Municipal Transportation Agency - Regular Meeting

regular meeting of the Municipal Transportation Agency Board of Directors and Parking Authority Commission to order. Secretary Silva, please call the roll.

Colleagues, are there any changes to the minutes? OK. We'll now open public comment on the minutes for two minutes each.

We'll now close public comments. Secretary Silva, please call the next item. Oh, colleagues, is there a motion and a second? Motion to approve. Second. Secretary Silva, please call the roll.

If I may, on behalf of the board, thank you so much for your excellent work. We get to see it just at the end. And it is really remarkable what you're doing. And it's great to learn more about it. So thank you so much.

Thank you, Mr. True. Are there any questions or comments from my colleagues? Very good. I have two things I'd like to ask you a bit more about regarding the Fourth of July. It's a significant event. incident to review and work through, I absolutely recognize. Do you have any comments that you would like to share at this point regarding the mayor's letter a few days ago to state regulators regarding autonomous vehicles and how that impacts congestion and traffic. Is there anything about that that you can share more about?

Thank you very much. And the other thing that I wanted to ask about is related to the fix-it week on the T3rd line. And I've been copied on a number of communications from merchant leaders. in the Bayview and I think that has there continued to be coordination with those folks and specifically once these improvements are in place, is there something that can happen on our part that supports those merchants further?

Yes. It's my understanding and my observation that there's a lot of entrepreneurship in that community and I think that the concern there is the first impression that visitors get of the neighborhood. at our facilities, and so I just like to stress the importance of that work, and I appreciate that it is being done and will be kept up with more assiduously.

Director Henderson. Yes. Thank you, Chair. I'm sorry to double back. I just have one question about the Fix-It Week that actually came up to my mind as you brought up that project. I realize that this is the last week and this weekend is a pretty short sample period, but it brings to my mind the closure brings up the potential longer term closure that comes up with the Islayas Creek Bridge. And so I just was hoping that when you all, after everything is done and we have some more information and lessons learned and maybe some data too, I just am curious if you could bring back some information

Thank you. Before I open public comment for this item, I would like to remind members of the public that they may provide comment on the topics that Mr. True shared with us today. Those are the special recognition of the service management team, the follow-up to July 4th, T3, Fix It Weekends, and other recent events. If you feel the director missed addressing a topic, you may comment on that during item nine, which is general public comment. If you are here to speak, On an item later in today's agenda, please wait to make your comment until that item is called. With that, public comment on the

That is related to the director's report.

Ms. Chandler? Yes. So what Mr. True spoke of was the work that we're doing on the T3 line. It sounds to me like your comment might be better suited for general. I appreciate that. Thank you, ma'am. You got it.

I have no other speakers. Thank you. Public comment for that item is now closed. Secretary Silva, please call the next item.

Unless there are other items from my colleagues, I would like to take this moment to acknowledge Director Mike Chen, who recently resigned from our board and was nominated by the Mayor to serve on the Planning Commission. As you may recall, Mike previously served on the SFMTA Citizens Advisory Council before joining our board, and we're very grateful for his service to the agency and to the public. We plan to recognize Mike at a future board meeting. And in the meantime, I'd like to congratulate him on his nomination and wish him continued success in his public service to San Francisco. Collea

Very good. Public comment for that item is now closed. Secretary Silva, please call the next item.

We will now open public comment for matters not on today's agenda for two minutes each. One second.

Secretary Silva can take those. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next speaker. Pardon, one moment.

Very good. Thank you. Please continue. Thank you.

No additional speakers, chair. Thank you. We will now close public comment for this item. Secretary Silva please call the next item.

Thank you. We will now open public comment for the consent calendar except for item 10.2.

Thank you. We will now close public comment for this item. Colleagues, may I have a motion and a second to approve?

Yes. Secretary Silva, please call the roll.

Thank you. Secretary Silva, please call the next item.

Thank you, Mr. Tsai. We will now open public comment for this item.

Thank you. Public comment for this item is now closed. Colleagues, do you have any comments or questions for Mr. Tsai? Vice Chair Kahina?

Thank you, Chair. Mr. Sai, if you could help us understand enforcement-wise, how does this change whether cars are parked there or waiting there or stalled? Like, what does that look like and what's the plan right now to enforce? As you showed in Google Maps, there are a lot of folks already parking there, right, even though we have current restrictions on that. And I do see red zones there. So can you help us understand how this legislative change helps us enforce that area and clear it from vehicles?

So if I'm tracking this legislation allows us to harden some of the areas whereas in the current How it's currently? Legislated we can't harden If we wanted to is that does that track with my understanding? Okay. And in terms of outreach and engagement, have we connected with some of the charitable organizations there? We heard about some of the religious organizations, but there's also a theater there, Counter Pulse, other different. Just curious to understand how that has gone and what feedback you have gotten from folks.

