Dunno, isn’t the 26 kind of useless? Maybe it is less crowded than the Mission Street buses and thus smells a lot better, but it doesn’t really do anything they don’t. And it’s so much nicer just walking down Valencia. Anyway, does anybody have any anger to express?
Link to Transit Effectiveness Project.
Previously on Mission Mission:
Bright Green Blobs in Own Sticky Goo Discarded on Outbound 26-Valencia
26 is a good line. if im trying to get from sleazy 6th/mission to army without incident – the 26 is the line for me.
too much bullshit going down on the 14, even the L.
Honestly that line sucks. I used to live near it and we had a running joke which was that if you ever saw the bus you should have an impromptu street celebration as it was akin to seeing a double rainbow or something
Totally – axe it already, there is no purpose for this line. Use the money to fund more 14L buses, or just move the existing 26 buses down one block and spraypaint “14″ on the front. It’s incredibly infrequent and incredibly redundant. I bike down Valencia all the time and I almost never see one of these things.
We have lived here almost two years and my fella never noticed there was a bus that went down Valencia until he saw these notices.
I like the 26, in theory, because it runs from my apartment straight through the Mission. In practice, it’s catastrophically late most of the time. So it goes.
hey i’ve had some great times on the 26, and i’ll surely reminisce about it when it’s gone, but i’m not gonna fight for it
Allan – Exactly. I’ve had some bleary rides on the 26, but it was always when we stumbled across it and said, “Hey! It’s a 26! Let’s ride it!” I don’t really think of it as a real Muni line.
I saw footage of the 26 bus once, but it was shot on grainy, super-8 film. -There was definitely something going on, but you couldn’t make it out. It was either a Muni bus or a guy in an ape suit.
Goodbye Ghost Bus! We hardly knew ye.
i have a love-hate with the 26. it goes past my apt, very noisily, every 10 minutes from 5am to 2am, but really — a great fast alternative to the 14/49/67. It also has helped me during times where i thought my bladder would explode and couldn’t stand the every 1/2 block stop-lurch of the aforementioned bus lines.
The 26 is great if you live on or around Chenery, otherwise you’d have to hike it up the hill from 30th or the Glen Park BART. That said, they could probably just divert one of the zillion buses that cruise down Mission.
I used to ride it when I live on 28th and needed to get to school (SFSU). It was the only line that got you to school if you didn’t live near BART in the mission. Our morning driver (1996, 1997?) totally hated his job and you could tell. It was the worst 30 minute bus ride with hard turns on a bus with no shocks. Those were the days LOL
I don’t live in the Mission, but I’ve never really seen the point. Is there really someplace it goes that the 14 doesn’t? I mean, it’s a block apart! We don’t need to have a separate bus line.
I’m far more upset that TEP is trying to reroute the M. Instead of going to Balboa Park they want to make it stop at SF State and send the J to fill in the rest. Aside from the BART station being a natural point for the lines to end this makes going to West Portal a pain in the ass and means that going downtown now requires a much, much longer ride through the entire line of the J which, unlike the M, is almost entirely above-ground.
While the TEP has some good ideas the greater problem is that the city really, seriously, needs to be subway-oriented. Buses and streetcars just contribute to the traffic and fail to solve our problems. We’re a small, but very dense city with horrible street traffic. Subways are really the only appropriate solution in that sort of scenario. Buses should be reserved for short, local trips only.
it’s all about where you go. what about the subway through Chinatown? Do you know how stinky the dirty 30 is above ground, with windows open? Imagine it contained underground. shudder.
I used to ride the 26 in ’75 and ’76 from Chenery and then from 17th and Valencia to SFSU. It was very convenient and was almost full every trip. For some reason, it is now fairly empty. In Sacramento, the transit district is planning to raise fares 50% and cut service by 30%, while still planning to build more tracks in 2010. Take your cuts, save your money, and take a walk.
It’s because Muni did a stupid thing and reduced it to Balboa Park, that’s why.
Maybe I’m one of the few who disagree on the 26, but it saves me a lot of hassle. While the J does cover part of the same route and I could theoretically, it’s a convenience bus. It stops a block from my house, and when I’m carrying a large run of groceries, instead of walking up the murderous overpass over 280, I can take a much shorter route. However I’m in the minority, as the main loss is a 3-4 block area that’s covered only by the 26.
I’ll admit, it is a largely redundant bus, though infinitely better than the 14 or the J, which the J is almost as bad as the 26. Extending the J around to State is a hideously bad idea. It’s infrequent enough, and often late as it is. The J is practically the 26′s twin sister in it’s inability to maintain it’s schedule and makes so many stops it’s slower than molasses in January.
