From: rail2000@aol.com (Alan Hirsch)
Subject: SMCo vote may delay rail plan
Followup-To: ba.transportation
Keywords: BART CalTrain San Mateo County
Reply-To: rail2000@aol.com
Organization: Peninsula Rail 2000
Distribution: ba
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 17:39:45 GMT


San Mateo County Vote May Delay Regional Rail Plan

The San Mateo County Board has put BART vs CalTrain the ballot in San
Mateo County this November in two ballot measures.  Though a victory of
the ballot measure that promises BART-to-Menlo Park in an advisory
measure, it won't mean they will tear up CalTrain tracks--it will
likely delay putting in better CalTrain service in the short term, and
might kill hope of a CalTrain extension to downtown San Francisco.  More
importantly, it puts in jeopardy coordination of planning efforts with
Santa Clara County to ring the bay with rail transit by the year 2000.  

Measure B/BART asks voters whether to begin negotiations to join the BART
district and, more importantly, whether to extend BART "throughout" the
county.  It promises the results of the negotiations will go back to the
voters when the costs, taxes, and timeframe are known.  

Measure C is to affirm the CalTrain upgrade to BART-level service and its
extension to downtown San Francisco.  San Mateo Supervisor Tom Huening
was the only one to sign the ballot argument against CalTrain.

The problem is, Measure B and C are seen by most people as an either/or
measure.  To date, voters are armed with little transit knowledge--other
than their firsthand experience riding BART and/or today's CalTrain--to
make a decision.  With no information on the costs and timeframe of BART
vs a CalTrain upgrade (and the vision of an upgraded CalTrain), voters
will likely choose BART over CalTrain by a wide margin. 

Though the impact of such a vote on an advisory measure is unclear, it is
certain that CalTrain opponents such as Tom Huening will use a big yes
vote on BART as an excuse to continue their efforts to kill the CalTrain
extension to downtown San Francisco.  Already, Huening has proposed that
money set aside for CalTrain be reallocated to pay for BART--whose
extension to SF airport is costing almost double what was promised voters
in the original ballot measure.

BART Measure Unnecessary & Confusing

As has been pointed out, this controversy is unnecessary.  Negotiations
to extend BART and join the BART district could have been carried out--
and the results put on a future ballot--without an advisory vote.  In
fact, by putting the BART advisory measure on the ballot, it actually
delayed the negotiations by 3 months.  And what the wording of the two
measures mean is highly confusing--every one of Board members who drafted
the measures stated as much at the October 6 Board meeting during a
discussion proposing that the measures be removed.  Supervisor Tom Nolan
states that he never meant BART to go to Menlo Park when he put in the
wording "throughout county".

Probably the best characterization of B was made by Santa Clara Supervisor
Rod Diridon who described it at a JPB meeting as "Asking voters if they
want a Cadillac without telling them the cost".  

Bad Government from False Promises

The ballot confrontation is an unintended--but not unexpected--outcome of
continued promises by BART managers and regional leaders who state "BART
around the Bay" is the only solution to building a regional transit
system, and a blackout of news or discussion of plans to upgrade CalTrain.
In reality, the BART vs CalTrain trade-off has already been decided on the
Peninsula and Santa Clara County: transit staff, business leaders, and
environmental and transit activists who have studied the problem of
bringing regional rail transit to their communities have compared BART and
CalTrain technologies and available revenue sources.  Their conclusions
are almost unanimous: BART-around-the-Bay is dead due to its high cost,
long timeframe to construct--and urgent need to provide better transit
service quickly to meet the region's clean air goals.  Only by using the
CalTrain upgrade approach--incremental improvements, using existing
passenger and freight rail lines, culminating in high-speed electric
trains--can we provide local communities transit without economy-crushing
taxes.

What this means is that asking voters to OK negotiations for BART
"throughout" San Mateo County is a sham.  For any concrete proposal for a
BART extension beyond the airport will almost surely be defeated when it
comes back to the ballot and the general public is confronted by the cost
(taxes) and timeframe to accomplish this.  This defeat is not only
guaranteed by the facts about cost (taxes) and timeframe, but by the fact
that there is no organized support for raising taxes for BART.  The civic
groups, city councils, and other community leaders who normally support
transit and infrastructure improvements have already lined up against BART
because a lower-cost alternative is available.  Even SAMCEDA, the most
powerful business group in the county, and active proponent of BART to SF
airport, has come out dead-set against BART south of the airport.

But as yet, no career politician has yet been willing to publicly speak out
on the BART vs CalTrain issue.  The conventional wisdom is that BART myth
is almost unassailable--if you want to get re-elected.  In fact, the
strongest statement heard challenging the BART-myth is that they are in
favor of "Rail around the Bay", which, for those who know, is code for "No
BART"--and ambiguous enough to get elected.

Key Role of Peninsula Rail 2000

In fact, up to now, the only people attempting to broadcast the CalTrain
story as a challenge to the BART-mythos has been Peninsula Rail 2000 and
the Sierra Club.  To date, PR2000 has focused its limited resources on
educating city councils, businesses and key environmentalists.  This
strategy has resulted in funds for the CalTrain upgrade being included in
Santa Clara County's measure A sales tax extension this November.  We
have also made the San Mateo County business community and city councils
aware of this trade off--but they have taken little action as they assumed
the agreement of BART to SFO and Measure A sales tax for CalTrain resolved
the issue back in 1988.  However the Board's recent actions are unsettling
this consensus. 

With the recent turn of events threatening the future of CalTrain, it is
likely the business community will pay more attention to the train since
it is key to their meeting their TSM/clean air goals by 1997.  A strong
showing for C/CalTrain now will save voters from spending millions studying
BART to Menlo Park--a proposal that none of us will ever see built. 

--

Alan Hirsch
rail2000@aol.com

Newsgroups: ba.transportation