Last week I wrote about the problems with Oakland’s transportation decision-making process. Existing problems include not only a lack of planning for future investment, but flawed approaches to oversight of public and private transportation projects for compliance with city goals, poor coordination with other cities and agencies, and an almost incoherent division of transportation responsibilities both within the bureaucracy and at the City Council level. A Transportation Commission is floated as one solution to that problem. Before thinking about what a Transportation Commission or other changes to transportation decision-making would look like in Oakland, it’s instructive to look at other cities’ approaches. I examined the transportation structures of a dozen West Coast cities, and Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan’s office shared their research on Transportation Commissions with me.

Rather than list all of the cities and their different approaches to transportation decision-making, I will summarize three different models of transportation decision-making and use representative examples. Many cities have advisory-only transportation commissions with no real power and a limited or unclear mandate for review, much like Oakland and its Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (which I chair). Some cities have Transportation Commissions with some real power, and City Council Committees that unify transportation policymaking. And two cities, Los Angeles and San Francisco, have powerful independent transportation authorities with a clear mandate and substantial, though appealable, authority.

Advisory-only transportation committees

Berkeley, Portland, and Seattle all have advisory-only committees. All three cities have both Pedestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committees, with varying levels of oversight mandates. Portland and Seattle have regional transportation authorities, and don’t have city-level Transportation Commissions. Berkeley has a Transportation Commission, but its only role is advisory, and it doesn’t have a clear mandate (for example, the Planning Commission, not the Transportation Commission, reviewed both Bus Rapid Transit and the new ferry service). Berkeley’s City Council has no committees beyond Rules, so there’s no transportation committee; Seattle’s Council coordinates its transportation policy message to regional agencies with a Council Committee; and Portland has a very different governing structure than California cities. None of these cities encourage its transportation commissions to examine private development projects. All in all, these cities do not have a very different approach to transportation decision-making than Oakland.

Some independent transportation authority

Alameda, Long Beach, and San Diego are examples of a middle ground between advisory-only and authoritative Transportation Commissions. In San Diego, the Land Use and Housing Committee of the City Council hears all transportation-related issues, including parking and encroachments, making it easier to have a coherent policy. The city does not enjoy a Transportation Commission, or even a bike or ped advisory committee, but does have a Community Planning Advisory Committee and an Airports Advisory Committee, with substantial oversight over some aspects of transportation. Long Beach doesn’t have City Council Committees, but has an independent Public Transportation Commission that oversees its city-run bus system (Oakland, by the way, does have a city-run bus system, and is planning to expand it, yet has no transit authority figure).

Alameda’s Transportation Commission not only has a clear mandate to review transportation policy and the transportation aspects of major projects (and Environmental Impact Reports), but serves as the public appeal board for decisions made by the Department of Public Works. In Oakland, the Planning Director’s decisions are appealable to the Planning Commission, but other internal decisions are either unappealable or only appealable directly to the full City Council. By providing a venue to appeal decisions on minor encroachments, for example, the Alameda Transportation Commission relieves the City Council of some time-consuming tasks, while reinforcing the unity of the transportation decision-making. The Alameda Transportation Commission, however, has multiple vacancies, and Alameda does not seem to be doing a great job with transit planning (though at least they have some ideas!).

Transportation commissions with real power

Los Angeles and San Francisco have institutional structures devoted to transportation. The LA City Council has a Transportation Committee, and San Francisco has an independent Metropolitan Transportation Authority with significant power. Los Angeles operates a Department of Transportation (LADOT), unifying all transportation-related service in one organization, as does San Francisco, whose MTA arose from a combined Department of Public Transit Parking and Traffic and MUNI in 1999. LADOT has an advisory committee roughly equivalent to a Transportation Commission, with significant authority over transportation decision-making, including ambulance licenses, off-street parking, transportation planning, and encroachments; In SF, all such decisions are made by Mayor-appointed SFMTA. Both LADOT and SF have separate Taxi Commissions. The LA City Council and SF Board of Supervisors maintain ultimate authority over transportation decisions but rarely get involved on non-budget issues.

