Results tagged “buses”

A new piece in the East Bay Express tells the tale of AC Transit's decision to move forward with a $28 million purchase of 12 zero-emission, hydrogen fuel cell buses -- that's just over $2M per bus, and the same total price tag of 55 hybrid buses. Robert Gammon in the Express calls this a "boondoggle," and points to President Obama all but eradicating the federal fuel cell program due to costs.

SFist loves cameras. Public, private, wherever, whenever -- we want them up, we want them rolling. So, we were tickled exuberant after hearing that San Francisco transit officials plan to install continuously-running cameras on Muni buses. The cameras would "trigger an alert every time a driver hits the brakes hard, swerves or gets into a collision," according to reports, and be placed inside and outside buses. If all goes according to plan, they will capture electrifying footage like this.

A spot.us (a reader-supported news-ish site) pitch person wonders why most express buses stop by 8:30 a.m. (inbound) and 6:15 p.m. (outbound). Also, since most express lines are jam-packed with riders, why won't Muni add a few more of these convenient buses? "Overcrowded buses would seem to indicate that there's more demand than Muni can fill with its existing express service," spot.us goes on to point out. We know we'd love more express buses. The few of them we manage to catch get us to where we're going in record time.

Good news: Translink will be up and running on Muni in the late fall/early winter of 2007. Or at least, that's what Muni said last year, and surprise! It's still not working. (And before that, it was January of 2007.) Translink is the work of a company called ERG, Ltd (emphasis on the "limited"); and in the decades (decades!) that it's been bandied about, lots of other cities have managed to set up Translinks of their own. No wonder Scott Schroeder, BART's controller-treasurer, wants the MTC to cut its losses and just give up on the project.

It's going to be a far busier-than-normal meeting of the SF County Transportation Authority tomorrow. There's huge stuff on the agenda: updates on the bike plan; millions of dollars being thrown around for the Transbay Terminal; $160,000 for reducing graffiti on street signs; potential changes for Geneva Ave and McAllister Street, including a possible permanent re-route of the 5-Fulton; safety upgrades at 9th and Irving; and some forward momentum for restoring mass transit on Geary to pre-WWII levels. Whew!