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CBS News
3 days ago
- Politics
- CBS News
San Francisco report details traffic patterns after closure of Upper Great Highway
San Francisco transportation officials released their first report on traffic patterns in the outer Sunset since the controversial closure of the Upper Great Highway. That closure led to the opening of the city's newest park, Sunset Dunes. The SFMTA has been monitoring traffic closely before and after voters approved the closure in March. The data shows some roads are more congested, while other parts saw less traffic. Using traffic data from key streets across the Outer Sunset, the SFMTA said minor traffic shifts were largely aligned with traffic projections. Nick Lanham and his kids are loving the new park. "I don't feel like traffic has gotten much worse. There's a little bit more in the morning and evening, but mostly maybe two cars deep at the stop sign, but it's not bad at all," Lanham said. SFMTA data shows traffic on the Upper Great Highway between Fulton and Lincoln has dropped by 30%. But opponents of the closure point to the increased traffic in other parts of the district. The report said Chain of Lakes Drive has about 2,000 more vehicles per day than pre-closure. Lower Great Highway has about 700 more vehicles per day. The SFTMTA said that means about one additional vehicle per minute at peak hour, compared with pre-pandemic traffic. "The SFMTA may find there's a hundred less cars on Sunset Boulevard. But what they're not capturing are the thousands of people who are driving circuitous routes to try and navigate through their daily lives and choosing not to do things because it's too complicated to get there. That's a common experience and that's real," said Richmond District resident Richard Corriea. Those pushing for the recall of District 4 Board of Supervisors Joel Engardio, who supported Proposition K and the opening of the park, aren't giving up the fight. "We're not anti-park, anti-bicyclists at all. This is about excluded from the process and excluded in district 4 by their representative," said Corriea. For supporters of the park, like Lucas Lux, the President of Friends of Sunset Dunes, the data backs up what he's been seeing on the streets. "When the park first opened, you could feel and see a little bit of a traffic change, but as people adjusted to new route using Sunset Boulevard, which the data shows people are doing, residential streets are pretty much as they were before and that's the way it feels to me as well," said Lux. SFMTA said other roadways remain below pre-pandemic traffic and that Sunset Boulevard remains at 90% of pre-pandemic traffic volumes. Lincoln Way east of Chain of Lakes was not impacted by the closure of the Upper Great Highway and remains 7% below pre-pandemic traffic volumes.
San Francisco Chronicle
4 days ago
- Automotive
- San Francisco Chronicle
S.F. releases new report on traffic after Great Highway closure. Here's what it shows
Transportation officials in San Francisco have released their first report on traffic patterns since the closure of Upper Great Highway in March, presenting a more complete picture of how driving has changed in the Outer Sunset. The data shows an increase in congestion on Chain of Lakes Drive, a main route to cut through Golden Gate Park. After the city shuttered a portion of Great Highway on the coastal side to convert the road into parkland, some drivers re-rerouted to Chain of Lakes. The cut-through now carries about 11,000 vehicles on an average weekday, 21% more than it did prior to the permanent shutdown on March 14, according to San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. However, another key route, the still-open section of Upper Great Highway between Fulton Street and Lincoln Way, saw a decrease in traffic. It runs parallel to Golden Gate Park on the west side, and now carries roughly 12,000 vehicles on an average weekday, down from 17,000 last year. SFMTA's report follows an analysis by the Chronicle last month, which showed more rush hour traffic on some roads after cars were banned from Upper Great Highway from Lincoln Way to Sloat Boulevard, now a park promenade lined with art installations and bicycle paths. The Chronicle's study, like the new one from SFMTA, found the relationship between road closures and driving behavior is complicated. Some arteries suffered no slowdowns at all, according to the Chronicle analysis, and speeds on a few roads may have picked up as drivers adapted their routes. 'Largely, these results fall in alignment with what we have been saying and what we were expecting,' SFMTA spokesperson Parisa Safarzadeh said of the agency's report. She has noted that city transportation planners continue to monitor traffic in the neighborhoods around the new Sunset Dunes Park. Crews have made many engineering tweaks to facilitate smoother drives, including three new traffic signals and a reconfigured intersection at Lincoln Way and Great Highway, where dual left and right turn lanes make it easier to go around Golden Gate Park instead of slogging through Chain of Lakes. The closure of Upper Great Highway became a raw topic in the Sunset, particularly among commuters who use Chain of Lakes to travel from the Outer Richmond to south San Francisco or freeways heading to the Peninsula. Some have channeled their frustrations toward Supervisor Joel Engardio, who supported Proposition K, the ballot measure to make the road closure permanent. Disenchantment over Prop K and the new Sunset Dunes Park helped fuel efforts to recall Engardio. His political fate will be decided in a special election this September.
