UCLA professor and parking policy superstar Donald Shoup.

This Tuesday, the San Francisco MTA released a long-awaited parking meter study, which calls for increasing meter hours in commercial districts where parking occupancy rises above 85 percent and businesses are open late on weekdays and Sundays. Afterward, Streetsblog called UCLA Professor Donald Shoup, author of The High Cost of Free Parking and arguably the world's foremost parking expert, and asked for his thoughts on the study.

Professor Shoup had read the document and called it "pathbreaking," lauding the MTA for being thorough and data-driven, and for embracing occupancy targets to manage parking supply.

Shoup also reiterated the importance of Community Benefit Districts (CBDs) as a tool for selling parking reform to the public. In CBDs, a portion of the new meter revenue collected in commercial districts is returned to that district for sidewalk repair, street trees, enhanced street cleaning, etc., so that businesses can see firsthand how parking revenue improves their streets.

Professor Shoup also pointed to Redwood City, Ventura, and Old Pasadena for best practice examples of occupancy-based parking policy changes that have revitalized neighborhoods and facilitated business. Here is an edited transcript of our interview. [For a longer version, head over to Streetsblog San Francisco.]

Matthew Roth: What are your impressions of the MTA's new parking meter study?

Donald Shoup: It's pathbreaking. There's never been anything like it anywhere before. I think they've done the right thing to say, 'we're aiming for an occupancy rate.'  You want the spaces to be well used, but readily available. Well used means almost full, but readily available means not quite full. You have to be very careful to make sure you get that right. They're willing to adjust it if they get it wrong. I think the right price for parking is sort of like the Supreme Court's definition for pornography: I know it when I see it. There's no way to say the price is right except by looking at the result and San Francisco is committed to change the price wherever they get it wrong.

I think they did it with a very careful goal in mind and that is: set the lowest possible price they could charge and still have spaces available on every block. So that's different prices at different times of the day and at different locations, but I think if they aim for this policy, if they've chosen the lowest price they can charge and still have available spaces, it means if they go any lower, all the spaces will be filled and people will say there's no place to park. And if they go higher than that, there will be a lot of vacant spaces. Some of the supply will be mismanaged. 

MR: How important are Community Benefit Districts for selling parking reform to the public?

DS: Well, I think it is the key to getting political support. As you probably know, Redwood City has this policy and Ventura in Southern California, they just started it. From the merchants' point of view, they think that the revenue return is the most important part of the entire policy. They realize that it's going to cut down on cruising and maybe greenhouse gas emissions, but the important thing to them is seeing improvements right in front of their businesses. Without that it seems to be hard to support the idea.

It's also true in Washington, D.C. They installed it around a new ballpark and they returned 75 percent of the revenue to the metered districts. And this can be for transportation improvements. I think that something visible and sharing with the community is very important. If they don't do that it's hard to show and prove and have pictures of the benefits.  

I think it's important for getting people to understand the workings of the program. I don't think the community benefit district will change anything about the right price for parking. I do, however, think they will make the policies seem much more reasonable to everybody. If they use the money to make sidewalk improvements, one of the most important transportation pieces of infrastructure in San Francisco. I think the sidewalks are almost as important as the bus system. If they said we'll use some of the money to improve the sidewalks and the streetscapes on the metered streets, everybody would see that the city is giving back something and not just taking. I think if you give back something that's very visible and very valuable, the metered communities will see the benefits right in front of their eyes. Everybody wants better bus service and more frequent bus service, but that's hard to see, especially if you're a struggling merchant. I think that it's easy to see very clean sidewalks, very well-policed sidewalks in front of your restaurant, rapid responses to any cracks in your sidewalks, maybe much more frequent cleaning.

MR: Some businesses complain that extending meter hours or raising rates will drive customers away, that they'll go to suburban malls where parking is plentiful and free. How do you contend with that assertion?

DS: You have to emphasize that the pricing is to keep the spaces almost entirely, but not quite, full. So you can't say the people are being chased away if almost all the spaces are full almost all of the time. You just wonder, where are they being chased? For the businesses, the important thing is that people are being chased away because the spaces will be occupied, but they will be occupied by people who will be willing to pay for parking if they can easily find a space.

If I were a waiter working in a restaurant, who do you think would leave a bigger tip, someone who will come only if they can find a free parking space after they have driven around long enough to find it, or someone that who is willing to pay for parking if they can easily find a space? I think the person that is willing to pay for parking is more willing to leave a bigger tip or pay more at a store or bring more business to the area than somebody who wants to be a freeloader and just won't come to your neighborhood unless they can get free parking. When you think about it, the kind of customers you're going to get is probably a little bit more free-spending if they can easily find a space and they're willing to pay for parking.  

