Safer Streets for the Sunset

By Supervisor Gordon Mar

When we invest in walking and biking infrastructure, we’re investing in public health, public safety, placemaking. and the environment. And with traffic fatalities and casualties skyrocketing, we have a moral obligation to take action, to work better and faster towards our goal of zero traffic fatalities and to ensure our streets are safe for all. Every one of these deaths is preventable, and we must do more to prevent them. We know seniors and people with disabilities are the most impacted, and the most at risk, and we must do better. 

Which is why we hope you join us for a Safe Streets town hall, where we will discuss street safety issues, share information and listen to your input. It will take all of us working together to make our streets safer and we want to hear from and work with you to do it:

Safe Streets Town Hall

When: Saturday, July 13, 2-4 p.m.

Where: Wah Mei School, 1400 Judah St.

More information can be found on facebook.com/d4gordonmar. Feel free to email us with any questions at marstaff@sfgov.org.

And, as the rainy season ends and summer starts, we are also getting ready for the start of some major transportation projects that will also help improve the safety of our streets:

Muni Track Work on Judah

Through the first three weeks of July, N-Judah track maintenance work will continue to take place at Judah Street and 17th Avenue. Following its completion, track work will continue on Judah at 18th Avenue. Please reach out to jay.lu@sfmta.com with any questions or concerns.

20th Avenue Neighborway Project

This project was recently approved by the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) board with our support and will be breaking ground this summer to bring meaningful traffic-calming and street-safety improvements across the entire length of 20th Avenue. Improvements will includ designated bike lanes, roundabouts, bulbouts, pedestrian beacons, and increased visibility at intersections. 

While I fully support the project, I’ve also heard the concerns of merchants and residents along Irving Street about the potential impacts of some parking removal at the 20th and Irving intersection on their quality of life and livelihoods. To mitigate these concerns, our office is partnering with SFMTA to relocate the two dedicated Zipcar spaces on 20th Avenue at Irving to open up these two parking spaces to the public. We are also meeting with merchants to present and discuss additional resources and options for mitigating the impacts and supporting our small businesses. All small business owners are welcome to join us at the next merchants meeting:

Outer Sunset Merchants and Professionals 

Association Meeting

When: Tuesday July 23, 6-8:30 p.m.

Where: SF Hole in the Wall Pizza, 1825 Irving St., between 19th and 20th avenues

Fundamentally, these concerns speak to a need for better outreach from SFMTA on projects like these and the importance of giving community members a voice and a seat at the table in the decisions that impact your lives and neighborhood. So, I’ve asked the SFMTA board, as the oversight body of the SFMTA, to set a higher bar for outreach for future projects and I’m working closely with the SFMTA to improve the process going forward. 

Projects to improve street safety are essential, but so is having a good process for public engagement and input with creating and constructing them. 

L-Taraval Transit 

Improvement Project

By far the biggest project happening in the Sunset, the L-Taraval Project, includes much-needed sewer and water line repairs, replacement and maintenance, along with safety and reliability improvements for pedestrians and the 30,000 passengers who ride the L-Taraval every day.

The project will break ground this month, with work starting west of Sunset Boulevard before moving east in 2020. Altogether, construction will continue for at least two years. The most immediate impact is the placement of a construction staging area along the Great Highway, which was chosen as a location to minimize impacts on residents and businesses and where track pieces will be welded and prepared for installation. This includes the loss of parking spaces on the Great Highway between Ulloa and Santiago streets. We only recently learned of the need for a staging area and have worked quickly with SFMTA to develop an aggressive plan for mitigating the parking loss. Options to add-back parking are being presented to impacted residents, who will be able to vote on the option that best meets their needs. SFMTA will also be hosting an open house to present more information on the project and anyone interested in learning more or sharing comments or concerns can contact Jerri Diep at (415) 646-2382 and jerri.diep@sfmta.org.

Street safety isn’t all we’ve been working on!

We recently held community meetings on the Sunset Boulevard Master Plan and the Outside Lands Music Festival, sponsored a resolution to ensure transparency and uniform reporting requirements for all healthcare providers and joined Supervisor Rafael Mandelman in calling for a hearing on gig workers’ rights.

We’ll have plenty more to share soon. If there are other things you think we should be working on, we’re all ears. Don’t hesitate to reach out to marstaff@sfgov.org with your input, or to set up a time to meet with me during our neighborhood office hours every Friday.

Gordon Mar represents District 4 on the SF Board of Supervisors. He can be reached at (415) 554-7460 or marstaff@sfgov.org.