January Nanny of the Month

Dick Spotswood: Transit-dependent growth is 'greenwash' growth in Marin

Dick Spotswood: Transit-dependent growth is 'greenwash' growth in Marin from Marin IJ

By Dick Spotswood
Special to the IJ

Posted:   02/05/2014 04:21:00 AM PST

Click photo to enlarge

Dick Spotswood writes a weekly column on local politics for the Marin Independent Journal. (IJ...

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IN SUNDAY'S COLUMN I chided the Marin Transit District's board, including our county's supervisors, for spending $300,000 on consultants to, among other tasks, learn why Marinites don't ride local buses. I urged them instead to simply takes the bus to work to learn why others don't ride.

I first called all five supervisors and asked if they rode Marin Transit and if not, why not. Four replied. Only Supervisor Steve Kinsey was missing in action.

Supervisor Susan Adams was the only regular bus rider, though for most trips she drives. The supervisors' collective rationale for not regularly using transit was logical. It simply isn't convenient given their busy schedules and the long time it takes to travel to most places by bus.

Given that most Marinites, especially those with young children, live lives just as busy as our elected officials, that's a telling lesson.

It exposes the fallacy behind so-called transit-centered development.
Few ride transit out of some altruistic impulse. Travelers will take buses, ferries or trains only if they are convenient, charge reasonable fares and take people from home to destination in a time not much longer than it takes to drive.

For Marin travelers, the only destination that practically fits those requirements is San Francisco's Central Business District. Due to poor past regional planning, the 21st century reality is that most Marin residents' employment is elsewhere.

It might be here in the North Bay, in Contra Costa or Alameda counties or even other parts of the city, like booming Mission Bay.

For those commuters who, like our county supervisors, are not headed to the Market Street corridor, regular transit use often isn't practical.

When supervisors calling for high-density housing contend that new residents will not clog roads because they will mostly travel by transit, they are engaged in wishful thinking.
They should ask themselves a question: Would they give up their own car and rely on buses if they personally moved to Corte Madera's new 180-unit Tamal Vista Apartments?
Of course the answer will be, "I'd like to, but I can't."

They should expect the same reply from most of Tamal Vista's new residents who will be leading lives just as busy as any county supervisor.

The claim that building mammoth apartment blocks next to bus stops will somehow reduce greenhouse gases is just green-washed marketing.

If anyone should understand that truth, it's our auto-commuting elected officials.

Marin Democrat and Republic Chairs discuss Public Pension reforms

Spotswood: Ride Marin Transit and save $300,000

Dick Spotswood: Ride Marin Transit and save $300,000 from the Marin IJ

By Dick Spotswood
Special to the IJ

Posted:   02/02/2014 04:03:00 AM PST

Click photo to enlarge

Dick Spotswood writes a weekly column on local politics for the Marin Independent Journal. (IJ...

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COUNTY SUPERVISORS and council members on the Marin Transit District board just voted to spend up to $300,000 on consultants to learn, among other things, why Marinites don't ride local buses.

The initiative will also include "outreach" and a marketing study.

Here's an idea.

Instead of again hiring expensive outside consultants to state the obvious, why not require county supervisors and the two council members who sit on the Marin Transit District's board to ride their very own buses at least once a week.

For a $2 ride they'll learn in real time the pros and cons of traveling on Marin Transit buses from their homes to the Civic Center.

Years ago, I was a Golden Gate Bridge District director, and on the general manager's annual performance review committee we set a goal for the general manager to ride Golden Gate Transit once a week.

The same expectation needs to be set for Marin Transit directors.

To answer the obvious question, I was then an almost daily bus commuter from Mill Valley to my San Francisco Financial District law office.

Would it be so hard for Supervisor Kate Sears to regularly take the bus from her Sausalito residence to the Civic Center?

Surely Supervisor Steve Kinsey could take it to his Metropolitan Transportation Commission meetings in Oakland.

Of course, his trip requires two Golden Gate bus routes, a transfer to BART, plus a short hike — a nearly two-hour trek.

Being personally more transit-centered might even lead supervisors to surrender their soon-to-be $10,888-a-year car allowance and instead receive a transit pass.

One supervisor already walks the talk. Supervisor Susan Adams is a regular Marin Transit rider, using shuttles from her Marinwood home to the Civic Center.
Nor does the frugal Adams accept the auto allowance.

If transit directors ride their own buses they'll have a splendid opportunity to fully understand the system they govern. They'll gain direct input from bus passengers and drivers without consultants in the way.

This isn't about Golden Gate's excellent commuter buses serving San Francisco's central business district. Sears understands that, as she once commuted by bus when she worked in the city.

It's about buses that start and end in Marin, funded by Marin taxpayers and governed by county supervisors and two council members, Novato's Madeline Kellner and Stephanie Moulton-Peters of Mill Valley.

Even if they pass on becoming transit passengers, the supes can easily find out why Marinites don't ride local buses.

