Category: Transportation Planning

Colorado’s Bold New Approach to Highways: Not Building Them

California has a battle going on in transportation planning. The Air Resources Board has determined that a major reduction in VMT is required to reduce the state’s emissions. Caltrans, on the other hand, is continuing to push highway expansions. See: Newsom vs Newsom. Air Board, Caltrans clash on 80/50 widening plan. Who is in charge? The environmental wing of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration is telling its transportation wing that it has failed to properly analyze the proposed widening of Highways 50 and 80 between Sacramento and Solano counties, a potential death blow to this version of the project. In a…

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San Francisco’s Transit First policy is working, albeit slowly

Here’s a stunning article about what it looks like to stop giving preference to travel by auto: Why S.F. drivers say owning a car in the city is ‘miserable’ Then, in January 2020, the city banned cars on Market Street. Later that year, spurred by pandemic stay-at-home orders, officials closed the Great Highway and Golden Gate Park’s JFK Drive to cars and created a network of about two dozen Slow Streets where motorists are expected to drive slowly and share the road with cyclists and pedestrians. The fight over Slow Streets prompted bitter hearings, and the battle over car-free JFK Drive led…

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State fails to adequately address transit fiscal cliff

Terrifying tales of transit agency layoffs and service cuts, known as the fiscal cliff, loom as the consequences of the pandemic and the drop in ridership from the shift to working at home. The Legislature and Governor have responded to the frantic lobbying by kicking the can down the road. The East Bay Times responded with a powerful editorial, Why Newsom’s Bay Area transit bailout will likely fail.  Excerpts: Rather than directly address these problems, the new bailout plan from Sacramento doubles down on an oversight commission [MTC] that has failed since its establishment in 1970 to fulfill its state-mandated…

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Press Coverage on the Valley Link lawsuit

The Tracy Press carried a front page article on the Valley Link lawsuit on Friday, May 27. Another version is available here. The story covered the key contention being asserted: The project goes far beyond what the Legislature authorized. In addition, it covered the Tracy-specific issue of the Authority going to the Legislature to overrule the voters of Tracy.

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Non-profits sue to stop the Valley Link rail project

On Monday, May 23, two non-profit organizations filed an amended taxpayer lawsuit against the Valley Link project, which proposes to build a $3.6 billion dollar rail line connecting the Dublin/Pleasanton BART station and North Lathrop in San Joaquin County. The largest project cost element is the demolition and relocation of the I-580 freeway to make room for the tracks. Over a billion dollars would be wasted tearing up eleven miles of recently built freeway, adding no transportation capacity in itself. David Schonbrunn, President of the Transportation Solutions Defense and Education Fund (TRANSDEF) stated that “We want to nip this in…

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Challenge to MTC’s funding of parking garage

In 2016, BART was under pressure from local residents to build another parking garage at the Dublin/Pleasanton BART station. TRANSDEF responded with a 2017 letter, challenging the environmental review.  BART decided in 2017 to not proceed with the project. Republican Assemblywoman Catharine Baker then cut a deal with the Brown Administration (reportedly in exchange for her vote on the Cap and Trade bill) to give a $20 million grant to the garage project. A grant was then dutifully made by the State Transportation Agency, CalSTA, from its Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program, which is funded by the GHG Cap…

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Santa Cruz County produces biased report prior to June ballot measure calling for removing the rail line

A small group of homeowners, bankrolled by a former Apple executive, has qualified their Greenway Initiative for the June ballot in Santa Cruz County. This group, whose motivation appears to be preventing trains from running near their homes, are seeking the public’s support for a measure that would eliminate the County’s policies calling for building a commuter rail system on the Santa Cruz Branch Line. It would instead tear out the tracks to build an extra-wide multi-use pathway they call the Greenway. TRANSDEF is committed to rail as the low-carbon approach to organizing transportation and land use in the era…

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