The following is a summary of the twelfth meeting of the SFTEP Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC) for the Transit Effectiveness Project (TEP). The semi-structured meeting included an update on key project activities and a discussion on the proposed charter amendment, for which Judson True from the SFMTA was available to answer questions. The discussion led to the tabling of the discussion of strategies for increasing Muni speed until September. The meeting concluded with an opportunity for public comment.

 

PARTICIPANTS

CAC Members/Alternates	Public	Project Team/ Other Staff
Becky Evans, Sierra Club Bert Hill, Bicycle Advisory Committee Bob Planthold, Senior Action Network Brian J. Larkin, SFCTA Citizen Advisory Committee Daniel Murphy, SFMTA Citizens� Advisory Council David Pilpel, Sierra Club Gary Noguera, Coalition for San Francisco Neighborhoods Howard Strassner, Pedestrian Safety Advisory Committee Joan Downey, SFMTA Citizens� Advisory Council Norman Rolfe, SF Tomorrow Steve Ferrario, SFMTA Citizens� Advisory Council Mark Salomon, Coalition for Transit Justice David Snyder, SPUR	Eric P. Scott	SFMTA Julie Kirschbaum Peter Straus Judson True   Controller�s Office Liz Garcia   TEP Consultant Team Laura McVittie

 

 

I.      TEP PROJECT UPDATE

 

Status of Key Activities

The project team has been meeting with SFMTA staff to analyze the data from the service assessment.  Key findings will be shared with CAC members in September.  Broad citywide outreach to get input on the service concepts will occur throughout the fall and early winter, district by district.  The team will begin community briefings as early as November. Over the next 4-8 weeks, the team will use the operations review to create concrete recommendations with action plans along various funding scenarios. The following recommendations were made by the CAC members:

• Consider how you time the release of information with the elections and holiday season. A good time would be in mid-November, after the election.

 

Service Evaluation Data

Projecting individual data files on the screen, Julie Kirschbaum demonstrated how to read the series of charts and maps displaying data for each individual bus route.  The data displayed was collected between Fall 2006 and Spring 2007.  This effort preceded the opening of the T-Third, though efforts on rail and lines that have had changes are underway.  Once the data is available for CAC member distribution, the team looks forward to hearing about any errors or questions CAC members may notice in the data tables or maps.  CAC members offered the following and comments:

• Please provide notes or a general narrative about how to read the data. Many aspects are intuitive to people working on the project but not to the general pubic.
• Be aware that the scales change from map to map.
• The errors look small in comparison with the size of the data set.

 

 

II.      PUBLIC OUTREACH

Julie Kirshbaum presented a summary of the public outreach efforts and discussed issues with the committee.

 

Surveys

The project team has completed about 30 presentations to community groups. The on-line survey collected responses from about 3,000 individuals.  The more recent TEP survey for seniors and persons with disabilities has just been closed. Both will be analyzed and the results will be shared at a future meeting.  Comments from the committee included the following:

• Those that requested more peak service may have done so to alleviate crowded conditions during the morning and evening rush.
• Consider that more people use the system at peak hours and focus more attention there.
• It would have been helpful to determine how the respondents interpreted options such as �no info� or �more coverage.�

 

Employee Outreach (In-reach)

In-reach activities are numerous; they include inserting TEP newsletter articles in paycheck envelopes, providing briefings to management, presentations to divisions, providing opportunities for employees to fill out surveys, organizing round table discussions in break or meeting rooms, and riding along with (shadowing) operators.  The variety of opportunities will enable staff to learn more about the project and to provide their expertise in a way that is most comfortable and convenient for them to do so.  In-reach is continuing with the cable car barns, tabling at the bus rodeo, and station agent interviews.  

 

The second phase of in-reach is underdevelopment.  The draft service concepts will be shared with the employees and the team will host an internal town hall meeting and implement voicemail �blasts,� (recorded messages).

 

The CAC members had the following comments and questions:

• Do the operators mention the need to streamline traffic?
• The operators are under the impression that police should be riding the buses. SFMTA pays the police department several million a year to help and there is a lack of police presence on the system.
• How do you make a change to the line?
• Ask union leaders to help get feedback from members at barn meetings.
• Operators are aware of the TEP but are cynical.
• One way to create a �quality improvement process� would include a cross-disciplinary team where everyone would have equal status. The group could brainstorm solutions which would extend to the whole organization if approved by upper management.
• Perhaps operators have poor communication with supervisors because there aren�t enough supervisors.

• Are labor agreements hampering cross-discipline sharing?

• Could a policy be developed to retrain drivers who wear out the equipment? There may not be a system for recording the wear a vehicle goes through, especially if vehicles are shared between routes.

• When school groups use transit, they should get free rides to encourage transit use.  Currently they pay fares. 

 

Comments on Phase II of Employee In-reach.

• Are delays caused by getting riders to yield seats to disabled customers boarding the bus?  This may compromise the efficiency of boarding.
• A summary of project findings should be shared with operators.
• Traffic engineers should be involved in the ride-alongs and during in-reach sessions with the operators to note where they are facing challenges due to signal timing and other challenges within the engineer�s domain.
• The qualitative data (comments received during outreach activities) should be compared to the statistical analysis that has been conducted thus far.

 

 

III.      PROPOSED CHARTER AMENDMENT

Judson True, the Local Government Affairs Manager for the SFMTA, attended the meeting to help answer questions about the proposed charter amendment.

The charter amendment would provide more funding for SFMTA and more decision-making power to its Board.  Judson acknowledged his need to be careful with his responses so as to avoid violating the strict laws limiting what departments may say about ballot measures that might affect them.

 

The committee raised and discussed the following questions and concerns:

• Would the amendment have an effect on traffic flow and transit effectiveness?
• A charter amendment must have two public hearings before going on the ballot, according to some it was unclear if this happened.  
• Would the amendment allow investment in management and speed of service?
• The charter amendment will grant more authority to SFMTA and its staff.
• When would the new funding take effect?
• Can the new funds be used to supplement existing maintenance?
• Will the TEP find more than $26 million in desired changes?
• Will the Fisher and Peskin ordinances be combined?
• Lifespan of the charter amendment is about 10 years, but the impact of adding 2,000+ parking spaces in the City will last longer.

 

 

IV.      PUBLIC COMMENT

• The public needs education about how to ride the bus and operate back doors.  Simply adding better signage would go a long way to improving efficient alighting.
• Better signage at stops with transfer points nearby would help riders learn about their options in the case of a delay on their line.  NextBus signage should also be used to let riders know about nearby or alternate routes.

 

 

V.      NEXT STEPS

Alternate Dates and Times

�         Liz will send out a reminder email soliciting alternate CAC meeting dates when needed. 

 

Future Meeting Topics

�         Strategies to increase Muni speed (September)

�         Reviewing speed maps of all the routes

�         Discussion of the Mayor�s Revenue Panel Committee work

�         A presentation about the Fare Free Muni Feasibility Analysis

�         Discussion about the recent poll of downtown businesses funding Muni