out of 10, when there is a traffic back up, it is a bus that is not in its bus lane, in the middle of the traffic lane, and people are trying to get around the bus. being able to clear that up will help tremendously. i have taken the van ness buses many times over the years for many reasons. sometimes it is a commute to work. it was davis. some time he did make it in seven minutes and sometimes in 20. when you talk about transit reliability, while we are looking at a snapshot of van ness avenue, we also have to remember that the linkages -- the linkage is to a larger network. what we know about a writer ship is that people are willing to

ride transit if it guarantees reliability and certainty. the problem with the van ness bus is it is very uncertain. people who would normally -- normally, could take the bus to the opera house or city hall or other places are not going to rely on an unreliable mode of transportation. therefore, they drive, but i honestly believe you will see rare efficiencies, and i think there would be a lot of people willing to take it because they knew that there was 70 in the time, and then that connecting with the underground system that they could actually get to downtown and the like more quickly. it might even be better for some people than doing the express buses. i think we have to think about it in a larger, connected network. the larger network of how people are able to get to other places, particularly the opportunity to connect at van ness and market to so many other lines to get people from around the city, so i think that is really a great

achievement. i think that we obviously need to do a lot more education. there's a lot of people concerned about parking and the turn lane issue as well. i do agree that it is important to minimize turns for transit purposes, and i do think that a lot more people who are driving would come back to van ness. actually, if you are near lombard -- a lot of people start off on van ness, and it gets back up, and they turn off to get on the of the streets because it is just more congested that way. i look forward to after this project moves forward, looking at how it impacts traffic patterns in the area. that is another important distinction. obviously, we prefer to have a subway, but unfortunately, that is not in the cards for us here, i don't think. but i think this is really great

progress on this project. i am really optimistic to hear you say we might even be done by 2015 because that would put us on par with potentially when cpmc would be opened. but i will leave that to you all the figure out. >> we are working to the expert at the schedule as best we can. to clarify, i too would be a 26 opening. 2015 for the start of construction. commissioner borden: another question -- caltrans. how are they involved? i know they have to approve the project. are there anything -- >> it is like a separate process imbedded within the environment process. they have what is known as a project study report, which is their internal documentation for approving the project. we've been working through the different designs making sure it

is compatible. we will still need to continue to get approvals as we go throughout the process, but we have been in lockstep with them. they see it as part of the complete streets mandate, and we are trying to work with that to make them as comfortable as possible with something that is new ground for them. >> -- commissioner borden: i guess the other thing you could talk more about is i personally think the middle lane is the preferable alternative for achieving efficiency, but the concern, of course, is people crossing the street from the middle lane to get to the sides they need to be on. can you talk about with signaling or other things you are planning on doing with the pedestrian improvement, how that will impact people's ease of getting off the buses and crossing the street? >> certainly, there will be

pedestrian and audible signals, as i mentioned, at all intersections, but particular attention will be paid to the station locations. we know we will probably want to put some sort of -- hopefully aesthetically pleasing -- barrier where there is not the actual crossing some people are not running the cross traffic to try to catch the bus. commissioner borden: that happens all the time right now. >> correct. it is again a trade off. when it is on the side, have the time, you do not cross the street at all, and the other time, you are walking all the way across the street to go in a different direction. it is not a new thing. we certainly will be putting in a corner bu. one of the benefits is we are able to reduce the walking distance. again, not having that left turn signal phase just adds to the amount of time you can give to either the cross or through movement, allowing pedestrians to live at a slower speed to get all the way across -- to move at

a slower speed to get all the way across. commissioner borden: i see all the time that buses arrive at approximately the same time at an intersection, one going west and won going south, but there does not seem to be courtesy given from the bus drivers to ensure that -- i mean, a lot of people getting off a bus may want to get on the other bus -- what is the policy encouraging or getting the drivers to -- i mean, that is another issue that causes people to run across traffic. i do not know what the policy is within muni. >> i do not know if there is a policy specific to that. sydney for key crossruffs, the key rapid transit, there certainly would want to be some sort of emphasis on making this connections -- certainly for key crossing routes.

it is something we can look at and design, and if there is a policy to be looked at -- commissioner borden: i think it makes sense. to many times i see people running after buses because they have come off one to catch another, and the bus drivers ignore them, and it is just a bad scene and, again, discourages people from using transit. commisioner miguel: i would particularly like to thank tilly chan for her work. she knows how far back i go on it as well. in my mind, this was five years ago the only alternative because it was the only logic. it is the second choice. bart is the first choice. but it is not going to happen in my lifetime or probably my

grandchildren's lifetime, for that matter. i understand your elimination of stops and am fully in agreement with it. five blocks is pushing the envelope. i do not know if there is any way of playing with that one. the three works. there's no question on that purified, to me, is pushing the envelope a little bit. i'm pleased that you are able to work so well with caltran. at one time, that was literally impossible. but ever since they came to some agreement when the ball park went in south of market, when octavia boulevard went in, they realized that you do not operate freeways when they touched down in cities or go through cities

