BOS Should Reject the Badly Flawed SFMTA Budget

Rachel Gordon reports that the SFMTA board has approved a budget that balances a $129,000,000 deficit (~$80,000,000 of which it absorbed from other departments for no good reason) almost entirely on the backs of Muni riders.

• Adult fares will go up 50¢ to $2.00
• Senior/disabled/youth fares will go up 25¢ to 75¢
• Adult Fast Passes will go up to $55.00 in July (already scheduled) before reaching $60.00 in January
• Senior/disabled/youth Fast Passes will go up by the same amount, to $15.00 in July and $20.00 in January
• The following lines will be canceled:
• The 4-Sutter
• 7-Haight
• 16-Noriega morning express
• 20-Columbus
• 26-Valencia
• 53-Southern Heights
• 74X-Culture bus
• 89-Laguna Honda
• And to quote Ms. Gordon, "Dozens of other lines will have their routes modified or hours cut back."

Private motorists' share of the pain:

• Meter rates will go up 50¢ an hour and operate on all holidays except New Year's Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Sound fair? Not to me.

Tear Down This Wall

In a thinly-veiled attempt to make me love it, the Transbay Blog has a great article on how to get rid of the Central Skyway. That makes the Transbay Blog the latest voice calling for San Francisco to finish the good job it started when we knocked down the elevated structure North of Market Street.

I've called for this, and Streetsblog SF reported that the MTA has agreed to consider studying alternatives to the elevated skyway at the urging of superheroesque Tom Radulovich. Well, Transbay blog has an alternative worth considering.

I've got my own fantasy map that I'm working on polishing up, and I'm sure there are smart folks out there with their own great ideas for this miserable waste of space.

This is an issue that's important to me, and I hope it takes off!

Quote of the Day

Free parking is not free for BART,

BART director Tom Radulovich tells Streetsblog SF.

Not the opportunity cost of the land, not the cost of operating the parking facilities. BART has been really dumb about how we use the land around our stations in the past and now we have to decide what BART stations are going to be when they grow up