Critical Mass rolls down Lombard Street, July 2007. Photo by Chris Carlsson

Well,
no. We’ve had a great run in the 2000s. Averaging between 750 and 3000
riders on any given month, the birthplace of Critical Mass keeps going
strong, in spite of the total lack of promotion or organizing during
this past decade. But many of us long-time riders have been dismayed to
see the persistence of silly, aggressive, and counter-productive
behavior that makes the Critical Mass experience worse for our natural
allies on buses, on foot, and even folks in cars who might join us in
the future. Not to mention that it makes it worse for us cyclists too,
to the point that many former regulars have stopped riding. Part of the
frustration for us long-time riders is that we went through all these
issues quite intensively back in the early-to-mid 1990s, and to see
them cropping up again is a harsh reminder that we’ve done a piss-poor
job of transmitting the culture, the lessons learned, from one
generation to the next. Plenty of current Critical Massers were under 5
years old when we started it, and the ride’s culture has been more
loudly and consistently transmitted by distorted representations in the
mass media than it has by those of us who put our hearts and souls into
it for years.

To address this, a few of us launched a new blog dedicated to San Francisco Critical Mass.

Online for only a couple of months, it has already reprinted a well-digested list of “do’s and don’t’s”, and a rumination from a long-time former Masser on the hard work it takes to keep a space like Critical Mass open and inviting and pleasurable, as well as a look at the Budapest, Hungary Critical Mass and an always provocative look at bike helmets.
It’s a moderated blog with a limited number of contributors, but it’s
open to a wide range of comments including some markedly negative ones,
while it also seeks to keep the discussion constructive and insightful.

Critical Mass, Budapest, Hungary. (Photographer unknown)

When
Critical Mass began in late 1992, over two dozen individuals spent a
lot of time thinking and talking about this new experience, and the
culture that was emerging with it. Part of those discussions involved
how to spread the idea to other cyclists, and eventually to other
cities. That led to a publication in those pre-World Wide Web days that
was called “How to Make a Critical Mass", which went far and wide and probably had a bigger effect than we ever dreamed.

June 1996, Critical Mass heads west on Howard Street at 4th. (photo: Chris C.)

During a bit longer than the first two years, some of us published a monthly newsletter called “Critical Mass Missives,”
but after April 1995 we ceased and more or less stopped being a “secret
cabal” behind the tone and etiquette of the ride in San Francisco.
Critical Mass was growing very large by then, reaching well over 1,000
riders, and by mid-summer 1996 the ride was drawing several thousand
riders. Already in 1995 several of us early instigators had grown bored
with the ride, feeling that it had lost some of its early vibrancy. The
political space we had so jealously fought for and guarded seemed to
wither away all by itself as hundreds and thousands of new riders
joined in.

During late 1995-early 1996 one guy tried pretty
hard to “take over” Critical Mass, doggedly printing hundreds of
posters, promoting long rides that stretched out to the far western
edges of the city, even inaugurating what became for a few years an
“annual ride to Sausalito.” His preference for elaborate routes that
went to hills and ridges all over the city, and required endurance and
sometimes speed to keep up, seemed to many of us regulars to be an
unwelcome departure from the convivial purposes of Critical Mass. It
wasn’t meant to be a road race, an endurance test, or a contest to see
who could ride the furthest or climb the most hills. It was supposed to
be a place where we met once a month on bikes and “road home together,”
enjoying a leisurely pace through town conducive to conversation,
political and philosophical discussion, and meeting new people, usually
ending in a park or a bar.

Happily, a newer group of riders
coalesced with the purpose of overthrowing this lone nut’s temporary
reign over Critical Mass route planning. Alternative routes began to
appear. A concerted effort was made to steer the ride back to a
friendlier and more celebratory experience, and redirect the emphasis
towards the social and away from the athletic. This effort was largely
successful and a series of rides with a rediscovered joie de vivre
took place over the 1996-97 months, leading to the infamous
confrontation engineered by then-Mayor Willie Brown in July 1997. (See
Ted White’s documentary “We Are Traffic!"
for a good account of it.) The following month saw thousands returning
to ride in the “Good Soldier Schweik” ride, where we “rode to rule,”
following as many traffic rules as we could, which predictably made
downtown traffic MUCH worse. 

