Street Transformations to Address COVID-19 Keep San Francisco Moving

Street Transformations to Address COVID-19 Keep San Francisco Moving
By Eillie Anzilotti

Photo of a slow street in the Tenderloin neighborhood

A street closure in the Tenderloin as part of the COVID-19 response efforts.

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, many aspects of people’s lives have changed – including how we get around town. To reflect this new reality, the SFMTA pivoted in the way we design and operate our streets. From streets that prioritized people walking and bicycling in some of San Francisco’s major parks to Temporary Transit Lanes (TETLs) that protected Muni lines from the return of traffic congestion, San Francisco reimagined how streets could be used for people.

We have documented some of these transformations in a new report that highlights emergency street operations, Temporary Emergency Transit Lanes, the Slow Streets Program, Tenderloin street closures and reusing streets within or close to parks for recreational purposes. Within each effort, the report touches on the ways in which city programs have been responsive, equitable and people-centered.

Some highlights of our COVID-19 response work over the last year include:

The SFMTA implemented over 700 street changes to remove parking and close streets based on the request of essential service providers, including medical care, food banks, testing sites and more. The majority of these requests were filled in less than three days.
12.5 miles of Temporary Emergency Transit Lanes (TETLs) were installed, significantly reducing travel times for tens of thousands of riders. For instance, after transit lanes were installed, transit travel times on Mission Street in the South of Market neighborhood stayed constant, even as traffic volumes increased by 20%. Travel times on the 14 Mission and 14R Mission Rapid are now 20% faster than pre-pandemic.
The SFMTA installed 45 lane miles of Slow Streets during the pandemic. On average, traffic volumes decreased by over 50% after Slow Streets treatments were installed, while bicycle ridership increased by over 70%.
Two miles of safer and calmer street treatments were implemented in the Tenderloin, including block closures for essential services, physical distancing lanes for increased walking space, shared spaces and play streets.

In response to unprecedented circumstances, the SFMTA has delivered a suite of responsive, innovative programs and projects within short timelines. Some aspects of these new programs and projects, such as Slow Street corridors, have demonstrated benefits beyond emergency response and are now moving towards a permanent, post-pandemic future.

Additional programs will continue to be monitored for their value and effectiveness within a rapidly evolving environment. As the pandemic continues and the needs of our streets and residents continue to shift, the SFMTA is committed to keeping San Francisco moving.

Published October 20, 2021 at 03:08AM
https://ift.tt/3n8e5Mo

Comments

New top story from Time: R. Kelly Found Guilty in Sex Trafficking Trial

https://ift.tt/3kMSmKc (NEW YORK) — The R&B superstar R. Kelly was convicted Monday in a sex trafficking trial after decades of avoiding criminal responsibility for numerous allegations of misconduct with young women and children. A jury of seven men and five women found Kelly guilty of racketeering on their second day of deliberations. The charges were based on an argument that the entourage of managers and aides who helped the singer meet girls—and keep them obedient and quiet—amounted to a criminal enterprise. Read more: A Full Timeline of Sexual Abuse Allegations Against R. Kelly [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Several accusers testified in lurid detail during the trial, alleging that Kelly subjected them to perverse and sadistic whims when they were underage. For years, the public and news media seemed to be more amused than horrified by allegations of inappropriate relationships with minors, starting with Kelly’s illegal marriage to the R&B phenom Aaliya...

New top story from Time: 2021 Could Be the Biggest Wedding Year Ever. But Are Guests Ready to Gather?

https://ift.tt/3wC3WKU I was supposed to get married in September. Well, technically, as my husband would be quick to correct me, I did get legally married in September 2020 in the courtyard of our New York City apartment building in front of our parents, a handful of friends who lived nearby and a naked guy standing in the window of the building next door, who, I am told, cheered when we recessed. The 13 people in attendance wore masks I’d ordered with our wedding date printed on them, sat in distanced lawn chairs and sipped gazpacho I’d blended and individually bottled that morning in a frenzy of health-safety panic. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] This was not the wedding of 220 people that we had originally planned. A few months into the pandemic, we made the call to delay our big celebration until 2021. We were hardly alone. In a typical year, Americans throw 2 million weddings, according to wedding website the Knot. Last year, about 1 million couples in the U.S. post...

New top story from Time: Top U.S. General Foresees Afghan Civil War as Security Worsens

https://ift.tt/3ycQZbv KABUL, Afghanistan — The U.S.’s top general in Afghanistan on Tuesday gave a sobering assessment of the country’s deteriorating security situation as America winds down its so-called “forever war.” Gen. Austin S. Miller said the rapid loss of districts around the country to the Taliban — several with significant strategic value — is worrisome. He also cautioned that the militias deployed to help the beleaguered national security forces could lead the country into civil war. “A civil war is certainly a path that can be visualized if this continues on the trajectory it’s on right now, that should be of concern to the world,” he said. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Miller also told a small group of reporters in the Afghan capital that for now he has the weapons and the capability to aid Afghanistan’s National Defense and Security Forces. “What I don’t want to do is speculate what that (support) looks like in the future,” he said. In meetings at the...

New top story from Time: A COVID Outbreak Sparked by Partying Teens Leads to 5,000 Being Quarantined in Spain

https://ift.tt/2UJaeL7 MADRID — Almost 5,000 people are in quarantine after vacationing high school students triggered a major COVID-19 outbreak on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca, a senior official said Monday. Authorities have confirmed almost 1,200 positive cases from the outbreak, Spain’s emergency health response coordinator, Fernando Simón said. The partying teens celebrating the end of their university entrance exams last week created a “perfect breeding ground” for the virus as they mixed with others from around Spain and abroad, Simón told a news conference. Mallorca health authorities carried out mass testing on hundreds of students after the outbreak became clear. It is believed to have spread as hundreds of partying students gathered at a concert and street parties. Officials have so far traced 5,126 travelers to Mallorca. More than 900 COVID-19 cases in eight regions across mainland Spain have been traced back to the outbreak. Scores of infected teens are...

