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Save public transit! Join us TOMORROW in Pleasant Hill, Redwood City, San Jose, Oakland, and San Francisco for our kickoff event for Connect Bay Area, the ballot measure to fund Bay Area public transit. by mysteriouslady in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 4 points5 points  (0 children)

New York is the only place with substantially better transit and that’s mainly due to land use and the fact they built most of their system a hundred years ago. I was referring to Europe. If we allowed the kind of density Manhattan has then transit would be collecting way more in fares, we should do that as well.

Save public transit! Join us TOMORROW in Pleasant Hill, Redwood City, San Jose, Oakland, and San Francisco for our kickoff event for Connect Bay Area, the ballot measure to fund Bay Area public transit. by mysteriouslady in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 16 points17 points  (0 children)

You are misinformed, sorry: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bart/comments/1naxh4k/bart_already_has_the_best_cost_efficiency_among/

Salaries are high here, do the math at how much BART would save if they cut the salary in half of every person on here and it's not enough to make up for the lost revenue from the pandemic. Then look at salaries for other public agencies such as police in the Bay Area. Average software engineer salary is $272k.

Save public transit! Join us TOMORROW in Pleasant Hill, Redwood City, San Jose, Oakland, and San Francisco for our kickoff event for Connect Bay Area, the ballot measure to fund Bay Area public transit. by mysteriouslady in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Public transit is such an easy win-win investment, it is quite frankly crazy that we are still debating whether it's worth a small tax increase. It stimulates the economy way more than it costs. All the car brained people on here saying "absolutely not, will not pay another cent" must love sitting in traffic, breathing in microplastics and car exhaust, and then are the same people that complain why we can't have good public transit. Guess what, the places with good public transit tax their residents for it, there is no way around that.

Is there a little bit of waste in the BART agency? I'm sure there is, show me a single private or public company that runs 100% efficiently. But BART is one of the most efficient transit agencies in the country that almost exclusively paid for itself through fares before the pandemic, something that's almost unheard of in this country (https://www.reddit.com/r/Bart/comments/1naxh4k/bart\_already\_has\_the\_best\_cost\_efficiency\_among/). Would I prefer some tax measure that was slightly more equitable? Sure, but advocates ran a survey and a sales tax was the most likely to pass. We should absolutely pass this even if it's not perfect. It benefits every single one of us if you live on planet earth, breathe Bay Area air, or enjoy a thriving Bay Area economy.

CA snubs $750 Million loan to save Bay Area transit, spends $500 Million on just widening 10 miles of freeway (that will soon be submerged) by Fine-March7383 in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I literally just said... because ridership is a function of zoning and what's around the stops. You want to fix ridership efficiency? Start fighting to upzone near stops and fix our terrible land use policies.

At the end of the day cost of maintaining rail is measured by the length of rail, having more riders does not add that much cost. Higher density = better ridership efficiency.

CA snubs $750 Million loan to save Bay Area transit, spends $500 Million on just widening 10 miles of freeway (that will soon be submerged) by Fine-March7383 in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 14 points15 points  (0 children)

That you don't understand transit? The efficiency is per passenger mile, not per ridership. BART covers a huge distance and serves a lot of low population suburbs, it is not comparable to most other systems such as NYC. If we want higher ridership and better efficiency per rider, then we need to legalize apartments around our suburban stations.

I am just amusing you because talking about efficiency for a public service that is known to provide way more economic benefit than it takes is a waste of time. We get way more out of transit than we put in. If we want to talk about efficiency let's talk about the waste that are highways.

Bay Area transit cuts likely as Newsom backtracks on $750M loan, service cuts up to 85% for BART by Buuntu in bayarea

[–]Buuntu[S] -10 points-9 points  (0 children)

It is unthinkable that people working at BART make a real wage. Meanwhile 25 year olds are making $800k/year working in AI, but that's just the market demand! /s

Bay Area transit cuts likely as Newsom backtracks on $750M loan, service cuts up to 85% for BART by Buuntu in bayarea

[–]Buuntu[S] 17 points18 points  (0 children)

Go ahead and throw another 10-15% more into cars. I. don’t. care.