In terms of the economics of it, Old Pasadena simply took off economically the year they installed meters. The sales-tax revenue is about six times higher than it was when they put in the meters in 1992. That is because, at least in Old Pasadena, the meter money has greatly improved the public infrastructure of that neighborhood. In San Francisco, they're talking about using most of the money for public transit, so there won't be the physical improvements. You're probably attracting a more free-spending group of customers and maybe more carpools, because they'll be splitting the cost of the curb parking. Maybe two dollars an hour won't seem like such a punitive payment if there are four people in the car and they're staying in an area for four hours. The solo driver will object to paying for parking. But if I were a business person, I'd rather see the cars arriving with four people in them rather than one.

MR: What should San Francisco, or any city trying to reform parking policy, do about time limits?

DS: The other thing I think that San Francisco is doing and that Redwood City did and that Ventura has done is eliminate any time limits on the meters. They removed the time limits and they rely on pricing to create turnover and vacancies and this has been the most popular part of the policy in Redwood City. People now don't have to worry -- a driver and three friends want to go for dinner some place and they park -- they don't have to worry that they have to get back to their meter in an hour or two hours. Whatever they're doing, they don't feel like they're pushed around so much by the city.  It still creates a lot of turnover because the price is higher, but the user is more in control of their life than when somebody who manages meters says you can only stay here for an hour or two hours.

The advantage of using prices to manage parking is that you don't need to have these arbitrary time limits. I think when people say they're going to run meters in the evening, it seems ridiculous because people want to park once and walk around for the evening. Turnover is not important for that, but pricing is important to make sure that some of the spaces remain available. So I would say that whenever you talk about running the meters in the evening, you have to say there's no time limit on them. You can put enough money in to stay for the entire evening, park once and go to dinner, a movie, a bar, and then walk around for as long as you want. You have to break this automatic assumption that a meter means that you have to leave in an hour or two hours.

MR: In the MTA study, during metered hours, Columbus Avenue had 71-81 percent occupancy.  Does that mean the meter prices are too high?

DS: Yes, I think it's quite common for meter prices to be too high, especially in the morning. Definitely on some days and at some hours the prices will definitely come down. 

MR: Is 85 percent occupancy target a firm benchmark? Are there situations where you want more or less occupancy?

DS: Well, it's short-hand. It just means you shouldn't have too much of an hour that is totally full. You shouldn't have much of an hour that is less than 70 percent, but somewhere around 85 percent. Sometimes it's going to be higher and sometimes its going to be absolutely full. What you'll see is variation around 85 percent, but I think what you mainly want is to make sure it isn't full more than 10 or 15 minutes out of any hour.

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom Photo: Gawker

Mayor Gavin Newsom has been quietly pressuring MTA Chief Nat Ford to delay or prevent proposals to extend parking meter hours on weeknights and Sundays, despite a looming mid-year MTA budget deficit and studies that show it's good policy, Streetsblog has learned. ...

"The Mayor thinks it's the wrong time to make these moves," said Nathan Ballard, Newsom's communications director. "Right now, with the economy where it is, the burden on ordinary people for city services is already stretched to the max, and so he hasn't seen anything that convinces him otherwise. He's open to arguments, but he's still where he was."

The "we can't change policy in a bad economy" argument is familiar to Capitol Hill transportation watchers, who saw the Obama administration use the recession to rule out a gas tax hike or per-mile vehicle fee earlier this year.

But in Newsom's case, as Matt and Bryan point out, San Francisco is lagging behind its fellow major cities when it comes to charging for parking. In Los Angeles, where voters will soon be looking at Newsom's credentials, meters remain on until 2 a.m. New York City keeps meters on until midnight, and Washington D.C.'s stay on until 10 p.m.

And with the city transit authority facing possible fare hikes or service cuts in the wake of a budget deficit, it's tough to see how not extending parking meter hours doesn't hit non-car-owning voters where it hurts.

After covering PARK(ing) Day events since 2006, this year we took it down a notch. We figured it was about time we got to relax a little and enjoy the space and -- frankly -- not get dehydrated from bicycling about all day. So sit back and enjoy.

This year more than 20 countries participated. New York City featured about 50 spaces filled to the gills with people, sod, chairs, food, fun, games, and, in one case, bubble-wrap galore! You'll also get a look at "Hex Pack Patio," the POP.Park design competition winner from Samina Iqbal.

After the jump, more scenes from Park(ing) Day in San Francisco, courtesy of John Hamilton.

Police chief George Gascón, center, fields a question from Streetsblog's Bryan Goebel. Photo: Michael Rhodes.

Gascón goes on the record with positions on speed cameras, pedestrian and cyclist safety, and police chases. He says traffic enforcement resources should be allocated to the most hazardous areas, and he'll consider appointing a liaison to address the concerns of cyclists. You don't hear him commit to lowering speed limits or rotating cops through bike patrol duty, but you do get a feel for how he views traffic enforcement and the responsibilities of different road users.

