>> chair peskin: good morning and welcome to the san francisco county transportation authority meeting for today, tuesday, march 19. our clerk is mr. alberta quintanilla. mr. quintanilla, could you please call the roll.

[roll call] >> clerk: we have quorum. >> chair peskin: thank you, mr. quintanilla. colleagues, we will be joined a little late by commissioners. fewer and stefani. could we have a motion to excuse those two commissioners for the first part of the meeting? made by commissioner mandelman, seconded by commissioner yee. and we will take that without objection. i also want to note that at 10:30, commissioner walton will have to leave. by that time, the other two commissioners will have arrived. mr. quintanilla, can you call

the next item. [agenda item read]. >> chair peskin: commissioners, we've gotten off to a bad start of the year with eight fatalities of our street in 2019. this morning, i got terrible news that in district three, a crash happened between a vehicle and a bicycle. the individual's in stable condition, but it was just a really bad start for that person and this commissioner this mornings. i want to share a few highlights from the vision zero meeting last week. the 2018 traffic fatality report showed 23 fatalities, of which 18 were lost on foot and bicycle. in 2018, pedestrians accounted

for 53% of traffic fatalities, in which 52% were in communities of concern, and 73% were people age 50 or older. we heard from commissioner fewer about the loss of two pedestrians in her district, and we also heard from the police department will the shortage of officers and motorcycle units in the traffic division, a troubling trend of hit and runs which the p.d. is actively investigating. colleagues, if there is one spot we can bolster the sfpd, it is in the motorcycle unit.

it was good to see the fifth to sixth street protected lanes going in on howard last weekend as called for by commissioner haney, and sorry for the tragedy in your district. here, chair yee called for stock in how we implemented the coming two-year action strategy and what we can do in places where we are behind.

commissioner -- >> m.t.c., of course, is also under going a big planning process with plan bay area. they have been holding public meetings on the topic, including one tonight at the san bruno tanferan mall from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. that's the one that's closest

to us. there are a few others in the area. for folks interested, please weigh in, and we will also be weighing in with them in the next few months. this will lead to the updated plan bay area and updated county wide plan, which is our san francisco blueprint for investment in the 25-year period. 22 miles of express lane, basically, the portion of 101 from whiple avenue in redwood city to the airport. it would add a new carpool lane in each direction. if you are not a carpool, you

would pay a fee to use that area. it would generate some much needed funding. the project costs over half a billion dollars, but it did receive some funding from our senate 1 gas tax, as well as 50 million in funding from employers in the provide -- private sector. the climate emergency directive, we were appreciative to see came out of the land use and transportation committee. we will be supporting s.f. environment and your offices to demonstrate what it is we're doing to plan for climate and resilience policy as well as supporting initiatives that

would come out of that, whether it's investment in policy and the like, so we'll ensure that our long range transportation planning efforts are well planned to accomplish our climate goals. the vision zero committee, of course, chairman mentioned that, and we will be coordinating going forward in the next several meetings to really track the vision strategy, as well as chair yee mentioned, a last back to see how well we've been doing over the last few strategy updates. the county wide plan and direct s.f. does have a streets program, and director reiskin have focused on making sure we

achieve that. i think deliveries and goods movement is very much coming to the fore for all of us. on project delivery, you'll note that the better market street has released its draft environmental market report. we've been working in conjunction to support s.f. planning. the better market street project will propose improvement from octavia to the embarcadero. it's a whole host of improvements for each and every mode, particularly making sure we have a dedicated cycling

track, but address being all of the dated infrastructure. so we will be having an april 9, i think, board meeting-presentation from the board manager. i lock forward to having her here and briefing you all. we did have a happy moment for the ground breaking on the geary project. i want to thank commissioner yee and commissioner brown and thank all the departments for the ground breaking. this will improve safety and reliability for those that ride the geary rapid. we're looking forward to the whole improvement coming together in the next couple of

years. on march 13, we hosted 50 companies and agencies, our annual event to improve coordination and present opportunities for contracting, brought together firms with primes and contractors to learn about the upcoming projects. we continue to track our d.b.e. performance throughout the year, as well. thank you. >> chair peskin: thank you. is there anyone that would like to address the director's report? are there any commissioner comments or questions? seeing none, comment is closed. mr. quintanilla, could you please read the next item. [agenda item read]. >> chair peskin: is there any public comment on item number

