San Francisco to Tax ‘Google Buses’

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• January 6, 2014, 7:27 PM ET

San Francisco to Tax ‘Google Buses’

ByJeff Elder

AP

San Francisco will tax the “Google buses,” a little bit, anyway.

The luxury buses cruise the sometimes cozy streets of San Francisco’s neighborhoods, picking up and dropping off commuting techies. They’ve become symbols of the growing resentment around gentrification and rising rents in the Bay Area. Many companies  in Silicon Valley to the south pay for the bus service, but the derisive nickname “Google buses” has stuck.

San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee announced an 18-month pilot program Monday to charge the shuttle companies fees based on the number of stops they make in city bus zones. The shuttle companies would be charged $1 per stop, which the mayor’s office estimates will bring in approximately $1.6 million in total revenue for the entire pilot. That total is intentionally limited: State law limits such fees to the cost of providing a service or policy. So all of the fees will go into policing the program.

The city and Silicon Valley companies including...

Read more at the Wall Street Journal

Trials Biking on the Streets of San Francisco

"Viral YouTube cinematographer Devin Super Tramp recently worked with Ford to produce a ride along video that combines BMX and parkour on the streets of San Francisco. The acrobatics were performed by a team of riders that included Tim Knoll, a BMXer known for his unusual gymnastic riding style.

"Watch as the team undertake a bevy of ridiculous stunts and tricks.
Read more at Hypebeast.com."

Discovered at Regrit

Transbay site work reaches milestone

by Jessica Kwong

Sixty-five feet below ground level between Mission, Howard, Second and Beale streets, crews working on the Transbay Transit Center project reached a quiet milestone.


A 10- to 12-hour concrete pour completed Saturday was the last one necessary until excavation wraps up early next year. That makes 10 mat slab pours to date, each between 4,000 to 6,000 cubic yards of concrete. Rail tracks will eventually sit on the slabs.

“This is achieving a big milestone for our project,” said project superintendent Jordan Smith of Webcor/Obayashi, the general contractor, at the site Wednesday. “Essentially half of the project has mat slab. What that allows us to do is continue on schedule on the walls and columns and rebar on one side.”
Construction has made good time, with the foundation for the western half of the 600,000-cubic-yard hole in the ground already set with mat slab.

The multilayer process started in early September and involved drilling 65-foot-long micropiles on the dirt base to anchor the coming structure, four inches of concrete slab, a waterproofing layer, another 4 inches of concrete slab, rebar reinforcement and finally 5 feet of mat slab that Caltrain and high-speed rail will arrive on.

Dirt is still visible in the easternmost portion of San Francisco’s biggest hole in the ground, with excavation slated to end in mid-January. The final mat slab pours will occur in mid-February.

Read more at SFExaminer.com

Love & Shelter for All: Global Shelter Project

Check out Charles Holsopple at the Global Shelter Project!

He's doing great work to end homelessness and promote sustainability.

Here's a little bit of his writing:
"Let's promote local, regional, national and international awareness that we are all better off if all 7 billion and one of us have a dignified access to a gallon and a half of clean water 2000 nutritional calories and 200 ft.³ of secure living space.Data driven studies will provide the areas of most need as well as reflect the causes and potential solutions to this imbalance.Properly observed and engineered, methodologies can be identified and supported for whatever changes our social and environmental climate unveil to us. " - Charles Holsopple


Visit Global Shelter Project today:

 http://globalshelterproject.blogspot.com/

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