As Bryan notes, Gascón's willingness to sit for an interview stands in marked contrast to his predecessor, Heather Fong, "who often steered clear of reporters, and ignored efforts to establish closer working relationships with transit advocates." By fielding questions about traffic enforcement, Gascón is sending the message that street safety is worth his time and attention.

Here in New York, we have yet to see a comparable level of seriousness about street safety from Ray Kelly or NYPD's public information office. This week, NYPD spokesman Paul Browne has not returned requests for comment, submitted by fax and email, about the fact that traffic fatalities in New York City are on the rise. While every other city agency Streetsblog has dealt with returns phone calls and provides statements on the record, the NYPD has ignored our every request for information beyond the most basic facts about traffic collisions. This is entirely consistent with the public statements on traffic crime from Gascón's counterpart, Ray Kelly.

Shown documentation last month that motorists commit traffic violations virtually unchecked on city streets, Kelly gave the verbal equivalent of a shrug, citing the number of tickets NYPD hands out. No word on whether those tickets actually deterred dangerous driving, or whether Kelly has given a moment's pause to the idea that we can measure the rate of traffic crime as we do violent crime, and track progress on safety accordingly.

Not that the commissioner isn't a voluble fellow. If you do score 30 minutes of face time with Kelly, just stick to questions about neckwear, like the Times did a few days ago, and you'll get an earful.

For many American cities, 2009 marks the second time around for car-free events modeled after Bogotá's Ciclovía. In San Francisco, like New York, last year's innovation is this year's tradition, as you'll see in this Streetfilm from John Hamilton:

Despite a blanket of fog, the last San Francisco Sunday Streets of 2009 was, from all accounts, a smashing success, one of the most popular so far, with thousands of people enjoying four activity-filled hours of pristine car-free space through Golden Gate Park and the Great Highway. Kids, families, bicyclists, skaters, dancers, and even the MTA Chief Nat Ford came out to enjoy the car-free zone.

Don't miss the Fun Cycle, also known as the Conference Bike, which is like an all-ages version of the beer bike.

Photo: Bryan Goebel

First he was rumored to have been considered for a job in the Obama administration. Then, it was the executive director opening at the LA MTA, a position insiders say he was interviewed for but didn't get. And even now, despite a pledge he made in an interview with Streetsblog that his "career goal" is "to focus on the San Francisco MTA," rumors persist within the MTA and at City Hall that MTA Chief Nat Ford continues to look elsewhere.

As late as this week, a spokesperson told Streetsblog SF that Ford "is not looking," and remains "committed to the SFMTA." We'll let you know if our west coast colleagues hear otherwise.

Just about everyone who visits San Francisco's grand Market Street is awed by its hustle and bustle, myriad modes of transportation, and beautiful architecture. But just about everyone also agrees that Market Street has much bigger potential as a space that accommodates its users in more efficient and human terms.

Streetfilms was able to talk to many advocates who would like to see a different configuration of Market Street -- folks who have already invested in making it better, and passersby who use it as a daily commuting option. It's fair to say not all ideas are universally accepted among all stakeholders, but hopefully their thoughts can serve as a springboard to a bigger discussion on what to do when Market Street is finally re-examined and re-paved.

From the new San Francisco branch of Streetfilms, Janel Sterbentz takes a look at one of the city's main bicycle routes -- Valencia Street -- and asks how it would function if signals were timed to give cyclists the "Green Wave" instead of cars. Cyclists would get a smoother ride and feel less compelled to roll through red lights. Pedestrians would benefit from slower vehicle speeds and more predictable cyclist behavior. As for transit vehicles, Janel reports, average travel times for trams and buses have improved on Amsterdam streets with a cyclist green wave. Even motorists, it turns out, should be rooting this on:

While naysayers may object that this will increase traffic congestion, it is more than reasonable to counter that real-time traffic conditions on Valencia Street have already slowed to a general range of 8 to 20 mph. It makes logical sense that retiming traffic signals for actual traffic speeds would increase traffic flow, reduce idling, and minimize stop-and-go movements, thus decreasing pollution.

Portland, Oregon has already realized this and implemented a citywide traffic signal optimization project, which saves motorists over 1,750,000 gallons of gas and 15,460 tons of CO2 each year. It cost $533,000, which was paid for by the Climate Trust of Oregon carbon offset program. In downtown Portland nearly every street is timed for 12 mph, making these streets de facto Green Waves.

Despite data from its own models that suggest drivers on Valencia Street would reap similar efficiencies from slower signal timing, the San Francisco MTA refuses to fund a pilot study. In New York, we could see cyclist green waves bringing a more civilized pace to numerous avenues that currently function as speedways, but let's get specific. Tell us which New York City corridors are outright begging for bike-centric signal timing.

