Heard that a lot of businesses did not feel comfortable publicly voicing their concerns. So weve kept their responses anonymous as. In conclusion, this is not about a one day or a three day closure. This is about reset ing and rebuilding that trust in the community and making a process so its possible that the block can work well and get to 24 over seven. And it wasnt working for some merchants. And thats not a reason to cancel it entirely. We really want an opportunity to grow and expand. On the success in hayes valley and see it thrive. So with that, that concludes my presentation and happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Thank you. Colleagues, do you have questions before we go to Public Comment at dr. Ikuko . Just one. I have i have feelings about this, but my clarifying question to you is there have been some talk of asking us to do some kind of study on what it would take to make this permanent and whats your thoughts on on doing that kind of study . Yeah, its would be amazing to pedestrian personally the space i think that we should leverage upon a pilot type program that shared spaces provides so often we go in with a blank slate go forward with a pilot and then evaluate results. Weve had three years to kind of build off of. So i think that that would be a great process that i would love to be part of. And i think to move that forward, we really need to kind of have merchants brought along iron out some of the issues we have been experiencing over the last couple of years to see if it really is a long term viable solution for all the merchants in the corridor. And you said that this is kind of like it feels a little bit like a timeout where youre like, go back to your room and think about what youve done. Kind of vibes. How long is this timeout in your mind . Like how long do you want to see that the merchants are able to run this block before they can . Its a good question. I mean, we whats in front of you is a one year permit and thats consists joint with the other shared spaces we brought forward and thats in to provide stability for the community. But we very well could talk about a three month or a six month period. I dont know if that means the permits 3 or 6 months or we just commit to an evaluation time that we are resourcing, are transparent about what the metrics we want to see. I think anything less than that, i think theres a theres a lot of work that goes behind, as you know, to get these going. I probably wouldnt suggest less than three months, but. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Director henderson. Thank you, chair. I have a couple questions. Just i appreciate the amount of what sounds like a lot of staff work that went into to working with the community to identify a path forward. And i have a question about the timing for this. Its a one year permit. So then what happens . What should we expect in a years time . Um, would it have to . Would it . Yeah. What should we expect in a years time . Yeah. All sponsors have to reapply, so theyre kind of like parklets as well. Theyre sort of still temporary activations of the street. So these are, for all intents and purposes, temporary permits. So a sponsor gets permitted for a year, and after that point they can reapply. Okay. And then do you have any in terms of considering a permanent programing of the space in this way . Is there a process or some sort of way that the community and the staff can commune, skate during that during that year to be able to consider something more permanent or like im just curious, how do do we have to wait a year to have that conversation about expanding it potentially . No, thank you for asking so i can provide clarification. No by all means. At a minimum, it can be a year, but we can entertain at any time. A permit scope can change and we can bring it back to the board and permit if we see after three months, we want to grow or revoke. Its not has to wait for a year. But thanks for asking. Got it. Thank you. Of course. Thank you, director. So thank you, monica. Really nice presentation. I like all the graphics. It really paints really clear. Picture for me to understand what has been going on and also what are the proposed traffic cone layout. I like to what you mentioned about some some of the incident or concern from our Fire Department. I like to know if can you enlighten us a little bit about about what are the situations that are concerning for Public Safety . I mean, im really aware of that whole area. I live nearby by all that area and golf street. Its like a major thoroughfare to, you know, everyone just racing down that street and i just want to hear when you mention some of these situation options where, when, when, when folks double park and congested that intersection and what are the concerns about when this street is i just want to hear historically what we have learned. What are the concerns . Of course. Yes. Thank you so 400 block has a is dense with restaurants and businesses that get a lot of activity. If someone is traveling in a vehicle down southbound golf, which as you know, is a big thoroughfare, they get to haze. They cant turn right because the block is closed. So naturally, were seeing them just get illegally double parked at the barricades. So basically in the middle of the intersection, not blocking the lane of traffic per se, but theres enough space there that theyll just do the quickest thing possible. And then they go out and get to the restaurant or business on the block and get back to their car. The businesses have told us they dont like that. They they the setup is detrimental to their business. And weve heard from folks like San FranciscoFire Department, what if theres an emergency and theres a blocked car in the way they cant get there, their truck down. So hopefully a new barricade set up and creating additional loading zone just south of hayes will and better signage will kind of alleviate that. But i dont know if you had specific questions broader than that specific