Google and other corporate shuttles have been disrupting life in the Mission, SOMA, and other neighborhoods easily accessible by the 101 for some time now.  But, despite the oft-repeated claim that they help reduce congestion, pollution, and allow employees to go car-free, it's being found that they're just displacing the congestion from the highways and moving it into our neighborhoods.  Tony Kelly, president of the Potrero Boosters Neighborhood Association, reports in today's Chronicle:

[People driving around the Mission] are commuting here, parking their cars for the day, and then biking, walking or hopping on a private shuttle bus to their jobs. For them, the Mission is their free public parking lot.

San Francisco's parking enforcer, the Municipal Transportation Agency, tells us that on a typical day more than 80 percent of the cars parked on crowded northeast Mission streets arrive from elsewhere.

The situation is particular pronounced in the northeast Mission, where historically industrial streets are not covered by residential parking permits.

The parking crunch would have traditionally lead to a new resident parking district, allowing residents to park (for free) all day long, with commuters having to move their cars after 1 to 2 hours.  As Kelly puts it, “that's been a key part of San Francisco's 'transit-first' policy, which is designed to keep residents' and commuters' cars at home.”

However, the city is instead looking to blanket the northeast Mission with parking meters, both on commercial and mixed-use residential/commercial streets, with hourly prices that fluctuate based on demand.

Kelly accuses the city of “turning its back on decades of transit-first policy” at the expense of Mission residents.  But, really, it seems that MTA is just looking to cash in on the commuter's laziness.

[SFGate | Photo by The Tens]