What a Year It Has Been! Let the Celebration of Transit Month Continue

What a Year It Has Been! Let the Celebration of Transit Month Continue
By Erin McMillan

Muni bus stopped at intersection and unloading passengers at bus stop.

49 Van Ness/Mission using the brand new bus rapid transit lanes on opening day in April.

During Transit Month this September, we’re continuing the celebration by looking back to more of the work we’ve done over the last year— some that has been less obvious to Muni customers, but critical to a well-functioning system and other work that is more front and center.

Fix It! Week and Continuing State of good Repair Work

Muni is an impressive transit system. Moving thousands of people on rail and buses every day takes a lot of coordination and a lot of work. Dealing with unique challenges like San Francisco’s geography and shifting travel patterns, we also have to deal with issues related to the Muni system’s age. Proper care and maintenance of a transit system many decades old takes strategic planning as regular maintenance needs to happen while continuing to provide service. Typically, regular Muni Metro maintenance work occurs each night after subway service hours, SFMTA maintenance crews work to maintain the tracks and equipment underground. On most nights, this gives crews only about two hours to get work done. This two-hour window sometimes isn’t enough to complete critical maintenance tasks, so beginning in April, we started Fix It! Week, a quarterly week of planned maintenance that occurs during extended, overnight shifts when trains aren’t in service.

This year Fix It! Week provided 63 total work hours during which several SFMTA teams completed over 2,000 hours of maintenance and inspections. On the busiest nights, the maintenance teams had up to 55 staff in the tunnel from West Portal to Embarcadero delivering safety improvements, station and tunnel enhancements, subway track and wayside equipment maintenance, and traction power upgrades.

In addition to finding new and creative ways to maintain the system more efficiently, we also had to entirely reimagine the service network to accommodate changing travel patterns and in response to the pandemic. Over the past year alone we’ve increased Muni service multiple times as the impact of the pandemic has eased and we’ve slowly been able to hire new operators.

Trip patterns have changed over the last two years with a noticeable shift in San Francisco residents traveling neighborhood to neighborhood instead of the peak period downtown-centric travel pattern that was prevalent pre-pandemic. And we’ve adjusted. Service is slightly over-supplied so that there is capacity when it is needed. Anticipating how people will move in the future is difficult, but our service planning team is hard at work tracking ridership, customer feedback and operator availability to do our best to accommodate how folks want and need to move around the city. We are working to build back our ridership by providing high-quality, reliable service that people can count on.

Our response was the 2022 Muni Service Network which was developed through an extensive outreach process. Throughout the COVID-19 emergency and recovery, the SFMTA prioritized restoring service to these, and other neighborhoods identified in the Muni Service Equity Plan.

On the more visible side of our work, in April we started bus rapid transit (BRT) service on Van Ness Avenue as part of Muni’s Rapid Network, which prioritizes frequency and reliability for customers. Muni and Golden Gate Transit customers are already experiencing shorter travel times. With dedicated transit lanes in the middle of the street, enhanced traffic signals with Transit Signal Priority, the Van Ness BRT is the fastest way to travel north-south in this part of San Francisco, and riders are noticing. Since the BRT corridor opened on Van Ness Avenue in April, ridership on the 49 Van Ness/Mission has nearly doubled and is exceeding pre-pandemic ridership by 13%.

In other major capital and service news, last October service started on Geary in its new transit lanes after the completion of the Geary Rapid Project. Pre-pandemic, the combined Geary routes had one of the highest bus riderships in the country, with more than 56,000 daily customers relying on the 38 Geary and 38R Geary Rapid. As riders return, they are experiencing a faster, more reliable ride thanks to transit improvements like red colorization and dedicated transit lanes, bus stop optimization and signal retiming that were made along the three-mile stretch of Geary. These quick-build improvements alone resulted in 38R Geary Rapid travel time savings of up to 20%.

And last but certainly not least, you may have heard we have officially announced the opening of Central Subway! Weekend service starts Saturday, November 19 and will give customers a chance to check out its four new stations, and also allow our operators and crews to work out any kinks while operating. We’re looking forward to welcoming you aboard!

Wishing you a Happy Transit Month!

