Measure B Claims Spurious

Measure B is being promoted as a job creator and as connecting BART to San Jose and the various rail systems. There a lot of projects which would create jobs, but one has to ask about the pay back for the money spent. As for connecting BART, one has to look at the options for a transit rider traveling between San Jose and BART on the east side of the bay. There is currently the VTA 180 express. A second possibility would be a bus which takes a more direct route. Of course there is the proposed very expensive BART extension. Then there there is the stealth solution, the Caltrain route to Union City. The BART proponents do not argue that the Caltrain route to Union City would be superior to the BART extension because that would be a hard argument to win. The better approach for BART proponents is to ignore the Caltrain solution and hope that voters do not figure out that there is a much cheaper alternative. It is true that BART could carry more riders, but as pointed out in the original post, there are fewer potential riders than could justify the BART expense. Caltrain would not be able to carry as many riders, but that is line with number of potential riders. If higher ridership develops over time, then standard rail can be easily upgraded with longer station platforms, double tracks, and the purchase of additional equipment.

Use Caltrain Instead a BART Extension - Cheaper and Better

The VTA's 180 express between San Jose and the Fremont BART station connects BART to San Jose. It is a slow way to cover the distance. A heavy rail connection is needed. Extending BART to San Jose is one of two options, the very expensive one. The other is to extend Caltrain to the Union City BART station, the all but ignored option. Local politicians as well as the newspaper promote the BART option and refute the Caltrain option by ignoring it. That is how you refute an option that would not stand up to scrutiny. See a discussion of the option of extending Caltrain to meet BART. A big selling point for the BART extension seems to be that the six billion dollars will create business opportunities and jobs. But, with six billion dollars, we could get the Caltrain link operational and still have a lot of money left for other critical projects.