KPIX Poll Shows Bridge Toll Hike Measure Facing Uphill Battle

A news story on KPIX-TV showed an RM3 commercial in the background, while delivering poll results:

According to the exclusive KPIX 5 Survey USA Poll, 40 percent of Bay Area voters support the plan, while 34 percent are against it. Another 26 percent respondents said they weren’t sure.

That support is a lot softer than earlier polling, which had made MTC confident enough to try pushing the toll hikes.

Host Phil Matier pointed out the overt contradiction between the claim that the measure’s added public transit will reduce traffic and real-world experience:

An interesting pitch, considering the poll shows that after all of the billions of dollars invested in mass transit in the Bay Area, eight out of ten people still regularly drive their cars.

However, he did not draw the obvious implication that the Bay Area’s transit investments have failed to move a substantial portion of the population to use transit. Besides being a damning critique of MTC, the region’s transportation planning agency, it strongly suggests that RM3 will not have the traffic-reducing effect that its sponsors claim. 

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