street parking. they were going to look into the no left turn sign, yet nothing has been done about it. what are you going to do about it? when are you going to do about it, ok? >> my name is martin robinson. i am a merchant at third and peru. i want to echo the comments that mr. walker has made. it appears to be false promises that have been made by this agency about construction of the light rail. they were going to assist some of the merchants who were impeded by the construction phase. not one merchant receive 15 cents from this agency. in addition to that, we are dealing with the social plight and the economic blight that the city and county has not addressed through the redevelopment agency. your agency is part of that because you are riding the rails

through the third street corridor. in addition to that, when you come for the approval of the rail going from king street to bay shore and the visitation valley, you came with the promise of jobs. the only jobs received were flat positions for the residents of the neighborhood. it is really making a statement that false promises to get a project approved and cosigned through the community -- it never works out to be the things of the past. we do not have the jobs. we have disturbance, we have social blight, and all the folks blighted do not affect the mta, but it does affect the residents. comments made before me about the off street parking. we have parallel parking on all the side streets. we have the problems with three lanes going southbound and northbound. we had two lanes and with the bus stop, there is one lane. any time a coach bus stops, there is one lane. you have impacted the neighborhood but not brought any

solutions with that. >> good afternoon. i want to say that it was a very touching, sensitive, and wonderful presentation, and i watched on line when you honored that cabdriver, i acknowledge you did honor a cabdriver, and i hope you can do it at least once every three months. it was very touching. i am almost as excited as when i woke up this morning and heard that carson polymer will be joining us in the bay area. the exciting new system here that he is a very nice person. also to say that i am still

positive and hopeful and optimistic that ed will be ramos great things for the organization. -- that ed reiskin will do great things for the organization. also, he speaks extemporaneously sometimes. he does not read from a script. i want to stress that because it shows he wants to talk with you and to you, not at you. thank you. next, i heard there was a proposal to do a trial. they want to take a way a lane going in-bound to downtown during rush hour. not a good thing. they want to do this trial. it is going to hurt cab service in the evening hours. i appreciate that you ask questions about it before they do this. this would be horrible for cad service. also, i urge you to watch the hearing that was held at the board of supervisors last thursday. i cannot remember which committee, but go online and look at the hearing about the

credit card issue. i urge you sooner than later to take on the topic before it goes to the board of supervisors and it will most likely pass. please deal with the issue. the drivers got this meter increase, but it does not offset the enormous cost of having to deal with these credit-card charges. thank you for your time. good afternoon >>, directors. -- >> good afternoon, directors. the taxi advisory council was established to oversee the taxi medallion sales pilot program and also to advise the mta board of directors, primarily on the progress of that program. since being formed, it has first of all given a preliminary

endorsement supporting the pilot sales program. second, we produced a formal report through the chairman of the taxi advisory council, once again supporting the pilot sales program, and finally, we have given -- at the last meeting, we gave a recommendation, encouraging the mta board to immediately reopen -- create a window for potential sellers that qualified under the disability requirements. we also recommended expanding that age limit from 70 to 60. i want to -- i am year primarily to emphasize to the board the importance of acting on these recommendations as quickly as possible because the program has been incredibly successful. it has given an exit to elderly medallion holders.

it has created an opportunity for new medallion holders to invest and buy into this industry, and we are running out of sellers right now, even though we have over 1000 people who would be happy to purchase medallions and people who would love to be able to sell them, the opportunity has been closed. so please consider reopening that. my times >> started. i have not said anything yet. i have been with yellow cab 23 years. this is my 2011 survey right here, board members. i sponsored specifically for hearings, by the way. you have the 2009 and 2010 crop is, but i see they are not quite complete.

the bottom line is cut a little short, and you might need a new copy of those. it cost me about $35 to produce, by the way. it takes me about six hours to catalog them. takes me about four hours to take them together and two hours to cut it. two months to serve a 1000 customers and one of five minutes to fill out a survey appeared readily given, i get a 93% return rate. i would like to thank each and every customer who put up with me during that time, especially the ones who get carsick. even if -- if anyone has any questions, you cannot ask me now, i guess, but you can e-mail me. i would love to answer any questions you may have. the history of the taxi commission is very disturbing. they never included my survey or reports, by the way, in their hearings or their profits,

except for one year. in your august 2 better practices report, there is no mention of either. it mentions something about staff review of available relevant data. i believe this is relevant data. it goes on to mention the taxi survey. i think staff is biased. i think it is withholding pertinent data. how can that be? i like to know if the hired consultant is aware of the existence of this data or previous data, it takes $1,000 to create what is already -- how many thousands of dollars does it take to create what has already been completed, not counting the two years of time it takes? can customers wait? can the public before redundancy? thank you. next speaker director nolan:

please. -- director nolan: thank you. next speaker. >> now, we go back to the story. it taxes director, as we talked about in the previous different meeting, she went with-cab company with the president to canada, and she was slammed with a credit card charge. now, going to that credit card, driver's are putting in the cabs a message that cash is preferred. it is a continuous fight going on. and 32-year-old cabdriver coming