Conclusion

It is apparent that there are several models for expanding and unifying transportation decision-making with an independent body. For City Councils, the LA and San Diego model of placing all transportation issues in one committee seems to work well. But there is a huge difference between the SFMTA, whose decisions are hardly ever appealed to the Board of Supervisors, and the Alameda Transportation Commission, which is clearly subservient to the City Council and doesn’t have much budgetary authority. LADOT’s Board of Transportation Commissioners are invested with similar powers to the SFMTA, yet their decisions are more explicitly subject to City Council review.

The virtue of creating an independent authority would be to tap expertise in the community while relieving the Council of some of its more mundane duties, like examining encroachments. The BPAC is meant to advise city staff, yet has no mandate over anything but the bike-ped program so has to resort to wheedling to hear private or redevelopment projects. The LA Commission is structured to advise staff, but in reality has similar powers to the SFMTA, which is meant to be the final word. Both the Alameda and Berkeley Commissions are mandated to merely advise the Council, yet Alameda’s Commission has real power and unified authority while Berkeley’s has neither. Other cities vary in their Transportation Commission’s bureaucratic placement (ie, advising staff versus advising the Council), power and mandate, and scope of authority. Oakland has many models to examine when planning its own Transportation Commission, but which one is best?

The lack of coordination on transportation extends to the City Council level. Transportation issues are split up among different Council Committees, making it harder to have a coordinated policy: parking fees are at Finance, investments and most policies go to Development, most right-of-way issues go to Public Works, and taxi regulation goes to Public Safety. Meanwhile, Oakland’s representatives on major transit agencies are scattershot: Rebecca Kaplan is our representative to ACTIA (the County’s main funding agency for transportation), Jane Brunner is our representative to the MTC-ABAG Joint Policy Committee, and CM Reid is Oakland’s voice on the Congestion Management Agency, which is the County’s transportation planning authority. A casual observer of transit issues will know that these three Councilmembers don’t see eye-to-eye on transit issues.

Though Oakland’s economy and cityscape is defined by transportation more than any other factor, the city has ignored transportation planning and has no coordinated or formalized means of addressing a whole host of transportation issues, from parking ratios for new buildings to bus stop locations. There is absolutely no planning whatsoever for transit improvements, and, frankly, CM Reid seems to be intent on preventing Oakland from making any transit investments now that he has approval for the Airport Connector, using his positions on the Congestion Management Agency and the Bus Rapid Transit Steering Committee to undermine BRT without doing anything that his bus-dependent constituents would even notice. In 2006, the Mayor’s Transportation Task Force recommended (PDF) creating a Transportation Commission “to develop. implement, and prioritize transportation strategies,” yet this idea was only half-formed and didn’t address many of the problems outlined above.

Can these problems be addressed with a Transportation Commission? Does the City Council have to restructure its own appointments and committee system in order to address transportation issues? Do City agencies need to be reorganized in order to create a Transportation Department, or can the Task Force’s suggestion of a “go-to person” and a working group be sufficient? Do you agree that the issues outlined above are real problems, or is Oakland doing just fine transportation-wise? Like almost everything else that came out of the Mayor’s Task Forces, the Transportation Commission idea has gone nowhere, but if the idea is worthwhile, there may be an opportunity to revive it. But that begins with identifying the problem. In this case, the problem may be bigger than the proposed solution.

UPDATE: I added a link to the Transportation Task Force report (PDF).

Oasis Dancing Permit Appeal

Though the claim that Oakland shutting down clubs with violent incidents is an elaborate racist conspiracy is far-fetched, it is certainly true that the city is not supportive of late-night businesses even as the General Plan and other policies encourage a “24-hour city.” From the smoking ban to cabaret permit application fees to pinball bans to the city-created taxi shortage, Oakland does not make it easy for nightlife venues to be successful. But when, against all odds, a dance club is successful yet does not lead to shootings in the neighborhood, one would expect the city to be pleased. One would be quite wrong.

