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Muni overtime pay, subpar citation revenue still draining SFMTA budget

San Francisco parking control officers
In January, when the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency was facing a $21.2 million budget deficit, the agency said it could make up its shortfall by increasing revenue from parking citations while cutting down on employee overtime pay.Neither plan seems to be panning out.Even though its citation revenue is $7 million below projections, the agency has yet to move forward with a strategy to redeploy parking control officers, and there are no immediate plans for the repositioning, agency spokesman Paul Rose said. Read More

Police complete search of Philippine Airlines flight, find nothing amiss

Philippine Airlines
Police and bomb-sniffing dogs completed a search of a Philippine Airlines flight late Tuesday night at San Francisco International Airport and discovered nothing amiss, a police sergeant said. The search was initiated in response to a threatening phone call made to the Philippine Airline cargo office at the airport at around 2:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sgt. Michael Rodriguez said.Employees of the cargo office notified police, he said. Read More

Police remove passengers from arriving flight at SFO, search cargo

SFO
San Francisco police officers and bomb-sniffing dogs are inspecting cargo that was removed from a Philippine Airlines flight that landed at San Francisco International Airport tonight, a police sergeant said.Flight No. 104, which was traveling from Manila to San Francisco, landed at the airport at 7:20 p.m., police Sgt. Michael Rodriguez said. The aircraft was met by members of the Police Department, he said, who escorted the plane to a remote section of the airport. Read More

Report finds one in five Bay Area bridges structually deficient

Bay Area bridges
One in five Bay Area bridges is marked by the federal government as high-priority for monitoring and repair, according to a report released today by a national transportation organization. The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit Transportation for America found the region had more "structurally deficient" bridges than the national average, the report said.The bridges have significant wear and tear or defects to at least one part, and they will continue to deteriorate over time, Transportation for America representatives said today during a conference call. Read More

Power mostly restored in Berkeley, BART stations reopen

BART
The North Berkeley and downtown Berkeley BART stations reopened Tuesday afternoon after power was restored to most of the city’s 27,000 PG&E customers who lost electricity during an outage Tuesday morning, officials said.Power was restored at about 1 p.m. to all but 3,000 customers affected by the outage, which began at about 11:15 a.m., PG&E spokeswoman Fiona Chan said.BART trains ran at reduced speeds through Berkeley during the outage and did not stop at the downtown and North Berkeley stations, agency spokesman Jim Allison. Read More

San Francisco Muni chief Nathaniel Ford would leave legacy of mixed results

Nathaniel Ford
Today is a big day for Nathaniel Ford. The chief of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency will sit down with the board of directors in a closed-door meeting about his future. Across the country, the Washington, D.C., airport transit authority that nearly hired him last week will reopen its search.If either meeting results in Ford leaving the SFMTA, his legacy will be remembered as one where solid planning gains were offset by major operating changes — albeit many of them beyond his control. Read More

Mechanical problems result in Muni delays during Monday evening commute

San Francisco Muni
A Muni light rail vehicle with mechanical problems caused delays early in Monday evening commute, but trains are now running on schedule according to San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority officials.Around 5:10 p.m. an L-Taraval train heading toward the San Francisco Zoo started experiencing mechanical problems at the Montgomery Street Station, Paul Rose, spokesman for the SFMTA said.The train’s passengers were off loaded at Montgomery, according to Rose, but the train wasn’t taken out of service until it reached Van Ness Station when it began to lose power. Read More

Muni passengers injured when big-rig T-bones light-rail vehicle

Six people were injured when a San Francisco Municipal Railway light-rail vehicle was hit by a big-rig in The City’s Dogpatch neighborhood Monday morning, a fire department spokeswoman said.The crash was reported at 10:23 a.m. at the intersection of Third and 23rd streets, Muni spokesman Paul Rose said. The collision caused minor injuries to six people on board, San Francisco Fire Department spokeswoman Lt. Talmadge said.The victims were taken to a hospital and are expected to survive, she said. Read More

Muni chief Nathaniel Ford chose a bad time to look at other transit jobs

Muni chief Nathaniel Ford
Metropolitan transit executives are a lot like baseball managers and school superintendents — no matter what kind of record they compile, there is always another job waiting. Think Bill Rojas, who left San Francisco schools in disarray, only to be hired by Dallas as the highest-paid superintendent in the country — until he brought that system to its knees and got run out of town. Read More

Caltrain suicides difficult for agency to prevent, but measures under way

Caltrain suicides
Deaths on the Caltrain tracks have gone down since 2009’s near-record high prompted increased safety and suicide prevention measures. It’s too soon to say, however, whether those measures are bearing fruit, officials said. Caltrain has had four pedestrian deaths so far this year. Read More
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