SF Park is an EPIC FAILURE! Jay Primus and the rest of the SFMTA are not listening to the residents!! SF Park came through my neighborhood in SOMA and replaced half of the Residential (Y) Zone parking with meters. The end result is that taxpaying city residents can no longer park their cars near their homes, apartments, and businesses.

The epic failure is that **NO ONE IS PARKING AT THE
METERS** along the Caltrain line Near Townsend and 6th street. Residents on Bluxome Street now have to park our cars up to 4 blocks away from our homes or pay $2.00 an hour to park at the meters to bring in groceries or off load our children. Is it any wonder why families have given up on San Francisco?

It is a huge inconvenience to the businesses and residents in my neighborhood and
it's has made SOMA a less desirable place to own real estate, or operate a business. The residents see this as a money grab by the SFMTA who rammed these meters through without regard for the needs or input of our neighborhood. The city takes away street parking from hardworking residents so that the SFMTA can build useless parking apps. What the Hell kind of class warfare is this? Residents should not need an app to park in their own neighborhood.

Residents in other parts of the city should fight this fascism and not allow these meters to be installed. The people who implemented this bloated poorly run project should be ousted from their App writing, Ivory Towers and replaced with people who are willing to work with residents.

YES! I am down with Jessica. People saying that it's actually a plausible idea to deposit 72 hours into a public parking meter for one hour so we can subsidize MUNI's ridiculous salaries and incredible inefficiency is just laughable. I don't even have a car, but this is making me sick. Enough is friggin' enough.

WHAT CAN WE DO TO STOP THIS?

Okay, it's great that we have a story like this posted and that it stands against what SFpark is doing, but what I would like to know is how we stop it. You suggested leaving a comment, which I'm doing, but what can we actively due to stop this?

I used to live in the City in the dense area of Polk Gulch (Between Russian and Snob Hill)> I was a "twenty-something" Art student attending the SF Art Institute. I rode the cable car to work in Union Square. We lived on Jackson at Hyde Street, and I walked everywhere else: to school at Chestnut and Jones, to the Grocery store on Polk and Jackson (Byrnes) or California & Hyde (Cala Foods). I could carry my groceries 5 blocks (even in rain) or my art portfolios 10-12 blocks. But I WAS TWENTY! Now, at age 59 I can't. Sorry. Yes, I got older. I would not even think of it. The City needs to encourage more mixed use buildings like the one at Masonic and Fulton (Fulton Market) with condos on the upper levels and stores or banks down on the street level. Even some of the mixed use victorians located in locations like the Sunrise Market on Haight Street, have customers get off the bus , buy their beer, cigs or whatever and go a few steps to their house. Public Transportation works well if the city is sprinkled with easy to access small neighborhoods with convenineces, but as some have mentioned, this new parking fee scheme will discourage visitors to the city who expect to park once they get here. I once Valet Parked my car on Post street when taking clients to Farallone to dine, and before I went inside, the meter maid had already ticketed my car before the attendant had even had a chance to move it. Of course the restaurant paid, but there went their profit on my meal. That would discourage a person to take clients out to dine when there are other alternatives. The same goes for shopping. If residents of the city opt to drive to Nordstrom's Rack or Home Depot in Colma to park for free while shopping, that sales tax goes to another county.
I guess what I am saying is there needs to be a happy medium. Don't charge rate so high that outsiders feel ripped off and vow to "Not Come to the City by the Bay", but also we shouldn't expect to get a dollar for fifty cents either. We're not Manhattan, are we? Shall we each look forward to everyone booking a Town Car do be driven a few blocks so as to not need to park when they get out? Hell NO!

The incredible arrogance of most of so many of the commenters is nauseating. In the SFs' huge salary generosity you have bands of brothers and sisters that get paid more than the city can afford, and they want more. Always more. So our city managers are always looking for more money more money. No balance. So here we are talking about making it more and more difficult to park. Charge more money and give it to muni. Have you noticed that the lift blood of a city is people? People who have access to the city? People who live here and people who travel here from everywhere. We are a very small city with a very high public profile. We need people to come here and support their addiction to San Francisco, wether its for a tall shot or a short shot. A show or a bite. A concert or a view. Anything they want they should be able to get to and do it in a way that leaves them feeling good. The idea being is that they will come back. Punish them with fees to pay an insatiable ineffective muni and you guarantee they go elsewhere.

Leave your agendas for a while and consider reality. Don't send our blood, to feed the muni vampire!