The Oasis, a somewhat run-down club with a wonderful space and an unique music selection, is appealing its denial of a cabaret license to the City Council tonight. Essentially, the owner’s permit was yanked because his almost hundred-year-old building didn’t pass all inspections, and he continued operation. Undercover police found after-hours operations and “the scent of freshly burnt marijuana” as well. When contacted about needing a permit (after four years of operation and business tax payments), the owner applied for a permit. His permit was rejected because he was operating without a permit. You can read the entire Kafkaesque saga in the staff report, but suffice to say that there are no allegations of violence or anything more serious than folks dancing without a permit.

Uptown parking lot

Late last year, Forest City Development asked for a three-year extension on its agreement to build a tower on a city-owned parcel at 19 and Telegraph. The Redevelopment Agency could ask for almost anything as a condition of extending their lease, but chose to ask for a surface parking lot. Ever since then, area residents, clubbers, and concerned citizens have been fighting this very visible step backwards for the Uptown neighborhood. Much has been written about this proposal, but it is important to note that, whether the parking lot is ever built or not, the only effective plans for increasing area car parking have come from pedestrian advocates opposed to the surface lot (including keeping the Franklin lot open later and installing signage). Tonight the Council will hear Redevelopment Agency’s request to apply to the Planning Commission for permission to build the lot; if they vote to move forward, it will likely be back before them in six months when either residents or the Redevelopment Agency appeals the Planning Commission’s decision.

So downtown nightlife lovers will congregate tonight, not at Somar, but at City Hall. There may be an after-party, but the meeting’s liable to run past bar closing time. If we’re successful, there will be other chances to party. After all, the City Council doesn’t meet every night!

Eager readers of the blogoaksphere certainly noticed many bloggers’ cause du jour – preventing the city from installing a surface parking lot in the middle of downtown’s up-and-coming Uptown neighborhood. The issue touched on a lot of the causes dear to bloggers’ hearts: pedestrian and transit-oriented planning, civic engagement, and enjoying nightlife. While advocates were clearly outlobbied at the City Council yesterday, and I find the Community and Economic Development Committee’s pro-parking decision as frustrating as everyone else, I see how the city came to this decision. It’s not just that the CED Committeemembers decided, for whatever reason, that they love parking and don’t understand its pedestrian impact, but also contributing to this result are the structural flaws that beset Oakland’s government in general. It’s the poor performance of the Redevelopment Agency, the deeply flawed labor contract, and the city’s lack of transportation planning that lead the city to push for parking lots instead of better solutions.

An ineffectual agency

It was the Redevelopment Agency that made the decision to ask the Council and Forest City for a surface parking lot. I have been told that the decision was reached after much internal debate, since Redevelopment had the option to ask Forest City for pretty much anything as a condition of extending their lease on the 19th and Telegraph parcel. Parking won out because the Agency has planned to build a parking structure on 18th and San Pablo for almost ten years, but can’t get it together to move forward. In fact, last year they ignored an unsolicited offer to build a structure with a bowling alley on top, and have no timeline for issuing an RFP. Yet Redevelopment told the Council that temporary parking is needed because it will take some time to build new parking, which is entirely the Agency’s fault, as the planed parking structure could have been built at any time in the last decade. In effect, pedestrians are being punished for Redevelopment’s inefficiency. And long-promised Uptown sidewalk improvements are still going nowhere, adding insult to pedestrian injury.

Labor issues

The city employees’ contract, which expired last summer but is still basically in effect, imposes stringent work rules that limit the City Council’s ability to pursue programs or efficiently manage the workforce. Several of the rules governing employees limit the options available to Councilmembers concerned about adequate parking in Uptown. Pedestrian advocates and local businesses suggested that, to increase the supply of street-side car storage, parking meter hours be extended until 2am, and street sweeping hours be pushed back until 2 or 3am. The City Council ignored those cost-effective ideas, because city work rules prevent meter maids from working after 6pm and street-sweeping crews from working past 3am. Since the city workers’ contract prevents the Council from adjusting parking enforcement to meet the needs of a late-night district, adding additional parking becomes an easier prospect than increasing the use of existing parking. It’s not just the enormous expense of the city workers’ contract that’s holding Oakland back, but its work rules as well.