And so based on the current configuration, based on our observations, we're seeing that most hosts use that loading zone, and they don't need additional loading areas on the north side? Correct. Okay. Yeah. Notices sometimes aren't enough to let folks know that these types of changes are coming. So I'm just curious to know if we wanted to be surgical about our outreach and engagement, is that something that staff is ready to do or open to doing? There aren't a lot of businesses here. It's a few phone calls just to see if we can talk to a human on the other side and just say, hey, these things

And typically, I'm very hesitant to approve something if there hasn't been robust outreach and engagement. Considering that this is just a change that has already been socialized in some ways, I still think it would benefit us to close the conversation loop with some of the handful of commercial tenant or activators in this space. rescinded these types of decisions in the past. And I just would want to see staff create a pathway to get that feedback once implemented from the handful of merchants there. And if they're seeing that they're struggling with this, bring it back to us and then we cou

Thank you, Vice Chair Kahina. Director Henderson?

Thank you. I just have a question about one of the comments that you made about working with the SFPD on a similar type of treatment to Eddy Street. Was there an increase in enforcement from either the SFPD or from SFMTA's parking enforcement team once that implementation occurred?

OK, then I think that we've been presented with these sort of transportation improvements multiple times to solve for the social issue. And I think that it's fair to say changing the curb color, basically, or whatever. The treatment, the no stopping any time is not alone will not solve for the issue that SFPD has worked with us and requested. And so I think that moving this forward, I would hope that we can also have some very intentional dialogue about how how we will manage enforcement on this corner, particularly because they've requested it. Because I think that the expectation that we cha

Thank you. Thank you, Director Henderson. Mr. Tsai, I'm curious about provisions for commercial loading in this area. Can you tell us more about what's available for deliveries?

OK, so delivery drivers will need to park in a commercial zone on another block and take their deliveries. And that's not true. I've seen that in other districts. Each block doesn't necessarily have a dedicated commercial zone. And I think that merchants have mixed feelings about that, of course. I don't know if there is a merchant group that is organized in this area that we can work with to have a comprehensive look at what are the loading needs and also for delivery drivers picking up DoorDash and things like that. But I think that might be worth paying attention to. And so what I'm hearing

I'll move the item to approve the items in 10.2.

Thank you. Secretary Silva, please call the roll.

Thank you, Mr. Tsai. All right. Secretary Silva, please call the next item.

Thank you, Ms. Kuo. I will now open public comment for this item.

Thank you. Public comment for this item is now closed. Directors, comments or questions for Ms. Kuo or Ms. DeLumo? Director Felder, thank you.

There we go. Helps to have the mic on. No, I just wanted to commend staff for the outreach and the work on what I think is, to echo the comments of one of the speakers, a real win-win here where we're able to have a situation where we're delivering some good news to merchants in the community in terms of being responsive to their needs while also improving transit reliability by extending the hours of the lane. So I think it's great when we have work like this that I think everybody can feel good about. So thank you. And I look forward to seeing this come together quickly.

Thank you, Director Felder. OK, Ms. Kuo, I am wondering about the work on Sacramento. There wasn't a plan view of that. And so my question is, I'm assuming that means there are no changes to the street design there. Or perhaps I'm missing something.

All right. So I conclude from that that if there was in the past a need to free up a traffic lane during the afternoon peak, it is no longer the case that that is needed. So we're removing that part-time parking restriction.

Very good. And I applaud staff for looking carefully at these, what may seem like small changes, but I would say that they're very meaningful to the businesses in the community. So that was one question. And then I'd just like to say that in terms of an analysis for this project, I imagine it's going to be rather challenging to separate out analyzing the effects of these changes when there are arguably other things going on in the neighborhood that are going to have an impact. What is our thinking about that? It's going to be very difficult to understand.

Very good. That's exactly what I wanted to hear. And yes, Ms. DeLumo, would you speak to the coordination for construction? I appreciated that you touched on that in your introduction, but perhaps a little bit more space to talk about it some more.

Yes, a lot of coordination is warranted here. And I'd like to thank Ms. Wu for being here. Would you like to take a moment to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit more about the work that's happening at DBW, right?

Thank you. Do you anticipate the greatest challenges to be occurring right here at the beginning when the most significant changes, it sounds like, will be happening or more as it goes on?

Very good. Thank you so much for your work and your collaboration with our staff. Those are all my questions. I would just like to state that I appreciate that this work has... been undertaken. I very much appreciate the collaboration with the merchants in the neighborhood. And I'm specifically speaking now to the changes to the street design and parking and loading that we're approving today. I think it's very, very important. Chinatown is an incredibly complex and congested area and I can only imagine how challenging it is to meet the needs of all the various stakeholders in this location. I

No problem. Ms. Crowe, could you come back up again just real quick? I just have one question based on public comment. And largely, I do wholly agree with Mr. Valoria in public comment, who said this project is a win-win, and I'm glad we were able to find the lane and end. restore some parking. One thing that did come up a few times in public comment is enforcement of the lane and I do anticipate that the lane will become pretty busy and congested and particularly since we're not moving to colorize it immediately. Ms. Cole, I'm wondering if you could talk about plans for enforcement of the lan

Okay, great. then I'm ready to make a motion to approve.

Very good. Unless there's other questions? Very good. Secretary Silva, please call the roll.

Thank you. Secretary Silva, please call the next item.

We will now open public comment for item 12 for two minutes each.

Thank you. We will now close public comment. May I have a motion and a second to go into closed session?

Thank you. Colleagues, staff, and members of the public, we are now adjourned. Our next meetings will be a Street Safety Committee meeting on July 30th and a regular meeting on August 4th.