Matthew Roth
Recent Posts
BART Board Declines to Vote on Fare Rollback, Considers 2012 Relief
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Flickr photo: Thomas Hawk. In an unusually short discussion this morning, the BART Board of Directors decided not to vote on a long-debated proposal to conduct a temporary six-month fare rollback, which was brought forward by Board Chair James Fang, but has received a chilly response from the public in polling and feedback. Rather than […]
SFMTA’s Newest Board Director Anticipates Challenges Ahead
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Flickr photo: Troy Holden. Now that the Board of Supervisors unanimously approved Cheryl Brinkman’s nomination at its meeting yesterday as the newest member of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency’s Board of Directors, the real work begins, and Brinkman herself is anticipating the challenges she’ll encounter with her first board meeting on September 7th. Supervisor […]
San Francisco’s Godspeed Courier Gets a Close Up
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The wonderful filmmakers at California is a Place have done another short about bicycles in the Bay Area, this one focused on Godspeed Courier in San Francisco. As they did in Scrapertown, filmmakers Drea Cooper and Zackary Canepari have captured a small vignette of a distinctive addition to bicycling in California with a beautiful eye. […]
BART Sees $4 Million Budget Surplus at End of This Fiscal Year
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Flickr Photo: David BART has once again bucked the trend of financial pain among other Bay Area transit operators by realizing a budget surplus at the end of fiscal year 2010, in large part due to strong sales tax receipts in the fourth quarter. In a letter to the BART Board yesterday [PDF], General Manager […]
New Report Impugns Texas Oil Companies Funding California Prop 23
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San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, No on Prop 23 Chair Tom Steyer, and Ella Baker Center Green-Collar Jobs Campaign Director Ian Kim at the microphone. Photo: Matthew Roth. UPDATED: 10:00 pm, 8-11-10 The fight against Proposition 23, which qualified for the November ballot and if passed would suspend California’s pioneering climate law AB 32, got […]
With the Bike Injunction Lifted, SF Starts to Build Out Its Bike Plan
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Mayor Gavin Newsom addresses the press. SFMTA Chief Nat Ford, SFMTA Board Chair Tom Nolan, Bicycle CAC Chief Bert Hill, Livable City Board Chair and SFMTA Board Nominee Cheryl Brinkman in pink and D-5 Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi at far right. Photos: Matthew Roth. Because official word about the lifting of the four-year-old bike injunction in […]
With All the Hubbub Over the Arco Station, Why Not Close the Driveway?
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Photo: Bryan Goebel As we’ve documented over the course of a year, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) has been toying with various treatments to minimize the conflicts between bicycles and cars queueing up on Fell Street near Divisadero Street to get gas at the Arco station on the corner there. The agency has […]
Cyclists Cheer as Judge Finally Frees San Francisco from Bike Injunction
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Photo: Bryan Goebel After nearly four years of legal wrangling, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Peter Busch lifted the city’s bike injunction this afternoon, freeing the SFMTA to begin working on implementing the remaining projects in the Bike Plan, and soundly rejecting the objections made by plaintiff Rob Anderson and his attorney Mary Miles. "We […]
Ad Nauseam: Miller High Life’s Subversive Bicycle Commercial
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During the big game, the commercials you most often see are pimping cars, pizza and beer, with nary a meaningful message among them. That’s what’s refreshing about this Miller High Life ad, which is still trying to sell you beer, but through a decidedly subversive tack. Seriously, I don’t think Clarence could have written a […]
New Video Sim Bets San Franciscans Will *Heart* SFPark
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In a refreshing turn, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), which runs Muni and manages the streets of San Francisco, has produced an informative and whimsical animated short explaining how their dynamic parking management pilot, SFPark, will work. Unlike the maddeningly obtuse SFMTA website, the video (and pretty much everything else about the SFPark.org […]
Transit Advocate Clears First Hurdle to SFMTA Board Appointment
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Supervisors Michaela Alioto-Pier and David Campos questioning SFMTA Board nominee Cheryl Brinkman at the Rules Committee meeting today. Photo: Matthew Roth. A noted transit advocate and a key organizer of Sunday Streets in San Francisco has cleared the most significant hurdle to her appointment as the newest member of the Board of Directors of the […]
Arrest Made of Muni Mechanic in Late-Night Transfer Racket
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Late night transfer tickets. Photo cbcastro. The San Francisco Police Department has arrested two men allegedly involved in the theft and fraudulent selling of Muni late-night transfer tickets, a practice that deprives the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, which runs Muni, of thousands of dollars a week. What’s worse, one of the men arrested is […]