Published September 29, 2022 at 11:07PM
https://ift.tt/cvAmX1k

Comments

New top story from Time: ‘One Slip of the Tongue Could Ruin Things.’ Bipartisan Talks on Police Reform Advance—Delicately

https://ift.tt/2ScOdmJ A small bipartisan group of lawmakers in Washington are making an urgent push to get a police reform bill passed in Congress in the wake of a Minneapolis jury finding Derek Chauvin, a white former police officer, guilty of murdering George Floyd, a Black man, last May. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle say they are optimistic that renewed bipartisan talks will result in a deal that can pass both of the closely split chambers of Congress. President Joe Biden has given lawmakers a deadline to get it done by the anniversary of Floyd’s death on May 25. “Congress should act,” said Biden during his joint address on Wednesday. “We have a giant opportunity to bend the arc of the moral universe toward justice.” The way forward in reforming America’s police force must now be found in a legislative body regularly paralyzed by partisanship and disagreement, on an issue that has become so divisive that compromise can translate to losing support from member...

New top story from Time: As Myanmar’s Junta Intensifies Its Crackdown, Pro-Democracy Protesters Prepare for Civil War

https://ift.tt/3cUWeEQ Before the Feb. 1 coup, Zarni Win* worked for a United Nations-funded committee that monitored a ceasefire between Myanmar’s junta and ethnic armed groups. Today, the 27-year-old from Yangon, the country’s largest city, is getting ready to enlist in one of those groups herself. “Now is the time to start preparing to eliminate the terrorist military,” she tells TIME. “I am ready to join the armed revolution.” Myanmar is veering dangerously toward all-out civil war as the military, known as the Tatmadaw, terrorizes the public , and attacks restive ethnic territories. The U.N. special envoy for Myanmar, Christine Schraner Burgener, warned on Mar. 31 that “a bloodbath is imminent.” In an online presentation cited by the Associated Press, she said civil war “at an unprecedented scale” was a possibility and spoke of Myanmar’s deterioration into a “failed state.” Protesters in Myanmar have maintained a largely peaceful resistance to dictatorship since ...

New top story from Time: Google’s Employee Vaccine Mandate Could Influence Other Companies to Do the Same

https://ift.tt/3BQnXRv (SAN RAMON, Calif.) — Google is postponing a return to the office for most workers until mid-October and rolling out a policy that will eventually require everyone to be vaccinated once its sprawling campuses are fully reopened in an attempt to fight the spreading Delta variant. In a Wednesday email sent to Google’s more than 130,000 employees, CEO Sundar Pichai said the company is now aiming to have most of its workforce back to its offices beginning Oct. 18 instead of its previous target date of Sept. 1. The decision also affects tens of thousands of contractors who Google intends to continue to pay while access to its campuses remains limited. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “This extension will allow us time to ramp back into work while providing flexibility for those who need it,” Pichai wrote. And Pichai disclosed that once offices are fully reopened, everyone working there will have be vaccinated. The requirement will be first imposed at Goog...

New top story from Time: All 53 People Aboard Indonesia Submarine Declared Dead After Vessel’s Wreckage Found

https://ift.tt/3ezrzg5 ANYUWANGI, Indonesia — Indonesia’s military on Sunday officially said all 53 crew members from a submarine that sank and broke apart last week are dead, and that search teams had located the vessel’s wreckage on the ocean floor. The grim announcement comes a day after Indonesia said the submarine was considered sunk, not merely missing , but did not explicitly say whether the crew was dead. Officials had also said the KRI Nanggala 402’s oxygen supply would have run out early Saturday, three days after vessel went missing off the resort island of Bali. “We received underwater pictures that are confirmed as the parts of the submarine, including its rear vertical rudder, anchors, outer pressure body, embossed dive rudder and other ship parts,” military chief Hadi Tjahjanto told reporters in Bali on Sunday. “With this authentic evidence, we can declare that KRI Nanggala 402 has sunk and all the crew members are dead,” Tjahjanto said. An underwater ro...

New top story from Time: Why Joe Biden Should Stick to the May 1 Deadline to Bring Home Troops From Afghanistan

https://ift.tt/3cWYYAw Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin’s impromptu visit to Kabul over the weekend where he claimed the United States seeks a “responsible end” to the war followed Secretary of State Tony Blinken’s letter to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and a leaked U.S. peace plan. These moves have made one thing clear: Washington’s foreign-policy elite is once again deluding itself, this time to think that if U.S. troops are kept in Afghanistan a bit longer, a deeper civil war can be evaded, the Taliban can be kept in check and the gains Afghans have achieved in urban areas can be protected. The reality is, whether or not President Biden withdraws all U.S. forces by May 1 in accordance with a U.S.-Taliban agreement , something he describes as “tough,” Afghanistan is likely to spiral into more violence. President Biden must accept the logical conclusion of this reality: The only variable he can control is whether American soldiers will be the target of that violenc...