Instead of a new big-bucks study, they should go to their files to read the district's 2013 — and $100,000 — "Countywide Transit Market Assessment," prepared by consultants. They will find that the bulk of Marin Transit riders are what's called "transit dependent." As Nelson-Nygaard's analysis says, "while only 2 percent of county residents have no car at home, nearly one-third of Marin Transit riders (32 percent) said they did not."

The heaviest-traveled routes are from San Rafael's Canal neighborhood. It's no surprise that the 2013 study found "respondents who said Spanish was spoken in their homes accounted for nearly 40 percent of the responses, compared to only about 12 percent of county residents."

Of course the new immigrants clustered in the Canal take the bus. They don't own a car or have a driver's license. As soon as they get licenses, their understandable goal is often to purchase an auto.

Marin Transit does an excellent job with limited recourses. It runs clean and punctual buses.
Its buses just don't go to enough places, aren't particularly speedy, require inconvenient transfers and don't run very often. Miss a bus and it's a long wait for another.
It's obvious. Run frequent buses at reasonable fares on a comprehensive network and more people will ride them.

What's not so obvious is how to pay for it.

One way is to not spend $300,000 on a study, "outreach" or even marketing. Instead divert the cash to running more buses.

Columnist Dick Spotswood of Mill Valley now shares his views on local politics twice weekly in the IJ. His email address is spotswood@comcast.net.

Saturday Night Videos

The Epic Land Part 1 - New Zealand Landscapes Timelapse from Bevan Percival on Vimeo.
Kangaroos can't jump backwards from motiphe on Vimeo.
TRUTH. BEAUTY. BAILEY. from J A M I E R O B E R T S on Vimeo.

The Journey Begins from Johnny Kelly on Vimeo.

LOT254 from Toby Meakins on Vimeo.

JUNKYARD - Hisko Hulsing from il Luster on Vimeo.

Walking City from Universal Everything on Vimeo.

Video: Apollo VII Astronaut Walt Cunningham takes on global warming in Poland

There are few people on Earth as carefully vetted, as rigorously trained and as highly respected as America’s Apollo astronauts.  They risked their lives in advance of science on behalf of all mankind.
CFACT organized an all day global warming conference at Warsaw’s Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University, together with some fantastic partners from Poland and Germany, which ran parallel to the UN’s COP 19.  CFACT provided headsets for simultaneous translation for the more than 250 Poles who attended with our international delegation to the global warming summit.
Colonel Walt Cunningham was lunar module pilot on Apollo VII, the first manned Apollo flight to space.  Colonel Cunningham explains why America’s space pioneers are shocked and dismayed by today’s politicization of science to serve the global warming agenda.  They call for the elimination of bias from scientific inquiry and a return to the rigorous application of the scientific method.

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A "Transit Village" in Thailand connects People, Shopping and Transportation

Reagan Vs. Obama - Social Economics 101

Photos from a wet protest in front of "CorteMazilla" high density apartments on February 7, 2014

For the full Story see the Marin IJ HERE

Marin County Democratic and Republicans on Plan Bay Area on February 5, 2014

Dick Spotswood, Marin IJ Political Columnists asks the Marin County Democratic Chair, Paul Cohen and Republican Chair, Kevin Krick about Plan Bay Area at the Marin Coalition meeting held on February 5, 2014 in San Rafael, CA

Get Your FREE hard copy of Plan bay Area

EDITOR'S NOTE : Just got my hard copy of the Plan Bay Area and recommend everyone get one.  It's free and you merely have to request it via email below.   It spells out in great marketing hype all of the "wonderful" plans they have for us.   Most notably,  Marinwood, Tam Valley and the Civic Center in San Rafael still appear as Potential PDAs.  So despite all this nonsense about "local control", apparently the bureaucrats at ABAG did not get the memo that planning should be local.

It is definitely worth putting in a time capsule.

Get Your FREE hard copy of Plan bay Area (You paid for it and you will continue to pay for it, in more ways than you can imagine) Plan Bay Area, adopted by the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), lays out a 25-year vision for transportation and housing to sustain our communities, environment and economy. The plan is available online and a limited number of printed copies are available via the MTC-ABAG Library. To request a printed copy, please email library@mtc.ca.gov or call (510) 817-5836. The long-range plan, which includes $292 billion in transportation investments through the year 2040, was developed over three years in collaboration with thousands of Bay Area residents and local government partners, as well as with a range of interested stakeholder organizations. Plan Bay Area is the nine-county region's first Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) to meet the requirements of California's landmark 2008 Senate Bill 375, which calls on each of the state's 18 metropolitan areas to include in the RTP a Sustainable Communities Strategy to accommodate future population growth and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cars and light trucks. Working in collaboration with cities and counties, Plan Bay Area advances initiatives to expand housing and transportation choices, create healthier communities and build a stronger regional economy. MTC Public Information January 21, 2014 DIGITAL VERSION  (for those who want to save paper) Plan Bay Area: Digital Edition  Entire Plan Bay Area (PDF 125 MB) Chapters (PDF): Introduction: Strategy for a Sustainable Region (17 MB) 1. Setting Our Sights (3 MB) 2. The Bay Area in 2040 (4 MB) 3. Where We Live, Where We Work (49 MB) 4. Investments (15 MB) 5. Performance (7 MB) 6. A Plan to Build On (10 MB) Appendices (35 MB) Supplementary Reports & Additional Resources  Related Documents: Draft 2013 Transportation Improvement Program (TIP)  Draft Plan Bay Area Presentation (PDF)