Wow, what a populist article about parking! :)

I don't own a car and I live in San Francisco so either am in no place to comment or am actually in the best impartial place to comment. Parking is NOT a fundamental human right despite the beliefs of car addicted polluters. Free market pricing is a great way to balance demand against limited supply. If parking is available (for a fair market price) there will be fewer emissions released when circling blocks for parks.

More city services should go this route. Wouldn't it be nice to cut your DMV waiting time from 4 hours to 4 minutes by purchasing an Express Reservation?

PS: Maybe the hypothetical waitress's two children should walk more than 7 blocks, not taking a car at all, so they wouldn't be so obese!

The comments about garages being cheaper are erroneous. I just checked 4 public garages' prices and they are the same price per hour as the meters in the same neighborhood. Also, the prices on the meters have not been raised yet, but will this month. I think the writer is giving us a good warning. Once prices of meters go up, they will never go down. The meters and meter maids are not subsidized by anyone. The inefficiency of MUNI and the ridiculous salaries of the people that work there are being subsidized by meter fees and parking tickets. The average yearly salary of a MUNI bus driver is well over $100,000. So, let's all be clear about who is paying for what.

I agree that gas prices should be extremely high- to force the need for alternatives to gas.
This does not extend to parking- what about motorcycles, or Hydrogen cars when they make it to the market? I bike to work, take muni to go out to dinner or a movie, but I also drive when I am purchasing a lot (like furniture, garden supplies).
I don't mind paying for parking when I need to, but this will definitely cause me to rethink what is really necessary. So it will play into the hands of the parking authority, keeping those like me away to assure parking for those who don't mind paying for it (the rich, aka elite).
However, let them pay! If we can charge the rich more, do it. For the few times it will inconvenience me to the many times the rich will pay the taxes of the city, I am ok with it. For the non-rich, learn to park in residential and muni downtown. There is always a way.

I have a car, I'm poor and I find my way around the city just fine without paying $18 an hour to park. You don't have to park at a meter, no one forcing you. At this rate the garages are cheaper and it's cover parking, hey, win win.

Lindsey you sound so mad at "dirty wasteful single occupancy" vehicles, you forget about regular old folks. It sounds like we should toss all those vehicles off a cliff so we can get closer to our ideal life !....... easy now ! I appreciate LaBua's article for asking good questions.
As I understand, a motorcycle will have to pay the same rates. I personally take my family of four occasionally to San Francisco to visit our oldest son. My wife got laid off two years ago and we feel the pinch, so YES parking prices matter to us ! We'd love to take a train or bus if it made sense, but right now we'd need to wait for three different buses and spend two and a half hours each way.

Dude - your read of this program is totally cynical and entitled.

"But the streets are public, and to charge up to $18 per hour for a public parking spot is not only absurd, but also elitist."

i.e. I should be able to park my dirty wasteful single-occupancy vehicle for cheap, wherever I choose, and the population at large should subsidize my habit.

Demand metering for both parking and highway use is the best way to reduce vehicle miles travelled, which must be the goal if we are actually serious about not destroying our environment.

Suck it up buddy.

$18 an hour is to generous of a rate. Make it $40 an hour I'm sold! :)

POOR PEOPLE SHOULD NOT HAVE CARS!!!!!

You got it right David. I like what Stella and Anon said down below- "I personally take offense when presented with phony motives, while reasonable ones make for smarter public relations, communication, and create a general sense of trust." There is no way that expecting higher revenue was not a design goal of this program. SFMTA and all government officials for that matter could take a lesson from this article and these comments and just start being honest and forthright with us, and not behaving like a phony corporation. We are not stupid.

Why do people move to San Francisco then complain about how it isn't like Pleasanton? San Francisco is a densely populated city. If you want to live here, learn how people get around in a densely populated city. That means Muni, bikes, walking, cabs, and occasionally in your own car when it's worth it to pay for parking. If you don't like it, there is no shortage of places you can go.

How do will people know what the hourly rate is before they actually park. If you have a lot of people pulling into spots, only to pull out right away after they discover the rate, it will create a lot of congestion.

Elitist?

Owners of private parking lots do exactly the same thing. When demand is high, they jack the prices. If you own a nice car you spent 40K or so on it? You paid 4 bucks a gallon to drive to the city? My god, what did you pay for insurance? Wash and wax?

Whenever a writer uses that term "elitist," it always gives me pause. Are you saying that people who advocate this parking program are better than you? I certainly cannot say if I am better or worse, what I can say is that I am sick of traffic congestion.

Free ride is over, dude. The true cost of parking is very high. A UC study a few years ago figured that to recover the true cost of parking to the taxpaying public every possible parking spot in the city would need to be metered at 4 dollars an hour, 24/7. Far from "elitist," its common sense, and if it puts more money in the city treasury, so much the better.