to work every day for 32 years. she has a dispute with one of the customers, and she was fired for not accepting the credit card. that 32-year job gone in minutes. going further, after the drivers' protest, we were put into town hall meetings. 36 hours of town hall meetings, six days, six hours each day. when they tried to stop us from speaking the truth, what happened? the report came against her. they find an outside consultant, and that consultant is now preparing a report, which can sue them and the people presented to that consultant were single people who have no

clue, but they are a friend of hers. we asked this to be addressed as soon as possible. drivers are furious, but said, and we would like you to take a look at it. thank you. then a good afternoon, directors. -- >> good afternoon, directors. i also urge you to bring the taxi medallion issue back on to the front burner. there is an important safety issue that the program was intended to solve, which it did very well, but it is starting to reemerge. for instance, we had a very long time driver -- i believe he was a veteran of about 50 years. we love this guy, and we really really want him to have an option to do something other than to just keep plugging away into his 80's. similarly, some inequities have arisen. i am aware, for instance, of a

relatively young medallion holder with a hip problem. in process, i hope to secure his family's future. we had an 80-year-old medallion holder who came down with cancer shortly after the sign up ended. she died a few months later. her family gets nothing. my understanding is that the sellers pool has been completely exhausted at this point. you have now over 1000 willing buyers. you have many people who would love to sell, and yet, there is just kind of a hiatus. i would urge you to, even if you have not decided what you want to do long term, at least continue the program and that had been working reasonably well these last couple of years. if nothing else, on a case by case basis allow some of the potential sellers to move

through the system. thank you. >> i am the executive director and ceo of two cat litter boxes. i am also a member of the taxi advisory council. all of us are concerned that our recommendations are not being communicated to you. we have four-hour meetings and then, for whatever reason, the resolutions are not going forward. when we passed at our most recent meeting, as people have said, is to reopen the sales application process to people aged 60 and above him have medallions or who are disabled. it is time sensitive because we have run out of sellers. the estimation is that 300 people will apply if you do this. there is a big public safety problem. eight years ago, there was a $14 million accident.

it was a person who got his medallion as a senior citizen, which shows the printing mechanism is 4 to begin with. the gentleman was striving against his will. he has since sold his medallion under the sales program, but currently, there are scores of drivers who want to sell, and there are 1400 people willing to buy and who are being forced to drive, and they put in 10-hour shifts. conditions are ripe for this to happen again. i believe the city's attorneys office advise staff that you can do this as a policy tweak as opposed to the transportation legislation because you already have a pilot authorizing this. so i hope you do this at your next meeting. thank you very much.

>> the last person to turn it speaker card under public comment. >> good afternoon, directors. i just want to echo what dan and charles and karl said. i am also a member of the taxi advisory council. it is baffling that we are at the very end of this pilot program and yet, you have not even been approached with what we're going to do in the future regarding the sales program. i would advise that you take this up as quickly as he possibly can and find out the reasons why it has not been presented to you in spite of both segments taking the advisory committee to this point. thank you very much. >> moving on to consent calendar, these items are considered to be routine and will be acted upon by a single vote unless a member of the border the public wish to have an items considered separately. you have a request that item

10.4 be severed from the consent calendar and that those are the only -- that is the only item. director nolan: the consent calendar minus 10.4. >> 0.4, approving traffic regulations on the muni vehicles. would you like to hear from the public? ok. [reading names] >> good afternoon. i do not support this proposed conversion. i have requested that the board removed it. my neighbors, both business and

residents, do not support this proposal. the lower merchants association does not support this proposal. there are no studies to support any benefits to the proposed changes. these proposed changes are a stab in the dark as to whether or not they will improve efficiency. i think they will not. it certainly will not improve service. it will essentially eliminate numbers 6 and 71 service by eliminating five bus stops within the neighborhood. this plan allows for one bus stop eastbound between buchanan and hai streetght and van ness and market street. it would be at a very dangerous intersection. the proposal would funnel all muni-bound pedestrian traffic from the hayes valley into this dangerous intersection. this is an ill-conceived and

poorly planned project. it is a waste of taxpayers' dollars. millions of dollars. i truly believe that the m.t.a. board needs to be the voice of reason and vote no on this project. director nolan: thank you, sir. next speaker. >> good afternoon, members of the board and chairman. i am its business owner. -- i am a business owner. and you're sort a longtime resident of san francisco, going on 35 years. i do not have a car. i take my bike everywhere and i have a clipper card in my pocket. i am concerned about the project because i do think it draws an unfair burden of traffic on to haight street. the activity of --, with which i am very familiar, has created a lot of traffic -- the octavia project. i think adding additional bus

traffic and an additional lane both west and east bound is going to be even more confusing for the amount of people that come into the city using that exit. it also takes away metered parking. i know that the plan has a net increase of two parking spaces. it could be three. but that is not on our street. that is somewhere else. right now, where do i stop to unload my groceries without being in an opposite direction of oncoming traffic for a bus? they eliminate every single bit of parking on the south side of the street. the businesses -- 100% of the businesses on those blocks are in opposition of this. even more important to that, i posted a flier on the corner and had 120 of my neighbors stop by my front door and knock on it to say they would like to sign the petition so that the board of mta knows that we do not support this. we have tried to engage the folks at mta, and they have been

