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Traffic and Toilets -- Strike for the Planet week 110 [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-10-20  

You can make a difference to the hurt being caused by climate chaos and the great extinction event in your town or your city! How? Reuse, repurpose, and recycle this information. You can push your local politicians to act. It will make a difference!

This is the letter for week 110 of a weekly climate strike that went on for 4 years in front of San Francisco City Hall, beginning early March 2019. For more context, see this story. For an annotated table of contents of the topics for all the strike letters, see this story. Meanwhile…

STRIKE FOR THE PLANET

All the relatively easy, obvious, and fairly cheap actions that can help SF?

You all are whiffing badly on doing any of them.1

This week’s topic: Traffic and toilets

You can do your job, or you can pander and backpedal and play politics. The right choices are obvious and cheaper, so why keep making the wrong ones? Wait, you think you’re not making wrong choices? But we’ve got receipts. In fact, let’s look at traffic and toilets as perfect examples.

Graphic Source: Seattle Department of Transportation

Receipt #1: Traffic

Traffic is both bad and insanely dangerous in San Francisco.2 Why?

For starters, San Francisco wasn’t built for cars at all; the roads were built for bikes. 3, 4

SF is geographically small 5 , too small to need cars 6 and too small to accommodate cars. 7

, too small to need cars and too small to accommodate cars. It is the second most densely populated city in the U.S. 8 This means there are more people per area and less space that is not inhabited. Add cars to the mix, traveling at high speeds and breaking traffic laws on a regular basis 9, 10, 11 , and you cause deaths and injuries.

This means there are more people per area and less space that is not inhabited. Add cars to the mix, traveling at high speeds and breaking traffic laws on a regular basis , and you cause deaths and injuries. Cars are expensive and the poorest households spend the most money on them. 12

And in SF it is the loudest who get heard, no matter how privileged they already are or how peripherally involved in an issue.13

And so, over and over again, you act for the rest of us then take it back or you don’t act at all.

So what?

Your inaction has a body count. Your accommodating cars at the expense of people has a fatality rate.

Slow Streets? Not enforced at all except by neighbors, cyclists, and pedestrians, and not understood or supported by many supervisors 14 , they are now sometimes speed ways for drivers ignoring all stop signs and speed limits. Yet hard looks to some residents in cars is somehow more important than human safety or accessibility on these streets. 15

, they are now sometimes speed ways for drivers ignoring all stop signs and speed limits. Yet hard looks to some residents in cars is somehow more important than human safety or accessibility on these streets. JFK Drive? Despite the fact that it’s only one road in a park full (too full) of roads all full of traffic, despite the fact that it is a high injury corridor, despite the fact that cellphone data shows opening this street to people did not change the number of residents visiting Golden Gate Park from any district16, you now are talking about closing this street down again to make it a high-speed raceway once more.

Right now your Vision Zero is a real zero and it’s killing us. So stop being so helpless! If one solution doesn’t work, try another. Be creative.

How? If Chiu can’t make it work at the state level, take action locally to lower both the death count and our carbon footprint. How? Try any and all of the following:

Open roads to pedestrians and cyclists and children and the elderly permanently.

Paint in mandatory car turn-offs on misused roads.

Allow 311 to accept Nest camera footage of road incidents.

Beef up transit especially in the east and southeast part of SF.

Enforce the traffic laws.

Put in more speed bumps.

Work with companies to change GPS directions.

Hook up the parks throughout SF and put in many many more parks in the east and southeast of SF.

Tax carbon polluters by the mile.

And more! There are a TON of options that have been tried all over the world. I’ve put a lot of them in past Strike letters. You hear about them from all the groups trying to reduce the carnage on SF’s streets, the real and literal carnage caused by cars. You are giving killing machines priority over school children, over the elderly, over those who are trying not to pollute. Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome is the definition of insanity. Really.17

[[File:Humanure dry toilet, Mongolian family house, Ulaan Baatar 2010, by Wolfgang Berger (6210815655).jpg|Humanure_dry_toilet,_Mongolian_family_house,_Ulaan_Baatar_2010,_by_Wolfgang_Berger_(6210815655)]] — that’s sawdust you can see inside.

