SMART needs a third option

Mr. McCarthy, you are absolutely right! In fact, what you describe is essentially the current plan for SMART as I understand it. What you describe as "phase one" is already "built." Operation awaits only delivery of rolling stock and minor track maintenance presently stalled by Novato's stupid lawsuit. The rest, including a rail-bus-car-ferry transit hub at Port Sonoma, are all in the works and have been on the drawing board for some time.

Marin's need for SMART isn't to provide transit for Marinites, but rather to provide a regional system to move people into, out of, and through Marin from other places. As long as Marin continues to build office buildings and "create" new jobs with essentially zero unemployment, every new job in Marin, every new office building n Marin, means more people commuting into and through Marin. Without a viable transit system, Marin will choke on its own commuters. In fact, give the cost of fuel, without a viable transit system, a lot of the people who work in, and in fact run, Marin, will eventually simply quit coming.

That is by far the best ideas put out yet, and I have been posting those ideas for years. John McCarthy is a genius, and also a Marin commuter who knows what Marin needs and what the north counties need and want. The ideas he suggests will actually take some of the north counties traffic off of the state freeway in Sonoma and Marin county, making it much better for the local residents who are not un=paid commuters. They are the self employeed and contractors that charge their customers travel time to and from jobs (like myself) and eliminating the trains from running through our cities in Marin will cut GHG's from stopped ideling cars waiting for trains to pass, and save us and our customers big money in lost wasted time and also the financing costs for the trains. RIGHT ON JOHN !

Concord is in Contra Costa county and the idea of running trains across the top of San Pablo Bay to Concord is ludicrous. The existing rail corridor takes a circuitous route to Sears Point, then up to Schellville (near Sonoma), over to Napa Junction, through Jameson Canyon, then south across the Carquinez straight into Martinez and Concord. The BART station is several miles to the nearest rail line. In addition to the hundreds of millions of dollars it would cost to rehabilitate the existing rail corridor and provide a link to the BART station the travel time would be prohibitative. By the way I am a civil engineer and have been involved in the planning and design of railroads and rail transit systems for 28 years.

Bob Cleek - Novato wrote:

Mr. McCarthy, you are absolutely right! In fact, what you describe is essentially the current plan for SMART as I understand it. What you describe as "phase one" is already "built." Operation awaits only delivery of rolling stock and minor track maintenance presently stalled by Novato's stupid lawsuit. The rest, including a rail-bus-car-ferry transit hub at Port Sonoma, are all in the works and have been on the drawing board for some time.
Marin's need for SMART isn't to provide transit for Marinites, but rather to provide a regional system to move people into, out of, and through Marin from other places. As long as Marin continues to build office buildings and "create" new jobs with essentially zero unemployment, every new job in Marin, every new office building n Marin, means more people commuting into and through Marin. Without a viable transit system, Marin will choke on its own commuters. In fact, give the cost of fuel, without a viable transit system, a lot of the people who work in, and in fact run, Marin, will eventually simply quit coming.

Bob , there is a glut of office space down in Marin now and they are starting to tear them down to put up condos. Also we do have many public transportation systems right now. Train supporters like yourself are in denial about the existence of the busses and ferries in Marin. The busses can go just about anywhere in Marin but the Sonoma trains are extermly limited in where they can go, that is the main reason the voters of Marin rejected the Sonoma commute trains 8 times in a row.

Alan Boone wrote:

Concord is in Contra Costa county and the idea of running trains across the top of San Pablo Bay to Concord is ludicrous. The existing rail corridor takes a circuitous route to Sears Point, then up to Schellville (near Sonoma), over to Napa Junction, through Jameson Canyon, then south across the Carquinez straight into Martinez and Concord. The BART station is several miles to the nearest rail line. In addition to the hundreds of millions of dollars it would cost to rehabilitate the existing rail corridor and provide a link to the BART station the travel time would be prohibitative. By the way I am a civil engineer and have been involved in the planning and design of railroads and rail transit systems for 28 years.

According to a study by the MTC, 61 percent of the Sonoma commuters who cut through Marin go to the east bay and beyond, so the train route direct to Concord would much faster than driving down through north Marin and going through the bottleneck in San Rafael over 580 across the Richmond bridge. The 13 percent of Sonoma commuters who are destined for Marin could ride a bus from Petaluma to Marin, and the contractors and self employed could drive their trucks with ease. Local and interstate commerce and the tourists would also be able to use 101 during commute times, unlike now. Most Marin locals avoid 101, or wait until after 10:00 am if they must use it at all.