Lack of transportation planning

Oakland’s transportation connections are the engine of its economy and the linchpin of residential demand. However, overlapping jurisdictions severely complicate the picture: AC Transit and BART provide most public transportation (though not all: Emeryville’s Emery-Go-Round, Contra Costa County’s WestCat, and the Water Emergency Transit Authority’s ferries also serve Oakland), CalTrans controls the freeways and some major roads, the Public Utilities Commission oversees railroads, and the Alameda County Congestion Management Agency and Transportation Improvement Authority direct most local transportation funds. When the City of Oakland is provided representation on these commissions, it is spread among the elected officials: Rebecca Kaplan is Oakland’s ACTIA rep, Larry Reid is Oakland’s CMA rep, and Jane Brunner sits on the joint ABAG/MTC policy-making board. The officials are free to pursue whatever policies they think are best on each commission without talking to one another, and the citizens of Oakland have no opportunity to influence transportation planning at public hearings.

Making matters worse, Oakland’s bureaucratic and official structure does not unify transportation decision-making. The Redevelopment Agency (the only part of Oakland city government with any money) is responsible for many if not most transportation improvements, and they do not necessarily work with CEDA’s bike/ped program or the planning department. Building Services also has jurisdiction over many transportation issues, especially as related to large-scale development projects. When Pat Kernighan asked the head of Redevelopment at the parking lot hearing if he was working with BART on signage and wayfinding, he said no. However, the bike/ped program is in fact working with BART on signage, but probably don’t realize that there are redevelopment goals that the signage can further. Transportation policy decisions are made by several different Council committees: most parking issues are handled by Finance and Management, planning for parking or transit-oriented development goes to Economic Development, most street improvements are heard by the Public Works Committee, and taxi regulation is governed by the Public Safety Committee. With most policy decisions made at the Committee level, Oakland’s City Council is structurally unable to coordinate transportation policy.

How does this lead to a bad parking lot? Besides the fact that a parking lot is obviously bad planning, if the Council committeemembers were up to speed on its transportation planning they may not have approved it. There is a transportation plan for Uptown, and it involves moving major vehicle traffic off of Telegraph and to Broadway at 20th St, a goal that clearly conflicts with a parking lot on 19th St. Sidewalk and bicycle improvements and a plaza are planned for lower Telegraph, AC Transit has already built their transit center on 20th and moved bus stops off of lower Telegraph, and Oakland’s taxi regulator is exploring adding a taxi stand to Uptown. Had the CED Committee been able to evaluate the parking lot in the context of these plans, they may have realized that it just doesn’t work. But not only is the Council unaware of existing transportation plans, it appears that city staff is as well. In such an environment, it is impossible to implement a transportation plan. It’s because of these factors, which also impact other aspects of Oakland’s poor governance, that Uptown pedestrians may be stuck with a parking lot.

Transit advocates had reason to cheer on Election Day. California voters endorsed high-speed rail, Berkeley voters overwhelmingly rejected a measure intended to halt Bus Rapid Transit, and East Bay voters ignored the noise about Van Hools and approved a transit tax to make up for state budget cuts. But as the euphoria fades, it’s increasingly clear that Oakland could be really screwed by post-election transportation decisions made by local bodies.

As I wrote before the election, the particular SF-to-LA route chosen by the High-Speed Rail Authority bypasses the largest part of the Bay Area, the East Bay, which also precludes service to Sacramento and Modesto without a costly extension. Many of my friends argued that this isn’t really a big deal for Oakland (though of course we would benefit from hosting the HSR hub), because downtown SF is just as convenient for us as the Coliseum. However, that’s not true for most East Bay residents.

Be that as it may, immediately after the bond passed, HSR Authority boardmember and former SF Supervisor Quentin Kopp said that the costs of the service may not be covered by the bond (surprise), and that service may not go to downtown SF but instead to the Fourth and Townsend Caltrain station. Aside from drawing attention to the fact that locating a regional system in San Francisco is unnecessarily expensive, this stop is far less convenient for everyone in the Bay Area outside the Caltrain corridor. East Bay trippers will now have to take BART to DTSF, then transfer to light-rail. Aside from adding a mode change, which is off-putting, the Fourth St light-rail line does not have anything close to the capacity to host the number of passengers carried by HSR. The prospect of overcrowded light-rail trains and a long schlep to a sketchy part of SF makes High-Speed Rail less appealing against the constant flights out of the Oakland Airport, a conveniently BART-available destination, especially with the forthcoming rail link.

