Congestion Pricing: More unpopular this year than last year
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| Photo by Cindy Chew for the Examiner |
The Chronicle had a story earlier this month based on SFCTA talking points about the dumb idea of filling in the Geary/Fillmore overpass.
Today the Examiner has another SFCTA-based story on the ultimate anti-car idea of Congestion Pricing, which City Hall and the Bicycle Coalition want to impose on everyone who drives in San Francisco.
That is, the San Francisco County Transportation Authority (SFCTA), created to administer the Proposition K sales tax revenue for city transportation, is now propagandizing city residents in support of projects that will make it more difficult and expensive to drive in San Francisco, even though City Hall can't keep city streets adequately paved---and city voters were told that "maintenance of local streets" was at the top of the list for how Prop. K money would be spent.
Instead of paving our streets, the SFCTA is throwing $123 million into the Central Subway money pit.
The new head of the SFCTA spent her early career at the agency pushing Congestion Pricing.
The hook for today's Examiner story is the annual Chamber of Commerce poll, which found that Congestion Pricing is even more unpopular this year than last year: 72% to 21% against this year (69% to 26% last year). Not surprising that the Chamber is worried about charging people $3.00 to drive downtown, since it would obviously discourage people from shopping and visiting city restaurants in a large part of the city. Check out the map below of the area proposed for Congestion Pricing that includes Fisherman's Wharf, Chinatown, and south of Market Street, a major part of the city's restaurant and retail industry.
The Chronicle's story on the poll yesterday didn't mention the Congestion Pricing results, but then the Chronicle didn't mention the results in last year's story either.
Today's Examiner story also promotes the idea that there's a safety emergency on city streets:
With 21 pedestrian deaths and four bicyclist fatalities, 2013 was the deadliest year for such deaths in The City since 2001. Drivers were primarily at fault for two-thirds of these fatalities, according to the Police Department.
But according to the MTA's Collision Report, 2013 was a typical year for fatalities on city streets (see pages 17 and 23).
On the other hand, City Hall has a serious problem with how it counts accidents on our streets, as that recent UC study told us. By relying on police reports and ignoring accidents treated at SF General Hospital, the city has been seriously under-counting cycling accidents---and maybe other accidents, too.
Neither the Examiner nor the Chronicle---or the Bay Guardian and the SF Weekly---have even mentioned that study. Why? Because it shows that riding a bicycle in San Francisco is a lot more dangerous than the city has been telling us, which undermines City Hall's pro-bike traffic policies---and both the Chronicle and the Examiner support those policies editorially.
Labels: Anti-Car, Bicycle Coalition, Congestion Pricing, Cycling and Safety, Examiner, SFCTA
posted by Rob Anderson @ 1:03 PM
3 comments
3 Comments:
Maybe if they had Congestion Pricing in Brooklyn this Terrible Accident would never have happened!
I'm confused. The cities that have congestion pricing I have lived in were able to do so because of excellent and safe public transit. I have lived in Rome which has a unique historic center with narrow streets and little parking, excellent bus service and a subway system that was not fantastic but better than MUNI. so I did not need a car and understood the congestion pricing policy. While living 3 years in London, I observed their congestion pricing which also made sense as London has better public transportation than any North American city. How can San Francisco try congestion pricing without a transit alternative besides bikes?
"How can San Francisco try congestion pricing without a transit alternative besides bikes?"
The same way the city, led by the city's dim-bulb, lemming-like "progressive" City Hall leadership, is redesigning city streets as per the Bicycle Coalition's specifications: Because they can get away with it, since they represent a clueless, uninformed electorate that operates under the illusion that San Francisco's government represents some kind of forward-thinking political/social ideas.
This city is dominated by what Paul Krugman in a different context calls The Very Serious People problem. In SF all Very Serious People support redesigning city streets on behalf of the bike lobby, which represents 3.4% of the city's population.
All VSPs support a goofball version of Smart[sic] Growth that requires that the city build thousands of housing units along major city streets (aka "transit corridors")because all those new residents won't have to drive; instead they will ride an underfunded, already crowded Muni system, or, even less plausibly, bicycles.
All VSPs in SF support the Central Subway boondoggle that's costing the city $123 million---the official, no doubt low-balled estimate---that should have been spent on the existing Muni system.
All city VSPs also support the even bigger, dumber high-speed rail boondoggle.(Gavin Newsom is jeopardizing his VSP status by coming out against the project, but he supports every other item in the VSP catechism.)
All city VSPs deplored Pamela Geller's anti-terrorism ads on Muni buses because they somehow roiled their moronic concept of multiculturalism---and they upset Moslems who view any criticism of their brand of superstition as intolerant.
The VSPs in City Hall that make city policy don't rely on Muni to get around, but they have to pretend to care about it because most of us have to rely on it. Most VSPs have cars, and many even have cars provided by the city. Except for David Chiu, VSPs only ride bikes on ceremonial occasions with photo-ops, like Bike to Work Day.
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