Rescue Muni

Ken Garcia writes today about an effort by San Francisco, supported by Mayor Newsom and Assemblymember Ma, to set up bus lane enforcement cameras in San Francisco. (This is currently done in London among many other cities.) Such a system requires a change in state law, hence the activity in Sacramento. The MTA proposes a $100 fine for violating the bus lane (double parking in particular, though moving violations should also be included.)

Rescue Muni strongly supports this proposal. Bus lane blocking is a MAJOR cause of delays on Muni, particularly on crowded lines like the 1-California and 22-Fillmore that run through congested commercial districts. Stay tuned for opportunities to support this measure.

Update: More on this at SFist.

San Francisco’s City Survey (pdf) found San Franciscans increasingly dissatisfied with Muni, particularly in the area of service reliability. The Chronicle has the story as well.

Rescue Muni is a long-time advocate for Bus Rapid Transit on Geary Boulevard, built in a rail-ready design so it can later be upgraded to light rail. (See this Chronicle editorial in favor.) Next month, this important project will come before the San Francisco County Transportation Authority board (aka the Board of Supervisors) for an important vote on its feasibility report, which is necessary for the project to undergo environmental review.

We need YOUR help to sign up supporters among 38 geary riders! Rescue Muni is participating in an effort to sign up supporters among regular Geary commuters this Thursday, April 19, at 4:30 pm. Friday, April 20, at 5:30 pm To participate, sign up at Go Geary and RSVP to Dave Snyder at SPUR who is leading this effort.

Also, we will soon be signing up merchants in the area who support the project. (See Go Geary’s excellent flier (pdf) about the benefits of this project to merchants and riders alike.) To participate in this effort please comment below. Thanks!

We’ve replaced your usual Rescue Muni website, not with Folger’s Crystals, but this new-fangled WordPress powered blog, for faster updates of news items and easy commenting. Old headlines are on the old index which we’ll keep around for a while. Feedback please!

Update: The Examiner has a story about this proposal today including skeptical comments from TWU Local 250A director Irwin Lum.

Supervisor Peskin is circulating a draft of a charter amendment to make some changes to Proposition E, which governs the Municipal Transportation Agency. In particular he is proposing to remove the section in the charter that specifies a wage limit for Muni operators. This section states in relevant part:

“The board of supervisors shall thereupon fix a wage schedule for each classification of platform employees and coach and bus operators of the municipal railway which shall not be in excess of the average of the two highest wage schedules so certified by the civil service commission for each such classification.”

The purpose is to allow Muni management and labor to more effectively trade off work rules for wage increases. Also included in this is measure is a proposal to dedicate more garage and parking fees to Muni.

Rescue Muni hasn’t seen this proposal yet but we will comment on it as soon as we see it. In general we like the idea to dedicate more funding to Muni, but it’s always risky to re-open Proposition E, as the previous proposal to do so was a bad idea that we worked to defeat.

(See SFist for additional discussion of this.)