Years ago, Midpen Open Space studied providing better access to Rancho San Antonio, its most popular park. Since then, the cities of Cupertino and Santa Clara have expanded the Silicon Valley Hopper microtransit such that it provides access not only to Rancho San Antonio, but nearby Fremont Older!

BART and Caltrain both need to work on creating cost estimates for 10 min service with 20 min off peak service Combine that with doubling bus frequency outside of SF and we’d be in a much better state to make transit an easy choice

The #1 piece of advice that TransLink's CEO offers other North American transit agencies: Provide frequent service

Trump is trying his hardest to make hydrogen expensive and hard to get, but California is still doubling down on hydrogen trains, now on the Sprinter and Surfliner. If only there was zero-emissions rail tech out there with an already developed power supply chain! ... oh wait there is, electric rail

$11 billion to raise and widen a highway, through a wetland, during a climate crisis. Imagine spending $11 billion on workforce housing in Marin/Sonoma/Napa/San Francisco so the people driving across 37 every day to get to work ... could just live where they work. California is a climate pariah.

Regrettably, Governor Newsom just signed this bill, paving the way to widen a rapidly sinking highway.

Caltrans has released a cross section for the ultimate (raised viaduct) version of SR-37. Now maybe I'm just being paranoid, but if you were building a road that you planned to keep at 4 lanes wide, I don't think it would look like this.

1. Commit to a project in a ballot measure at a cost based on 0% design in order to get planning/design $ 2. Start planning. Your 0% design cost earmarked in the ballot measure is now your floor. 3. Costs rise as scope is defined, inflation eats at value of ballot measure earmark. 4. ???

It’s really hard for many California electeds, staffers, and nonprofit advocates to imagine coordinated clock face and pulsed schedules providing integrated bus / rail networks and access. storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/c694...

Absolutely molten-hot language here from Professor Fraser Shilling, Director of the Road Ecology Center at UC Davis, on the decision to spend *half a billion* to widen Highway 37, which is sinking into the bay.

Gavin Newsom has been California’s best housing governor ever -- SB 79 will make or break that legacy. @gavinnewsom.bsky.social ✍️ SIGN SB 79 IN FULL ✍️

Join us next Wednesday for a webinar with @seamlessbayareaca.bsky.social and @publicenterprise.bsky.social to learn how the shape, type and speed of investment can improve service outcomes and affordability for transit and passenger rail projects. actionnetwork.org/events/trans...

California’s consolidated SuperNOFO for affordable housing finance prioritizes “project readiness” or design maturity and construction readiness. Imagine if California did this for consolidated transit funding? www.marinij.com/2025/09/30/m...

I’m old enough to remember when natural gas was the “bridge fuel.”

High construction costs and rates were probably the primary driver of MTA abandoning housing at Potrero Yard but contributing factors also include 1) the political insistence on zero market-rate units that could help pay for the infrastructure or BMR units; 2) the endless planning process.

AC Transit is celebrating 65 years of serving the East Bay! We’re honoring our roots with a classic GMC New Look bus wrap. This bus will travel across our service area through November, keep an eye out for it! Today, it’s on Line 12.

Got a LOSSAN TAC meeting on the 2nd Agenda:https://lossan.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=E1&ID=1331019&GUID=53E6AF69-21F9-4CDD-8397-275860C6E56B Surfliner was above the states 50% farebox requirement for the June 2024-25 year at 57.7% Weird to not do this chart as RT State had so many amtrak cars leased

For 15 years Caltrans has known that widening SR 37 at sea level is foolish and yet their $500M project marches forward. amp.sacbee.com/news/local/t...

Please call the Governor and ask him to sign SB 79! (916) 445-2841

There are ~75,000 people who work across the DOE national labs complex not including the tens of thousands of researchers who use their facilities.

The SB 125 Transit Transformation task force is entering its final meeting next Tuesday, but their recommendations currently leave out key reforms critical to bring down the cost of electrification and keep BART and Caltrain running: www.seamlessbayarea.org/blog/2025/9/...

There’s sort of no excuse for the rail electrification being such a sleeper issue given the incredible success of CalTrain. sf.streetsblog.org/2025/07/31/c...

California needs to fix the brown act by requiring all meeting be lived streamed and recordings provided along with limiting the use of verbal staff reports to conceal details. Some agencies really like using verbal reports to avoid putting details in the agenda

Investments in public transit have failed to provide the right incentives for infrastructure projects to get completed in an affordable and timely manner. Join this webinar to learn how reforms to the shape, type, and speed of investment can transform project delivery and service outcomes.

You have got to be FUCKING KIDDING ME. This thing is going to be stuck at like 98% complete longer than it took to get from 0-98%. I cannot believe that we just gave this contractor another contract (pre-construction on SEGway)

New @calelectricrail.org report calls for upgrades to make Metrolink better and faster. la.streetsblog.org/2025/09/24/n...

This is exactly why we're concerned about hydrogen trains, especially for important routes like the Surfliner. Lower reliability means either less service or more spending for the same service.