the same way you do in more open country. in the last 10 to 15 years, there has been a big change there. other than that, i look forward to moving along as quickly as possible. when google and matt quest and the little lady that resides in your car on your gps system tells you to take van nest -- when google and mapquest and the little lady that resides in your car on your gps system tells you to take van ness, she is wrong, but this could very well change that. i look forward to some changes there. i personally do not think it is going to have as much and have

on the streets east of van ness as it will on the streets west of it. that is something that is going to have to play out as people get used to the new system, but i have found it starts in at about three months, takes six months, and by a year, everyone knows where they are going. just look forward to that. commissioner wu: in response to some of the public comments, i do not believe that incremental changes can achieve the same efficiencies, and that also want to point out that on the small studs money, i did not believe it is transferable. i share the same concern about

the five blocks and a pedestrian safety. i appreciate seeing the pedestrian improvement and public realm is, i think, in the top three of criteria, but i think that the five blocs is really long. especially at broadway. broadway is in the middle of that five blocks. i know for sure there is a 200- unit senior housing building. i do not know if there are other senior housing buildings around there, but i know that a ninth critically. i would encourage the ta to look at the concentrations of senior housing and see what may be appropriate. i have the question about why not pass market, and that's may have been answered in the past, but why not south of market -- that may have been answered in the past, but why not south of market? >> the van ness brt has its own

utility, and that is where the two routes are running to get there. we know that the mission corridor is also a very important route, and the transit effectiveness project is looking at mission as one of its eight project level improvements as part of its environmental clearance. we know the 14 and 14l run along there, and there are a lot of additional considerations. commissioner wu: i understand the administrative constraints of the project, but i want to make sure the spot as to all the good will who are crossing going from the north side to the south side of the city. i think that is probably an important connector. and then, also wanted to ask and

encourage a ta to look at what the traffic impacts -- the only a left turn is on broadway, correct? broadway is already a very high- traffic street. there's a lot of pedestrian safety concerns. want to make sure that it is not creating more danger along broadway while improving van ness. ok, thank you. commissioner antonini: a couple of other items i wanted to mention. discussion about pedestrian safety is a really important one, and then ness is a really wide street, as we know. i do not know if you have explored the possibility of putting passageways under van ness. you only have, i think, seven stops, not counting market, which already has passageways. maybe eight if you count mission. while it would add to the cost,

and of course, you have to remove utility lines, which we have seen takes a while, but that would be a wonderful solution to allow pedestrians to move under the street, stop, come up at the median to board, or continue on to cross the street, or at least some of those at the heaviest intersections might make a lot of sense, since you are doing so much, cutting a trench and putting those in the makes sense. and i know you are coordinating this with the plans for the geary brt. while i think this bus rapid transit might work on van ness because it is such a broad street, but the idea that it is going to work on geary, i think it is such a small street in not see how that will work. i think that is where you will have to figure out a weighted funding. but because that brings us to

the question of what is going to happen at geary and van ness, if it is all above grade, the whole system might come to a grinding halt if he tried to have these lines fighting with each other. i encourage the work with other agencies to try to see if you can figure out a way to find funding to run at least a partial subway past then tested franklin or to laguna, and then you would have a broad street beyond that, and you have plenty of room for me in transportation -- median transportation. commissioner moore: i am concerned, picking up on it, and which resonates with me from commissioner gordon, that i think -- commissioner borden,

that i think a multi modal transportation system has to be in place in order to make this, which does not really elevate. we all know that the majority of transit lines in san francisco go east/west rather than north/south direction. we are all clear on that. my second point is picking up on commissioner wu's comment. i'm concerned we are choosing the worst street. i think there is another pattern by which perhaps one alternative needs to be looked at or needs to be put into two corridors.

trying to reinvent broadway, particularly with the waterfront lower part of broadway becoming more residential. the center part becoming more restaurant, quieted down, and then china town now having its own cohesive need to bridge across broadway for lots of people walking because the commercial activity of chinatown is really on the north and south side of broadway. i think we need to be very careful not to push highway one on to broadway. that is what i see happening. you will have the same group of people trying to turn onto van ness and going into lombard. i think there are major constraints we are causing, which i hope you are looking at

it as comprehensible way as possible. i am still interested to see that the original plan of then s as being a residential boulevard can still be realized in the way you were designing -- the original plan of van ness. so that the street itself creates a more residential boulevard. >> thank you. commissioners, if that is the last comment, we can -- commissioner fong: we will take

>> two elevated decks, one above the new rear addition, and one run above the rooftops. the third part of the projects is to reconfigure the existing two-unit building to a new two- unit building. two dr's were filed on the proposed project. concerns raised include privacy, light, air, noise, and smoke from the elevator debt. staff recommends the commission not take the dr and up through the project as revise -- and approve the project as revised.