CBS News
6 days ago
- Automotive
- CBS News
San Francisco students learn about mechanical repairs at SFMTA internship
Summer school begins, not in the classroom, but instead at a San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority bus yard for a group of 10 high school students, where every day they learn about the skilled trades of mechanical repairs. For 16-year-old Thomas Navarro, who will be a junior at Balboa High School, he said the experience has taught him that there is more to education than just textbooks. "I really like working with my hands, because I feel like I just get a better mindset," said Navarro. "I feel like I work better, because I understand it better." For the past four years, the San Francisco Unified School District has partnered with SFMTA to provide internships for students through its Summer Career Exploration Program. Mechanic Supervisor, Malei Moloa has run the program since 2020, and he said it is important to expose teens to the skilled trades. "We give them exposure to automotive mechanics, our automotive machinists, and our machining and manufacturing," said Moala. "This is real-world experience, some of it is a lost art, and there is a huge need for it. A lot of our trades have been dying, and they have not had a lot of intakes at the lower levels." According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the construction industry is projected to add 155,000 new jobs annually over the next decade, with the employment of electricians expected to grow by 11 percent by 2033. And the American Welding Society claims they will need 320,500 new welding professionals by 2029. "I have conversations with lots of city agencies, and the current workforce is getting ready to retire, and there's definitely a gap in trained machinists and auto technicians," said Mark D'Acquisto, who is a teacher in the SFUSD's College and Career Readiness Program. "So, anything we can do to expose youth to this can only help fill that void." Navarro said, while he enjoys going to class, he believes the program gives him more options as he prepares for his future. "I feel like there is a lot of pressure for people thinking they want to go to college, but I feel like, do what your heart tells you to because it's like at the end of the day, you're paving your own road," said Navarro.
San Francisco Chronicle
13-07-2025
- Automotive
- San Francisco Chronicle
S.F. residents had parked in their driveways for years. Then someone started snitching
For decades, Larry Reed and his neighbors had squeezed their cars into tight, sloping driveways in San Francisco's Dolores Heights neighborhood. Often the tail ends of the vehicles would extend to the sidewalk. Nobody ever protested, Reed said. Until about six months ago, when the first complaint rolled in. 'This has never happened in years past,' Reed said, recalling how a somewhat apologetic parking control officer rolled up one day, to assess a report that someone on the unit block of Chattanooga Street had parked a car over the property line. After leaving a warning notice for the culprit, the officer swept the block for other violators, including Reed's gray electric BMW. 'I really try to keep my car so that the space is pretty accessible,' Reed said, noting that he always has parked the same way, flush with the garage door. Inevitably, the back wheels and bumper stick out. California law forbids parked vehicles from blocking even small portions of public sidewalks, ensuring safe passage for wheelchairs, strollers, seniors with canes and people on crutches, among others. On Chattanooga Street, anyone who flouted the rule got a warning, at minimum. But as driveway parking enforcement ramped up throughout the city, frustrated residents pushed back. Some believed the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency was unfairly cracking down on infractions that didn't really create a safety hazard. Others suspected that a persnickety neighbor might be snitching on them — and in some cases, manipulating the photos attached to the reports. Sharon Gillenwater has avoided war metaphors when discussing the three citations her family has received for parking in the driveway of their Noe Valley home, worth a total of $324. Technically, the tickets were just, Gillenwater said, conceding that her Volkswagen SUV and her son's Subaru wagon exceed the length of her front stairwell. Still, Gillenwater can't hide her exasperation over what she describes as overzealous punishment. 'We're not fighting the law, we all agree that strollers and disabled people need to pass,' she said. 'But can we just be in the spirit of the law? In our case, there is plenty of room for two wheelchairs to go in tandem down the street.' At the same time, she and other Noe Valley residents wonder whether someone is trolling them, filing complaint after complaint about driveway parking to demand a response from the SFMTA. Gillenwater has observed that many complaints have text captions with identical font, and some use old photos as evidence. In one case, a resident drew two reports when she and her car were hundreds of miles away in the Sierra. In another example, someone filed a complaint against Gillenwater's son when his Subaru hadn't been in the driveway for two days. 'It's kind of our neighborhood murder mystery,' said Gillenwater's husband, Andrew Keeler, relaying what has become a tense joke. Searching for clues, some neighbors discovered an app called Solve SF, which uses artificial intelligence to ease the process of filing reports through the city's 311 complaint system. This concept incited suspicion in Noe Valley, where residents typed up five pages of oppositional research on Solve SF, mainly to uncover why the volume of illegal parking complaints in Noe Valley suddenly spiked in June. They blamed the app for wasting 'valuable city resources' (because some complaints don't result in tickets) and said it promotes 'questionable use of gamification of reporting.' 'So someone wrote this whole thing about my app, huh?' said Patrick McCabe, developer of Solve SF, who is proud of his innovation and its impact. However, he shot down a popular theory in Noe Valley that his app is, in effect, a troll enabler. According to McCabe's own analysis, a small portion of 311 complaints in Noe Valley last month used Solve SF, and the app wasn't responsible for the 'doctored' 311 reports that keep recycling old photos. McCabe is familiar with those reports, and has his own idea of who generates them: someone who snaps photos of illegally parked cars in driveways, stores them in a cellphone and keeps a text overlay for each one with the violator's address and license plate number. In all likelihood, McCabe said, the mystery snitch uses these stored photos to refile the same complaints, predicting that people will continue parking in driveways in which their cars don't fit. 'I see this (type of report) daily,' McCabe said. 'And they should use my app. It would be easier.' Meanwhile officials at the SFMTA said they will continue responding to complaints about illegal parking, and issue tickets when warranted. Last April, the SFMTA began a ' focused parking enforcement plan ' to enhance safety on sidewalks, targeting each of the city's 11 supervisor districts on a rotating basis. Officials said they would prioritize specific violations, including parking on the sidewalk. Supervisor Rafael Mandelman has fielded several emails from constituents in Noe Valley and the Castro who feel they've been unfairly cited 'for something they've been doing forever.' He can sense their agony, while also viewing the citations as artifacts of good governance. 'To the defense of the SFMTA, it's not like this law doesn't make any sense,' Mandelman said, explaining that public sidewalks should not be overtaken by private parking. Furthermore, he said, it's only fair that parking control officers treat everyone equally. They can't make exceptions for people who feel they're only obstructing a small portion of the sidewalk. And if they respond to one complaint, it behooves them to ticket everyone on the block who is committing the same infraction. 'It's really hard to ask these officers to be platonic guardians, and decide whether they should enforce in each individual case,' Mandelman said. 'They're not really supposed to be exercising discretion.' Cristina Rubke, a former SFMTA board director who uses a wheelchair, adopted a similarly diplomatic perspective. She expressed empathy for drivers struggling to cram their vehicles in snug spaces of San Francisco, including their own driveways. But, on balance, she's happy that the agency is enforcing the law. 'Honestly, most people are good actors,' Rubke said, 'they're not trying to force a person in a wheelchair out into the street. And yet as a general matter, these citations exist as a reminder that (other) people need to use that space.' Rubke remembers many instances when she has had to cross a street to avoid a car jutting onto the sidewalk. A couple of times she has tried to maneuver around the overhang, only to hit a crack in the pavement, and then backtrack. Reed said he's happy to rush out and move his car for any passerby, though he would prefer they call or ring his doorbell, rather than filing a complaint. To encourage civility, he posted a sign at his front steps. 'If you ever have a concern about our vehicle, please reach out,' the sign says, providing his phone number. 'We're happy to move it.' Since posting the sign, Reed said he hasn't received any more warnings. Which hasn't exactly solved the problem: His BMW still doesn't quite fit in the driveway.