1. Idling cars due to SMART trains is a myth. SMART railcars fit within a city bock and take 7 seconds, yes you saw that right, to cross an intersection. That is straight from the EIR. Even with the time for gates to rise, it is still under 30 seconds, less than the time it takes for a pedestrian to cross the street.

2. 82% of the Sonoma and Marin commute traffic stays within those two counties. The % commuters to SF has been steadily declining and will be far less than 10% in a few years, especially once bridge tolls rise.

3. This is not a zero sum game. We need rail, bike paths, buses and ferries....lot's of transit choices, to get us out of our car-dependancy mode and finally reduce our emissions.

I have some news for you John. Concord is in Contra Costa County, not Solano, and SMART would have to build a track through Vallejo and across either the Carquinez or Martinez bridges to get there. Do you have any concept of how much that would cost? You are nuts!

Anonymous wrote:

1. Idling cars due to SMART trains is a myth. SMART railcars fit within a city bock and take 7 seconds, yes you saw that right, to cross an intersection. That is straight from the EIR. Even with the time for gates to rise, it is still under 30 seconds, less than the time it takes for a pedestrian to cross the street.
2. 82% of the Sonoma and Marin commute traffic stays within those two counties. The % commuters to SF has been steadily declining and will be far less than 10% in a few years, especially once bridge tolls rise.
3. This is not a zero sum game. We need rail, bike paths, buses and ferries....lot's of transit choices, to get us out of our car-dependancy mode and finally reduce our emissions.

Enough with the marketing hype, Marla. As a traffic signal technician I can tell you that trains will delay traffic at local intersections, and the ones in central Marin are at very low service levels now, C and D in San Rafael.(2) According to the MTC study, 26 % of Sonoma commuters go through to S.F. and about 3% use the Larkspur ferry. And what does the 82% of traffic in Marin have to do with anything? We are talking about Sonoma commuters here, not the rest of the population that uses 101 for business, recreation and tourism.(3) "WE" need trains, why ? Are the elite Sonoma commuters too important to be seen using a bus ?

I think having SMART go to Port Sonoma should be part of phase 1. Ferry lines could link passengers to SF and the East bay (Vallejo, Richmond, JackLondonSq,....) That way, the transit could be set up sooner, rather than later, to all parts of the bay area. If the load becomes to great for ferries, then build additional lines to Solono and San Rafael as a phase 2 and perhaps 3. Anyway, I just wanted to suggest building a Port Sonoma solution soon. Hwy 101 is always a mess and the trip to SF wouldn't be much longer than the trip from Larkspur - the boat always goes so slow by San Quentin...

I think it's time to put to rest the big white elephant called SMART. I am in support of improving public transportation to reduce our gas consumption, but SMART is not a smart solution. The plan, if approved will result in an expensive solution that will benefit few users at a horrendous cost.

Wouldn't we be better served by a fourth solution? The money that the SMART proponents want to spend (waste?) on the train could be better spent on acquiring and operating a well bus service between Sonoma and Marin and on to San Francisco. The advantages are many: the service could start in a few months rather than in two years, a bus service is flexible and can be easily adapted to changing tastes of riders, no infrastructure needs to be built, the express bus service can easily integrate the feeder service that the rail will need in any case. Last but not least, let's not ignore the fact that SMART can be expected to cause costly litigation by home owners who will be affected by the noise created by the proposed "quiet" train.

There's not much difference between being stuck in traffic for forty-five minutes to get from Novato to San Rafael in a bus or in a car, is there?

I can also assure you that Marin environmentalists would put their bodies before the bulldozers to prevent a ferry terminal at Port Sonoma. That would be detrimental to the environment.

