Matthew Roth
Recent Posts
In Magnetometers We Trust
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Streetline parking equipment has already been installed for a pilot in Hayes Valley. San Francisco-based Streetline, Inc. is one of several vendors who will compete for a contract to install parking occupancy sensors and networking technology in the SFMTA’s SFPark pilot. When the SFMTA initiates its baseline parking data collection for SFPark in late April […]
Bike Commuter David Chiu Will Preside Over the Board of Supes
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David Chiu, accepting the presidency of the Board of Supervisors, with Mayor Newsom looking on. After seven rounds of voting and nearly an hour of exasperating political theater, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors chose newly elected District 3 Supervisor David Chiu as its president. A voluble cheer erupted in the North Light Court at […]
Schwarzenegger Long on Fiscal Stimulus Rhetoric, Short on Transit Specifics
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Governor Schwarzenegger sent a letter Tuesday to President-elect Obama encouraging massive expenditure in the federal stimulus package on a host of projects in California. The letter comes a month after the governor and president-elect discussed the stimulus package in person: When we met, I had identified $28 billion in infrastructure projects ready to break ground […]
Eyes on the Street: Cleaning the Curb, Fouling the Sidewalk
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The race is on: as soon as the sweeper passed, these drivers jockeyed for their curb spot On a recent Tuesday morning, at Folsom and 25th streets in The Mission, I watched one of the more bizarre street-cleaning rituals I’ve ever seen in any city. I know San Francisco drivers get a free parking pass […]
SF’s Parking Experiment to Test Shoup’s Traffic Theories
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SF Park Pilot Areas – Richmond and West Portal control areas not featured The Municipal Transportation Agency’s federally-funded parking experiment, SFPark, is shaping up to be the most powerful tool remaining in the city’s traffic-busting toolbox considering the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce’s criticism of congestion pricing and Mayor Newsom’s recent tempered support for the […]
Bushwaffle Tour with Rebar
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Rebar hosts a public tour with Bushwaffle, a modular inflatable outdoor furniture piece, demonstrating the power of Bushwaffle to soften any urban surface and provide space for freedom and play. Fun with Bushwaffle!
San Francisco Mayor to NYC: “Eat Your Heart Out.”
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A rendering of the Transbay Transit Center with a 5.4 acre park on its roof. At a groundbreaking ceremony for the long-awaited Transbay Transit Center in San Francisco yesterday, Mayor Gavin Newsom asserted the project will be "so much more extraordinary than Grand Central Station." Pointing to the renderings on a projection screen behind him, […]
SF Responds to Bike Injunction With 1,353 Page Enviro Review
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Two-and-a-half years after a judge issued an injunction preventing the city from adding any new bicycle infrastructure to its streets, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) and the San Francisco Planning Department have released a 1353-page Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) on the San Francisco Bicycle Plan.
At a cost of more than $1 million, the city has attempted to demonstrate in excruciating detail what would seem to be obvious: better bicycle amenities contribute to increased cycling and an improved environment.
Jan Gehl Reflects on San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf
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"When I was a visiting professor at Berkeley in the 1980s, I used to come to Fisherman’s Wharf and walk around," Danish urban designer Jan Gehl said Wednesday night, to more than 100 San Franciscans at the Pier 39 Theater near Fisherman’s Wharf. "Now it’s like deja vu; it’s exactly like I remember it 25 […]
Jan Gehl Says San Francisco Must be Sweet to Pedestrians and Cyclists
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It’s a good day in a city’s urbanist evolution when Jan Gehl comes to town, and now San Francisco can add itself to the growing list of cities around the world that have embraced his people-first approach to urban design and planning. Hoping to keep pace with the progress in New York City over the […]