The latest Marin Transit board meeting was one full of change and surprise. Amid increasing ridership (though it fell in June), MT posted a $1.5 million surplus, which will go into a rainy day fund. To keep ridership on the up and up, the agency hired a new communications and advertising consultant, who will manage MT's branding, website, social media, and communications strategy. IJ reporter Nels Johnson, however, seemed to think the $300,000 consultant was taking the agency "for a spin." And, in the name of efficiency, the MT board cut Route 222, which got less than 3 riders per hour in June. Elsewhere:

There was so much public comment about Marin's new housing element that the Board of Supervisors had to postpone its debate until next week. (Patch) On a side note, whoever's idea it was to bring in a saxophonist to lead the potentially rancorous crowd in singing, "There's still a lot of love in Marin!" is brilliant. (IJ)
The Civic Center Drive upgrades look fabulous, but now that they aren't in a PDA TAM may need to rescind its funding. (Patch)
A driver hit a bicyclist in Fairfax yesterday by turning left through a bike lane, sending the bicyclist to the hospital with a broken collar bone. Though the circumstances seem like they warranted an investigation or a failure-to-yield citation, the driver was not cited by police. (IJ)
The costs of demand-responsive bus service, promoted by Bob Silvestri as the ideal transit, make it an ineffective replacement for traditional bus service. (Listen Marin)
The lack of BART in Marin is apparently because we're classist and racist and always have been. (The Grid) Except, y'know, that's not at all why we don't have BART.
TAM should take on all the causes of congestion on Highway 101, not just cars, according to Corte Madera Mayor Diane Furst. She sat on a working group to draft an alternative plan to flyovers on the freeway. (Marin Voice)
The Golden Gate Bridge will close for a full weekend next year for the installation of a new movable barrier. This will be the first time in the bridge's history it will be closed for more than a few hours. (IJ)
Parking minimums can severely constrain construction, either driving up rents in the building or preventing new construction altogether and contributing to a housing shortage. Affordable housing advocates take note. (Sightline)

Politics

San Rafael council candidate Randy Warren hits rival Maribeth Bushey-Lang hard, saying her need to recuse herself over issues like SMART make her unfit for service. (IJ)
The move to recall Supervisor Susan Adams failed to attract enough signatures, and Save Marinwood is not happy. Interestingly, no signatures were submitted to the county, so we'll never know how far short the recall came. (IJ, Save Marinwood)
Paul Mamalakis examines the race for Novato City Council. (Advance)

I’ve publically berated Golden Gate Transit for ignoring its Twitter accounts, leaving riders in the dark about service changes, enhancements, bus bridges, late buses, full ferries, and everything else a rider needs to know. Sonoma County Transit is worse, as it has no social media presence whatsoever. Well, it’s time to change that. As of last week, #NorthBayTransit will fill the gap for transit users in Sonoma and Marin. Schedule changes, stop changes, announcements, and all the rest will have this hashtag attached. It will transcend operator, so all eight transit agencies in the region (nine if you count GGT’s buses and ferries separately, ten if you include SMART) will have a one-stop-shop for all transit information.

The idea was birthed on Twitter with @mikesonn, while we complained about GGT’s press release-heavy communication style. Why not also tweet a brief description and a link? He asked that I keep him in the loop about what was happening, and I wondered whether I should keep everyone in the loop. The easiest way to keep tweets on a subject is a hashtag, and #NorthBayTransit was born.

Since I’m not on the ground in the North Bay, he offered to keep an eye out for unannounced changes in San Francisco. John Murphy (@murphstahoe) will tweet about issues in Sonoma. Meanwhile, I’ll get out whatever I can whenever I see it and push transit agencies to adopt the hashtag.

But we can’t do this on our own. We need your help to keep the feed up to date and active. If you see a problem, get bumped from a ferry, or have news to share, tag it. Retweet the agency feeds when they actually write something and tag those, too. @caltrain, a Twitter account updated by users, only works as well as it does because of the dedication of riders. You, the North Bay’s transit ridership, are the key to success.

I’ll see you on Twitter.

#NorthBayTransit