Receipt #2: Toilets

SF has big problems here. We don’t have enough public toilets18, we’ve got a dysfunctional sewer system that is old, expensive, and wastes huge amounts of water19, we have a massive poop in the streets problem20, 21, 22, and we’re in a megadrought.23 Turns out that composting toilets can solve a LOT of these problems. So why don’t we have them?

Composting Toilets are not new, even in San Francisco.

In fact, Eric Brooks was pushing hard for SF to adopt this technology in 2010 and 2011 and there were hearings and serious work done. 24, 25, 26, 27, 28 But, as is usual when it comes to SF and making good choices, nothing happened.

But, as is usual when it comes to SF and making good choices, nothing happened. Yet there are composting toilets in use in private homes in SF. 29

SF’s building codes allow for composting toilets. 30

Composting toilets protect the bay and ocean from untreated sewage releases. 31

Composting toilets save huge amounts of water — more than 6,600 gallons of water per person per year. 32 Again, we’re in a megadrought; we need to save water.

Again, we’re in a megadrought; we need to save water. Composting toilets return needed nutrients to the environment. 33

Composting toilets will reduce toxic algae blooms. 34

There are multiple examples available (throughout history, in fact) to see how composting toilets work, multiple sources for information, and even a readily available book and videos on how to compost human waste.35

Composting toilets are a prime example of a win/win/win solution, one that’s been available to us for over a decade, one that is more important now and easier to put into action now than ever before, that you still haven’t acted on.

You’ve seen the receipts, so deliver the goods

Do the work! Do you know how expensive not acting is?36 The costs of acting are much less than the costs of doing nothing.37 Just ask the insurance industry.38 And the military.39 It’s easy math.

Small things at the local level make a difference

We’ve already shrunk the atmosphere40 and shifted the poles41, and now we’re pissing away the water while letting CO 2 spewing death monsters (this stencil was on the Panhandle path for years, for good reason) run riot over the city.

Bike path stencil in the Panhandle at the intersection with Masonic. It was there for years, until it faded.

SF’s chances for survival are borderline at best, and require immediate action?42 You’ve taken oaths to act for the good of SF. You say you are bound by the Precautionary Principle. So act already.

Because it’s not about politics anymore; it’s about survival.43

FOOTNOTES

1. “whiff”. Urban Dictionary. 19 December 2005. https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=whiff .

2. You wouldn’t know if you travel primarily by car, but ask any long-standing bicyclist or pedestrian and they’ll tell you about weekly near misses where a car almost got them, bad injuries, and friends and relatives permanently damaged or killed by cars in this city. And it’s gotten so much worse since Lyft and Uber. I’ve been in 3 bad crashes while biking in SF, my husband has been in 2 bad crashes while biking in SF, my students have been in multiple bad crashes while biking or skateboarding or just crossing the street in the crosswalk with a green light at the school intersection in SF. It is always the car’s fault, the police usually try to blame the victim, and we’re told nothing can be changed unless a certain number of people die in the same situation and then we might get a stop sign. This doesn’t work, hurts the poorest, youngest, and oldest the most, and fits the definition of insanity.

3. Joseph Stromberg. “‘Roads were not built for cars’: how cyclists, not drivers, first fought to pave US roads”. Vox. 19 March 2015. https://www.vox.com/2015/3/19/8253035/roads-cyclists-cars-history .

4. Lia Garcia. “30 Things Nobody Tells You About San Francisco”. Practical Wanderlust. 26 May 2021. https://practicalwanderlust.com/things-nobody-tells-you-about-san-francisco/ . “Driving a mile in San Francisco can take an hour for no reason, plus another hour to try to find parking. This is also why you should never drive in the city: the traffic, the parking, and the LYFT/Uber/food delivery/Amazon package delivery drivers who treat congested streets like their personal parking lots make it absolute hell.”