four, the minutes of march 12, 2019. seeing none, public comment is closed. is there a motion to move the minutes? motion by commissioner brown, and a second. roll call, please. [roll call] >> clerk: we have final approval. >> chair peskin: thank you, next item, please. >> clerk: item 11, item first approved at the vision zero committee meeting. vision zero legislative update, this is an action item. >> chair peskin: okay. this item was considered by the vision zero committee and recommended to the commission. is there any public comment on

this item? seeing none, public comment is closed. is there a motion to move this? made by commissioner brown, seconded by commissioner walton, and on that item, same house, same call, we have final approval. next item, please. >> clerk: item 12, progress report for the vanness avenue bus rapid transit item. >> chair peskin: mr. gabancho, the floor is yours. 27% complete. >> good morning, chairman peskin, commissioners. i'm the project manager on the

vanness improvement project. the core of the vanness improvement project is san francisco's first rapid transit project. the majority of the project work is utility work. we're currently in the process of replacing and overhauling domestic water lines and sewer lines that date back to the 18 -- late 1800's, as well as portions of the emergency firefighting high pressure water system that was installed shortly after the 1906 earthquake. the goal is to minimize potential service outages, allow for growth along the corridor and improve the survivability of the infrastructure in case of a natural disaster such as an earthquake. we're making civic improvements from corridor line to corridor line, we're rebuilding the

entire street. the vanness b.r.t. will serve as the center of the rap-- spi of the network. at the end of the project, we expect to realize a 32% improvement in travel time, improvement in reliability up to 50%. we expect to carry 35 more passengers, all the while saving money in the improved routes along vanness avenue. for those authorize not entirely familiar with the concepts, the first is the

transit only lanes. they'll be colored red to improve visibility and awareness and they have been legislated for use by muni, golden gate vehicles, and transit vehicles only. the traffic signals are being retimed to prioritize north-south traffic and being given traffic signal priority so that our buses can move fore smoothly up and down the transit lanes. in addition to that, we're implementing a number of pedestrian improvements, including lighting and use -- and new striping -- crosswalk striping and pedestrians bulb out, which will contribute to meeting our vision zero goals. another significant change along vanness avenue is the removal -- the permanent

removal of all left-turn lanes except at lombard and broadway. this change has been made to improve safety for people walking along the corridor, facilitate easing traffic congestion. secondary poles to be installed in the civic center historic district has a modern pedestrian light and street lamp and has been designed to

meet the department -- or the secretary of the interior's standards for federal landmark historic districts. the construction is now 28% complete: the updated percent calculation for project completion as of february 2019 is based on expenditures but excludes administrative items and items driven by unforeseen site conditions. the current project schedule is shown on the darker lines. it actuals the actualized schedule. the lower line called the baseline schedule. the project is currently running 564 days behind schedule as of the february 2019 report. it assumes additional time --

this assumes additional time for the installation of road base that we have -- that we have discovered was in poor condition or missing, and has resequenced the existing overall condition. the utility phase is the longest phase of the project and so far as where we have encountered the most delays in unforeseen site conditions. on this slide, we show vanness avenue with mission street on the far left and lombard on the far right. face 1-a which we are in the process of completing right -- phase 1-a, which we are in the process of completing right now

is expected to wrap up in the next couple of months. physician b which was started in the summer 2018 is expected to wrap up this coming summer. phase c will be beginning in the summer of this year and finishing in the spring 2020, and phase 1-d is expected to start in the summer 2020. >> chair peskin: peter, can you help us out in phases 1 a through 1-d? are these different colors? different intersections? >> so at the very top, we show phase 1-a, and that was different construction headings. we had eight blocks at the north end of the corridor, and eight blocks at the east end of the corridor. as the utility work finished in those zones, we expanded into phase 1-b, which was

immediately south of the original two construction areas and began doing water and sewer work in those areas. as that phase completes its work, the work should be shifted over to the opposite side of the street. south of sutter street, it means we'll be moving from the west side of the street to the east, and on the far north of the corridor, we'll be moving from the east side of the street to the west, to do the same sort of sewer work we've been doing previously. the -- these have numerous causes for delays. we had a very wet winter in the year, the winter of 2016 and 2017. we lost a lot of days this year due to rain, as well. we had a number of abandoned -- of unforeseen site conditions, such as abandoned utilities

