Those controversial Google buses are about to get a whole lot more controversial.

A well known housing rights activist, as well as SEIU Local 1021 and the Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club, today plan to file an environmental appeal to the Municipal Transportation Agency’s decision to allow private tech shuttles to use public Muni bus stops for just $1 a stop.

The matter now lands in the lap of the Board of Supervisors, which must decide on the issue within 45 days. If it sides with the MTA, the matter could head to court.

The private tech shuttles — popularly known as “Google buses” — had been using Muni bus stops for free to pick up tech workers living in the Mission and other neighborhoods and drive them to their offices in Silicon Valley. Housing activists and others staged protests — sometimes blocking the tech shuttles — and accused them of displacing low-income residents, unfairly using public infrastructure for free and blocking traffic.

After months of meetings between city officials and tech company representatives, the MTA last month agreed to an 18-month pilot program that is due to start in July. It would require that the shuttle operators pay $1 per stop, yield to public buses and not use some of the busiest Muni bus stops.

But Sara Shortt, the director of the Housing Rights Committee, says that’s not nearly good enough. She and others plan to file an appeal under the California Environmental Quality Act to the supervisors, saying the city has failed to analyze and mitigate the environmental impacts of the agreement. They argue the tech shuttles displace low-income and minority communities and have adverse impacts to air quality. (It unclear how the latter accusation came about since it is believed that most tech workers would drive their private cars to work if the shuttles didn’t exist.)

“Rents and evictions have soared along the Google bus route,” Shortt, who lives on Valencia Street, which is filled with tech shuttles during commute time, said in a statement. “All of my neighbors are worried that they will be the next one to get an eviction notice.”

Richard Drury, attorney for the group, said in a statement, “The commuter shuttle program is like the opposite of school busing. Rather than busing low income children of color to neighborhoods with good schools, this program buses wealthy white adults into the Mission, where they displace low-income residents of color. This is an environmental justice issue and an environmental impact under CEQA.”

— Heather Knight