activity. Me but that is my question is any incident or collectively we had alerts at our agency to flag this is a pretty dangerous kind of way to arrange the street the way we are. Like if anyone had been injured by this or i mean, yeah, no, im not aware of an a crash per se, but we do have the fire marshal here in the room and id love to invite him up to kind of respond directly to at least from their perspective, what theyre seeing for Emergency Response time. I dont if thats pertinent to your question, but that would be id love to have them come up. Thank you. And also, i know mary thompson, who i know has to leave at 330, and hes here with the office of Small Business. She wanted to speak as well at at some point when thats relevant and important. Thank you. Good afternoon, chair egan. Directors ken coughlin, your fire marshal. I want to answer your question. I see where youre going with that. Not physical instance, but the problem is that hay street and that block is a route for our battalion chiefs and sometimes our engines that cross town. So we have webster, webster and almost here we have a firehouse and we have another one at oak and franklin, and we have battalion chiefs who run a section of town. And every time you have a fire in building smoke, call, building alarm, they have to respond one way or another. And unfortunately, the their response area is not nice little blocks. Its kind of its interesting. Its been that way for a long time. Anyway, as we this closure, which monica didnt mention, actually has a 20 foot access lane down the center. Okay. Because there are still buildings. There are there are still restaurants there. We still have to respond, whether it be a medical or a fire, more likely a medical call. So the rearrangement of the cones was to allow the Fire Department to get through there without actually having a monitor to move the cones, because we noticed that was a problem. Specifically, it would be those cars that were double parked for food pickup deliveries that the chief the engines, the trucks tried to get through. And all of a sudden theres a car there and they just couldnt get through. So thats the thats more of the type of incidents we ran into and thats why we worked together with sfmta to reconfigure the cones, to bring them out. So we dont have that legal parking at the intersection and blocking the crosswalk. So what you said, not specific, harmed anybody more of a delay. The harm would be have to be analyzed afterwards. If somebody didnt get there on time. Thank you. I really appreciate your your expertise and what is the traffic cone look like now . What does it look like now . Yes the way the cones are, they will they type to barricade . Is that the type three barricades at the end . Thats what the larger ones with the slats. And then they have just simple cones in there. What weve asked and worked with is to still use the type three barricades. But space the cones a little bit larger so we can still get through without running them over. If you run them over the wrong way, then they get stuck on the wheel well. Now you got more of a bigger problem. Youre going to ruin a Million Dollar fire engine. So the thing is, the idea is to have quick access directly through the lane without and then also some cooperation with the operator side of the merchants. Right. Well the permit says you cannot put anything permanent in that space. Were not worried about people walking in the street. They tend to move out of the way when you have a big red fire engine making lots of noise and coming down at you. So thats not the problem. Its the its keeping the physical items out of the street tables and barricades and things like that. I believe the permit actually even calls for cones to mark down the street to say this is how far you can come out, you know, put tables and chairs in the parking place and even a little bit wider. But leave this area clear. So you may have heard of instances where weve driven down the street. Thats what its for. We are we do use it as a response route. We have used it to get from one side of town to the other. As you know, oak street fell street. Theyve gotten quite busier over the years as some type of reconfiguration. So hayes is an important cross town pathway for us. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Colleagues, id like to ask Marianne Thompson from office of Small Business to address the board so she has to leave at 330. Thank you. Board members. Thank you, monica. Thank you. So in the last few months, the office of Small Business has engaged very strongly with sfmta. Its important for us that the voice of Small Businesses be heard, and this has really been a great process in many ways. What sfmta did was they enabled us to bring many voices to the table. Those who were unheard, unseen in Merchants Association actions that sfmta did not know existed. I want to applaud sfmta and the Mayors Office for bringing everyone together in a really, really safe space and having these great conversations. For those of you who dont know me and my work, i have actually been with the office of economic and Workforce Development for over ten years. Open space activations is at the heart and soul of what i do every day. Besides engaging Small Businesses, many of you have been to a lot of my activate sessions and didnt even know it. Hayes valley. Thats when your work is good. Hayes valley is at the heart of this is deep to me because when i go to hayes valley and when i get there, by the way, i am a muni person. I dont have a car. So when im there and i see that space, i want to see it activated. And i want to see it be brilliant and i want it to be the shining star of the city. We have work to do to get it there. And i think its really, really important that we say that out loud. We have work to do to get it to be a shining star. And i and i really, again, want to thank monica and her team for listening to people. I also want to point something out because ive been here since 1 