that were not shown on any of our drawings, as well as under ground structures, rocks, tree roots, that proved more difficult to move or work around than anticipated. we've been working to address those conditions with a contractor through advanced potholing, in other words digging where we might find trouble and the use of ground penetrating radar to dig down and state ahead of the construction. >> chair peskin: and you indicated last meeting, you were going to try to makeup for lost time. has there been any progress in that direction? >> there has been some progress. the current delay of 1 -- 564 days is at or about where it was last time i was here. the reason we haven't shown more progress on that is we

discovered -- let me see -- without getting too far into the weeds, when we began working on vanness avenue, we discovered it had a three-inch asphalt layers over a ten-inch concrete base. when we started to do the work there was no concrete. >> chair peskin: so 3 inches of asphalt over dirt? >> no. what we discovered is there was 8 inches of asphalt over dirt. we discovered that when we do the work, we want to put in the concrete. short of having to add that work to our construction schedule, we would have shown a

greater recovery of the schedule. >> chair peskin: so when we did our original potholing, how come we didn't realize we didn't hit concrete? >> when we did our original potholing, we did it in the parking lanes, and the parking lanes had concrete under them. as a matter of fact, it was fairly late in the process because a lot of the utility work went in the parking lanes, as well. when we moved out of the parking lanes and started moving into the traffic lanes, we discovered there was no concrete. that was the situation. we've talked to caltrans about it, and they don't have the standard of having the concrete road base, so the city has been

working on our own to try to move this forward and get a more permanent fix in. once we get the utility wrapped up, we'll be working on the median in the center of the street. that's what we call phase two, which we'll be getting into late next year -- no, late this year, excuse me. we'll be getting into late this year, in the winter of 2019-2020, and it's expected to take about a year. we as wrap up the new bus running ways and the new median on the street, we'll be running a lot of the new lines and finishing the pedestrian bulb outs or accessibility ramps

along the corridor, and that will be the last work that we do before we go into revenue service. we're working to accelerate the work wherever possible. we are working with a contractor to go to six to seven days of strategic work so we can accelerate some of the work, for example, this additional road work that we didn't anticipate having to do, as well as bringing on additional crews to accelerate targeted work and try to recover time on the project. to date, we've made out just shy of $72 million, to pay period of the current month, we've paid out $2.1 million.

the current contract amount stand at $2,273,000. total project budget is $309.4 million. the contractor has filed certified claims against the project. we're very close and anticipate having contract motion deniedsp those claims. we're working together to put together numbers on their claims. we've also established a dispute resolution board to facilitate negotiations in the event that there are future

claims. >> chair peskin: and that is walsh? >> that's walsh. we've -- the sfmta is committed to helping businesses through the construction project. we have a vanness business advisory committee with businesses along the length of the corridor. we meet monthly with them so we can provide them information about ongoing construction activity and work with them to address the concerns of specific businesses. the project staff is working actively to address specific needs such as construction site house keeping and custom signage. we're working with sfpd to provide additional controls along vanness avenue to try to discourage vandalism and graffiti as well as break-ins. we are working with the office of economic security and workforce development to help

provide vanness with services and individual attention. the division is provide a reporting metric to share progress on these efforts. there are more than 250 businesses that -- operating along vanness avenue between lombard and mission street. when the sfmta hears about a business that is closed or needs support, when we hear about businesses close, we try to ascertain the reasons for the closing. when we heard about a business that needs support, we put them in touch with the office of economic and workforce development. the businesses are invited to participate in a program to assist them. of the businesses that we found out that have been -- are having trouble and have participated in the program, only one of those has closed.

there's four other businesses that has closed along the corridor since construction started. two of them, we're -- we know closed for reasons other than construction, and the other two, we are ascertaining what the situation was. >> chair peskin: so out of these businesses, it sounds like three of them arguably has closed because of construction impacts. is that a fair statement? >> the three where we cannot rule out the construction impacts as contributing to their closing. >> chair peskin: and then, would it be fair to say there are ten others that are

extremely stressed? >> there are ten other businesses along the corridor that have come to us with concern that we have referred to the office of economic and workforce development to see what kind of support we can provide and what we can do to minimize any impacts on them. >> chair peskin: so i'll make sure that this is something that all of us on this commission and everyone is engaged in. we did appropriate $5 million of the m.t.a.'s $38 million eraf shift for severely impacted businesses from city work of which holy moly, it would seem like these businesses qualify for. so let's not take too long in analyzing how we are going to get that money out the door and help those folks. commissioner fewer? >> supervisor fewer: thank you

