San Francisco may charge motorists

[TMN]

From the LA Times, dont be too shocked........

SAN FRANCISCO -- You've just driven from Oakland to San Francisco across the Bay Bridge and shelled out $4 for the toll. You'll be dinged upward of $30 to park for the day in the city. And, if city officials have their way, motorists could be charged $3 to drive into downtown San Francisco during peak commute hours and another $3 to leave.

America's second-most-congested city could become the first to institute congestion pricing to reduce downtown traffic, improve the environment and raise money for further transit fixes.

A similar effort failed earlier in 2008 in New York.

Such a plan might sound like a slam-dunk here in the first American metropolis to ban plastic shopping bags -- where officials considered tapping pet feces for fuel instead of sending it to the landfill, the mayor banned the use of city funds to buy bottled water (too much garbage), and the bicycle lobby is a force to be reckoned with.

But reaction to the plan's recent rollout has ranged from lukewarm to downright hostile.

Even Jose Luis Moscovich, executive director of the San Francisco County Transportation Authority, acknowledged at a recent City Hall forum that "we're all nervous about it."

Moscovich is the man who said that "tens of thousands of additional car trips in San Francisco" share a "common thread" with "terrorism, climate change, the mortgage crisis, Hurricane Katrina."