COMMUNITY AND SYSTEMS PLANNING FOR MUNI'S THIRD STREET LIGHT RAIL PROJECT

San Francisco's Municipal Railway (Muni) is one of the seven first generation light rail operations in the United States to survive until the streetcar's rebirth as light rail transit (LRT) in the 1970s. Currently under construction is its two-phase Third Street Light Rail Project, projected to open in fall 2005, the most significant expansion of any of these systems since 1959. The planning history of this project is traced, with particular emphasis on how the project was developed as an integral component of Muni's network, not as a line unto itself. The twists and turns of community planning and politics are described to show how such issues can be resolved and lead to a strengthened project which furthers various objectives. The paper describes how a simple surface LRT proposal evolved into a two-phase project, including a 5.4-mi Phase 1 Initial Operating Segment (IOS) and a Phase 2 New Central Subway (NCS) extending 1.7 mi into San Francisco's Chinatown. With 92,000 daily projected riders, a project which could have dissolved in bickering and divisiveness is instead on track to become one of the most densely ridden LRT projects in the nation.