Now might be a good time to ask your boss for that raise.
Starting July 1, the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority will increase its prices for parking violations and Muni monthly fares as a way to "keep up with rising costs" of doing business.
The signature gravelly patter of George Zimmer sent many a man scurrying into one of his Men's Wearhouses and into a newly purchased suit.
And there's more than being nattily dressed for which to thank the East Bay man, who was ousted from his position at the company he founded 40 years ago: There's medical marijuana and, if and when it happens, legalized cannabis.
Zimmer was California's most-generous donor to Proposition 215, the country's first medical marijuana law approved by voters in 1996. He also donated heavily to 2010's failed legalization initiative, Proposition 19.
Where else can we find such a generous supporter of drug legalization? Hint: environmentalists don't like it. Double hint: it's Sean Parker!
If you find yourself feeling strange and slightly more aggressive this weekend, you have a decent excuse: the really close full moon.
Come Saturday and Sunday, the moon will draw closer to Earth more so than any other time this year -- and it'll be big and full. It's called a Perigee Full Moon, or to the other non-scientists out there, it's commonly referred to as a Supermoon.
And even this extraordinary moon is rather extraordinary.
Muni passenger Dr. Frank Primus showed his chosen profession -- he's a resident surgeon at U.C. San Francisco -- fits his personality. Yesterday, he coolly and decisively stopped a runaway 43-Masonic bus when the driver was incapacitated.
But this isn't Primus' first Big Game experience. He was five-year member of the Stanford University football squad, graduating in 1999 after redshirting his freshman season.
Primus' colleagues at UCSF confirmed the surgery resident -- who is on duty at this very moment -- is the same Primus who graced the gridiron down on The Farm. They also added that he is an "extremely friendly and cool guy."
Everybody's got something to say about bike lanes. The funny thing about bike lanes is that they actually make life better, not just for cyclists, but for everyone.
So while the Better Market Street project wants to move bikes over to Mission Street, the SFMTA revealed what almost everybody who has ridden a bike in San Francisco already knows: A bike lane isn't always safe and relaxing.
In fact, the SFMTA says that almost all of the bike lanes in San Francisco are uncomfortable and feel unsafe for pretty much anyone pedaling through the city. That Bicycle Strategy Update and Needs Assessment includes plans to improve many problem spots and lanes around the city, which would cost roughly $200 million. This would put the percentage of money spent on cyclists on par with the percentage of trips by bicycle, which is about 7 percent. By 2020 the total trips by bike will increase to 20 percent.
One of the many disturbing things we learned after watching/listening to the video of Yeiner Perez, the naked acrobat who is accused of terrorizing commuters, is that BART stations aren't equipped with bullet-proof glass.
Amid tense labor talks, where safety issues are a top concern, BART workers note that in the past three years, 2,446 serious crimes took place in just five BART stations, including homicide, rape, physical battery, aggravated assault, and serious property crimes. During the same time period, systemwide, more than 1,100 BART customers, and another 100 BART workers were physically attacked on BART property. Not to mention the shootings and suicides that are plaguing the system now.
In 2012, BART reported 51 trauma-related injuries -- almost twice as many as the year before, according to the Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 1555.
Yes, flying can get more uncivilized.
A United Airlines flight departing SFO earlier this week, bound for London, reportedly forgot to pack an important item for the non-stop 10-hour trip across the ocean: toilet paper.
So along with a safety demonstration, the airline crew had to instruct passengers to dig around their bags and purses for some alternative wiping machinery -- a napkin, a tissue ...
Last night Muni took commuters for a ride they won't forget.
A 43-Masonic bus reportedly went off its usual route when it slammed into a car, jumped a curb, and kept on running until finally a passenger intervened.
KTVU tracked down the "cool-headed" passenger, Frank Primus, who was sitting in the rear of the runaway bus. Primus says when he realized the bus wasn't actually stopping after hitting the Jetta, he dashed up to the driver's seat, and put his foot on the brake.
"I realized we were headed toward Fell and the bus wasn't stopping, the guy wasn't stopping the bus," Primus told KTVU.