commissioner fong: ok, first dr requestor? is it - standing there's one or are there still two? >> there's still two. >> good afternoon. my name is steve williams. the other request your are behind me. he had planned to represent himself, but a conflict arose, and he asked me to come down and represent he and his family. he has lived in the house immediately north of this site since 1973, so just under 40 years. what strikes me about this case is how valuable the process was in this case. how well it worked with this project. the neighbors pointed out that the project did not qualify as a

merger and that it was not slated for owner occupancy, and as a result, the merger application was withdrawn. the neighbors objected to the project, that it violated the height guidelines and other guidelines for the district, and the project was changed and altered so that the process in this particular instance really worked well, and the analysis that you have in front of you that puts in there that it should not have been presented to the commission under the pending dr policy -- that is just not so. in this case, the dr changed the project significantly so that the merger is no longer there. the roof deck has been completely changed, and the project has been amended and reduce. i send an e-mail out yesterday.

the other salient thing about this project is that it is still a merger. i sent you the quote from the project sponsor that is on their website where it says that his intention is to turn this building into a single-family home. even if he has to keep it as two units. i could put one bedroom units in the bottom, meaning back of the garage where there is not any currently habitable living space. making it really a single-family home with an au pair suite. the project is deliberately designed to circumvent the policies of the code, and it is not ambiguous. you have it directly from the developer himself. he states that that is his intent, is to circumvent the policies of the code and to create this smaller, undesirable

unit and the large, luxury unit. to me, that creates the exceptional and extraordinary circumstance, went a project sponsored's own words state that that is the purpose of the project -- when a project sponsor's own words state that that is the purpose of the project. the numbers have been crunched very creatively. you look at these units. they are large units. 1600, 1700 square feet. by the time they get down to eliminate all these other spaces that they eliminate, they are overestimating the size of the new units and the basement and underestimating the size of the existing units because these units are very large. the extension into the rear yard -- this lot is the only long lot on this block face, and it does have a profound effect on the

buildings around it, even though it is small. the pop out still is going to create a looming situation where none currently exists. can i have the overhead please? the rest of the houses on the block literally have a postage- stamp-type yard. they are very small, barely 20 feet in depth. none of these homes could create a situation that we have here now. the impact -- if you look at these dr applications, the photographs, this is perhaps the most dramatic. the new deck will extend 2/3 of the length of his entire yard. here's the link of his yard right here. this is the bottom of the debt.

please recall that there will be a three-foot guard above that. so this is the situation being created because of the unique and historic configuration of these lots. we urge you to deny the extension of the rear yard. thank you very much. commissioner fong: second dr requestor? >> commissioners, thank you for the opportunity for me to talk to it. this is my first time in the sort of situation. my name is michael kaiser. i am and immediately adjacent resident in 2806 union street. if we could switch to the powerpoint. thank you. i would like to present today some concerns we have regarding the roof that proposed for this development. first off, our experience has been somewhat frustrating in attempting to work with the

sponsors. we were very late in being notified of the process, and indeed, parts of it have turned out to be factually incorrect when we have received a communication from them. one thing i will point out right of the beginning as we are not on the second-floor. we are on the third floor of a five-story building on a hill. a second floor was used as an argument to claim that we were not relevant to the roof deck in question, which affects our privacy. the magenta or red color shows the proposed debt, and the blue gives you an idea of the existing debt. if you look at a view from our office/dining room area, of the apartment where i live for seven years, you could see the privacy and the proposed debt is rather significantly affected. additionally, it is not just in one room, but a close friends of the only window and open area, open space that we have coming into our unit. what we asked, because we realize in the spirit of

compromise that it might be difficult for us to ask that it not be constructed at all -- we ask it be shifted 10 feet to the west in order to minimize the in fact on privacy in both of our rooms in our unit. as you can see from the diagram, the majority of our living space is currently affected by the proposed debt in terms of privacy, nuisance, noise. indeed, the space i'm talking about is 440 square feet, which is indeed 17 square feet smaller than the proposed 457-square- foot roof deck we are talking about. these are our only major windows. additionally, in order to illustrate what the experience has been like for us, when we received -- well, when we came late to the process -- i was happening to the rest of the process has been good, but for us, we did not receive very early notification. when we communicated with the sponsors, i believe that is referred to as long and detailed communication, we had about

three to five e-mails, the brunt of which was the sketch sent to us by the designer, showing us the expected impact. when we looked the plans over, we found this was incorrect. you can see a top-down view on the slide, the red denoting the impact shown by the designer, but looking at the existing landmarks, you can see the actual impact is significantly larger. when you go back to the view of privacy affected, we were basically shown a diagram that was not correct. i realize the it is easy to get these things wrong, but this was indicative of our experience. the deck is inconsistent with guidelines based on our understanding. we ask that it be size consistently with others on this block. roof decks are typically in the 350-square-foot size on this block. this one is much larger. guidelines are actually even more explicit.

this section here about the roof construction greatly affect the neighborhood character as perceive from high locations, which was ours, is fromadditione appeals board -- a point out the problem with irritation, noise and smell from ruth? . this is something we are concerned about -- smell from a roof decks. the designer's work perhaps with some neighbors but we were very surprised by this. they have not worked in any way is with us. there was a sideline analysis done for units about 80 feet away or more. we're closer than that and the sideline was done. contrary to statements from the designer -- we're not sure who we can talk to, thus we