5. 46.91 sq miles or 121.51 sq kilometers — courtesy of the U.S. Census office at https://www2.census.gov/geo/docs/maps-data/data/gazetteer/2019_Gazetteer/2019_gaz_place_06.txt , accessed 1 June 2021.

6. Julieta Chavez Delua. “Top 10 cities where you can live without a car and help save the Earth”. Habitat for Humanity. Accessed 2 June 2021. https://www.habitat.org/stories/top-10-cities-where-you-can-live-without-car-and-help-save-earth .

7. It’s easy to see if you look at garage sizes, amount of street parking v. population, the amount of sidewalk space taken up by cars, the impacts on parking and accessibility for those who need motorized transport (such as the disabled), and the costs of all these things as measured in deaths and injuries to those of us not in cars.

8. New York City is the first.

9. Max DeNike. “S.F.’s “Vision Zero” Isn’t Stopping Bad Drivers, Or Hit-and-Runs”. SFWeekly. 24 June 2016. https://www.sfweekly.com/news/s-f-s-vision-zero-isnt-stopping-bad-drivers-or-hit-and-runs/ .

10. Mike Moffitt. “The rudest, most careless drivers on Bay Area roads”. SFGate. 28 November 2018. https://www.sfgate.com/cars/article/Bad-drivers-Bay-Area-dangerous-rude-13413159.php .

11. Mike Moffitt. “Does California have the worst drivers in the U.S.?” SFGate. 21 November 2018. https://www.sfgate.com/cars/article/Worst-drivers-U-S-California-Allstate-ranking-13406189.php .

12. Joanna Moorhead. “If you live in a city, you don’t need a car”. The Guardian. 6 March 2013. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/mar/06/live-city-dont-need-car .

13. Take, for instance, the Great Highway. Turns out that survey data showed Sunset residents want to keep the upper Great Hwy open to everyone except cars but the Richmond district wants to close it down to everyone but cars. The upper Great Hwy is in the Sunset, it is not in the Richmond. It is the people of the Sunset who suffer the most when this stretch of racecourse is open to cars, not the much wealthier people who live in the Richmond.

14. Looking at you, Supervisor Mar.

15. Per a comment from one of Supervisor Melgar’s aides at a neighborhood meeting on the Kirkham Slow Street.

16. Carly Graf. “Is Golden Gate Park really for all San Franciscans?” San Francisco Examiner. 21 May 2021. https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/is-golden-gate-park-really-for-all-san-franciscans/ .

17. Carly Graf. “Days after fatal SF hit-and-run, speed camera bill stalls in Sacramento”. San Francisco Examiner. https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/days-after-fatal-sf-hit-and-run-speed-camera-bill-stalls-in-sacramento/ .

18. David Mamaril Horowitz. “City shutdown means fewer restrooms available for homeless”. San Francisco Examiner. 6 April 2020. https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/city-shutdown-means-fewer-restrooms-available-for-homeless/ .

19. Ken Miguel. “San Francisco’s aging sewers provide gross glimpse into need for repairs”. ABC7 News. 23 October 2017. https://abc7news.com/san-francisco-sewer-system-dpw-sfdpw-sewers/2558293/ .

20. Nathan Robinson. “Why is San Francisco … covered in human feces?” The Guardian. 18 August 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/18/san-francisco-poop-problem-inequality-homelessness. 18 August 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/18/san-francisco-poop-problem-inequality-homelessness .

21. Noah Sanders. “Why Is There So Much Human Shit on the Streets?” The Bold Italic. 6 November 2013. https://thebolditalic.com/why-is-there-so-much-human-shit-on-the-streets-the-bold-italic-san-francisco-ccaecdc7512 .

22. Adam Andrzejewski. “Mapping San Francisco’s Human Waste Challenge - 132,562 Cases Reported In The Public Way Since 2008”. Forbes. 15 April 2019. https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2019/04/15/mapping-san-franciscos-human-waste-challenge-132562-case-reports-since-2008/?sh=55ca85bc5ea5 .

