by Calvin Welch, HANC Board

On July 27th the Board of Supervisors passed 9-2 a resolution sponsored by District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston and District 1 Supervisor Connie Chan calling upon the SFMTA "to reinstate all transit lines and restore pre-Covid service hours by December 31, 2021 and release by September 30, 2021, a written plan for the restoration of all lines and service". 

The resolution was necessary because the SFMTA has failed to make such a commitment and Mayor Breed has stated that "many lines have existed for generations...We need to make the system more efficient...It is more complicated than saying ‘yes, we will restore service to lines."

No Explanation

Failing to explain why lines that have existed “for many generations" are inefficient, Breed articulated a policy that was repeated time and again by her recently appointed Director of SFMTA, Jeffery Tumlin, at a July 23rd public hearing on the resolution before Preston's Government Operation Committee. Tumlin- a private consultant, had previous operational experience running the Stanford University transportation program where his Linkedin  bio states - rather alarmingly in his present role- he  eliminated "the use of General Funds for transportation," and repeatedly stated that he would not perpetuate "inefficient" transit lines that were, in his opinion, threatening to create a "death spiral" for Muni.

Tumlin had previously told a KPFA audience that what will determine the pace and characteristic of restoring Muni will be "people returning to downtown office[s]".  In short, for Tumlin, the primary task of Muni is to provide a way to get people to work, "we drive riders away [and] businesses can't recover because they can't get their workforce to the downtown".

In the proposed August expansion of Muni service two lines that serve our community, the 6 and the 21, are not slated to be opened at all.  At the 23rd Supervisors’ committee hearing Tumlin specifically refused to give a timeline for the 21 Hayes or the 6 Parnassus in response to questions posed by Supervisor Preston.

Outmoded Approach

The failure to commit to full opening of all lines and the concentration on a downtown workforce shows how outmoded Tumlin’s and Breed’s understanding of Muni and the emerging economy of San Francisco is.  The 6 and 21 serve two of the largest hospitals in San Francisco with a combined workforce of over 15,000 people.  Not one of the City's hospitals is located downtown yet health care workers are the largest workforce in the City outnumbering tech almost 2 to 1. Indeed, Mayor Breed just signed an agreement with UCSF to allow the doubling of the daily workforce--from some 25,000 trips a day to 52,000 by mid century. The agreement seeks "to increase the capacity and frequency of service ...of Muni lines"-- an objective impossible to achieve with no 6 Parnassus.

Mayor Breed and Tumlin have strongly supported the closure of Kennedy Drive in Golden Gate Park. Equity and access questions have been raised about such a closure that can only be honestly answered by increasing public transit to the Park.  Closing the 21 Hayes is the exact wrong public policy to achieve that end.

Total Transportation Needs

A robust and modern public transit system needs to serve the total transportation needs of residents, not simply of employed office workers downtown that for generations have determined Muni's routes.  People need public transit to get to school, to recreate, to socialize, to access heath and human services, to shop, and to get to work in our neighborhoods, and not simply to get young, able bodied office workers to and from work downtown.  It seems that we are going to have to fight for that and that fight starts with keeping the 6 and 21 lines. We then need to fund Muni in a way that serves its crucial role in our future that does not rely on regressive sales taxes, parking fees and fare box revenue.