SF.Streetsblog.org

Streetsblog seems to be arriving in the Bay Area not a moment too soon. As Streetsblog San Francisco editor Bryan Goebel reports, the SF MTA's board voted to eliminate a critical piece of bike infrastructure at Market Street at Octavia Boulevard on Tuesday. Why? Apparently, the eastbound bike lane on Market Street is interfering with motorists' ability to make an illegal right turn on to the 101 freeway.

It looks to me like a classic example of old school traffic-engineering at its worst: Reduce cyclist and pedestrian injuries by simply discouraging cyclists and pedestrians from using the street. Frankly, it's incredible that this kind of planning and engineering still holds sway in a city whose mayor claims to be building "a new green economy" and a "sustainable vision."

Bryan and Streetsblog San Francisco reporter Matthew Roth are going to make sure that issues like this receive the regular coverage that they deserve and officials are held accountable for their press releases. It should be fun. And Streetfilms was already there...

A few notes:

1. We know that we need to redesign our web sites to make it easier to find Streetsblog San Francisco, Los Angeles and Streetsblog.net, our national network of 175 livable streets bloggers. We hope to have a quick, interim redesign finished soon and a more comprehensive redesign of the Livable Streets Network later this year.

2. Streetsblog San Francisco is funded by a generous donation from Jonathan Weiner, a bike-commuting, Muni-riding, San Francisco-based software entrepreneur, a grant from the Wallace Global Fund and ongoing support from Mark Gorton and The Open Planning Project.

The Plan describes a set of policies for the City and County of San Francisco to follow to achieve a more livable streetscape environment. It creates a street typology system for making streetscape improvements, and describes appropriate standard and optional elements for each street type. For each element, there is a set of guidelines for appropriate location and design. Finally, the Plan will describe ways that the City can fund, maintain and enforce Better Streets improvements.

The folks at local advocacy org Livable City say the street types in the plan are a step up from the traditional, car-centric classification system, but caution that the current draft lacks critical components:

Important tasks, like identifying which streets are of what type, and creating standards for essential elements of successful streets (street lighting and pedestrian-friendly building fronts, for example) are missing so far. The Better Streets project also shied away from addressing the speed and volume of traffic, two critical elements for creating safe and livable streets. Governance (how city agencies plan and coordinate street projects) and a strategy for funding and implementation also need to be addressed.

Starting in January you can read about the evolution of Better Streets in the cyber pages of Streetsblog SF. In the meantime, members of the Livable Streets Network familiar with the plan should feel free to dive in and flesh out this wiki entry.

A rendering of the Transbay Transit Center with a 5.4 acre park on its roof.

Pointing to the renderings on a projection screen behind him, with a 5.4 acre park atop the terminal, 2600 units of housing (with a pledge of 35% affordable homes), the construction of the tallest building in the West, and a terminal expected to serve 100,000 daily riders, Mayor Newsom added: "Eat your heart out, New York City."

If the city manages to find the $2 billion necessary to complete the project, San Francisco's transit hub would be finished in 2014, 101 years after Cornelius Vanderbilt opened the doors to New York's Grand Central Terminal.

The Transbay Transit Center, a public-private partnership headed by the Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA), will replace the existing Transbay Terminal with a multi-modal transportation hub that would serve nine transportation systems in the same complex, including the potential California High Speed Rail route through San Francisco.  

Mayor Newsom and several other speakers stressed the economic significance of a large-scale construction project as the overall economy sours and the city makes budget cuts.  

Nathaniel Ford, Sr., Chairman of the TJPA and head of MUNI, argued that "without projects like this, we will not be able to provide mobility for the growing population of California, and bring together the fractured public transportation system in San Francisco."  

Mayor Gavin Newsom, former Mayor Willie Brown, and board members of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority

Though the project design is impressive, funding remains a daunting obstacle. As outlined in the excellent feature story by Steve Jones in the San Francisco Bay Guardian yesterday, the TJPA has not found the money to pay for the entire project and may be relying on state funding that won't materialize, especially with California's ballooning budget deficit.

While the TJPA has suggested that it hopes the Transbay Transit Center will catch the eye of President-elect Barack Obama's team, as it expedites construction projects for the fiscal stimulus package early next year, it will be only one of many transit projects competing with the road and bridge lobby, which is already circling the wagons nationally and in California.

"It's exciting to see the first shovel in the soil for the new terminal and there are still real concerns about how we raise the additional $2 billion or so for the project," said Dave Snyder, transportation policy director for San Francisco Planning and Urban Research. "But this is a perfect public works project for the new century."

Below are the various renderings of the proposed terminal as presented by Mayor Newsom and the TJPA at the groundbreaking:

The Natoma Street facade

The center light column from below...

... and above.

The view from Mission Square

Photo: Matthew Roth

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.

Despite the significant time and money required to produce the tome, Mayor Gavin Newsom struck an optimistic note, citing the proposed addition of 34 miles of bicycle lanes to San Francisco streets — a 75 percent increase over the existing 45 miles of lanes. 

