Bay Area

The Many Ongoing Public Transportation Projects of the Bay Area
The San Francisco Chronicle offers a round-up of 11 big transit projects, by Caltrans, BART, SFMTA, and others, making progress around the bay.

Legislation Introduced to Enable the Bay Area to Tackle Housing Crisis as a Region
A new bill would grant the Housing Alliance for the Bay Area taxing authority to raise revenue in the nine-county region to find solutions to the housing crisis. Another bill would reduce the voter threshold below two-thirds for eligible taxes.

Cupertino Mayor's 'Wall Joke' Gets Lots of Negative Feedback
Cupertino Mayor Steven Scharf, a fervent opponent of a new Bay Area housing initiative, opened his Jan. 29 state-of-the-city address with a short joke about "building a wall around Cupertino and making San Jose pay for it" that didn't go over well.

Housing Politics: Think Regionally, Lose Locally
Two Bay Area city council members serving on a regional commission suffered the political consequences of supporting a controversial regional housing initiative, not from their constituents, but from their colleagues.

Regional Attempt to Address Housing Crisis Advances in Bay Area
A regional, comprehensive, and controversial approach to tackling the housing affordability crisis in the nine-county Bay Area, including strategies to render renter protections and new housing production, has cleared three major hurdles.

Autonomous Driving Technology Might Have Saved Lives
It could have been a multiple-vehicle fatal car crash—a driver fell asleep at the wheel driving 70 mph—but the outcome was two DUI charges.

Planning Underway for New Bay Bridge Bike Path, and a Second Transbay BART Tube
In a distant and expensive future, there are two new ways to get across the San Francisco Bay without a car. One will have a much better view.

Idea Competition for Solving Bay Area Traffic Names Finalists
Twelve finalists have been picked for their ideas about how to spend $1 billion in funding to fix transportation in the Bay Area.

Will More Money Solve San Francisco's Homelessness Problem?
San Francisco voters will decide on Proposition C, a business tax based on gross receipts levied on large employers, the most contentious of five local measures.
Gabriel Metcalf Reflects On 20 Years Of Change In Bay Area
For over 20 years, few people have understood or influenced the Bay Area like Gabriel Metcalf, president of San Francisco Planning and Urban Research. Metcalf recently announced a move to Sydney, Australia, and reflected the past two decades.

Antioch, California BART Extension So Popular There's No Place to Park
The new Antioch station is seeing ridership well over predictions, and some think there would be even more riders if there were more parking.

San Francisco Suburb to Vote on Massive Project to Double Population
Brisbane, a city of about 4,700 on the southern border of San Francisco, will vote on a controversial ballot measure in November to approve or reject a mixed-use development including up to 2,200 residential units on a 660-acre vacant brownfield.

Taxpayer Group's Lawsuit Could Repeal Toll Hike on Bay Area Bridges
A California taxpayers association has challenged the June passage of a regional ballot measure because it didn't receive two-thirds support from voters, although two prior voter-approved bridge toll increases also fell short of a super-majority.

Means-Based, Transit-Fare Discounts Take a Leap Forward in the Big Apple
The 2019 New York City budget includes $106 million to subsidize half the transit fare for qualified residents for six months. The city joins the ranks of Seattle, Toronto, and the Bay Area that offer income-based discounts for transit fares.

Winners and Losers of the California Primary
With national media focused on individual candidates, propositions that dealt with park and water bonds, transportation spending, cap-and-trade, and rainwater may have been overlooked. Plus, a measure to increase bridge tolls in the Bay Area.

Dismal Poll Findings for Bay Area: Half the Respondents Want to Leave
To paraphrase Bill Clinton, it's the housing, stupid! In addition to the troubling findings of the Bay Area Council poll, a California housing report found that Silicon Valley had the highest percentage of residents leaving their counties.

Lyft to Buy Motivate, One of America's Largest Bike Share Providers
Motivate operates Ford Gobike in the Bay Area, Citi Bike in New York and Divvy in Chicago among other bike share fleets.
Floating Village Proposed for Protection Against Floods and Quakes
A "floating village" has been proposed for a San Jose neighborhood, with building riding on pontoons as a safeguard against repeated flooding.

Bay Area Home Prices Rise Despite Out-Migration
Kathleen Pender, business columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, points to two reasons why home prices rise amidst a Bay Area exodus to other states. On a state level, out-migration shows California's strong but dysfunctional economy.

The One Tech Company That's Engaging In California's Housing Debate
While tech giants like Google, Facebook, and Apple have approached the Bay Area's housing crisis gingerly the CEO of Yelp has thrown himself into the YIMBY movement. His activism says a lot about the real world and the virtual world.
Pagination
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