MTA drama + German Carless Suburb

The controversy over the SFMTA budget continues.  The Board of Supervisors, led by David Chiu, are threatening to reject the budget against MTA's (and the Mayor's) wishes.  A Board of Supervisors' meeting is set for 2pm today and the budget is the 8th item on the agenda.  SF Streetsblog promises to provide a twitter-feed of the highlights.

UPDATE (Wednesday at 11:47 AM PST): It appears a compromise has been reached -- just barely.  Apparently Chiu's motion to table the budget rejection only passed by a vote of 6-5.  Unfortunately, the "compromise" doesn't seem to have much effect on the average San Franciscan.  Fares are still rising and service is still being cut.  It appears that my old hood got hit especially hard, with the 10 being discontinued above broadway and the 20 being cut altogether.  I rode the 10 for more than a year-and-a-half and it was always full of worker bees in the morning and night rush hours.  Guess those middle-class San Franciscans better save up some money for bicycles!  The anti-climactic ending to this struggle offers a perfect microcosm of San Francisco politics circa 2009:  shelter the rich, save the needy, and screw everyone in between.  So much for a transit-first city.

Also: check out this NYTimes article about a German suburb (formerly a Nazi army base) that has rendered autos verboten.  It is encouraging to know that such a revolutionary idea has taken hold in a place with such sordid historical ties.  Could car-free streets be on the way to a suburb or city near you?