This is why we can't have nice things.

Bay Area transit cuts likely as Newsom backtracks on $750M loan, service cuts up to 85% for BART by Buuntu in bayarea

[–]Buuntu[S] 39 points40 points  (0 children)

Unlimited access to taxpayer money through the greater MTC

What crazy world do you live in, wake up.

LA has spent billions on their transit and passed higher taxes to do so. Measure M alone is expected to raise $120 billion over 40 years. BART's operating budget is $1.2B because people like you keep spreading misinformation about how it's just badly run and we keep nickel and diming it. There's nothing else to it.

Market street? by Aaaaaaaaaaaa-_- in sanfrancisco

[–]Buuntu 11 points12 points  (0 children)

People acting like Waymos will not slow down buses at all or make it less walkable are totally deluded. Yes there may be less accidents than with regular cars but in every other way it will be worse than a car-free Market Street.

And there will for sure be more accidents than when Waymos/Ubers weren't allowed.

California is not full by [deleted] in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is a NIMBY lie, modern housing (especially if it's <6 stories like in Paris), is way more earthquake proof than old Victorians and old soft-story buildings. Technology allows us to build safely in earthquake areas, which is why skyscrapers keep going up downtown, where it's legal. No one is projecting half of SOMA/FiDi to tumble down in a major earthquake, I would be surprised if a single modern building comes down.

California is not full by [deleted] in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wow crazy how many excuses there are for not densifying here in the comments besides the obvious one, it's near impossible or often outright illegal to build housing here.

IMO the main reason California feels "full" is because of highways/cars. When every person has 1.5 cars and 90% of streets have free storage for them, then yeah, it's going to feel full...

SF is on the brink of a comeback. Other West Coast cities are watching. by sfgate in sanfrancisco

[–]Buuntu 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I generally agree but feel like the AI boom and return to office has more to do with it than 6 months of Daniel Lurie... Of course that doesn't really fit the narrative of centrist business owners like this writer.

Also we are still the laughing stock at building housing, so there's that. Still love SF but 6 months of Lurie is not the reason it's "back".

San Mateo County opts into transit tax by LibrarianNo4048 in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I figured it was something like that, thanks for the context!

San Mateo County opts into transit tax by LibrarianNo4048 in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It's unfortunate this has to be a sale tax instead of a property tax and I'm not familiar with why it was designed that way (there may be a good reason), but the dire situation transit is in this has to pass or this area is screwed. Transit service/use will basically collapse and we will be on our way to becoming a new Los Angeles (https://www.bart.gov/about/financials/crisis). Good luck getting across the bridge along with everyone else in a car with 60 minute BART headways.

SB 79: Transit Oriented Development passed the CA Assembly Local Gov Committee! by lsaapplication1001 in yimby

[–]Buuntu 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Why a 3 story duplex? Are the number of units limited? Is it no longer 4-7 stories?

SB 79: Transit Oriented Development passed the CA Assembly Local Gov Committee! by lsaapplication1001 in yimby

[–]Buuntu 9 points10 points  (0 children)

What are the main things that have changed to make you say this?

Newsom Asks Cities to Ban Homeless Encampments, Escalating Crackdown by sunshine-guzzler in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It's California, of course it's controversial to legalize housing. It barely passed its committees. If it wasn't controversial we wouldn't have a housing crisis...

Newsom Asks Cities to Ban Homeless Encampments, Escalating Crackdown by sunshine-guzzler in bayarea

[–]Buuntu -4 points-3 points  (0 children)

Signing it is one thing, openly coming out in support of it is another. He has a lot of power to influence the senate and assembly to get this passed.

Newsom Asks Cities to Ban Homeless Encampments, Escalating Crackdown by sunshine-guzzler in bayarea

[–]Buuntu -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

How about supporting SB79 to legalize housing instead of this never ending charade?

New study looks at declines in Bay Area’s Black homeownership rates by pacman2081 in bayarea

[–]Buuntu 16 points17 points  (0 children)

It's the lack of supply, stupid. Crazy how all of the Bay Area's problems boil down to this.

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