After that, the police mostly
backed off, realizing that leaving us to conduct ourselves through the
streets was a better crowd control strategy than confronting us and
harassing us. Tickets were occasionally written, but in general, over
the years that followed, a tacit truce has prevailed. In the decade
since, the ride has percolated along, often quite euphoric and fun, but
in the past two years or so, taking on a distinctively repetitive
quality.

August 1999, Critical Mass huffs and puffs up Potrero Hill. (Photo: Chris C.)

Most
months the ride leaves straight up Market Street, unnecessarily
blocking and delaying most of the city’s primary public transit lines.
Every month the ride seems to be drawn inexorably towards the Broadway
and Stockton Tunnels, and at least two or three times it turns back
towards downtown in a regressive loop. By the time we get to midtown,
someone usually has the bright idea to “circle up” in the Market/Van
Ness intersection, or an equivalently central locale. Along the way,
the drunken guy is cursing at passersby and bellowing like a stuck pig.
Young riders prove themselves as “really radical” by cutting across
into oncoming traffic and stopping cars for no particular reason other
than that they can. Failure to stick together in a tight mass (always a
problem, even in the early days) leads to cars finding themselves
trapped among throngs of cyclists. The calm driver usually inches over
and stops until we’ve passed, but some are confused and frightened.
Taunting and name-calling from self-righteous cyclists is all too
common, and when a motorist is provoked they are blamed for causing the
problem. (This is not to say that all confrontations are caused by
cyclists… historically, and in the present, many more problems are
caused by motorists trying to force their way through the cyclists.)

August 2007, Stockton Street. (Photo: Chris C.)

Most
of these dynamics can be altered by simple courtesy and smart behavior.
Treat motorists with respect, thank them for waiting! They are people
like us, and they might want to join us in the future if they are
invited. Cars that get stuck in the Mass should be helped out to the
right if possible. If Mass is fragmented and dispersed, organize a stop
at a red light and regroup. People in the front are hugely responsible
for stopping regularly, far more than feels comfortable, but it’s the
only way to keep the Mass together. Don’t “cork” intersections where
the Mass is broken and only a few bikes are trickling through. Better
to stop the bikes on the red light and regroup. These are simple
lessons we learned years ago to make for a better Critical Mass
experience for everyone.

Halloween 2008, Broadway in North Beach, a party pause! (Photo: Eduardo Green)

You
may not care if you’re winning hearts and minds, but overall, the point
of Critical Mass is not a fraudulent “class war” between cars and
bikes. We started Critical Mass to be a new kind of public space, and
to help promote a different way of being together in city streets.
Rolling along on bikes, tinkling bells, chatting and discussing,
smelling an exhaust-free atmosphere, listening to humans instead of
motors, and feeling the city’s geography in a wholly new way, is
exhilarating and liberating—not just for us riding, but for the
thousands of people we pass by. Our pleasure is infinitely more
inspiring AND subversive than any amount of angry posturing,
self-righteous taunting, or childish tantrums. Critical Mass is for
adults of all ages, and encourages the brave young radicals who want to
FSU to take it to the other side of town during Critical Mass, and
don’t use us to hide behind as you work out your unresolved anger with
your parents!

August 2008 in the Marina District. (Photo: Adam Aufdencamp)

Meanwhile,
Critical Mass rides on. It’s still a magical experience that will
surprise and endear you. Countless San Franciscans have ridden in
Critical Mass only to realize that daily cycling is within their reach,
and obviously a preferable alternative to being stuck in a car, or
waiting for MUNI… Join us next month, and in the coming year… it’s
been going for over 17 years and ain’t stopping any time soon… Last
Friday of every month, 5:30 in Justin "Pee Wee" Herman Plaza, foot of
Market Street. Bring your best selves!

For decades, planners and transportation specialists have debated how San Francisco's most important street could be re-visioned to  make it work better for transit, pedestrians, cyclists, shoppers, and those living on or near it. Now, as the Better Market Street Project moves forward with trial traffic diversions, the Art in Storefronts project, music and programming in public spaces, greening along sidewalks, and pedestrian safety improvements, San Francisco's political class is intent on revitalizing the street for the long haul. Though the concrete vision for what Market Street will eventually look like is some ways off, there is more effort now than in many years to improve the public realm and ensure the street lives up to its great potential.

