John King, the Chronicle’s urban design writer, has a good piece today about some aspects of the proposed Market Street redesign. They’re about six weeks behind us though, when it comes to discussing the number of streetcar stops that should be retained as part of the revamp of our main street.
A key goal of the Better Market Street project is to make the street better for transit and bikes.Autos? Eh, not so much.
John called us to get our take on the possible reduction of F-line stops from 12 to either 9 or 6. We told him we had an open mind on the subject, provided of course any changes helped speed the flow of transit along the street. As one example, we suggested that replacing the current stops at Fourth and Fifth with a larger, fully accessible stop at Powell might actually be an improvement, while freeing vital street space for other uses (like a bike track) in the constrained area next to the BART escalator shafts where the streetcar stops are now.
Bottom line: it’s all about thinking carefully about what works, rather than reflexively assuming every stop has to remain. We all want the F-line to load and unload more quickly, to reach the boarding islands quicker and more reliably and to avoid getting stuck behind other traffic unnecessarily.
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