We were told that closing the parks on Sundays to car traffic would keep visitors away. Have you been to GG? You will find people are still coming, lots and lots of them. If you go, try using a bike or public transport. San Francisco is a marvelous city for walking! On your way, stop in one of our great restaurants for a little sustenance. If for some reason, you insist on bringing a car, use the public garage near the music concourse. Do not spend hours in the surrounding neighborhoods endlessly circling looking for free parking. Life is too short.

whooppee turn on the money vacuum. all this highway robbery doesn't even provide many jobs as they laid off over 100 meter maids last Christmas.
Guess we are all supposed to have lots of spare time to toddle around on the muni. Which will never approximate NYC which is mostly underground and avoids pedestrians and cross traffic.
This is just the city cashing in on the density cures all ills scam. That is one idea you know stinks when the giant sewer boxes under soma and the financial district waft up those odors full of airborne disease organisms even when the rainy season is still upon us.
Step right up and buy our overbuilt condos but forget about transportation and the water supply. Those will go to the highest bidder.

Oh and one more thing for those of you who buy in to the "If demand outstrips supply, then it totally makes sense to raise the price."

Really so if I go out to eat and it so happens burgers are in high demand the cost of that meal should change ?

Your theory works only when the profit motive is the reason for change. The correct answer is if you pay more you get more and better service. If I go to a hotel I can choose a room with a 300 hundred thread count sheet and pay more than for a room with a standard count sheet. I can pay more for a room with a better view and larger space or I can pay less for being next to the ice machine.

Well this is all well and good except I am quite certain that just a few months ago this same agency stated quite clearly that parking tickets and meter fares were considered vital and necessary revenue.

Say I go to a parking space and at that time it cost fifty cents per hour (whatever) then say in the next 1/2 hour all the spaces are filled and so a new rate is charged right ?

Does that mean my time is going to be reduced to reflect the new rate ? or extended if the rate is decreased ? or I keep the rate until the time is expired ? OK and so what ? well I guess that means if I come back to my space with time left I can not buy more time until the meter expires ? and if I can buy more time will the charge be for the new rate ?

Sounds like fun to me. Still when they decided to go ahead with this improvement expecting lower revenue was not a design goal. On that I am willing to bet.

Frankly I prefer Cape Town. Once there I went to park at a bar for some food and drink. A very nice Zulu man with a sawed off shotgun met me at the gate. I ask him how much to park and he said "When I smile mon that is enough."

One more step towards a poorer quality of life, brought to us by spoiled and irresponsible people. This is nothing but a regressive tax.

San Francisco loves to invent new ways to steal even more of your money. SFpark is just going to ensure that only the rich will be able to have a car. Get used to walking, commoners (it's quicker than waiting for Muni). Or better yet, get out of the city. It hates you.

right on !!!! someone cut through the BS; new programs imposed upon us under dubious premises and with obvious financial repercussions..... it seems to me that these hiked meter rates will not be in effect because the city cares about availability as much as because it can charge top dollar !!! . . . I personally take offense when presented with phony motives, while reasonable ones make for smarter public relations, communication, and create a general sense of trust.

we are still very much a car dependent society.I am right now on a tight budget, I ride my bike and walk around town fairly often, but there are errands where bike or bus won't take me, and hefty parking prices are a heavy toll on my outings. it's funny to imagine a more money based society where you'd have to rent a piece of bench to sit down .... we're getting there aren't we ? .... so, I like when David mentioned the old simple rule of "first come first served" regarding parking, works well within my values .....
...... I don't mind paying for parking, as I understand the vast benefits of paying taxes, but some new laws and rules and practices get adopted sometimes without much scrutiny ...... this Sfpark program seems like hostage taking ..... aren't there any consumer protection rules against that ?. . .

I applaud a lesson in civics when a mind questions the validity of changes imposed upon us. History is riddled with sad episodes carried out under the benign title of a beneficial program....under false pretense of concern and slippery semantics. I think it's great to be vigilant and read between the lines, people with questioning minds are the gatekeepers of democracy !
Fun article !

Money is not the first goal of the program. The goal to to give the developers the permits that will take this City to 1.5 million by building very high (ie.Market and Van Ness to multiple 40 story towers. To do that, we must discourage vehicle ownership. The way to do this is to raise the cost of parking so people who find automobiles unaffordable.

The goal of SF Park is to drive down vehicle ownership by making automobiles in San Francisco unaffordable. Why? Willie Brown (who is still running this town) is doling out permits to those who will Pay to Play... Development entitlements or Shares, in effect, in San Francisco, Inc.