“We’ve accomplished a great deal together, but much work remains to be done to improve the safety and convenience of bicycling,” said Newsom. “I will continue to push for a better bicycling environment as part of my deep commitment to improving the health of our environment, our residents and our city.”

A public hearing on the DEIR has been scheduled for January 8. The deadline for comments is January 13. 

While Rob Anderson, the plaintiff in the lawsuit that sparked the injunction, will surely continue his befuddlingly successful crusade (a couple of choice jeremiads from his blog: cyclists as a special interest wielding inordinate political power, and biking as a frivolous mode of transportation akin to skateboarding), the city assumes the DEIR will be sufficient to lift the injunction. 

“The Planning Department is confident that the DEIR fully satisfies the issues cited in the superior court's injunction and will enable timely implementation of bicycle improvements that will enhance transportation alternatives in San Francisco,” said Planning Director John Rahaim.

What this means practically is a different matter. According to Andy Thornley, program director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition (SFBC), even if the DEIR is certified by spring and the Bicycle Plan goes before the MTA board shortly thereafter, the 60 projects outlined for immediate implementation likely won't begin until the summer of 2009. 

“The Draft EIR is a very expensive bow-tie that we’re going to attach to the Bike Plan itself.  While it is a big deal, it shouldn't be the only focus. The city needs to build out the Bike Plan as soon as possible."

The injunction held that the previous version of the Bicycle Plan had not received sufficient review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The Bicycle Plan DEIR identifies some potentially significant impacts as defined by CEQA affecting traffic congestion, transit operating delays, and loading activities for some project options, particularly along portions of Second Street, Fifth Street, Cesar Chavez Street, Portola Avenue and Masonic Avenue.

Though the city took considerable heat over the summer for revealing at a Board of Supervisors hearing that it had fallen behind its own schedule for releasing the DEIR, the Planning Department delivered on its promise to release it by Thanksgiving. Both advocates and critics of the Bicycle Plan will have plenty to sift through over the long weekend (and likely through the new year).

Given the timeline of up to five years for completion of the 60 near-term projects in the Bicycle Plan, it is unclear whether Newsom, a likely candidate for governor in 2010, will realize significant bicycle improvements during his last term as mayor.

Photo: San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency

Photo: Christina Izzo/SF Chronicle

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the target vacancy rate for curbside spaces will be between 10 and 35 percent. New technology will help monitor the results and set prices:

For example, the hourly meter cost would fluctuate between 25 cents and $6. However, during special events, such as large concerts, ballgames and street festivals, the charge could go as high as $18. Currently, meters cost $1.50 to $3 an hour, depending on the neighborhood.

The executive director would also have the authority to change the price according to location, time of day and day of the week, based on demand.

The city would track parking meter use with a sophisticated system of sensors embedded in the pavement. High-tech space monitors would be deployed in lots. The hourly rates would not be adjusted more frequently than once a month and would not go up or down by more than 50 cents at a time.

Drivers won't have to worry about having enough nickels, dimes and quarters to feed a meter. Instead, the city will install a new generation of meters that will allow people to pay by credit card, prepaid parking cards and, perhaps, cell phones.

When John Kaehny reported on SFpark for Streetsblog this summer, he noted that "big city parking policies have been based on a mixture of political pandering, myths and half-truths." The data collected from San Francisco may go a long way toward dispelling those assumptions.

In New York, the low price of curbside parking results in tens of millions of miles driven each year, according to calculations from Transportation Alternatives, which has urged the Bloomberg administration to take bolder steps on parking policy. For a city where even the more progressive pols grandstand on parking issues for populist cred, shaping the debate is a big challenge. "The public has never heard a good case as to why higher rates are beneficial," Kaehny said.

A pair of six-month DOT pilot programs in Greenwich Village and near Kings Highway in Brooklyn could help change that, Kaehny told us, by collecting data that will bolster the argument for raising rates.

This week's events make Halloween seem like a long time ago, but it was only last Friday when Clarence Eckerson, on a west coast jaunt for Streetfilms, shot this video of Critical Mass in San Francisco. Some think it was the city's biggest mass ride ever. Clarence offers a possible explanation:

With monthly rides under attack in some cities, it is interesting to see the tactic that San Francisco takes. The police department is practically hands off, and the ride is very peaceful and non-confrontational. Even drivers and spectators don't seem to mind the action.

"So," Clarence wonders, "why can't it be the same in NYC?"

"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 years ago."

The Wednesday event was part of the ongoing public outreach effort for the Planning Department's Fisherman's Wharf Public Realm Project, which seeks to greatly enhance the quality of the public spaces around the famous tourist destination (nearly 13 million annual visitors, or roughly one-fourth of all visitors to New York City). Having been recruited by the city to impart his internationally-renowned vision locally, Gehl urged San Franciscans to consider best practices from cities throughout the world that have transformed waterfronts from failing public spaces into the vibrant heart of the public realm. He argued that the spirit and principles that have made Oslo, Copenhagen, and Melbourne so successful could work in San Francisco.

