The $316 million makeover of San Francisco’s Van Ness Avenue is running a year and nine months behind schedule, according to the main contractor, with the completion date now pushed to late 2021.

At the same time, contractors have submitted claims for cost overruns totaling $21.6 million, with more claims likely to come.

“It’s ridiculous. We need better project management both from the contractors and from the MTA,” said San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency board member Art Torres.

“They are like the Keystone Kops,” said Supervisor Aaron Peskin, who also chairs the San Francisco County Transportation Authority.

Mayor London Breed called the latest projections “frustrating.”

One cause of the delay was the scores of “unexpected” utility lines — some more than 100 years old — uncovered during the infrastructure replacement part of the project.

“We feel that once the underground work is completed and we start on the surface work that we will be able to make up for the time we lost,” SFMTA spokesman Paul Rose said. “We certainly don’t want it to go past early 2021.”

Walsh Construction, the main contractor, didn’t return calls for comment.

The goal of the $185 million-a-mile makeover, which began in 2016, is to build express bus and traffic lanes aimed at shaving about 10 minutes off the trip between Market Street and Lombard Street.

In the meantime, businesses along Van Ness have seen their curbside parking disappear and sidewalk fences go up, essentially walling many of them off from the street and potential customers.

“It is really hurting us,” said Azar Korbachen, who works at the Alborz restaurant, on the southwest corner of Van Ness and Sutter. “People don’t want to walk on this side of the street, especially at night. They don’t feel safe.”

Van Ness is the latest big transit project in the city plagued by delays.

The massive Central Subway, which is to run between the Caltrain Station at Fourth and King streets to Chinatown, is a year behind schedule.

The Transbay Transit Center opened months behind schedule after the budget for the huge transportation hub had climbed from $1.6 billion to $2.2 billion.

This latest delay projection also comes at a time when SFMTA leadership is feeling the pressure.

The politically powerful Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club just shot off a letter to Breed calling for new leadership at the transit agency.

“The SFMTA Board of Directors repeatedly oversees projects that go over schedule and over budget, without any accountability,” said club co-chairman Eric Lukoff. “This is one of the many reasons why we have called for new leadership on the board and in management.”

When asked about the delays, Breed, who faces re-election in November, said that while the causes for delays on projects like Van Ness Avenue can be “complicated and unforeseen, it is frustrating when it takes a long time to deliver major city improvements.”

SFMTA Chief Ed Reiskin agreed that the delays are frustrating.

“We are working hard with the contractor to recover time on the schedule and beat the current projection,” he said. “And we’re bringing in project management resources to do everything possible to expedite the work and minimize the disruption.”

Maybe they’ll have better luck next time.

A similar makeover of Geary Boulevard is scheduled to begin next month.

Punt: The idea of the Oakland Raiders playing their final Bay Area season in San Francisco is getting lukewarm reception from Mayor London Breed.

Raiders management, in a snit over Oakland suing the team over its move to Las Vegas, had reached out to the San Francisco Giants about playing six to eight games of the 2019 season at the team’s Oracle Park.

Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf supported the idea, in part because it would mean local fans could attend one final season in the Bay Area and because the Giants said they would try to use workers from the Oakland Coliseum on game days.

But the idea of tens of thousands of Raider fans rolling into South of Market this fall was not a pretty picture for Breed. And with good reason.

“Right now we are concentrating on the opening of the new Chase Center,” said mayoral spokesman Jeff Cretan, referring to the 18,500-seat arena a few blocks down the street from Oracle Park.

Adding thousands of cars to the city’s already crowded streets to the traffic expected when the new arena opens could lead to epic tie-ups.

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Phillip Matier appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX-TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call 415-777-8815, or email pmatier@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @philmatier