In 2024, AC Transit's hydrogen bus fleet achieved an availability rate of 43% (for the 2018 variety) and 64% (for the 2022 variety). Essentially you need twice as many hydrogen buses as service you want to run actransit.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=...

What’s crazy is in the 3 years since AC transits Gillig BEB were delivered the maximum pack size and therefore range has increase by 50% from 440kwh to 686kwh That means what was 170-200 mile in service range is now 255-300 miles.

We wrote about how these reforms would impact the SMART extension to Healdsburg. The state is paying for 73% of the project, but cost escalations due to early commitments are dragging out the project. SB 125 can fix this! calelectricrail.org/how-the-sb-1...

I recently rode high-speed rail in Spain from Ourense (population 1/2 of Bakersfield) to Madrid (metro population ~SF Bay Area), with stops in Zamora and Segovia (population ~Madera). I-5 truthers conception of HSR as an express between mega-cities is out of line with international best practices.

The evocative look of an immaculate collection of officers cars hauled by the charmingly raggiest trio of MP15s is a vibe that'd make your average train club member boil over.

Today, CER launches our paper “ElectroLink: Modern Passenger Rail Service for Southern California.” ElectroLink shows how electrification, level boarding and through running can speed up trips, improve access for all riders, and bind together the region. ⚡♿🚴 calelectricrail.org/electrolink-...

Looking at badly needed economy sleepers for Amtrak A full single roomette setup would sleep 32-34 with 2 bathrooms and 1-2 showers That’s basically in line with a 16 section sleeper although it looks like a 18-20 section would be possible with 2 bathrooms and 1-2 showers Assuming crews in dorms

Looking at badly needed economy sleepers for Amtrak A full single roomette setup would sleep 32-34 with 2 bathrooms and 1-2 showers That’s basically in line with a 16 section sleeper although it looks like a 18-20 section would be possible with 2 bathrooms and 1-2 showers Assuming crews in dorms

Calsta has decided to move the hydrogen flirts south to Pacific Surfliner between LA and San Diego where they will struggle the most They hold less than half the people with just 2 bathrooms and vending machines replacing cafes. As a result sets will have to be doubled up increasing their ops cost

Is the incoming leader of the California senate sneakily trying to kill a proposed 250 unit apartment building in Santa Barbara via a budget trailer bill? It certainly seems like it! 🧵

I think the next AC transit order is going to be telling and be ether a further commitment down the wrong path of hydrogen or correct with batteries for the 200 approach EOL They’ve got 130-140 Urban 40ft buses, 10-15 Urban 35ft, ~50 Transbay 40ft Dumbarton express piggybacking 16-30 Transbay 40ft

1300 homes are starting construction at the Novato San Marin SMART station. MASCOTs/MTC ought to start planning speed or siding improvements to allow for 30m schedules pronto. www.marinij.com/2025/09/06/n...

I’ve had long established policy workers in Sac tell me this was more or less impossible. That you can’t get middle class people out of their cars and on transit and even worse you’d increase car dependency since middle class residents would displace lower income renters away from transit.

Senator Scott Wiener says that California should stop underfunding public transit compared to other states with major transit systems @scottwiener.bsky.social @governor.ca.gov

The experience with land use in California shows how attractive discretionary land use approvals are local electeds and how they are corrosive for housing affordability and availability. There’s a corollary with Discretionary Grants for transit and active transport investment.

just saw this great video by a guy called @gavinnewsom.bsky.social calling on the Governor of California to approve funding to save bay area public transit from service cuts. it's a great idea, the governor should take this guy's advice! www.youtube.com/watch?v=iK8l...

To put this loan amount in perspective: California is spending $500 million to widen a 10-mile stretch of Highway 37 in the northern Bay Area (through a wetland, no less). But $750 million to save the *entire* Bay Area’s transit systems is apparently infeasible.

Unless you want AC Transit to be in the position of having to support and cooperate with Trump's efforts to kidnap people (and possibly intimidate voters), tell the AC Transit board to reject submitting this grant application www.actransit.org/form/contact... actransit.legistar.com/MeetingDetai...

playing hardball (if you believe gavin is playing hardball) over $750 million in mass transit emergency loans for a region whose GDP is $1.13 TRILLION is staggeringly unbelievable. this governor is haggling over 1/100 of a penny on the dollar. how are people supposed to get to work??

Without this promised emergency loan from the state, millions of people in the Bay Area will suffer due to the steep cuts to transit service, the worsening traffic, and the rise in pollution. We need to turn out in big numbers Monday morning & get loud actionnetwork.org/events/emerg...

The 9 county Bay Area population is currently almost 7.7M. One MTC board rep per every 250k people would be 30 total, compared to the existing 18 voting members. SF would still have 3 members, Marin would still have 1, but Alameda County would have 6 & Santa Clara would have 7.

MTC’s take on the CA37 project, basically.

A lil' somethin' from a project that I am cooking up! Based entirely on the art design of the 1948 Rapid Transit Now study.