When
it comes to building new developments in the Bay Area, especially in
San Francisco, the battle over limiting the construction of new parking
spaces is pitched. Parking reform advocacy organizations like Livable City,
which maintains a listserv populated by car-free and livable-city
advocates keeping a keen watch on planning commission parking
exemptions, have long encouraged city leaders to tighten the
parking-to-unit ratios in dense neighborhoods flush with transit and
bicycling options.

Photo: Matthew Roth

Why,
these advocates ask, would any city seeking to be a model of
sustainability require developments to have one parking space per unit,
as is the case across San Francisco outside of the downtown core and
certain neighborhood plan zones (the mandatory parking ratio can be
higher in other Bay Area cities)? San Francisco is the city it is
because it was built densely, with
minimal parking, and areas like the Mission or North Beach would be
impossible with 1:1 ratios.

And who should they hang for granting variances permitting
higher than 2:1 ratios, as happened last week when a two-unit home at
2626 Larkin Street in Russian Hill received permission from the San
Francisco Planning Commission to build five parking spaces, one with a
parking stacker for additional cars?

When these questions are asked of city planners and developers, like they were during the struggle to limit parking at 299 Valencia Street,
advocates and political leaders are led to believe that it is
impossible to finance new developments, particularly condos and
non-rental properties, without the maximum parking ratio possible. Less
parking, goes the developer refrain, banks will refuse to loan and the
units will be impossible to re-sell.

Not all developers buy that argument, however, and some have buildings that disprove it.

"If
you are doing a project next to BART or many buses, you really don’t
need to have a lot of cars," said Oz Erickson, Chairman of the Emerald Fund, Inc,
a developer who has built more than 2,000 units in San Francisco.
Emerald’s newest development, a rental building at 333 Harrison Street
in Rincon Hill, will be built with a .5:1 parking-to-unit ratio, even
though the developer could appeal for a variance to build more parking.

"It really works in those situations when the cost of excavation for an
additional floor is really high and you’re doing a rental project that
has really good public transportation," said Erickson. He explained
that excavation and construction costs for a single parking space in
his new development could run as high as $60,000, whereas the return on
the space will only be $200 per month. Further, the additional
construction time required to excavate for parking pushes costs even
higher, which, according to Erickson, is a liability in a lending
climate as constricted as the current one.

Erickson didn’t
always build with voluntarily lower parking ratios and he said that the
333 Harrison development wouldn’t be as easy to finance if it were
condos. "Banks like to see 1:1," he said, though they have gone below
that ratio on centrally located areas like Kearny Street and they have
done it for condominium projects without maximal parking.  Erickson
confirmed what has been reported in other cities,
namely that national banks unfamiliar with a city’s particular
development market can be reluctant to go below the familiar parking
ratios.

Above all else, Erickson argued, a city should provide as much
flexibility in developments as possible. "You really should be in a
position where zoning laws do not require you to put in parking," he
said.

Patrick Kennedy’s Gaia Building in Berkeley has 91 units and only 35 parking spaces. Photo: jeremydw

Across
the Bay in Berkeley and Oakland, Patrick Kennedy has been building
residential units with scant parking for decades. Kennedy’s Panoramic Interests
is responsible for much of Berkeley’s current skyline, including the
Gaia Building and the Fine Arts Building, and his mission is to build
infill development near transit with as little parking as necessary.

One
glance at his website and you understand the developer is unlike many
others, with quotes from Lewis Mumford ("Cities exist not for the
passage of cars, but for the care and culture of human beings) and Jane
Jacobs ("Possibilities to add convenience, intensity and cheer in
cities… are limitless") alongside before-and-after photos of his
buildings. For Kennedy, building more parking is a choice that reflects
a developer’s priorities.

"If you want to go after the densest
configuration of housing, you have to not plan around the car," said
Kennedy. "Spaces for cars cost a lot more to build than spaces for
people because they chew up so much space."

Kennedy admits that
he hasn’t built condos since 1996 and that much of his units are taken
by students and young professionals in the UC Berkeley orbit, a
decidedly less car-dependent demographic who are seeking a city
experience. He is, however, currently developing a building in San
Francisco two blocks from a BART station, where he intends to limit
parking significantly. The building will have 23 units and parking for
only two cars, both of which will be car-share vehicles.

