TransForm in the News
-
January 26, 2012
Joel Ramos of the TransForm transit advocacy group, one of about 30 speakers at the meeting, said the plan is too explicit in allocating money to Livermore BART rather than considering alternative transit.
-
January 24, 2012
"When you don't have enough money to take care of your existing systems, it doesn't make sense to make them bigger," said Jeff Hobson, deputy director of TransForm, a transit advocacy group. "This draft plan doesn't cut it, but it's not too late for the Alameda County Transportation Commission to get it right."
-
January 21, 2012
“When you’ve got a house where the roof is failing, you don’t take out your savings and build an addition,” said Jeff Hobson, deputy director for TransForm, a transit advocacy group. “We feel like it’s nutty to go ahead and plan for more multi-billion-dollar extensions.”
-
January 3, 2012
"None of the problems with this project have gone away just because they have broken ground," John Knox-White of TransForm, a transportation watchdog group, told the Oakland Tribune. "This was a political pet project that was pushed through because many people had been working on something that looked like this for a long time."
-
December 5, 2011No longer is a speedier commute the primary way to assess the benefits of 90 of the most expensive transportation projects being considered in the Bay Area over the next 25 years.
The Metropolitan Transportation Commission is looking at factors often ignored when assessing whether it is financially worthwhile to pay millions to widen highways and expand trains. Road fatalities and injuries, emissions reductions, the cost of owning and operating a car and even the health effects of physical inactivity are being considered in the Project Performance Assessment study now under way....
"This is groundbreaking analysis that could call into question some of the biggest transportation projects," said Stuart Cohen of TransForm, an Oakland-based public transportation advocacy group. "For projects that have a score under 1, or lead to greenhouse gas increases, it will -- and should -- bring on intense scrutiny."
-
November 1, 2011This is not a one-size-fits-all program. Innovations in transportation amenities, tailored to the community, can help justify lower parking requirements. Those in turn will lower development costs, reducetraffic, and help the environment — read “healthier, more affordable communities.”
-
October 26, 2011
"We are talking about authorizing a $6 billion project, one of the largest transportation projects in the history of the Bay Area, yet many important questions remain unanswered," said John Knox White, project manger for Transform, an Oakland-based transportation advocacy group. "If we do it right, we can end up with a world-class transportation system. But the commission's current approach won't do that."
-
September 17, 2011
Oaklandish, on Broadway and 14th, was offering tacos in parking spaces in front of the shop, and passers-by could get a bicycle-powered smoothie—mixed in a pedal-driven blender—at the TransForm parklet on 14th Street.
TransForm Deputy Director Jeff Hobson hopped on the bicycle to give a demonstration; as he pedaled the blender blades whirred audibly. “At 12:30 there will be smoothies out here,” he said. “Bicycle-powered smoothies.”
-
September 4, 2011
"The thing we would love to see is a comprehensive plan that will offer people transit options and increase carpooling and vanpooling," said Stuart Cohen, Transform's director. "Instead what we're seeing is an emphasis on expanding the (highway) system."
-
August 12, 2011
Gas prices that averaged $4.32 a gallon in the region in May are "the largest factor, undoubtedly," said Stuart Cohen, executive director of TransForm, an Oakland-based transportation advocacy group. "There is clearly a change in behavior when you see $4 at the pump and $50 fill-ups for a midsize car."
But Cohen and others say it's not just the price of gas. Higher bridge tolls and parking fees have hit drivers in the pocketbook and led some to take the bus or train to save money. Some are cutting back on driving to reduce the cost of maintaining older cars as they worry about keeping their jobs.
-
July 28, 2011
On July 21, more than 60 bicycle, transit and pedestrian enthusiasts gathered in a community center in San Francisco to hear stories of people who think outside the car and plane. “Car-Free Adventures and Heroes,” organized by nonprofit TransForm that seeks to improve the Bay Area’s public transportation and walkability, featured a couple who spent a year traveling the world without flying, a couple writing a series of guidebooks for car-free trips and a San Francisco family that lives car-free.
-
July 3, 2011
“Any kind of incentive policy for car ownership or use is incredibly outdated for the air district to have, even if it’s an electric vehicle,” said Stuart Cohen, executive director of TransForm, a regional transit advocacy organization.
Although district employees might be driving low-emission cars, they will be contributing to particulate matter kicked up by road dust, along with adding to congestion on the region’s already-strained highways, Cohen said.
-
June 16, 2011
"We have a serious problem that would get much worse in providing transportation access to seniors," said Stuart Cohen, a Bay Area spokesman for the coalition. He is executive director of TransForm, an Oakland-based transit advocacy group.
-
June 16, 2011
“In just four years, 62 percent more seniors in the San Francisco metro area will live with poor transit compared to 2000, versus 56 percent more for Oakland metro area and 66 percent more for San Jose metro area,” notes a press release from TransForm [4], an Oakland-based non-profit advocating for transit and smart growth.
-
May 26, 2011
The East Bay BRT would improve transit reliability along International, as well as install bulb-outs, crossing signals, and lighting to make International a less dangerously designed street.
“I’m confident that the types of pedestrian improvements that parents and seniors are calling for are attainable in this BRT project,” said Joél Ramos, TransForm community planner and newly confirmed SFMTA Director. “This project would make the streets safer for everyone, whether you ride transit or not.”