And guess what? It is a big secret as the Chron is in on it as they will soon be rezoned too!

When you pay taxes- you are paying for the daily care and attention that your parking spot is given by the city. To pay even more is a city greedily double dipping. When did SF stop caring about the people?

SFPark is a step in the right direction. If demand outstrips supply, then it totally makes sense to raise the price. Those who are priced out must find alternatives, such as public transportation (yes, it exists, even if it's not that great). If people stay out of the City, then there will be fewer people competing for the same space, which is the whole point of raising the meter rates. Anyway, Pandacs is right that low parking meter rates do not reflect the overall costs of using that space.

You got it all wrong, David. Why should it be dirt cheap to park a polluting private vehicle on public space?

Change will only come when parking (and gas) prices rise to reflect the true costs of motor vehicle use to society and the planet.

SFPark is an innovative, progressive idea and I'm proud we're trying it in San Francisco.

Robert, LA is getting the same kind of changing-rate meters as SF!
http://www.nbclosangeles.com/the-scene/cars/The-Meters-Are-Watching-9341...

I agree. This is totally elitist and crazy. The SFpark app is cool, and the book is cool. These tools make parking more efficient. Charging 6 bucks an hour and 18 bucks on days there is a ballgame is nothing short of extortion. I also agree that the goal of raising the rates until there is one open parking space on every block is absurd. How about first trimming the salaries of the literally hundreds of SFMTA fatcats making over 100 grand per year.

Pandacs,
Check the facts before you hog all of the comment space. I've lived here for 30 years and could list all or your erroneous points, but will spare other readers. Well, just one...it does not cost 200 million dollars to maintain the meters and pay the meter maids. Before you start out your comment with "I'm fairly sure that..." perhaps you should do some fact checking and be all the way sure. Do you by chance work for SFMTA? This story hits the dead center of the bullseye.

I hear ya, and would be all for the interceptors being swapped out for bikes, and agree public money should be going to education, housing, transit etc. and not highly paid officials. I just don't see how that has anything to do with the theory behind SFPark - it is a pilot after all, so if it doesn't work the City can pull the plug.

The deal with SFPark is that it's based on the idea that free/low-cost parking is a huge public subsidy in and of itself and skews the actual cost (economic, social, environmental) of driving on our City (proven by Donald Shoup - just google "The high cost of free parking"). It's a classic tragedy of the commons that encourages people to drive because parking rates don't accurately reflect the cost of using that space.

As for the garages, the pilots are only in dense areas that are already served by garages (downtown, Fisherman's Wharf, etc.) I would hope that any expansion would take the lack of garages in other areas into consideration, but knowing MTA, you may have a point there...

pandacs, sounds like you wrote the sfpark q/a page. parking garages? This is not new york city, sf has almost zero parking garages. dated rates? The meter prices have been going up even with the older parking meters. parking ain't cheap to begin with! Pollution? why don't the dpt interceptors trade for bicycles, cheaper, no pollution, and the employees get some much needed exercise for their bodies and their brains. the city needs to stop using our money to pay big salaries to top officials and god know what else. we need to start using our money to help our public schools and youth.

Totally elitist, which was always their goal. I've just about had it with the hassles of this city (where I've lived since 1986). I go to L.A. and three QUARTERS is PLENTY for a meter for lunch or shopping. Ridiculous. Where's the money going, SF?

I'm fairly sure the concept behind SFPark is that the current rates at meters are dated and don't reflect the actual cost of maintaining the space (w/meter maintenance, parking enforcement, plus spaces take up land that could be used for other public purposes). The program is trying to debunk the notion that cheap/free parking is a right.

Another key piece of SFPark that isn't mentioned in the article is that the City is reducing the cost of garages and improving signage for public garages. The idea is to get the majority of people to start parking in garages so they don't circle endlessly looking for cheap or free on-street parking which a)is one of the primary causes of congestion in the City, b)causes accidents because of distracted drivers, and c)pollutes the air.

With those two programs combined, people who want to pay the exorbitant price for the last space on the block can do so, but most regular folks will be encouraged to park in a garage or go find a cheaper space on a block close by that has several spots open.

I don't buy that it's elitist to charge more when spaces are scarce, I actually find it elitist that people who own cars (I own one too) demand the right to park their car for free or cheaply on the street. We live in a dense city that's only getting more crowded, seems to me like the City is taking a pretty progressive approach to managing growing parking demand with severely limited supply. Now if only the revenue from this program were going to a transit system managed better than MTA/Muni...