"If
the car is considered a mere afterthought, we can get [more] units in.
Building a parking space costs at least $50,000 per car, including
opportunity costs for what else might have gone in the space," said
Kennedy, adding that if they were to build the building with
conventional parking ratios, he could probably only squeeze 6 units
into the same space.   

Kennedy argued that parking requirements
can be a significant barrier to home-ownership for first-time buyers.
"If you’re going to get the entry-level, it’s smart to keep prices
down. If you had the choice of a small condo that had a parking space
for $450,000 or a condo for $250,000 without a car space, which [would
you choose]?"

"Owning a car is expensive in a city," he added.
"You can manage in San Francisco without a car if you’re in a
neighborhood with a lot of transit."

Both Erickson and Kennedy
stressed the importance of providing choice to customers, not excluding
parking completely, but recognizing that more and more people who
choose to live in cities might not want the parking space.

Kennedy
explained that he lived car-free for four years in Cambridge when he
was a student, which he extolled with the fervor one might expect from
a bicycle advocate. "The best way to force [people] out of a car is to
not provide them a place to park," said Kennedy, before asking whether
Superior Court Judge Peter Busch had lifted the bicycle injunction in
San Francisco.

Referring to cyclists and others who don’t own cars: "I think
it’s important to provide them with an opportunity to live a car-free
life if they choose to."

Two and a half years after a judge issued an injunction preventing the city from adding any new bicycle infrastructure to its streets, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) and the San Francisco Planning Department have released a 1353-page Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) on the San Francisco Bicycle Plan. 

At a cost of more than $1 million, the city has attempted to demonstrate in excruciating detail what would seem to be the obvious: better bicycle amenities contribute to increased cycling and an improved environment.

Despite the significant time and money required to produce the tome, Mayor Gavin Newsom struck an optimistic note, citing the proposed addition of 34 miles of bicycle lanes to San Francisco streets—a 75 percent increase over the existing 45 miles of lanes. 

“We’ve accomplished a great deal together, but much work remains to be done to improve the safety and convenience of bicycling,” said Newsom. “I will continue to push for a better bicycling environment as part of my deep commitment to improving the health of our environment, our residents and our city.”

A public hearing on the DEIR has been scheduled for January 8th. The deadline for comments is January 13th. 

While Rob Anderson, the plaintiff in the lawsuit that sparked the injunction, will surely continue his befuddlingly successful crusade (a couple choice jeremiads from his blog: cyclists as a special interest wielding inordinate political power or a frivolous mode of transportation akin to skateboarding), the city assumes the DEIR will be sufficient to lift the injunction. 

“The Planning Department is confident that the DEIR fully satisfies the issues cited in the superior court's injunction and will enable timely implementation of bicycle improvements that will enhance transportation alternatives in San Francisco,” said Planning Director John Rahaim.

What this means practically is a different matter. According to Andy Thornley, program director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition (SFBC), even if the DEIR is certified by spring and the Bicycle Plan goes before the MTA board shortly thereafter, the 60 projects outlined for immediate implementation likely won't begin until the summer of 2009. 

“The Draft EIR is a very expensive bow-tie that we’re going to attach to the Bike Plan itself.  While it is a big deal, it shouldn't be the only focus. The city needs to build out the Bike Plan as soon as possible."

The injunction held that the previous version of the Bicycle Plan had not received sufficient review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The Bicycle Plan DEIR identifies some potentially significant impacts as defined by CEQA affecting traffic congestion, transit operating delays, and loading activities for some project options, particularly along portions of Second Street, Fifth Street, Cesar Chavez Street, Portola Avenue and Masonic Avenue.

Though the city took considerable heat over the summer for revealing at a Board of Supervisors hearing that it had fallen behind its own schedule for releasing the DEIR, the Planning Department delivered on its promise to release it by Thanksgiving. Both advocates and critics of the Bicycle Plan will have plenty to sift through over the long weekend (and likely through the New Year).

Given the timeline of up to five years for completion of the 60 near-term projects in the Bicycle Plan, it is unclear whether Newsom, a likely candidate for governor in 2010, will realize significant bicycle improvements during his last term as mayor.

Photo: San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency