SPUR Transportation Policy Area Header

Transportation

We believe: Walking, biking, and taking transit should be the safest
and best ways to get around for people of all ages and abilities.

Our Goal


• Reduce emissions from transportation.

• Reduce driving.

• Build complete communities around transit.

• Make Bay Area transit work for the 21st century.

• Eliminate traffic deaths.

a bus traveling unimpeded in a transit-only lane

SPUR Report

Making Roads Work for Transit

Transit delays and unreliability can make riding the bus a nonstarter for those who have other ways to get around. Giving transit vehicles priority on Bay Area roads can deliver the speed and reliability improvements needed to get more people on buses and out of cars.
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cyclist riding on a road with separated bike lanes

Policy Brief

Accelerating Sustainable Transportation in California

To fight climate pollution, California will need to build out the infrastructure to make walking, biking and riding transit the default ways to get around. SPUR makes the case to extend state legislation that is making it faster to build commonsense sustainable transportation projects.
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A mostly empty parking lot viewed from above

SPUR Report

The Bay Area Parking Census

For decades, parking in the Bay Area has been both ubiquitous and uncounted. SPUR and the Mineta Transportation Institute have produced the San Francisco Bay Area Parking Census, the most detailed assessment of parking infrastructure ever produced for the region.
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Updates and Events

Despite Recession, Cycling Sees Dramatic Increase in SF

News /
The recession has caused both private auto and public transit use to fall in the past couple of years, both in San Francisco and throughout the country, as travelers cut out superfluous trips to save money and those who have lost their jobs simply do not have anywhere to go. Yet one mode of transportation in SF has shown massive mode-share gains over the same…

Learning From Muni

Urbanist Article
While there are lessons both good and bad that other cities might draw from Muni and its parent organization, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, a few recent highlights may be most noteworthy.

Woe is Parking.

News /
As someone who has lived in this city for virtually my entire life, there is one thing I know for sure – parking is a pain. Were I to calculate the total time I’ve wasted cruising for a parking space or the total amount of money I’ve spent in parking tickets, I might go insane. However, we are not just losing our time, money, and…

Learning from Metrorail

Urbanist Article
The Bay Area Rapid Transit Authority and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority developed their respective regional transit systems around the same time, and toward similar aims. Both were conceived in the 1940s to complement new highways and underwent construction in the 1960s as opposition to those highways began to mount. BART began operation in 1972, and has grown to 104 track miles; Metrorail began…

Learning from Washington D.C.

News /
This past fall, a group of SPUR board members and staff traveled to Washington DC to learn from the urban-planning successes of our nation's capital; today, three members of that group presented their findings at a lunchtime forum. SPUR Deputy Director Sarah Karlinsky began the discussion with an overview of the Washington urban planning models from Pierre L'Enfant's plan of 1791 to and James McMillan's…
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