Published Tuesday, September 11, 2001, in the San Mateo County Times

Mineta vows to work on S. Bay BART extension

By Sean Holstege
Staff Writer

SAN FRANCISCO -- Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta told business
leaders Monday he will "work like heck" to get federal money for the
BART-to-San Jose extension, in a speech that echoed the priorities of
his predecessor.

Mineta, a Bay Area native and lone Democrat in the Bush cabinet, was
warmly received at a San Francisco Chamber of Commerce breakfast
after he praised a number of regional projects as "visionary."

Topping his list was a Port of Oakland expansion, plans to rebuild
the Transbay Terminal into the West Coast's version of Grand Central
Station and regional efforts to link BART and five other transit
agencies with a single electronic fare card.

"All of these projects represent the kind of creative thinking this
region will need. It is the kind of thinking we will encourage,"
Mineta said.

The former South Bay congressman was less sanguine about finding more
federal money for the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge, which has
seen costs leap from $1.3 billion to as high as $3 billion in two
years.


"Trying to eke out some more money for that project will be very
difficult," Mineta said.

He reserved his strongest enthusiasm for a proposed 20-mile BART
extension from Fremont to Santa Clara. The project is estimated to
cost $4 billion, but the lion's share has been pledged by voters in
Alameda and Santa Clara counties and by Gov. Gray Davis.

"The federal share of that thing comes out to around $700 million,
and I'm going to work like heck to get it. It will be one of the
lowest federal matches we will ever have and we just can't pass up
that kind of an opportunity," Mineta said.

Earlier he told business leaders, "the highway building boom may be
over," a refrain from former President Bill Clinton's Transportation
Secretary, Rodney Slater.

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