Published Saturday, December 1, 2001, in the Redwood City Independent

Letters to the Editor

No BART to San Jose

Editor: I wonder how familiar San Bruno [Redwood City -BATN]
Councilmember Jeff Ira is with the cost and effectiveness of BART
when he presses for a BART extension to San Jose?

>From Millbrae to San Jose is more than 30 miles, and if BAR is built
similarly to BART's Colma-Millbrae extension at $175 million per
mile, it will cost about $5.25 billion in current dollars.

Caltrain would cost less than one-fifth of that and could be in
service at least 10 years earlier.

Caltrain's operation is funded by three counties and its capital cost
ids funded by the region and the state as well.

For BART, Santa Clara County has committed a yet-to-start sales tax
for 30 years to fund a portion of San Jose BART extension costs on
the East Bay, so where would it raise additional funds?

VTA is also committed to pay $48 million per year to BART and does
not know where this funding will come from.

BART will operate similarly to Caltrain's local service, stopping at
every station. So its speed will not be much faster.

Upgraded Caltrain will have both local and express service and the
express will be much faster than BART. Caltrain Express from San
Francisco to San Jose would be about 50 percent faster then BART.

Roy Nakadegawa
BART Director, Dist. 3