How to Pay for Parking at The City's New Multi-Space Paystations

How to Pay for Parking at The City's New Multi-Space Paystations By Pamela Johnson One of San Francisco's new paystations as the city moves away from its aging parking meters. How drivers pay for street parking in San Francisco continues to evolve. In March 2022, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) began the Citywide Parking Meter Replacement Project to replace San Francisco's aging 27,000 parking meters. Half of the parking meters will be replaced with new single-space meters and the other half with multi-space paystations that use a brand-new pay-by-license-plate system. The project is expected to be completed by the end of 2024. San Francisco uses paid parking to create curb availability in commercial districts and high-demand neighborhoods. When parking meters are in operation, drivers spend less time circling the block looking for a space. Less circling means less congestion and fewer greenhouse gas emissions. To help drivers use the new m...

New top story from Time: A’Ziah ‘Zola’ King on Making an Authentic Film Adaptation of Her Viral Story—and What Comes Next

https://ift.tt/3qrYOHB A’Ziah “Zola” King is well aware that her storytelling is exceptional. For the uninitiated, a brief summary: in 2015, at the age of 19, Zola chronicled a (mostly) true tale of epic proportions in a 148-tweet thread that began with a blossoming friendship and a road trip to a strip club in Florida and ended in a shootout. The thread, compelling in its easy humor and wit yet ultimately chilling in the harsh realities it depicted (among them, sex trafficking and gun violence), captivated the Internet and was subsequently dubbed #TheStory online, going viral before going viral was a commonplace occurrence. Zola’s legacy online is significant—her grand tweet thread is largely credited with inspiring Twitter to create official Twitter threads, an easy way to link tweets together for more comprehensive storytelling, while her brief, cheeky turns-of-phrase, meted out in the limited characters of a tweet (“vibing over our hoe-ism” and “pussy is worth thousands”...

New top story from Time: Ireland Abandons 12.5% Tax Pledge as Global Deal Races to Finish

https://ift.tt/3iFmrts Ireland is ready to sign up to a proposed global agreement for a minimum tax on companies, a climbdown that removes one hurdle to an unprecedented deal that would reshape the landscape for multinationals. On the eve of a key meeting between 140 countries hosted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Irish government said it will join the push for a floor of 15% levied on profits of corporate entities. “This agreement is a balance between our tax competitiveness and our broader place in the world,” Irish Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe said in a statement Thursday evening announcing the pledge. The decision “will ensure that Ireland is part of the solution in respect to the future international tax framework.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The rate agreed is 2.5 percentage points higher than the longstanding level that has been a pillar of Ireland’s economic model for a generation, underscoring its huge symbolic signifi...

New top story from Time: How Liberal White America Turned Its Back on James Baldwin in the 1960s

https://ift.tt/2QBsNzv In discussions about race relations today, the works of James Baldwin continue to speak to the present, even decades after they were written. So it is worth remembering that, at the very height of his influence, Baldwin experienced the same frustration that some Black activists, particularly on campus, feel about white liberals today: their refusal to acknowledge their complicity in the regime of white supremacy. In Baldwin’s case, the liberal backlash was widespread, and effectively marginalized him for a time. The very first piece on the front page of the very first issue of The New York Review of Books , Feb. 1, 1963, was a review of Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time by F. W. Dupee of the Columbia English department. Dupee (a former Communist Party organizer) took exception to Baldwin’s apocalyptic tone. “Do I really want to be integrated into a burning house?” Baldwin had written. The answer, Dupee wrote, is that “[s]ince you have no other, yes; and t...

New top story from Time: I Left Poverty After Writing ‘Maid.’ But Poverty Never Left Me

https://ift.tt/3kXte3r I signed my first book contract without paying much attention to what it said. I didn’t know at the time that the book would be a best seller or that it would one day inspire a Netflix series . I just needed the money. I was a single mom with a 2-year-old and a 9-year-old, living in low-income housing, and because of a late paycheck, I hadn’t eaten much for a few weeks, subsisting on pizza I paid for with a check I knew would bounce. This wasn’t my first bout of hunger. I had been on food stamps and several other kinds of government assistance since finding out I was pregnant with my older child. My life as a mother had been one of skipping meals, always saving the “good” food, like fresh fruit, for the kids I told myself deserved it more than I did. The apartment was my saving grace. Housing security, after being homeless and forced to move more than a dozen times, was what I needed the most. Hunger I was O.K. with, but the fear of losing the home wher...

New top story from Time: Good Intentions Are Not Enough. We Must Reset for a Fairer Future

https://ift.tt/3usi2im We need a reset. We know we have racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, and additional forms of bias and discrimination built into our workplaces, our schools, our medical care and all our institutions. We know it is systemic and harmful. In the tech industry , its products are harming our brains, our self-worth, our values, our pandemic response, our children and our society. Social media platforms are enabling and amplifying white supremacy and other forms of hate for profit. Workers are struggling to make a living wage while CEO billionaires work them harder, pay them less, create poor working environments and hoard ill-gotten profits. In politics, we are witnessing attacks on voting rights , abortion and housing; in schools and universities, teaching racism and science are under threat. In hospitals, Black, Latinx and Southeast Asian workers hold the front line while their communities get less access and worse care. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] ...

My precise view

Search This Blog