We Said, Now We've Got Our Magic Bus

The San Francisco County Transportation Authority unveiled plans recently to help speed up the MUNI bus routes on Van Ness street, part of their Bus Rapid Transit plan. As part of that plan, they are also talking about setting up a system that will let actual riders get actual times of actual buses arriving at actual bus stops. Now how about that?

The main component of the plan is to have a bus-only lane for the buses. Obviously, the thinking is that one of the main things that holds up buses is traffic and evil double-parkers. This way, buses can cruise through unimpeded. They will also be given priorities at intersections. People in the know speculate that this would double the time it takes bus to move anywhere.

What they haven't figured out yet is which lane it would be. It would either be the center lanes or the far-right lanes. Of course, this has been debated about for years, as is the same kind of thing on Geary, to no avail. Storeowners and businesses go screaming the moment somebody talks this stuff up. We shall see.

The plan has been in the works for awhile now but was given a sneak-peak on last Tuesday night. Next up for the plans are to go in front of the authority's board. If it passes that, then there will be an environmental review. If it passes that (and the inevitable law suit that will come with it), people are hopeful it can start up by 2010.