New top story from Time: The Story Behind Team USA Women’s Gymnasts’ Leotards

https://ift.tt/2WpAo6G There was probably little doubt that when the U.S. women’s gymnastics team walked into the arena at the Tokyo Olympics for the team event, their leotards would embody some red, white and blue theme. And the women did not disappoint. Striding on to the mats, the four-woman team event squad resembled patriotic superheroes in their red-sleeved leotards with a white band across the chest and blue bottom. And that was the idea. Jeanne Diaz, senior designer and director of custom at GK Elite, the leotard manufacturer that for the first time made the women’s Olympic uniforms, says the theme for the leotards was Modern Warrior. “These strong…women come onto the mat like it’s their battlefield,” says Diaz. “They are ready to go, ready to fight for these gold medals and I wanted the apparel to highlight the strength of these athletes.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Altogether, GK Elite designed eight leotards for the six-member women’s team to wear during ...

New top story from Time: RushTok Is a Mesmerizing Viral Trend. It Also Amplifies Sororities’ Problems With Racism

https://ift.tt/3iZ1hHp While what goes into the curation of every TikTok user’s For You page remains a mystery , one thing has become clear—content from University of Alabama students vying for a spot at the school’s sororities has dominated the app over the last week. This trend, dubbed “RushTok” by TikTok netizens, started when sorority hopefuls began making videos of themselves and what they were wearing for “Bama Rush,” University of Alabama’s Greek recruitment week. The formula for a RushTok video is simple yet mesmerizing: state the rush day and the activity, and then name the brand of every item of clothing and accessory you’re sporting. Typical Bama Rush TikTok videos share common characteristics, including a bevy of blondes with Southern accents, hashtags of the school’s call, “Roll Tide,” and a widespread affinity for brands like Michael Kors, Shein, Steve Madden and Kendra Scott. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Perhaps it should come as no surprise that the vide...

New top story from Time: After Its Deployment in Upstate New York, Residents Raise Concerns Over Gun Violence Task Force

https://ift.tt/375f9sG In the midst of nationwide calls to move away from age-old police tactics towards incorporating more community-led responses to gun violence, one U.S. Attorney’s decision to form a task force—with the goal of taking “proactive” measures to address gun violence in two cities in New York—has drawn criticism from local residents. James P. Kennedy Jr., U.S. Attorney for the Western District of New York, announced the formation of the Violence Prevention and Elimination Response (VIPER) task force on July 7, intended to combat a recent surge of gun violence in Rochester and Buffalo, NY. Combining the work of city, state and federal agencies, VIPER’s focus is to get high-level and well-known gun offenders off the cities’ streets, Kennedy said. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Similar federal-led initiatives are rolling out across other cities in the country. Last week, the Department of Justice launched a series of firearms trafficking strike forces in “fi...

New top story from Time: President Biden Made the Right Choice to Withdraw from Afghanistan

https://ift.tt/3eDDERj President Biden made a commendable decision to end the war in Afghanistan . It wasn’t an easy decision. But it was the kind of decision that leaders make when subordinates don’t agree, and those choices are often the “least bad” option. And it was an overdue decision to those of us who fought the war. As the Commanding Officer of SEAL Team TWO in 2012, I ran all special operations in southeastern Afghanistan, on one of several tours in the country. “Nations are really good at starting wars and really bad at ending them,” I told a reporter at the time who embedded with us in a remote, restive Afghan village. “There will always be a political settlement needed.” For 215 days of our 300-day deployment at least one unit was engaged in direct, daily combat with the Taliban, and I approved air-to-ground strikes over 1,100 times. We, like every unit, improved security and governance as the U.S. invested heavily in Afghan military forces and civilian ins...

New top story from Time: Why It’s Crucial to Talk to Kids About Gender Pronouns

https://ift.tt/3fKr8kO It’s only been a week since Katherine Locke’s newest book was published, and they’ve already received messages from parents of trans and nonbinary children saying how much it spoke to them. The book, What Are Your Words? , tells the story of a kid named Ari, who is gender fluid and nonbinary and tries out different pronouns depending on how they feel on different days. Aimed at readers aged 4 to 8, the book follows Ari and his nonbinary uncle Lior as they try to figure out what words fit them. “I certainly didn’t grow up talking about pronouns that weren’t she/her, he/him, and I didn’t know how to have these conversations either,” says Locke, who released their first picture book last November and has previously written novels for young adults and adults. “It’s been really gratifying to see people embrace the book and its concepts.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] With colorful illustrations by Anne Passchier, the book emphasizes that pronouns are...

My precise view

Search This Blog