According to Bob, the Sonoma ferry is in the works, but according to Marla, that is not in SMART's plans. It's time for SMART spokswomen to start being honest, instead of spouting off phoney numbers that are not based on reality.
We need to face the facts. Sonoma county has twice the population of Marin, all tightly packed into the Sonoma urban corridor that is all flat. Trains could very well serve Sonoma's commute needs, as I have read that 70 percent of Sonoma residents who need to commute do so in Sonoma county, from Healdsberg to Petaluma. Marin county is completely different geography, much older cities and towns built way up in the hills, canyons, valleys and along the coast where trains have never run at all and definately never will. That is why the people of Marin object to funding trains for Sonoma county. If Sonoma wants trains then they definately should leave Marin out of the loop and vote on it themselves, Marin is what squashed their train project in 2006, why risk it again, take the "M" out of SMART and change the name to Sonoma Novato Overland Transit (SNOT). " Marin enviornmentalists really don't have any say about the Port of Sonoma ferry, because it's not even in Marin and no sales tax can be collected from Marin residents, it's Sonoma's baby now.

The federal government has already approved tens of millions, if memory serves, for development of a regional ferry-link transit center at Port Sonoma. Berg development company has purchased the Port Sonoma land and is planning the site as we speak, or so I've been told. Port Sonoma will provide a single unified connection point for ferries, rail transit, bus service and auto commuters for points north and east. My guess is that they don't much care what Marin thinks of that. The projections indicate the enterprise will do just fine without our participation.

Often as it is repeated, Marin seems deaf to the reality that it sits squarely on top of three major REGIONAL transportation arteries. Every commuter, every roll of toilet paper, every can of Coke, that makes its way north of Marin and all the way to the Oregon border travels through Marin on US 101. Marin isn't an island.

NO, SMART will not provide much, if any, useful service to commuters WITHIN Marin County.(However, it's not so that "trains have never run at all" in much of Marin. Up to the 1930's commuter trains to SF ran through EVERY single town in Marin, including Point Reyes Station!) What SMART can do for Marin, however, is move some of people in the hundreds of thousands of vehicles that come to, and through, Marin every day, other than on the highways.

Marin has nearly zero unemployment. That's a good thing, but what it means is that any new jobs created in the County must be filled by people who live elsewhere. The numerous large office parks built here in recent years may be good for the almighty "local tax base," but they are mainly filled with people, such as secretaries and clerical employees, who aren't going to make enough money to live in Marin, or who will choose to spend what money they make on a larger, nicer home outside the County at far less cost. All of those people need to be moved from there to here every day. Without rail, buses notwithstanding, the only way to accommodate the present rate of transit demand is to keep adding lanes to the freeways. Does Marin really want to perpetually remain one huge freeway "construction zone" forever and ever?

So long as Marin closes its borders to an efficient, long distance rail transit system that is capable of interfacing with BART and the national rail system, those people who come to and through Marin are going to continue to clog the freeways and get to work exhausted and annoyed every day. Marin cannot continue to straddle 101 at the Golden Gate, 580 at San Rafael, and 37 at Novato, block rail transit, and expect its highways to keep pace with the growth that is going on all around it. It's really not rocket science, but so long as Marin maintains a narcissistic, insular, attitude and refuses to recognize it lives in a much larger community of communities, it's going to continue to choke on ever thickening exhaust fumes. Then again, rallying the troops to prevent the aerial spraying of moth hormones is so much more politically correct and "green" than dealing with the really important challenges facing the community...

Bob, I recently was up in Arcata visiting freinds, I brought up the NCRA and they laughed. They told me that they voted it down 2 years ago, they want rails TO trails, just like in many other areas of the country have done with great success.
The north coast is served by hwy 299, a major east west trucking route for all their goods produced and consumed, 101 is for travel. They said that the state is planning on making 299 four lanes all the way from Blue Lake to Weaverville. That is going to take many years and cost billions but it is important because that is the main artery to the north coast, trains are not important at all.
In Willits , Ukiah and Lake county, the major shipping route is hwy 20, not 101. 101 serves mainly Marin, and Sonoma is served by hwy 37 to 101, so your cans of Coke theory is not accurate.
The people of Marin can easily avoid using 101, there are many other much nicer routes to take other than looking at all those ugly vacant office buildings and condos, and worse yet all you sad commuters from Novato and Sonoma. The Sonoma ferry would take them off of 101.
I can tell you really care about the health of the people of Marin when you say that building trains for Sonoma is more important stopping the spray program, that sums you and all the greedy politicians and train developers well, SCREW THE PEOPLE OF MARIN, WE WANT TRAINS.

Genius.

