Muni issues plans for restored lines
Muni plans to bring back 85% of service by January 2022, as the agency struggles to restore lines while facing hiring and financial troubles after a year of scaledback service.
The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency is currently running 70% of preCOVID service. While the agency plans to restore some subway and streetcar lines in May, with cable cars returning by the end of the year, the LTaraval, MOcean View and KIngleside Muni Metro trains likely won’t restart until early 2022, Director of Transit Julie Kirschbaum told the SFMTA board last week.
Supervisors and residents pressed the agency during a meeting of the San Francisco County Transportation Authority Tuesday to bring back more service. Some said they and their constituents are stranded.
“I’m not happy about the delayed timeline in restoration,” said Supervisor Myrna Melgar. “Folks are desperate in my district.”
Muni ridership was still down 76% in January compared to the previous fiscal year, but supervisors said service needs to return as the city reopens and traffic worsens again. The agency is “looking forward to recovering our ridership and supporting getting people to work, school, and other outings such as we did prepandemic,” agency spokeswoman Erica Kato said. But the public health crisis has exacerbated Muni’s hiring and budget challenges that now make restarting lines after a year difficult.
Approximately 100 operators have been promoted, retired or are no longer working for the agency for other reasons since training stopped in early 2020, Kirschbaum told supervisors Tuesday. The agency is restarting hires after a freeze over the past year to save money, but training takes time. The agency is on track to train up to 50 more rail operators in a 13week course by the end of August.
“We are hiring as quickly as we can,” Kirschbaum said. “As quickly as we can is unfortunately not very quick.”
The agency also faces longterm budget challenges and wants to be conservative about what level of service it can financially sustain. Muni predicts its structural deficit could reach $36 billion over the next 30 years.
The SFMTA expects to receive a total of $714.7 million in federal stimulus money by this week and more to come, which will close its deficits for at least the next two fiscal years. The agency also has around $130 million in reserves, not enough to bring back full service, Director of Transportation Jeffrey Tumlin said Tuesday. The agency plans to go to the ballot in 2022 for an ongoing revenue measure.
In May, the agency plans to open Tline subway service from Embarcadero to West Portal and restart NJudah rail from Ocean Beach to Caltrain. Bus service in May will close a hilltop gap between Forest Hill and Glen Park. The agency will also restore the F line streetcar service from the Castro to Fisherman’s Wharf over the summer, but will shut it down in the fall because of Better Market Street Project construction.
Also by the fall, the agency hopes COVID19 socialdistancing guidelines, which reduce capacity, will lift. The PowellHyde cable car line is expected to restart before the holiday shopping season.