San Francisco Chronicle
07-07-2025
- General
- San Francisco Chronicle
Mystery benches are appearing on S.F. sidewalks. The city isn't happy about it
Eight benches recently appeared on curbs in San Francisco, all bearing the DIY-craftsman style of something hammered together in a backyard, from plans pulled off the Internet. Which, in all likelihood, is how the benches were made. No individual has publicly taken credit for this unofficial seating, installed near bus stops in the Mission and throughout the East Bay. Yet each bench has a stencil for the ' San Francisco Bay Area Bench Collective ' website, referring to a loose group of urbanists and do-gooders who believe their furniture provides a 'much-needed' space to rest. To city officials who have to monitor, clean and possibly remove the benches, they are a source of headaches. Ultimately, it's unclear who would be held liable if someone trips over a bench and sues, or who is responsible to fix them if they break, staff at San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency told the Chronicle. There is also confusion over which city department should handle the rogue benches. Public works manages infrastructure on city sidewalks, and has received at least one complaint about a rogue bench. If a bench is placed in a public park, however, it becomes the burden of the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department. And if one of these structures pops up at a bus stop, it's within the domain of SFMTA, the agency in charge of building and managing bus stop transit shelters. 'While we appreciate the sentiment behind these (guerrilla) bench installations, there are a lot of complex issues that would need to be addressed,' agency spokespeople wrote in a statement, in which they cited the question of 'upkeep' if a bench is tagged with graffiti, and the more serious concern if someone is injured while using a bench. Moreover, SFMTA spokespeople wrote, any piece of sidewalk furniture needs to leave enough space for wheelchair users. Carter Lavin, co-founder of the transportation advocacy group Transbay Coalition, believes cities 'need to find a way' for people to invest their love and their values into the urban environment. A bench, he said, is an expression of civic engagement. 'Why are benches important?' Lavin asked. 'Fundamentally, it's about human dignity, comfort and love for our fellow residents. The world can be a hostile place, and a bench is a way of saying, 'You're welcome here. You're invited here.'' The message came through to Rita Rincon, who stopped to rest on one of the guerrilla benches near 18th and Mission Streets. Rincon, who is 90, marveled at the structure's sturdiness. Constructed of wooden planks bolted together, the bench was plain, and in its own way, 'beautiful.' 'This is an adequate bench,' Rincon's caretaker, Maria Mira, said in Spanish, taking a seat by her client's side. But the bench at 18th and Mission could also be viewed as a blight. Set in front of a liquor store, and feet away from a bus stop, it already showed signs of wear. Vandals had scribbled graffiti on its buffed wood, and bits of trash were stuffed between the boards. Grassroots carpenters in the bench collective trace their movement to a Sunset District engineer named Chris Duderstadt, who spent years building and placing public benches around the city, and even posted the architectural plans online for others to emulate. Transit activists in the East Bay independently latched onto the bench concept two years ago, after observing, with dismay, the number of people who have to stand at bus stops. In November 2023, Berkeley resident Darrell Owens snapped a photo of his neighbor sitting on the ground while waiting for a bus. The neighbor was recovering from surgery and couldn't bend his legs, Owen wrote in a photo caption, when he posted the image on social media. It instantly went viral. Owens and Mingwei Samuel, a fellow transit enthusiast with a woodworking background, built benches in Berkeley and Oakland, inspiring Lavin and others from the Transbay Coalition to install them in El Cerrito and Richmond. People gathered for 'weekend builds' in garages, yards and driveways, sharing power tools and teaching each other how to drill holes or sand wood. Politicians in some cities welcomed the benches. Richmond City Council passed a policy in May instructing city staff to create a permitting program that would legalize the community-made benches at bus stops. 'I think this is innovative, it's needed and it's helped restore pride in our transit system,' said Richmond City Council Member Jamelia Brown, who co-sponsored the policy measure. 'It's great that someone thought of all the riders who had to stand for 30 minutes and wait for the next bus.' Whether San Francisco will follow Richmond's example is an open question. Already, the bench collective has seen two of its installations torn out of the Noe Valley area. 'Unclear who removed,' the group writes on its website. Days ago, Public Works logged a complaint through the city's 311 system about a bench at 26th and Mission streets. 'We'll go out and assess it and ask the bench folks to remove it,' said Public Works spokesperson Rachel Gordon. Noting that many of the guerrilla benches are bolted to the sidewalk, she said that city officials would probably ask the bench collective members to fix any holes. Lavin points out that the city has created processes for other imaginative ideas — like converting a parking space into a parklet. Such arguments prompt a beat of contemplative silence from Gordon. 'Look,' she said. 'We don't want to be overly cumbersome. But there are real reasons why we don't just say, 'OK, put whatever you want on a public sidewalk.' There are real things a government needs to take into consideration.' Gordon and other officials say they grasp the sentiment behind the benches. They understand the functionality and the symbolism of convenience, comfort and dignity. Nonetheless, Gordon said, 'We just want folks to do this properly.'
