SF Chron: More About the Ill-advised SF Chinatown Subway Line

[El Pinko]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/02/21/BA11V61G4.DTL

Nevius: Chinatown subway plan makes me wince
C.W. Nevius
Thursday, February 21, 2008

There's really only one question to ask about the proposal to bore a light-rail subway deep under the heart of downtown San Francisco. You're kidding, right? Just the initial math makes your head hurt. Basically it works out to somewhere between $1.22 billion and $1.4 billion for an underground railway that runs for less than two miles and has only three stops. That's not a transit system, it's a model railroad. When completed, the short spur would run from Fourth and Brannan, under Market Street and up Stockton Street to a station in the middle of Chinatown, a distance of 1.7 miles. Throw in a few of the inevitable cost overruns and this could work out to a billion dollars a mile.
....

Basically, the argument seems to boil down to this - we've got the money (as if federal tax dollars grow on trees), the Chinatown community is behind it, why not build it?
Oh, let me count some of the reasons. "How many other subway runs have three stops?" asks project opponent Howard Strassman. (Strassman is a transportation expert for the Sierra Club, but says he is speaking only for himself on this issue.) "It's a very short run. It's pretty silly."

...

Oh, and did I mention that in order to get under the BART tube, the subway station at Union Square will have to be at least 95 feet below the surface. That's nine stories. No worries, says Nathanial Ford, CEO of the San Francisco MTA. He says high-speed escalators and elevators are in use in other projects around the country.
Even so, says Strassman, "That's a very long escalator."

....

And frankly, most of the complaints about the project are likely to have little effect anyhow. Jerry Cauthen, a transportation advocate with San Francisco Tomorrow, says he "will appeal to the Board of Supervisors, who will probably kiss me off. The momentum for this is already going."




So basically, it doesn't matter if the city as a whole doesn't want or need this subway. The Chinatown business community will have their payback for the loss of that freeway ramp, and city planners really don't care what anyone thinks. Why build a train or subway line on the heavily-used Geary corridor when we could build this insane boondoggle to Chinatown that doesn't even connect with any Market Street stations? :sarcasm: This is, along with the whole "citywide free Wi-Fi" gimmicks, is the kind of thing that makes me seriously doubt Gavin Newsom's judgment.

[davidinalameda]

1. running it to Moscone does make sense

it looks like it stops at Powell St so it would connect to the main lines

[Auggie]

2. What Chinatown needs is more buses and/or express bus service

Yeah, I know express service is an oxymoron when it comes to Muni. But an additional express line that would run from only Columbus Avenue to Union Square with ONE stop at Stockton and then return via the same route makes so much more sense and is so much cheaper.

[davidinalameda]

3. nothing Newsom does makes much sense any more

[Auggie]

4. Yes. And IMO, the amount of money they're talking about will kill this project

very soon.

[Retrograde]

5. What Chinatown needs is less traffic

The 30 runs pretty often - I take it from Union Square to the train station regularly. But it is faster to walk - even with my bad knee and cane - from Union Square to Columbus than it is to take the bus. The traffic along that stretch of Stockton is hideous, some of the worst in the city IMHO. Add to that stops every other block in this densely populated part of the city and the 30 Stockton crawls.

Expensive or not, I think a subway is the way to go on this route, just like it is on Market.