Gehl presented the preliminary findings of his study of the area [PDF], asserting that the most interesting places in a city are "where the water and the streets come together." He said smart city leaders around the world have reversed the trend of abandoning their waterfronts to so-called "undesirable elements," and instead have developed integrated parks and promenades that appeal to the various needs of every demographic. Successful cities have recognized the changing interests of city dwellers who often congregate in public spaces not out of necessity, but out of an interest in being near other people.

He was adamant, however, that quality public space was not the same as commodified public space, or the "Rouse-fication" of waterfronts so that they resemble theme parks or festival markets (think South Street Seaport in New York or the Bayside Marketplace in Miami, projects of the Rouse Company). These, he said, are "based on getting people down to the waterfront and then skinning them in different ways... getting them to buy things they don't want."

While Fisherman's Wharf already has a number of gimmicky shops that local residents loathe, Gehl believes that much can be done to improve the quality of public space with simple amenities, such as more benches and movable furniture. He was shocked that the area didn't have more places to sit and watch people pass by.

Gehl's study notes that the volume of pedestrian traffic to Fisherman's Wharf is already higher than some other prominent walking cities, including London and Copenhagen. Much like the "ped-lock" in Times Square, in Fisherman's Wharf there are far more pedestrians than cars, though the city has made greater relative concessions to the latter. While Jefferson Street's 60-foot width is equally allotted between pedestrians and cars, during peak periods there are 15 times more pedestrians using the space.

During the sometimes contentious question-and-answer period after the presentation, the audience voiced support for preserving (and in some cases renewing) the area's historical maritime traditions. Several commenters suggested developing a fish market to attract local residents to the area, while one woman, a captain of a fishing vessel, invited Gehl to sail the harbor to better understand the perspective of those who still make a living from the sea. A large round of applause went up when one audience member recommended closing Jefferson Street entirely to private cars.

Jeffrey Pollack, Proprietor of Nick's Lighthouse restaurant and the head of the Fisherman's Wharf Restaurant Association, said his organization hoped that the city would alter zoning laws to improve the retail environment, specifically supporting local businesses as opposed to chain stores. "We're the second largest tourist draw in California behind Disneyland," he said, "but we don't want to be Disneyland."

Photo: Matthew Roth

Hoping to keep pace with the progress in New York City over the past two years, the San Francisco Planning Department has commissioned Gehl Architects to transform several prominent streets and public spaces in the city, starting with one of the busiest tourist attractions in the U.S., Fisherman's Wharf. 

On Tuesday night, in front of a standing-room audience of special guests at Pier One's Bayside Room, Gehl presented his general vision for improving San Francisco's public realm. The event, sponsored by Mayor Gavin Newsom, San Francisco Planning and Urban Research (SPUR), the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, Livable City, and Walk SF, was the first in the new Great Streets Campaign Speakers Series, which will bring some of the world's most remarkable urban visionaries to the Bay Area in the coming months to share their successes and offer San Francisco models for instituting its own vision for a sustainable and healthy city. 

Gehl is in town for a week of presentations to the public, to city agencies, and to merchants' associations. On Wednesday, he will present the results of his firm's Fisherman's Wharf study to the public for the first time. The Planning Department is hopeful that his work will stimulate a larger discussion of the quality of public space among the stakeholders in the area.

John Rahaim, director of the Planning Department, noted that Gehl's work around the world brings a cachet to San Francisco and helps "set the stage to implement pedestrian improvements and demonstration projects on our streets." Rahaim is optimistic that Gehl's work will "start a process to implement the principles of [San Francisco's] Better Streets Plan," the comprehensive new pedestrian and public space plan that is awaiting completion of environmental review.

Gehl was cagey when asked about what San Francisco should do to be more like Copenhagen or Paris, arguing that the study his firm has completed for the Fisherman's Wharf project is only a preliminary analysis and not a proposal. Nevertheless, he argued that if San Francisco wants to be a "lively, attractive, safe and sustainable city [it must] be sweet to its pedestrians, sweet to its cyclists."

Photo of Jan Gehl and SPUR Executive Director Gabriel Metcalf by Matthew Roth

On the heels of New York's Summer Streets, San Francisco opened up segments of its waterfront roadways to thousands of pedestrians, cyclists, skaters and dancers. Streetfilms contributor John Hamilton was on hand for Sunday Streets, and shows us how they go car-free in the Bay Area.

San Francisco held its inaugural car-free "Sunday Streets" event last weekend. New Yorker Jen Petersen was there and files this report.