Except the kibosh is on the OAK light-rail line. Currently BART operates a bus service between the Coliseum BART station and the airport. The bus operates in mixed-flow lanes and is often held up by traffic. The bus is extraordinarily popular, even turning a profit, and creating a rail connection between BART and the airport has been on the drawing board since at least 2001. However, the airport connector project has secured only $295m in regional transit funds, and with a significant private-sector partnership precluded by the credit crunch, BART is giving up. Meanwhile, SF continues to receive enormous regional subsidies for its airport connector, part of a $1.6b BART extension that has vastly underperformed ridership expectations and so continues to receive outsized subsidies.

Of course, with the now-probable passage of Santa Clara County’s Measure B, Oakland and the region will be on the hook for billions of dollars for a BART expansion justified by ridership projections so fantastic as to constitute lying. Combined with Governor Schwarzenegger’s push to build capital improvements while further cutting operating funds from unglamorous but cost-effective transit services like the bus, the East Bay is in for a very tough transit future.

One outlet for trapped transit users is market-based public transportation. Strangely, Oakland lacks jitneys and limousines, leaving us dependant on a taxi duopoly. With the paucity of taxi service inspiring a public outcry, city staff has reformed the taxi ordinance and will propose issuing new permits. Unfortunately, rather than issuing the 200 permits needed to make up for 30 years of a service freeze, city staff is only going to ask for 11 new permits. A San Francisco operator has said at public hearings that they would start a new service in Oakland if they can get at least 20 permits. City policy will instead maintain the duopoly, leaving Oaklanders bereft of service. At the state level, in regional transportation priorities, and even at the level of local transportation regulation, Oakland is totally screwed. As usual.

Though Oakland does not have a Transportation Commission, the city does plan major transportation improvements. However, there’s no one resource for learning about proposals, no regularly scheduled meetings on transportation policy, and no consistent decision-making process. In the next seven days, three important public meetings offer the opportunity to aid the city’s transportation needs.

Bus Rapid Transit

Bus Rapid Transit, the world’s most successful transit service, has proven controversial in Berkeley, with bus opponents launching an initiative to “leave our streets alone” (I am part of the campaign against this measure). Heated rhetoric aside, this is a major transportation improvement that deserves more attention from Oaklanders and policy-makers. North Oaklanders, and indeed anyone who plans to ever take transit to North Oakland destinations not adequately served by BART (like Temescal or Koreatown), are invited to learn more about the proposal tomorrow. (Thanks for the reminder, Becks!)

Jane Brunner’s Community Advisory Meeting on BRT

Saturday Oct 11, 10a

Peralta Elementary School, 460 63rd St

UPDATE: Becks reports on the BRT meeting at Living in the O.

Taxi Service

Think Taxi service in Oakland is adequate? Never waited too long for a taxi? Never spent hours calling the only two cab dispatchers in this city of over 400,000 people? Never resorted for a female friend’s throaty phone voice to get you a taxi back from a West Oakland warehouse party? Never missed an Oakland Opera performance because there just weren’t any cabs at 7pm in the DTO? Then this meeting is not for you.

Biannual meeting on adequacy of permitted taxi service

Monday, Oct 13, 7p

Hearing Room One, City Hall

(If you cannot attend the meeting, comments can be sent to Assistant City Administrator Barb Killey, bkilley at oaklandnet dot com)

UPDATE: Not many people came, but everyone who spoke was a regular (at least weekly) taxi user and said Oakland needs more cabs. I also heard from several people that they didn’t know about the meeting, and there was no notice on the city’s website.

Oakland – Alameda Transit Connections

With the expected development of the rest of the former Alameda Naval Air Base, the issue of providing improved public transit access from Oakland to Alameda is even more pressing. Proposals range anywhere from amphibious buses to Bus Rapid Transit to a “futuristic” monorail. Oakland’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee, of which I am a member, invites the public to comment on ways to bridge the Estuary.

Estuary Crossing Study

Thursday, Oct 16, 5:30p

Hearing Room 4, City Hall