00 and a lot of Small Businesses have been here since 1 00. And this is something for all of us to think about. The business that are here are sole proprietors. Some of them may have had to close their doors to come here today, having people go through Public Comment for an item that impacts Small Businesses. Lets rethink how we do this and lets really rethink how we treat our Small Businesses. And again, i really want to emphasize this because it did come up in our survey. People were afraid to come forward and speak about this closure because they felt at times they would be bullied or treated unfairly. And so i want to make sure at the conclusion of this, the voices from the Small Businesses that you hear today, they can walk away feeling safe and heard. And thats all we ask for. Thats it. Thank you. Thank you. Director henzi, i believe you had your hand up. I did this sort of. This is a question for monica, but it sort of builds on what miss thompson just touched on. Do we have typically, um, evaluate evaluation metrics and sort of reporting requirements for storm surge spaces, street closures. Um, and if we dont, um, have you thought of evaluation, evaluation metrics possibly for this one, like the number of activations they have, the number of, i dont know, people that you use it on comparing on what days, etcetera, and the such. Um so could you touch on evaluation of the closure as we consider this, as we before Public Comment. Yes thank you. Director henzi have thought about it. I think is a wonderful idea in the effort of transparency and Decision Making. It is not easy to develop metrics for Something Like this. How do you its such like a soulful art and sense of being sort of can you establish a number . Is the number of people a certain amount then that is a success . Is it the quality of the event and the activation . And so i dont say that as an excuse. I think it is definitely something i would like to explore. We have a lot of Evaluation Programs here at the sfmta and people that think a lot about this and i would love to consult them and people that work with Small Businesses so that we can establish that. But it is we would want to do it thoughtfully so that we are right. It is measurable. Yeah, it is a hard it is a hard thing to measure, but yeah. Okay thank you. Manager. That was it. Okay. Thank you. Director henzi colleagues, id like to open it to Public Comment. Unless theres anything else pressing right now. Okay. Please. Speakers in the room on the hayes street. Shared spaces. I do have some speaker cards. Andrew andrew singer. Jennifer laszlo barnett. Trzcinski stacy randecker. Afternoon board. Barnett brzezinski. District two frequent visitor of hayes valley. If i could recap a little bit of the presentation we just saw the closure and the area there in hayes valley on hayes street is so popular for people double parked to try to get into the area even more than they already can with with legal parking. So if there is a moment of peace and quiet on the street, aka it hasnt been activated, thats a permit violation because drivers are behaving badly and violating the barricade. Were going to remove the barricade and let them in more. As an example of whats going on around the city. And these are all incidents that happened in the last week and a half. A car drove off the road and onto a building at filbert and fillmore, causing a gas leak in building damage and making the Fire Department respond. A driver committed a hit and run in the bayview, hitting a car which then hit a muni vehicle, which im sure a lot of you are aware of. A car recently veered off the road on divisadero and smashed into a bus shelter between page and haight, a store in union square was ramrodded socalled by burglars who drive a car into the building in order to then steal from it. And there was a 100 mile an hour chase coming up the peninsula that ended right at the freeway exit where hayes valley begins. This is the type of thing that we are inviting onto our streets as a default when any other more higher purpose, pedestrian friendly closure, more business activity, more just neighbors getting to know their neighbors. This is considered the aberration. You have to apply for a permit for this. I strongly encourage you to please, please, please consider sending this back to the mta in encouraging them that any increase in vehicle lane mile access is a contravention of transit first policy and the climate goals the mta has and also ask a question why are we the only city going backwards on this nearly every city in the bay area and even around the world in the country is expanding Pedestrian Access be street in san mateo, castro street in mountain view. One of the speakers earlier mentioned san jose. So we need to do more of this within San Francisco. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker. Hi im jennifer laska, the president of the hayes valley neighborhood association. And i pulled the original permit three years ago and have been worked working tirelessly with the merchants on this as youve heard over and over again, this closure is very beloved by the community. The immediate community. And i hear from people who say that they come from all over the city to come, come and enjoy this space on the weekends. So that brings more business to our our Small Businesses in hayes valley. I want to note that the merchants actually applied for a three day closure. What youre seeing in front of you is a one day closure that was recommended by sfmta staff. That is not what we applied for. We still have not heard a good reason why a three day closure cant continue. Weve heard issues about the barricades. Theres a solution for that. Thats something that we totally agree with should be done. And weve also heard difficult days about rerouting the bus for three days a week. But no ones been able to explain to me why that really is a difficulty. And weve seen it done successfully for over a year now. So i really need to understand why that would be