This is a GREAT idea! I voted against SMART because it was an ill conceived, expensive plan with little proof that it would actually solve the traffic problem. However, what John McCarthy outlines is brilliant in it's simplicity, fiscal responsibility and civic support. I hope someone with the political will to get something done spearheads these ideas as alternatives to the same old SMART proposal that keeps getting voted down.

People should be aware of yet another casino/resort being proposed in Sonoma county called Graton Rancheria. According to an article I read in the S.R. press democrat last week, they estimate it will generate 5000 vehicle trips per day on 101 in Sonoma and some in Marin too, they did not say. Even if they built the Sonoma train, it will not stop at the new casino. Also the casino will suck up 4.5 percent of southern Sonoma's ground water, and the treated sewage will be dumped back into the Russian river like all the other casinos do, and that is the water that goes to Novato to be retreated and rationed out as drinking water. Unless something is done to stop them, they are going to continue to build more up there with no concern for all the traffic they dump onto 101 or garbage and sewage disposal and additional sources of water. Give em enough rope and they will hang themselves.

Pulipaca... you really have to get a better sampling. The support for "trails instead of rails" in Arcata comes from a rather small and politically isolated, however vocal, minority. Most people on the North Coast are really hurting with the demise of the logging industry. They strongly support ANYTHING that will bring jobs and industry into their economically depressed communities... particularly a restored rail connection with the rest of the United States, upon which their sound economic health is dependent. NCRA is committed to installing trails on their rights of way up there as well. You gotta ask yourself, with the economy the way it is, how many millions can be spent building hiking trails and bike paths when our major transit routes are clogged beyond usefulness. What sense does it make to spend BILIONS carving highways through the countryside when a few million can be spent to reopen a rail link that will eliminate the need for more asphalt and aggregate (which, by the way, we are already shipping in from British Columbia and Mexico.) It'll take a hell of a lot of bikes to offset the gridlock on 101 and let's face it, riding a bike is recreation and exercise, not a viable means of reliable transit over the distances and terrain we have here. Take a flat landscape and a well established high-density urban environment, like Amsterdam, and bikes are great. Around here, not so.(And, as a matter of fact, forty years ago, I was regularly using a bike as by primary transportation in the City. It wasn't easy, but it was cheap.)

Now, again, as for the "Graton Rancheria" casino fiasco... PLEASE recognize that Sonoma County residents OVERWHELMINGLY oppose this huge development. The "Federated Indians of the Graton Rancheria" weren't even a "tribe," nor, frankly, was there "founder" even a Native America, if what's been printed is accurate (Google "Greg Saris" and "Graton Rancheria" and read the Wikipedia entries... makes for interesting reading!) Basically, it is a bunch of unaffiliated "cigar store Indians" ("My uncle once said my great-grandmother was part Indian.") who are fronting for Station Casinos, one of the largest gambling corporations in Nevada. They want a toehold in the Bay Area, the closest casino operation to SF, in order to reap the huge profits available from this population center. On this we agree... that casino development must be stopped. Whether the local people can overcome a multi-billion dollar industry that has found a way to pimp Native Americans for their own profit remains to be seen. However, please get your facts straight. People in Sonoma County are even MORE opposed to development than people in Marin. Sonoma, for one thing, has more to lose and less to gain from development.

Also, yes, you are right, not only casinos, but also the City of Santa Rosa dump their sewage treatment plant treated wastewater into the Russian River and, yep, Marin is drinking it. So's a lot of Sonoma Co. Fact is, there isn't any more water and the more development, the worse the shortage is going to get.

Bob, you are right about the people of Humboldt county (the north coast) being hurt by the almost demise of the timber industry. There are still a few big mills up there, and they use 299 for trucking finished lumber to I5, also there are more big mills out in the central valley now than Humboldt.
I have friends who live near 299 in Trinity county, they told me that 299 is restricted to trucks at night, and there is a problem with the Weaverville grade, so that is why the state is going to invest in improvements on 299. Trains are of no concern to the people up there, the NCRA dangles carrots about high paying longshoreman jobs, but the public is not buying it, it's just more sales hype, those union jobs will go to their cronies and people from out of the area . And why do dislike using bicycles as transportation ? That is what SMART is trying to sell, as if anyone will ride a bike from Cloverdale to the Larkspur ferry, only masochists would want to commute that far on any mode of transportation, and you can be sure that the bike paths will be dropped by SMART immediately after they pass their measure, if ever.