Last week we hosted two member meetings with staff from the San Francisco County Transportation Authority (SFCTA) to discuss medium- and long-term planning projects. We want to be sure that our members’ voices are included in the outreach process from the beginning, showing strong public support for sustainable transportation options.
The first meeting was focused on the San Francisco Transportation Plan (SFTP+), a plan that determines large projects and investments in transportation for the next 30 years and is updated every few years.
SFCTA staff are looking for feedback on what are the big transportation projects residents want and need most. Our members expressed their desire to see more complete streets, traffic calming, bike share expansion, accessible biking programs, connecting the Bay Bridge for bikes, neighborhood-level muni service, and making transit faster and more reliable via bus lanes. There was also a lively discussion about congestion pricing, enforcement of dangerous driving behaviors, and charging people more for driving in SF to fund public transit and safe streets projects.
This aligns with the work we’re doing right now with the Muni Now Muni Forever coalition to find solutions to SFMTA’s fiscal cliff. We’re working to not only find funding for the current gap, but ensure that Muni has sustainable and stable funding sources for the foreseeable future. We know that this is a major priority for our members.
The second meeting was focused on the Westside Network Study which looks at the unique transportation needs on SF’s westside and will propose several medium-term projects to better serve the community’s needs.
The SFCTA is in the first round of outreach and is looking for suggestions for projects. Our westside members shared their desire for safe school zones, secure all-day bike parking at transit hubs, secure neighborhood bike parking for cargo bikes, more East-West bike connections, strong North-South bike connections between the Richmond and Sunset, improving bus reliability with bus lanes, and hardened infrastructure in daylighting. We were gratified to see our members being passionate about projects that will reduce vehicle miles traveled and car dependency on the westside while providing an easy transition to sustainable forms of transportation.
We are so thankful to our members who showed up and shared very thoughtful feedback and ideas. These meetings are incredibly important for County staff to hear what projects the biking community in SF want to see as they plan five-, ten-, twenty-plus years into the future.
Didn’t get a chance to attend the meetings? Take this SFTP survey to provide input.
