Blog » blog

In an interview with DC Velocity, Norm Mineta, President Bush's Secretary of Transportation and a Democrat from San Jose, provides some fantastic insight into the challenge facing our new DOT chief.

Mineta stresses the increasing inadequacy of the federal gas tax. Set at 18 cents per gallon since 1993, total receipts have decreased with inflation and improved fuel economy. The federal transportation account is deeply in the red. He reveals that Bush personally vetoed his propsal to index the gas tax to inflation when he first came to the USDOT.

The alternative? Mineta recommends a vehicle miles traveled tax, as does the National Surface Transportation Infrastructure Financing Commission. The National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission concurs, providing a very thorough analysis of funding options.

This matters for San Francisco, of course, but not as much as you might think. Federal funds account for just one fourth of the money we spend on transportation in the Bay Area.

Thanks to Streetsblog SF for the tip.

We're nearly done installing SPUR's first exhibition, Agents of Change: Civic Idealism and the Making of San Francisco. Here's a sneak peak of how it's shaping up—thanks to an amazing cadre of volunteers who have been working around the clock to get the show installed before it opens this Friday.

I have learned so much from working on this show with our brilliant and tireless curator, Benjamin Grant. His approach to grouping the successes (and failures) of urban planners and architects into six generations paints a vivid picture of all the changes to our city and region, while highlighting the achievements of the remarkable individuals and groups who made them happen. The approach also allows SPUR—firmly rooted in the current generation of The Eco-Urbanists—to forge ahead with knowledge, boldness and humility. We "end" with a big question mark: What's next? What does the future hold?

In the storefront, a model of San Francisco loaned to us by SOM:



The lobby, with reception desk donated by Pfau Long Architecture, and the entrance to the exhibition:



A set of three exhibition posters, designed by Leon Yu. The poster on the left features a photo of Mayor Jim Rolph (aka "Sunny Jim") on Muni's opening day in 1912; the center image is of protestors at a "Save us from the Freeway" hearing in 1966; and the right shows a photo of Critical Mass in San Francisco:

A shot showing our exhibition system, designed by Brett Terpeluk of Studio Terpeluk:

Only five members of the Board of Supervisors today voted to reject the SFMTA budget, two short of the supermajority of seven needed to reject it.

The supermajority requirement was put in the City Charter by Proposition A and Proposition E (both in part crafted by SPUR)  to create a balance between the need to defend the SFMTA from political influence and give the city's elected leaders a chance to reject the budget if it seriously misrepresents their values. 

In the current budget debate, where the Supervisors were asked to approve a replacement 2009-2010 budget to deal with $129 million in cuts (fully 1/6 of the budget), it is no surprise the Supervisors came closer to rejecting the budget than they ever have since Proposition E passed. SPUR initially supported the motion to reject the budget. Some changes since that time improved the budget and SPUR sat out the debate during the second round.

Cutting 1/6 of the budget was bound to be unpopular. While SPUR doesn't agree with every aspect of the SFMTA budget (what independent government watchdog would?), we do credit SFMTA executive director Nathaniel P. Ford, Sr. and his team for proposing a budget that avoided the worst possible cuts. We will work with the SFMTA as they continue to adjust their budget and prepare for the 2010-12 budget proposal.

Click here for SPUR's proposals for an improved SFMTA budget.

The Alliance for Biking & Walking, a national coalition of advocacy organizations, is working the Congressional Bike Caucus. The Caucus represents a majority of members who support an increased federal role in promoting bicycling as a solution to our nation's transportation crisis, not to mention our health and environmental crises.

In the attached letter from the Bike Caucus Chair, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Portland, OR), you'll see what  the national bike movement is up to. The letter calls for four policies:

1. an increase in safe routes to school funding. (This will help us traffic-calm many SF streets)

2. a complete streets requirement (that all streets be designed for safe use by all, a policy already in place in San Francisco).

3.  an "active transportation investment fund" to provide large grants for ambitious nonmotorized transportation plans, and

4. better data collection.

All in all, if the bike caucus (which is comprised of a slight majority of congress) supports this agenda, it bodes well for the urbanist transportation system SPUR is pushing.