[Carfreeliving] Will LA leapfrog San Francisco?

[David Baker]

It's very hard to change institutional "culture", but the only way
possible is to do it in a positive manner.  I thought the SPUR/TLC paper
was pretty reasonable and thoughtful and am a bit mystified by the snit
it seems to have put Mike in.  I'm sure there are some inaccuracies, but
I haven't been presented with the "smoking gun" that makes it an invalid
document.  And I think Oliver and Mike have been doing great work and
making steady, if slow, progress on the bike network.  However if we had
an effective and empowered and unified MTA their work would be much more
effective.  the DPT and MUNI cross purpose agendas (Potrero Avenue as an
example) are not forwarding the humane, energy efficient transportation
agenda in an effective manner.  This is a complicated town to do stuff
in, but it makes you wonder when LA has 22 BRT lines in process, and we
are doing a project in the valley down there that faces a BUS STATION!
that takes you to a SUBWAY STATION with next bus arrival signs, great
graphics on the busses and a general feeling of this thing is happening.
than I go to my local 22 bus shelter where the map was so faded 5 years
ago that you couldn't see the routes on it, and now it's just more
faded, and I get a bit worried about us here.  Oh wait, MUNI probably
hauls some multiple of the whole passenger load of the LA system,..
 
Glass half full, dude!
 
Thanks,
 
db

________________________________

From: Carfreeliving-bounces at livablecity.org
[mailto:Carfreeliving-bounces at livablecity.org] On Behalf Of Tom
Radulovich
Sent: Wednesday, August 24, 2005 6:19 PM
To: Carfree Living
Subject: Re: [Carfreeliving] Will LA leapfrog San Francisco?


Thanks, David, I guess i never felt I had a quarrel with Mike, and
although I haven't worked with him directly, he is pretty well thought
of here at the treehouse. I'm sorry he feels like I peed in his corn
flakes, but I swear I have never been anywhere near his corn flakes. 

I have been at the receiving end of a lot of vitriol from Mike and
Oliver, which I feel is misdirected. Killing the messenger, by carrying
on about how uniformed, misguided, negative irrational etc. that I, or
Jim Chappell, or other folks on the receiving end, happen to be, won't
serve to advance their cause. If the TLC/SPUR report was hopelessly
inaccurate, it is hard to believe that the MTA Executive Director (who
was given a draft to review in advance of its publication, and well as a
meeting to make sure we were on the right track) had no problems with
it, told us that is was pretty much what he had in mind, and chose to
enact almost all of its recommendations as presented. And it's not as
though I have any undue influence at MTA; this year's awful MTA budget
pretty well proves that.

What was very revealing about writing the paper was the extent to which
the DPW and Muni sides of the house viewed the other as the problem. I
received a few calls and emails from Muni folks castigating me for the
merger proposal, swearing that Jack Fleck would be put in charge of the
whole thing and it would be the end of Muni as we know it. DPT folks
also called to tell me that Peter Strauss would be put in charge of MTA
planning, and that it would be the end of the happy DPT family, as well
as the bike program, livable streets, etc. In the end neither 'side'
won; a qualified outsider was chosen to lead the combined department.
But the more it went on, the more the necessity of the merger became
apparent; the culture of both organizations, so negatively fixated on
the other, must change if we are make this city livable. And while it
may feel like a shotgun wedding to those inside, I think that when all
of the rancor is over (hopefully soon!) that MTA will live up to the
promise of its creation, which was really quite bold; create an
integrated agency that runs the transit system, allocates space on city
streets, controls the on-street and city-owned off-street parking, etc.
MTA controls most of the policy levers necessary to make this city a
livable and sustainable one, if they can only figure out how,
politically and administratively, to work them in concert.

How is that for a half-full glass? 

Best,

Tom

Tom Radulovich
Executive Director
Transportation for a Livable City
995 Market Street Suite 1550
San Francisco CA 94103
415 344-0489
www.livablecity.org
tom at livablecity.org



On Aug 24, 2005, at 4:58 PM, David Baker wrote:


	would you guys make up? please?
	 
	I agree with both sides to this issue, but let's be inspired to
do even better than we've been doing, which given all the issues is
pretty good.  When you're close to an issue the problems seem to come to
the fore, while visitors to SF from other cities tend to think we've got
a little bike heaven going here.
	 
	Though Mike, and don't take this personally, it's hard to think
of a better word than "glacial" to characterize the implementation of he
top 20 bike network projects!
	 
	Don't shoot! Please!
	 
	db


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