrian safety is one of biggest issues that our transit system needs to deal with. Horrific accidents. It’s much better to invest in safety; much better than waiting for an accident, which causes many more problems for our citizens and City. Last year, I asked SFCTA what we should do on ped safety. Investing in basic streetscape improvements, particularly for seniors and disabled. I actually asked that specific question on light-rail vehicles. It’s easy for some folks, but dangerous for others. Completely agree that have to figure out how to make such a system safer. Have conversations. At end of day, as mayor, would be important for me that communities can make commonsense fixes.

We will be hosting several Mayoral Candidates to get their views on Muni related issues.

Date: Monday September 26, 2011
Time: 6 p.m. to 7:45 p.m.
Location: First Christian Church (NEW LOCATION)
Address: 599 Duboce Ave (at Noe)
Map: http://goo.gl/IYeI2
Transit lines within one block: N, 24, 37. Other nearby transit: J, K, L, M, T, F, 71, 6, 22.
Plan your trip: www.511.org

To add items to the agenda, please e-mail Rob Boden at rboden@sftru.org by Thursday, September 22.

Haight 71

The Two-Way Haight Street project is moving forward in the process toward implementation. This improvement will allow the downtown bound 6, 71 and 71L buses to continue straight on Haight street all the way to Market instead of turning over to Page street. This will save the buses tons of time and is something that SFTRU wholly supports.

To see the what the proposal looks like click Haight Street Project.

The meeting is:
Friday, September 16, 2011
10 am
City Hall room 416 (hearing room #4)

Come and speak out in favor of all-door-boarding at Tuesday’s MTA boarding meeting.

We need folks to let the MTA Directors know the benefits of all-door-boarding. So come out and speak and help us make Muni better for riders.

The Details:
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Room 400, City Hall
Here is the agenda.

Its the 13th agenda item, so it won’t be up right away.

David Chiu

SFTRU would like to Thank all the mayoral candidates who came and spoke at Monday’s meeting. This included David Chiu, John Avalos, Tony Hall, and Phil Ting (no image available).

Each candidate gave a 5 minute rundown of what they thought was the future of transit in San Francisco followed by a 10 minute Q & A.

Some of the questions brought up were: weekend and evening parking enforcement, reducing congestion through the creation of a parking maximum of .5 to 1 (only building a 1/2 parking spots per unit instead of the current parking minimum of 1:1), Muni operator safety, and more.

John Avalos

Tony Hall

Date: Monday August 22, 2011
Time: 6 p.m. to 7:45 p.m.
Location: Park Branch, SF Public Library
Address: 1833 Page St (at Cole)
Map: http://goo.gl/maps/Sngy
Transit lines within one block: 71, 33, 43. Other nearby transit: N, 6, 21, 5.
Plan your trip: www.511.org

To add items to the agenda, please e-mail Rob Boden at rboden@sftru.org by Sunday, August 21.

Date: Sunday August 14th, 2011
Time: 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Location: The Buck Tavern
Address: 1655 Market Street (at Gough). Map it. Plan your trip
Transit lines within one block: F, 6, 71. Other nearby transit: J, K, L, M, N, T, 9, 14, 47, 49.

With a new director of the SFMTA the time for renewal at Muni is NOW. So we are stepping up our outreach and fundraising to press more effectively for the rapid transit network and service increases our city needs.

An incomplete list of the raffle and auction goodies:

• Really special chocolates from Jade Chocolates. Thanks Mindy Fong!
• Two tickets to the Asian Art Museum
• Two tickets to the repertory Roxie Theater.
• Four tickets to the Conservatory of Flowers
• Fillmore Farmers’ Market “Market Basket”
• And this incredible art, on water bottles:

These cool metal water bottles adorned with old transfers represent some of the best art available.

It’s not too late to donate items for Sunday’s auction and raffle. Contact Dave if you have something you’ve wanted to sell or donate.

See you there!