The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) has developed a citywide Curb Management Strategy, which serves as a policy document guiding the agency’s policies towards the curb across its divisions and recommends specific changes to state and local legislation, along with internal policies and processes.
The document will complement the SFMTA’s existing outreach and approval processes to help achieve broader city goals such as safety and equity.
At the core of the strategy is a framework to guide decisions around the curb across the city, recognizing that different neighborhoods have different needs. For example, the need for goods loading is much higher downtown and on neighborhood commercial corridors than in residential areas. However, throughout the city, the need for safe access to the sidewalk from a bus or a train takes precedence over parking.
Policy recommendations are organized under six key objectives, including advancing a holistic planning approach, accommodating growing loading needs, increasing compliance with parking and loading regulations, improving access to up-to-date data, rationalizing policies towards private users of curb space and promoting equity and accessibility. The SFMTA has categorized recommendations by level of effort and impact, and staff will work in close coordination with internal and external stakeholders to prioritize these recommendations for implementation.
The Curb Management Strategy will help the SFMTA think holistically and proactively about this important and limited resource, according to the agency. By making these strides, SFMTA says it can ensure the curb supports the city’s wider goals of Transit First, Vision Zero, the Climate Action Strategy and business vitality.