If they remove the 26, they need to compensate by making the J more frequent than it is. The J doesn’t cover the exact same areas as the 26, but for the San Jose to Mission runs, for those of us who would need to get to the 14 or 49 if the 26 were removed especially since the 36 won’t cover the areas south of Chenery that the 26 used to, the J needs to be made a more reliable train line.
I work with people with disabilities, and if you need to go from glen park to anywhere on valencia and handicapperz can’t take expensive BART and/or walk very far, the 26 is the only transportation.
of course, if we had a real subway system, all of this wouldn’t matter…
save the 26!!!
When I was growing up as a kid in the early 70′s the 26 Valencia was the bus I took to St. Thomas More every day. Glen Park was serviced by the 26 and the 10 Monterey. As usual when the bus made the left off of Chenery onto Diamond it seemed like it was always the 10 Monterey, never the 26.
Same shit, different decade.
“if you need to go from glen park to anywhere on valencia and handicapperz can’t take expensive BART and/or walk very far, the 26 is the only transportation.”
So about 2 people out of the 1.5 million who live and work in the city will be inconvenienced by canceling the 26? That sounds about right.
Your handicapped coworkers/clients should look into either getting a monthly Muni pass, which allows them to ride BART within the city for free, or using the luxurious paratransit service, which gives them free cab rides in exchange for leaving the 26 to be put out of its misery.
“Try getting paratransit.” Luxurious paratransit. Are you shittin’ me, theo? Try getting a fast pass on a fixed budget. TRY getting paratransit. TRY trying to use paratransit to get to an appointment on time. Paratransit is VERY hard to get, and the funds are extremely limited. ignorant people like you make me sick.
You’ve never even been on a bus, I’d guess.
Well, let them have cake!!
God the people here are so callous. Wait till you get sick and old, just you freakin wait. Your won’t be so bitchin’ then.
paratransit is awful you have to call the day before to schedule a pick up time.
not only that but paratransit costs 4$ for each trip!
its cheaper than a taxi but still expensive as fuck!
paratransit is AWFUL. what a joke.
obviously, the posters here have opinions without experience.
the reason the 26 Valencia is being eliminated is because it’s always been starved of support/buses. before nextbus.com started tracking the buses on the line, apparently a lot of drivers got away with not showing up. without nextbus.com, you couldn’t tell when it was going to arrive. of course, with the old regime, why bother having the line. with some oversight, it was starting to get real increases in ridership. I’ve come to rely on it for the majority of my errands.
I don’t know why it couldn’t be truncated to just those streets that are not otherwise served.
what doesn’t the 14 cover? plenty. Valencia St. for one, then the area around Market and Gough.
For all you healthy kids – which is what you sound like – easy for you to walk. nice you enjoy it.
but when I ride the 26 during the day, it’s often full-up, with seniors, moms with little kids, disabled people, and kids from elementary/junior high school. I don’t see hardly any noe valley hipsters – really, admit it, noe valley is your comfort zone, but outside your budget – so what would you know about it? Go make some snide comments about something else you know nothing about.
On a map, it looks like the 14 mission will carry over, but obviously none of you have tried the little walk, more like a hike – on long blocks with no clear route to Market/Gough – you’d have to cross two streets that are basically highways, Mission and Otis – get off at Mission and Division and see how easy it es to get to Market and Gough. The 14 is totally inadequate if your not a strapping young person.
none of the deciders have walked up the hill from mission to church to another supposed alternative, the j line. looks so close and easy on a map, doesn’t it? well, it’s not and it’s not an adequate substitute route for seniors and disabled folks.
and is the 14 going to run any more buses on the line to make up for the 26? is it going to be as safe and non-nasty? No, of course not.
RIP Valencia bus – nobody cares about the poor, kids, moms, old and disabled people anyway.
oh and another thing: most comments here reflect the opinions of those with plenty of cash to maintain their preferred mode of transit anyway, the car. so I hardly think those of this class have the slightest understanding of what I just posted.
thanks for that breath of fresh air, heather.
i hate to flame, but what a bunch of insufferable douchebags. “whoa, i didn’t, like, actually know that, like, there was even a bus like that. or, like, people ride it. ‘cos i helluv don’t.”
it doesn’t make sense to me that those who don’t use a bus route would have a voice in its future, or lack thereof. when you have no vested interest in a controversy, sometimes it’s time to just shut your fuckin’ pie-hole.