23. Jeff Berardelli. “Megadrought emerging in western U.S. could be the worst in 1,200 years, study finds”. CBS News. 17 April 2020. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/climate-change-drought-california-western-united-states-study/ .

24. Tilde Herrera. “Are There Public Composting Toilets in San Francisco’s Future?” GreenBiz. 9 December 2011. https://www.greenbiz.com/article/are-there-public-composting-toilets-san-franciscos-future .

25. Examiner Staff. “San Francisco takes a sniff at composting toilets”. San Francisco Examiner. 8 December 2011. https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/san-francisco-takes-a-sniff-at-composting-toilets/ .

26. “San Francisco Joins The Composting Toilet Revolution!” SOIL. 12 December 2011. https://www.oursoil.org/san-francisco-joins-the-composting-toilet-revolution/ .

27. Mark Boyer. “San Francisco Working on Plan To Install Composting Public Toilets”. InHabitat. 19 December 2011. https://inhabitat.com/san-francisco-working-on-plan-to-install-composting-public-toilets/composting-toilet-san-francisco/ .

28. Aaron Sankin. “Composting Toilets, Or ‘Pooplets’, Move One Step Closer To San Francisco Sidewalks”. Huffpost. 8 December 2011. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/composting-toilets-pooplet-report_n_1137963 .

29. Larry G. “Overview of the composting toilet”. Greywater Action. Accessed 1 June 2021. https://greywateraction.org/composting-toilet-in-a-san-francisco-home .

30. “Composting Toilets”. San Francisco Water Power Sewer/SFPUC. Accessed 1 June 2021. https://sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=835 .

31. “The Low Down on Pee and Poop: Composting Toilets and Urine Reuse”. Ecology Center. 7 August 2014. https://ecologycenter.org/events/the-low-down-on-pee-and-poo-composting-toilets-and-urine-reuse/ .

32. Sam Kubba. “Composting Toilet: Water Efficiency and Sanitary Waste”. ScienceDirect. 2017. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/composting-toilet .

33. “About Composting Toilets: Sewage Woes, Sewage Solutions”. Greywater Action. Accessed 2 June 2021. https://greywateraction.org/composting-toilets/ .

34. Brain Albrecht. “What you can do to help reduce harmful algal blooms”. The Plain Dealer. 11 November 2019. https://www.cleveland.com/news/2019/11/what-you-can-do-to-help-reduce-harmful-algal-blooms.html .

35. You’ve gotta love something named Humanure. Joseph Jenkins. Humanure Handbook . Humanure Handbook dot com. Accessed 2 June 2021. https://humanurehandbook.com .

36. Eric Roston. “The Massive Cost of Not Adapting to Climate Change”. Bloomberg. 9 September 2019. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-09/the-massive-cost-of-not-adapting-to-climate-change .

37. Starre Vartan. “The Cost of Tackling Climate Change Is Less Than the Cost of Doing Nothing”. Treehugger. 21 April 2020. https://www.treehugger.com/tackling-climate-change-will-help-economy-when-we-need-it-most-4865281 .

38. Andrew Hoffman. “Rising Insurance Costs May Convince People That Climate Change Risks Are Real”. Huffpost. 1 November 2018. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/insurance-costs-climate-change_b_5bd0a8d0e4b04d1f9a5582d9 .

39. Sébastien Roblin. “The U.S. military is terrified of climate change. It’s done more damage than Iranian missiles.” NBC News. 20 September 2020. https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/u-s-military-terrified-climate-change-it-s-done-more-ncna1240484 .

40. Damian Carrington. “Climate emissions shrinking the stratosphere, scientists reveal”. The Guardian. 12 May 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/12/emissions-shrinking-the-stratosphere-scientists-find .

41. Damian Carrington. “Climate crisis has shifted the Earth’s axis, study shows”. The Guardian. 23 April 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/23/climate-crisis-has-shifted-the-earths-axis-study-shows .

42. Richard Procter. “San Francisco Knows How to Stop Global Warming — Will It?” SF Weekly. 11 September 2019. https://www.sfweekly.com/news/san-francisco-climate-change-emissions/ .

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