very good about this, but the grants for the project is limited. it is very limited in scope. we want to work on it. we are not opposed to two-wide bus traffic, but the way the plan as outlined does not solve those plans. what we are asking again is a little more reason about why things are done this way or maybe even the community involvement. i heard someone say -- and i will finish up, i promise -- i heard a very good friend of mine say the other day that a well thought out plan of a bad idea is still a bad idea. in this case, it kind of is. we want to support mta and the project, but we want to do it in a way that is right for all of us that have to live and work here. thank you. >> [reading names] >> good afternoon. thank you, board members, for listening to all of us.

i am here representing jews for jesus. we have property, and we will be impact on two blocks that will be impacted by the change. we are in opposition to the plan. for any number of reasons. i have submitted an e-mail to the board outlining two and a half pages of opposition. our primary concern has to do with the safety at octavia and haight street. we think the impact at both in the sections will decrease safety. we think it is going to increase congestion at both intersections. we are also concerned about the loss of parking. we think that is going to adversely affect our neighbors across the street, and we are deeply concerned for them.

we are not opposed to change. we just think the plan is still- conceived and has been from the beginning. we would like to see it continue at the best at this point and have more things looked at. the intersection at golf and haight it will be negatively impacted. -- and market will be negatively impacted. >> good afternoon. i am a resident in the first block of haight. i would like to state again my opposition to this plan. i live with my family, but i was

raised in the house and our families are the property there for almost 60 years. to funnel more traffic and commuters and chaos into the immediate area is a dangerous prospect for anyone. our streets are dangerous. octavia boulevard, market street, golf street -- they are all filled with, you know, commuters and, you know, our share of really dangerous accidents. when accidents happen in our neighborhood, they are of a monumental danger. someone died just in july in our neighborhood, due to the traffic in our area. i want to say that we are in

opposition because -- only since april have the neighbors in our area been involved in the talks. i sense that -- i think that saying that the neighborhood association and special interest groups are on board with this plan is to disregard the people that live and work in this area. we are the ones that will bear the brunt of all the chaos of traffic running a bus down our block. i live on the south side of the block where they are going to remove all of the parking. what do i do when i cannot even let my family out in front of our own house or unload my groceries? i think it is a poorly conceived plan, and i thank you for your time, yet again.

>> i am surprised you said windy because my friends call me when the because they do not think i will ever grow up. i live in the neighborhood. at every meeting, i have said that there will be blood on your hands. that is because this is a wrong idea that has funding already approved for it. i am a bicyclist. i am a pedestrian. i live in the neighborhood, and i know this is a bad idea. for 27 years that i have lived in san francisco, the buses have never had a problem turning on page street and laguna. the only reason there are costs -- the only reason there are time costs that will be shaved off of the changes that you are proposing is because you are taking four stocks offer of this

line. in addition to that, you are serving less people in the community. we have group housing because of the central freeway coming down. they are bringing even more people into our neighborhood. and you are removing in a southerly fashion the bus route by a blocked. there are not only disabled, elderly, getting elderly, and regular people in our neighborhood. please reconsider this plan. do not go forth. keep the bus on page. do not make haight street two ways on this block. you will not see an increase except only in dangerous and litigate behavior by the people

that are injured by your actions. thank you. >> ms. riley? nope. charles. followed by barry toronto and then tom. >> good afternoon. i have lived in the neighborhood we're talking about now for 11 years, and i appreciate the opportunity to tell you that the reason why i believe the project should not go forward. i understand that there is a hope held out -- in the "exam and a" today, one of the writers wrote that this would save one or three minutes of time, and as mentioned, we do not believe that is even close to being accurate, and most of the benefits that would be perceived would come about by

making some immediate changes right now. i just looked at what is being proposed, and i believe that it is not right and not fair for the neighborhoods. i am will not dwell on the past and previous meetings that have been held, but i want to talk about what is being proposed. in order to try to get bus traffic through an area that is now being overwhelmed by traffic in the morning due to the freeway coming down in the on ramp to 101, they're talking about two things. one, they're talking about putting a bus ride down the middle of the street. there is no other part of the street that has that with the exception of one block away with the extension is. imagine to lanes which a bus -- lay in a switch a bus between two lands of cars. can it be done? yes. can it be done safely? i do not believe you can have cars going by on either side with traffic going in a bus in the middle.

it seems like a relief or way of doing it. as bad as it is, they're talking about making it look like a landing strip with a rather large red striking down the center. they are also talking about removing all the parking from the right side of hai streetsg. ht imagine the poor people living on that side. there's no chance that they will be able to do this. this really goes against the ideas that are promoted by things like the better neighborhood, the level san francisco, so i just ask you -- please do not put this forward. please do not allow two-way traffic on haight street. >> good afternoon. i can specifically for this agenda item. it leaves out taxes. why