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From page 388... ...
B‐92 SFMTA/MUNI: San Francisco Municipal Railway Case Study: San Francisco – Oakland, CA Highlights: Muni public transit service is managed by the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) , a unit of city government. The City and County of San Francisco has initiated efforts to incorporate climate risk into an array of planning and policy initiatives including the city's capital planning process. As a city department, SFMTA will follow the approved Capital Planning Committee's policies for projects, which meet certain criteria. The Guidelines and Checklist includes an 18 question checklist ensuring capital projects account for: future sea level rise and flood vulnerability, sensitivity to sea level rise, adaptive capacity, planning horizons, costs and other details. SFMTA staff has initiated a pilot project that aims to build upon this citywide effort and will integrate resilience and sustainability features into the agency's capital planning process. This work may serve as a model for other agencies to use in their climate resiliency and hazard/risk management programs. Key Resiliency Drivers City and state policy/executive leadership; Emphasis on sustainability and sustainability programs; and Disasters and the agency's awareness of threats.
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B‐93 Documentation of impacts is an important exercise as it helps to catalog impacts and incidents and supports the development of operational and incident specific plans. Agency Details Geographic Location West Coast Modes Operated MB, LR, DR, Other Vehicles Operated [all modes]
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B‐94 staff is involved with city and regional resiliency efforts, which have already produced applicable and beneficial tools to transit agencies. Policy and Administration Summary: The SFMTA is a public department under the City and County of San Francisco and is governed by an agency‐specific Board of Directors appointed by the Mayor. This board has the authority to appoint the Executive Director, approve the budget and set agency policy. City Level At the city level, San Francisco has participated and completed a number of resiliency related projects and plans and continues to be involved in resiliency planning. This demonstration from leadership highlights the support for continued work toward building resilience. Although no formal definition of resilience has been adopted by the city or SFMTA, it has participated in the Rockefeller Foundation's 100 Resilient Cities Program. The foundation defines resilience as "the capacity of individuals, communities, institutions, businesses and systems within a city to survive, adapt, and grow no matter what kinds of chronic stresses and acute shocks they experience." (2) In addition to this program, the city's Department of the Environment has developed a Climate Action Strategy (3)
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B‐95 2050. Additionally, the agency is also scoping future vulnerability assessments. Immediate efforts include the development of operational and maintenance weather response plans such as the El Niño Preparation and Response Plan for the 2015‐16 El Niño season. Other near‐term efforts include the implementation of a resilience and sustainability pilot project. This initiative is focused on SFMTA working to incorporate sea level rise into agency level capital planning decisions. This work would expand upon the city's efforts resulting in more projects being required to consider sea level rise resiliency and adaptation. Successes: Incorporation of sea level rise projections and vulnerability assessments into capital planning decisions and establishing an agency level pilot project to expand the city's policies and apply them to SFMTA's capital planning process. Maintaining a Climate Action Strategy.
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B‐96 the checklist requires use of agreed upon sea level rise projections that were approved by the CPC. These projections are provided in ranges defined as likely sea level rise estimates and an upper bound sea level rise estimates. In addition, the checklist accounts for project lifespan and planning horizon. The project lifespan is defined as the likely use and not intended use. For example, a pump station may be designed for a lifespan of 30 years but may be expected to be used for 75 years. The lifespan is then 75 years for the project. The planning horizon for the project is the lifespan plus the anticipated year of completion. Therefore a pump station built in 2020 with a lifespan of 75 years has a planning horizon of 2095. The horizon then correlates to specific projected tide level calculations for each year, in this example 2095. These tide design calculations and subsequent guidance on its use are all part of this sea level rise guidance for projects. Given that the guidance and requirement to complete this checklist is a recent development, no projects have gone through this new capital planning process. Therefore, there are no details on how the process works and how it will impact other aspects including project development, infrastructure design and construction as well as maintenance and emergency management aspects to projects. SFMTA Agency Level As part of a resilience and sustainability pilot project, SFMTA's sustainability program has begun developing a similar process within the agency for projects that do not meet the criteria for CPC review. This SFMTA capital planning process will utilize the CPC process as an informative process as well as much of the guidance already developed. This initiative is intended to be a collaborative effort across agency units and will seek to expand the considerations of the vulnerability checklist the CPC uses. For example, SFMTA would like to consider the importance of a project from a system criticality perspective. A criticality component would recognize projects that maintain service and continuity of operations will have higher priorities and importance than those that do not. For example, the process may weight projects that may result in increasing the system's ability to reduce rail service disruptions from urban street flooding over projects that perhaps simply reduce flooding of non‐critical areas. As a result, the more critical project may have a higher likelihood of immediately considering the incorporation of adaptation measures during project development, design and construction. These resiliency measures may include but are not limited to zoning approaches, engineering and design measures, and use of green infrastructure. As part of any process, there is a need for coordination among regional partners and stakeholders. To highlight just one example of this importance, one of the potential issues facing agencies that impact implementation of adaptation strategies are the impacts external agencies have on vulnerability through their actions. This can be both positive and negative. For example, an agency such as the Army Corps of Engineer may seek to construct a sea wall around vulnerable infrastructure. This poses the question of whether or not adaptive efforts are needed to some infrastructure if another project mitigates the vulnerability. However, even if this project was identified as a priority, it may be decades before it's fully constructed. How should an agency such as SFMTA address the risk between now and the time a project such as that is completed?