Whatever the weather, San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf doesn’t suffer from a shortage of dollar-shelling, strolling tourists on weekends, and so clearing street space for more people-powered mobility on a sunny morning had instant takers.  As was the case at New York’s Summer Streets, more than a few participants simply stumbled upon the event.  And since Civic Center and Fort Mason was hosting the U.S.’s first Slow Food Nation, a foodie-drawing tribute to regional, small-scale food producers, there was an even greater influx of slow and deliberate pilgrims on this particular weekend. There wasn’t a chance that the northern part of the route would go un-used, though I wondered how many San Franciscans actually ventured that way. But save for the artisan street vendors set up as usual at Market Street and Embarcadero, the weekend-shuttered financial district was still a tourist no-go zone. 

South of the Ferry Terminal Building (itself a regional foods marketplace), however, cyclists, walkers, rollerbladers, and runners transitioned to the physical activity-promoting leg of the route. And so rounding the bay’s curve to South Beach, where the SF Giants’ AT&T Park was open for base running, and the China Basin inlet, where Cheryl Burke Dance Studio offered Tribal Belly, Afro-Colombian, Salsa, and East Coast swing dance classes all morning, the re-appropriative potential of the street came to life. I maintain: there is no higher social use of street space than dancing!

And while the dance stage set up in front of Pier 48 was a lively space, the China Basin/Mission Bay stretch of the route felt fashioned by a place-marketing tour agency. Freshly-constructed condos and little else lined the street’s west side, while barbed wire fencing barred bay access for most of the route.  But oh how that unobstructed sapphire bay view beckoned! I found myself daydreaming about a waterfront Sunday Streets with free kayaks and canoes on offer.   

Pedaling beyond condo-led redevelopment’s reach, my thoughts turned to residents of the route’s immediately adjacent, currently park-poor neighborhoods. Did they know about the street closure, and had they toured this ribbon of their city on car-free streets, taken in a free dance class, or at least breathed in an unusually quiet view of the Bay Bridge, Alcatraz, and the Golden Gate? Or was this Wharf-to-Bayview route more effective for place marketing to the economically mobile, who might now add the yet-to-be-named, still comparably industrial waterfront south of Mission Bay to their "possible purchase" map?

Regardless, there were many smiling faces, and much inter-modal cooperation. For a city that has a hard time holding on to families with children, San Francisco (or the wider Bay Area) certainly has plenty who will show up with bikes, provided they can safely reach the designated route. Family bike gangs were more numerous than spandex and logo-covered road rider packs, Critical Massers (away at Burning Man, perhaps?), or fixie-fixated hipsters. The traffic current was slow, there were no lane markers for different modes and paces, and riders helped to point out perilous streetcar tracks for their fellow riders. And movers of all speeds even dismounted and unlaced rollerblades to dance together, still helmeted, in front of Pier 48. Maybe this is the most incisive indicator of a successful Ciclovía-style event after all. 

Photos 1 & 3 by Jen Petersen; Photo 2 by pecanpieguy/Flickr

I don't think "Talk of the Nation" is available on WNYC but you should be able to tune in via the Internet. They'll be taking callers as well.

After the jump, you'll find last week's Wall Street Journal article on Anderson and his law suit. And here, to give you a sense of where Anderson is coming from, is a choice quote from his blog:

Riding a bike in SF -- or any American city -- will never really be "a safe, attractive option," regardless of the miles of bike lanes that are eventually painted on city streets. Regardless of the obvious dangers, some people will ride bikes in San Francisco for the same reason Islamic fanatics will engage in suicide bombings -- because they are politically motivated to do so.

It's amazing that the court and 1970s-era environmental regulations have given this local gadfly such power and legitimacy, but there you have it. If you were going on national radio with Rob Anderson, what points would you try to hit?

SAN FRANCISCO -- New York is wooing cyclists with chartreuse bike lanes. Chicago is spending nearly $1 million for double-decker bicycle parking.

San Francisco can't even install new bike racks.

Cyclists say the irony is killing them -- literally. At least four bikers have died and hundreds more have been injured in San Francisco since mid-2006, when Mr. Anderson helped convince a judge to halt implementation of a massive pro-bike plan.(It's unclear whether the plan's execution could have prevented the accidents.) In the past year, bike advocates have demonstrated outside City Hall, pushed the city to challenge the plan's freeze in court and proposed putting the whole mess to local voters. Nothing worked.

"We're the ones keeping emissions from the air!" shouted Leah Shahum, executive director of the 10,000-strong San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, at a July 21 protest.

Mr. Anderson's fight underscores the tensions that can circulate as urban cycling, bolstered by environmental awareness and high gasoline prices, takes off across the U.S. New York City, where the number of commuter cyclists is estimated to have jumped 77% between 2000 and 2007, is adding new bike lanes despite some motorist backlash. Chicago recently elected to kick cars off stretches of big roads on two Sundays this year.

