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August 18, 2004
1 Announcements
Deb Hubsmith
Marin County/Bay Area Bicycle Coalitions. Learn how
to start a Safe Routes to Schools program. October
14-15. See <www.srts.org> for more information
Joyce
Roy/League of Women Voters. Informational meeting
by the state Lands Commission about public land
trusts. Tuesday, August 24, 4 p.m., 455 Golden Gate
Ave., San Francisco.
David
Schonnbrun/TRANSDEF. TRANSDEF is taking on Jack
Meyers and the proposed 80 Natoma St. development
that threatens the Transbay Terminal project.
Hearing on development permit appeal on August 30,
9 a.m., Rm. 400, San Francisco City Hall.
2
Transit-supportive development campaign
Stuart
introduced the campaign, which would condition
funds for transit expansion projects on supportive
land uses in the jurisdictions that will have
stations. He explained that TALC needs to identify
a clear message in the land use report to be
released sometime in October.
Campaign
strategy suggestions from attendees:
- Save taxpayer
money by having their transit ridership
- Effect of
transportation choices on obesity, asthma rates
- Developers have
a hard time doing in-fill, and banks won't finance
it
- Create lively
commercial areas; receive higher sales tax
receipts: Fruitvale is the 2nd-highest sales
tax-generating area of Oakland
- Reduce traffic
congestion
- Give people
more residential choices
- Higher real
estate taxes
- Better for
residents who move in: saves time, money on
transportation
- Development
generates impact fees
- Reduces sprawl
Best and Worst
suggestions from attendees:
- Santa Rosa
Junior College parking garage (proposed) (worst):
close to SMART station
- Madison Lofts
(proposed) (best)
- Irving and 9th
??? parking garage (worst)
- Gaia building
(best)
- Wal-Mart near
the Hayward Park Caltrain station (worst): train
service has been cut because of low ridership
4 Bay Bridge West
Span bicycle path (Josh Hart)
Bay Bridge
(1936): no cycle path currently; until 1959, cars
only on upper deck
West span is
being retrofitted. A new east span, which will
include bicycle and pedestrian facilities, is being
built.
Golden Gate
Bridge: 1,400 cycles/day, M-F; 4,700 cycles/day on
weekends; 2% of all trips across the bridge are by
bicycle
Based on
back-of-the envelope calculations, 1-2 million
trips/yr are expected for the Bay Bridge
Treasure
Island: $400m redevelopment plan: 2,800 housing
units, etc.; 350 units affordable. The bicycle path
would help low-income residents living on the
Island.
In 1999, MTC
hired consultants to investigate adding cantilever
structure to West Span. This would cost $160m.
Q: Summarize
timeline. A: The East Span replacement will be
complete by 2010. The West Span bike/pedestrian
path should open at the same time.
Comment: Window
of opportunity while East Span funding is in
question
Q: Any danger
of path being axed from East Span? A:
Schwarzenegger has opened design consideration, but
bike lanes have a structural function to them, so
they will probably stay.
Q: How will it
be safe for bikes and pedestrians to use the path
together? A: Striping or signage is necessary.
Next step: TALC's
Board of Directors will consider support for the
West span pathway. The
5 Bay Bridge Cost
Overruns (Stuart Cohen)
Schwarzenegger
does not want the state to pay for any of the
overrun. At least $1.4b is needed to say yes to a
bid that expires on Sep. 30, but there is a $600m
deficit. The Governor's proposal would use Regional
Measure 2 funds to both except this bid, and to pay
for the $2.5 billion of total cost overruns. In
other words it would totally gut Regional Measure
2. Everything will be decided in 1.5 weeks. The
chair of the Senate Transportation Committee is
interested in introducing it.
Another
proposal, soon to be championed by Sen. Perata,
would consolidate jurisdiction over current Bridge
funding with MTC. This would allow them to except
the bid. It would not give them jurisdiction to
raise tolls in the future.
some attendees
suggested that the entire design should be
reconsidered. The original plan was a retrofit of
the existing east span. An alternative would
involve building a skyway for the entire length
instead of constructing the tower. The single-tower
design is susceptible to terrorism and may be
seismically unsafe. According to one attendee,
however, the redesign might take so long that
inflation could eat up the cost savings.
RM2 passed with
57% of the vote. The state legislature could reduce
the majority needed to pass a regional gas tax.
However, there is a risk of confusing voters with a
new ballot measure, given the sales taxes and
seismic retrofit that are already on the ballot.
Some in Oakland
are concerned about losing the tower, but Mayor
Brown isn't.
Some BART
retrofit money was included in RM2, so
Schwarzeneggers proposed referendum would pit one
seismic upgrade against another.
The group agreed
to focus in on to talking points: (1) Don't dig
into RM2 (2) If new funding is necessary, raise it
through congestion pricing.
Strategy ideas
- Call campaign:
put out # for governor's office; send letters to
Governor
- Possible lobby
day/street theater on Monday or Tuesday
6 TALC Platform
(Margaret Okuzumi)
Last platform
developed 5 years ago
The Board has
put together a draft of the new platform. Members
should comment.
TALC is also
soliciting suggestions for possible future
campaigns.
The Board is
about to launch its outreach process.
Next meeting, October
20, 5:30 p.m.
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