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B‐97 Tools: Guidance for Incorporating Sea Level Risk into Capital Planning in San Francisco: Assessing Vulnerability and Risk to Support Adaptation (5) o Guidance for Incorporating Sea Level Risk into Capital Planning in San Francisco: Sea Level Rise Checklist (Version 2.0)
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B‐98 maintenance schedule that also includes random checks to ensure reliability. Light rail and paratransit fleets will: Conduct water intrusion test; Inspect, and possibly replace, HVAC gaskets on light rail fleet; Inspect and clear out roof water drains; Verify all rail vehicle sanding systems are functioning and supplied; Verify the water integrity of all rail service vehicles; and Replacement of propulsion and APSE blower filters; In preparing for an event, the SFMTA increased maintenance efforts by assessing various pieces of mitigation equipment, such as generators and sump pumps, to ensure they are appropriately located, tested, and fully equipped to operate when necessary. Personnel assignments to maintenance activities are also increased ensuring drainage areas are clear from debris. One technique used is the allocation of staff on‐site during weather events to conduct monitoring and quick response activities as needed to keep right‐of‐ways clear and report problems. This includes staffing parking lots, cable car turntables and sheave pits, among other locations identified in the plan. Should staff not be available for permanent assignment, frequent checks are conducted on infrastructure (e.g. fuel storage tank) . To support resiliency and response to potential flooding events, the SFMTA has identified efforts to help reduce impacts from an event. These include, but are not limited to: Storage of 10,000 sand bags for use to protect infrastructure from flooding; Movement of vehicles to higher ground at assigned locations; Deployment of portable sump pumps to areas with localized flooding; Closure of subway system air vents to prevent water backup; Acquisition of supplies to support quick restoration or replacement of signal infrastructure; Ensuring additional rescue vehicles are activated during the event to quickly respond to vehicles experiencing problems; and Deployment of mobile response units to address mechanical issues as they arise in the field.
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B‐99 plans upon disruption to service. The service plans outlined within the El Niño plan are for scenarios where the number of operators available was limited and service needed to be prioritized. Impacts to the system also require information to be passed along to the public. The plan outlines an extensive list of mitigation activities related to public information and internal staff communication. The plan addresses outreach to the public through websites, social media, community leaders, media, etc. Messages are to be drafted ahead of an event and available for quick editing and release addressing commuting, everyday travel, as well as essential and non‐essential agency personnel. Electronic signage such as NextBus and subway signage is addressed to remove predicted service to display messages related to alternative service. Finally, customers with disabilities or other access needs are addressed separately ensuring service changes and public information reaches this specific population. Efforts include similar activities such as updating websites and answering services, but it also includes proactively reaching out to customers with scheduled rides. Tools: El Niño Preparation and Response Plan (9) Key Successes: Integrating resiliency into hazard specific operations and maintenance plan.
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B‐100 6. SPUR. 2012. Ocean Beach Master Plan. Accessed online: Janaury 29, 2016.
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