Marin IJ: New Threat for Marin

All single family homes within 1/2 mile of the 101 Highway are part of the Urbanized 101 Priority Development Area and may be subject to Eminent Domain seizure for redevelopment under SB-1

from Marin IJ: Plan Bay Area opponents see new legislative threat on horizon

By Richard Halstead

Marin Independent Journal

Posted:   02/02/2014 04:00:00 PM PST

Marin residents who fought tooth and nail against approval of Plan Bay Area have identified a new bete noire: proposed state legislation that would replace redevelopment agencies with "Sustainable Communities Investment Authorities."

Senate Bill 1, introduced by Senate Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, would allow cities, counties and special districts to designate Sustainable Communities Investment areas in locations near transit corridors and to create Sustainable Communities Investment authorities to support development there.

"If you thought Plan Bay Area was bad, Senate Bill 1 is much more extreme," said Richard Hall, who led the fight to prevent his Civic Center neighborhood in San Rafael from participating in the Plan Bay Area scheme to reduce greenhouse gases by encouraging the building of denser housing close to transportation corridors.

In a recent column published on the Patch website, Hall wrote, "Senate Bill 1, if enacted, could send us back to Dickensian London — dark days where those with lower incomes were relegated to living in crowded conditions in inner city high rises."

Steve Shea, a policy consultant for Steinberg, said, "I read that article. It was humorous. I couldn't tell if it was tongue in cheek. The alarmist tone does not accurately reflect what is in the bill and what the bill would do."

Other local Plan Bay Area antagonists, however, share Hall's foreboding.
Peter Singleton of Larkspur, who co-founded Bay Area Citizens to oppose Plan Bay Area, said, "It's a really chilling, frightening piece of legislation. It has all the deficiencies of redevelopment agencies."

Susan Kirsch of Mill Valley, a co-founder of Citizen Marin, said, "SB 1 takes the inefficiencies of the dissolved redevelopment agencies and opens the doors to make the situation worse."

Under pressure to reduce the state budget deficit in 2011, Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature dissolved California's nearly 400 redevelopment agencies, giving the state access to $1.7 billion earmarked for projects to eradicate urban blight.

SB 1 would define blight in a new way: as inefficient land use patterns that result in increased greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, energy consumption, reduced farmland, habitat destruction and a lack of affordable housing.

Shea said, "The bill is attempting to build on the body of community redevelopment law. The redevelopment agencies have been eliminated but the community redevelopment law still exists."

SB 1 would harness the old financing model employed by redevelopment agencies to help finance the infrastructure needed for infill development and affordable housing. This model, often referred to as tax increment financing, involves the issuance of debt, usually in the form of bonds, to pay for new development. Increased property values result from the new development, which generates additional property tax revenue, and this incremental property tax revenue is then used to repay the initial debt.

The authority boards would be appointed by the city, county or special district that creates the Sustainable Communities Investment area. Hall sees this as an ominous trend.
"Unelected bodies are starting to control development, overriding local control," Hall said. "Cities and counties no longer have the ability to manage their own destiny."

But Rhys Williams, a spokesman for Steinberg, said, "The authorities will be managed by independent, citizen governing boards and will be required to comply with all state ethics and open government laws. No tax revenues would be diverted from the schools and the state general fund would be protected."

Like the old redevelopment agencies, the new authorities would have the power of eminent domain. And critics of the bill say under SB 1 the new authorities' eminent domain powers would be even greater. That is because the authorities would be allowed to rely on a legislative determination of blight and would not be required to conduct a survey of blight within the project area.

Shea, however, said that notwithstanding some of the rhetoric over the past issue of eminent domain, "There is not a lot of evidence it was abused on any widespread basis or even used very often.

"There are a lot of legal restrictions developed in case law that require a legitimate public use for any takings," Shea said. "So people can't necessarily come in and clear out residences and put in high-rise tenements as has been suggested."

One more vote by the state Senate is required before the bill can be sent to Gov. Brown for his signature. It is unclear, however, whether Brown will sign it.

Contact Richard Halstead via e-mail at rhalstead@marinij.com. Follow him at twitter.com/halsteadrichard

"Corde Mazilla" is 180 unit building next to the 101 Highway in Corte Madera.
Soon the entire 101 Corridor may be lined with these behemoths.  We will Save Marin again.