very much, chair. >> supervisor fewer: so i think the chart of what you just showed us is really inadequate of we need to get an idea of what's happening along the corridor. i would like a report on the status of the small businesses along the corridor where the construction work is being done. what i would like to see is an estimated loss of revenue due to the construction. also, the estimated cost -- loss of revenue they think they might be projected since this project now is two years -- or is it 500 and something days that you just said delayed in the project? so for us to look at a chart that is so simplistic, i actually think it doesn't give us enough information about what is the state of business along the vanness retire

corridor. we can outreach and say, hey, how are your businesses, but perhaps if we dig deeper and we talk to all the small businesses along that corridor, and we tell them that this is going to happen for another two years, what that response might be? i actually think $5 million is not going to be enough to keep these small businesses afloat. and then, also, these small businesses will have to deal with also possible rent increases every time there is a transit upgrade, there is always a rental increase that is involved, too. so these people are getting a double whammy. so i am requested through the chair that the next meeting we

be brought a report on the small businesses, their economic viability, not just what's projected now, but for the next two years since it's anticipated we'll be in construction the next two years. thank you very much. >> chair peskin: mr. chang, our next meeting is april the 10. does that seem like a period of time that you can, maybe in conjunction with oewd -- miss mccarthy, come on forward. >> we'll have to work with oewd to define exactly what is a small business and so on and so forth, so it will take a little bit of legwork. i hope that we'll be able to meet the april 10. perhaps a little more time will be helpful, but we'll do our best. we're already aggressively working on addressing this issue, so we appreciate your concern, supervisor, and commissioner, in this role. we're working on developing

metrics with oewd currently, so this is in support of that effort, so we'll work on getting that to you as soon as possible. thanks. >> chair peskin: thank you, kate, and maybe one thing we can do is just continue this item to the next meeting, and if not, we'll continue it to after that. commissioner fewer, are you finished? >> supervisor fewer: well, i also would like just to add about the budget schedule and funding plan, but if that's not up yet, i will keep my comments until we open up a discussion about that category. thank you. >> chair peskin: commissioner safai? >> supervisor safai: yes. thank you.

. >> these are the ten that came forward and said we would like some help, we would like to participate in this program. >> supervisor safai: so one of the things that could be helpful is every business in the city is required to put their gross receipts forward, and maybe one of the things is to look back over the last five

years of gross receipts of these businesses and then look at the two years that the construction's been happening. when i was working with the p.u.c. on a project that they replaced the sewer in sunnydale, that was what we asked the small businesses to do. we asked them to come forward with their gross receipts and their overall revenue, and they were able to demonstrate with certainty how many impact the construction project had on their business. supervisor's fewer is correct that that's not enough for all the projects that we're having over the city, but the impact that it can have to help keep some of these businesses afloat in the short run might be something that we have to come back and revisit. that's why i think we pushed so forward for this first initial step. this project is significant in its scope and length and its size, and it's been extended

significantly because of the underground was not what was anticipated. i think there needs to be an opportunity for some of the small businesses to come forward here in this chamber at a particular item. if the chair wanted to entertain that just for the businesses that are impacted along the corridor to come in and talk about the impact the project has had on their businesses. i think ten is a standard, but i would have to imagine that there's a lot more than ten businesses on that corridor that have been impacted adversely on that project. thank you. >> chair peskin: commissioner brown? >> supervisor brown: thank you. one side of that corridor is my

district. i think the communication with the district supervisors, myself, and supervisor haney on vanness is to give us that information with, you know, who these businesses are, because i have to tell you, i started the walk to talk to them, i didn't even get two blocks in two hours with the complaints. so you know, everyone's complaining, everyone is saying their business is down. so i also talked to them about opening their books, if they would be willing to open up their books to really demonstrate to the city that their business has been down in this construction, and there wasn't one person that said yeah, i won't do that. so i definitely feel that this is impacting. for us to go longer, i'm afraid that a lot of those are going