Famously progressive, San Francisco is known for being one of the most pro-bike cities in the U.S., offering more than 200 miles of lanes and requiring that big garages offer bike parking. It is also known for characters like Mr. Anderson.

A tall, serious man with a grizzled gray beard, Mr. Anderson spent 13 months in a California federal prison for resisting the draft during the Vietnam War. He later penned pieces for the Anderson Valley Advertiser, a muckraking Northern California weekly owned by his brother that's known for its savage prose and pranks.

Running for Office

In 1995, Mr. Anderson moved to San Francisco. Working odd jobs, he twice ran for a seat on the city's Board of Supervisors, pledging to tackle homelessness and the city's "tacit PC ideology." He got 332 of 34,955 votes in 2004, his second and best try.

That year Mr. Anderson, who mostly lives off a small government stipend he receives for caring for his 92-year-old mother, also started a blog, digging into local politics with gusto. One of his first targets: the city's most ambitious bike plan to date.

Unveiled in 2004, the 527-page document was filled with maps, traffic analyses and a list of roughly 240 locations where the city hoped to make cycling easier. The plan called for more bike lanes, better bike parking and a boost in cycling to 10% of the city's total trips by 2010.

The plan irked Mr. Anderson. Having not owned a car in 20 years, he says he has had several near misses with bikers roaring through crosswalks and red lights, and sees bicycles as dangerous and impractical for car-centric American cities. Mr. Anderson was also bugged by what he describes as the holier-than-thou attitude typified by Critical Mass, a monthly gathering of bikers who coast through the city, snarling traffic for hours. "The behavior of the bike people on city streets is always annoying," he says. "This 'Get out of my way, I'm not burning fossil fuels.' "

Going to Court

In February 2005, Mr. Anderson showed up at a planning commission meeting. If San Francisco was going to take away parking spaces and car lanes, he argued, it had better do an environmental-impact review first. When the Board of Supervisors voted to skip the review, Mr. Anderson sued in state court, enlisting his friend Mary Miles, a former postal worker, cartoonist and Anderson Valley Advertiser colleague.

Ms. Miles, who was admitted to the California bar in 2004 at age 57, proved a pugnacious litigator. She sought to kill the initial brief from San Francisco's lawyers after it exceeded the accepted length by a page. She objected when the city attorney described Mr. Anderson's advocacy group, the Coalition for Adequate Review, as CAR in their documents. (It's C-FAR.) She also convinced the court to review key planning documents over the city's objections.

Slow Pedaling

In November 2006, a California Superior Court judge rejected San Francisco's contention that it didn't need an environmental review and ordered San Francisco to stop all bike-plan activity until it completed the review.

Since then, San Francisco has pedaled very slowly. City planners say they're being extra careful with their environmental study, in hopes that Mr. Anderson and Ms. Miles won't challenge it. Planners don't expect the study will be done for another year.

Meanwhile, Mr. Anderson and Ms. Miles have teamed up to oppose a plan to put high-rises and additional housing in a nearby neighborhood. He continues to blog from his apartment in an old Victorian home. "Regardless of the obvious dangers, some people will ride bikes in San Francisco for the same reason Islamic fanatics will engage in suicide bombings -- because they are politically motivated to do so," he wrote in a May 21 post.

"In case anyone doubted that you were a wingnut, this statement pretty much sums things up!" one commenter retorted.

Mr. Anderson is running for supervisor again this November -- around the time the city will unveil the first draft of its bike-plan environmental review. He's already pondering a challenge of the review.

The Toronto Star gave parking policy maven Donald Shoup some major play earlier this week, running a profile of the UCLA professor excerpted from journalist Tim Falconer's new book, "Drive." In the piece, we learn why Shoup believes planners are apt to make bad judgments when it comes to the optimum supply of off-street parking:

...planning departments always insist that developers include a minimum number of parking spots. Shoup doesn't have much respect for the ability of urban planners to determine how many spots are necessary. Since planners don't learn anything about parking in school, they learn it on the job, but because parking is so political -- NIMBY neighbours constantly squawk at the thought of anyone parking on their street -- what they really learn is the politics of parking.

Hardly surprising, perhaps, but certainly applicable to New York, where parking minimums have facilitated pedestrian-hostile development, as on Brooklyn's Fourth Avenue. It also raises the question: Even if the city were to muster the political will to adopt Shoupian pricing for on-street parking (following the lead of San Francisco and Washington), would it have the fortitude to address another big part of the equation by reforming zoning regs that require parking in certain residential buildings?

A story in today's Times about the suspension of alternate-side parking rules in Park Slope shows the warped sense of entitlement such measures would run up against:

“Parking is such a joke in this neighborhood that no matter what they do, it won’t make a difference,” said Buddy Ferriola, from the deli Pollio on Fifth Avenue. “You got 20,000 cars and 2,000 parking spaces.”