to disappear, and what happens with those sites, they're going to be a lot more expensive for the rentals. so we're kind of wiping out a lot of small businesses by these projects. i know we have to do these infrastructure projects. i understand that, but right now, i am under siege in my district, and i definitely feel the money we put aside is not going to be enough. i also have haight street that is under going a several-year project. so when i'm going out to all of, you know, my commercial corridors, talking about legislation that we're doing, all the legislation for small business, they're like, well, what is happening now for the construction project? most merchants are very willing

to open up their books to show the impacts that it's having on their businesses. i feel like advisory

committee. we're actually accepting applications for those through march 29. and those applications are available at sfmta.com/vanness, and we have our business advisory committee meeting this thursday at sfmta at 1 south vanness on the third floor. and i encourage businesses who are looking for support to attend that meeting. the businesses are representative of other businesses on the corridor. and we work proactively every month. >> chair peskin: and miss mccarthy, you have a physical location. >> yes. and that's in addition to our 24-7 hotline that we have. >> chair peskin: and if it is the will of this body, which i

think it will be to have this hearing on april 23, we would be delighted if you would let the 250-plus businesses as well as any residents who are interested, if you could inform them that we'll have that hearing and we would very much like to hear from that directly. >> very good. thank you so much. >> chair peskin: thank you. commissioner fewer? >> supervisor fewer: i just had some questions about the budget and funding plan. i was reading here the original 2018 start date has been revised to late 2021, but i am looking at the shortfall, and it looks as though we have a shortfall of 9.8 million in funding need, is that correct? what is the total shortfall for this project? >> let me go back -- is this the slide you're talking about?

>> supervisor fewer: you know, i'm so sorry that i arrived late, yeah. so can you just explain to me the total? i'm just worried about the total shortfall of the entire program. >> at this time, i don't believe we have a shortfall on this project. >> supervisor fewer: so then, i have a question about in the report, and i'm looking at page 104 here, and it just says that funding plan is unchanged, sfmta intends to address this funding gap during its next capital improvement plan update, meanwhile, they're seeking additional sources of funds and considering deferring

unanticipated projects until towards the end of the construction. after the vanness b.r.t. done, the geary b.r.t. project is next in the cue, is that correct? >> yes. >> supervisor fewer: so everything we've mentioned today is really terrifying every one of my small business merchants along the geary corridor. they're holding regular meetings about this and freaking on, and rightly so. what i'm concerns about is that if there is an additional funding need for the vanness b.r.t., i would not like it to be taken from the project they will be anticipating doing in 2021, which is starting the geary b.r.t. i just want to put that on the

record. and -- and thank you very much. >> chair peskin: thank you, commissioner. commissioner mandelman? >> supervisor mandelman: thank you, mr. chair. i am -- having heard all of the conversations about the vanness b.r.t. project, i will say of all the things that make san franciscans worry about their local government, the mess on vanness is not on the top of their list, but it's probably three or four. and you know, thinking about a two-year delay in a project that was already very long -- and i guess i'm -- and i may just need this refresher because i am new here, but it seems as though the way that project is laid out, extending

from end to end for the entire duration of the project maximizes disruption for everyone along the corridor for the entire period of the project. and so i'm wondering if you can just educate me a little bit about why it was necessary to do it in this way, where we have shut -- sort of impacted the entire corridor all at the same time, rather than breaking it up into phases -- there are phases, but they're not visible either to the users or the users trying to get around on vanness. why was that not feasible in the hindsight, would it have made sense to break this project up into only portions of vanness at a time? >> during the planning stages of the project, we looked at a lot of different ways to

sequence the construction. this plan that we're currently implementing where we have different construction headings staggered along the length of the corridor, it was meant to maximize the speed of the construction while minimizing or distributing the impact. we looked at having more concentrated construction in specific areas of the corridor, but for example, now, regardless of where we are and just for the example of parking, regardless of where we are in construction, we're maintaining some street parking at every location along the corridor. we have significant impacts on the sidewalks and the parking on both sides of the street for -- for weeks at a time or months at a time, the idea of the sequence that we ended up using was that it was a lower

level of pain spread out over the entire area. we looked at some radical approaches to the construction, but the wall we kept hitting is vanness is a really busy corridor. it's part of state highway 101, and it's a major connector between the two bridges in the city, and we simply couldn't figure out where to put the traffic. if we ended up shutting down a lane or diverting traffic for those three or four blocks, we had nowhere to put the traffic. so we worked with the contractor to develop this approach where we could maintain two lanes of mixed-flow traffic and on one side or the other, we'd have an pa