The future of Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) service in the South Bay became less clear in March. The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) learned in March that a planned extension of BART from Fremont into downtown San Jose and on to Santa Clara will be delayed by an unknown number of years because of lower-than-expected sales tax revenues. A VTA consultant reported that after inflation is considered, sales tax revenues will remain flat through 2036. Revenues from the Measure A 2000 sales tax override for numerous transportation projects will generate only about $7 billion, rather than the expected $11 billion.
Estimated to cost $6 billion, the 16-mile BART extension had been scheduled for completion by 2018. Faced with the poor revenue forecast, Valley Transportation Authority officials now say they may build the extension in segments, with the final piece to downtown San Jose and Santa Clara not being completed before 2025. The news of the sales tax revenues arrived only five months after Santa Clara County voters approved an additional one-eighth-cent sales tax for the BART project.
In the meantime, two former BART board members and a transit advocacy organization have sued the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Alameda County Transportation Improvement Agency for allocating $313 million to help fund a 5.4-mile BART extension through Fremont to the city's Warm Springs District.
The group Transportation Solutions Defense and Education Fund and former BART Directors Sherman Lewis and Roy Nakadegawa argue that a 2000 Alameda County sales tax measure bars use of that revenue source for the Fremont project until full funding for BART to Santa Clara is assured. The Alameda County agency has allocated $224 million in sales tax revenue to the project. The plaintiffs also say MTC cannot shift $91 million in bridge toll increase money from a proposed Dumbarton Bridge train project to the BART extension.
The plaintiffs have asked a judge to block construction of the line to Warm Springs, which is scheduled to begin this summer. The Santa Clara County BART extension would take off from the Warm Springs station.
A former San Joaquin County political operative who was convicted of corruption in 2005 has had five of 17 guilty counts thrown out by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The appellate panel overturned counts of attempted extortion against Monte McFall but upheld conviction on 12 counts of extortion, mail fraud and witness tampering.
A state appellate court has upheld a Santa Clara Valley Water District rate increase as exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act, rejecting multiple arguments from a retail water company that the increase was subject to environmental review.
After five years, a planning effort for a new growth area in south San Jose has halted because a coalition of developers has ceased funding the effort. Coyote Housing Group, which includes Shapell Homes, Citation Homes and other developers, announced in mid-March that it would suspend funding for work on the Coyote Valley specific plan. The group cited the "extremely complex planning process" and complications with existing industrial entitlements in North Coyote Valley.
When 5.7 million people say they want to shield local funding from grabbing hands – as they did in November -- that should be the end of the story. At least, that's what California's redevelopment agencies would hope after this annus horribilis in the redevelopment world.
In Year Three of the Great Recession, it's comforting to think that California has heard all the bad news it's going to hear. Or at least we're so accustomed to bad news, that we've stopped getting depressed by it. As a result, many of this year's top stories come with silver linings.
The no-growth vs. slow-growth vs. build-everything debate has become a faint murmur, since not much of anything is getting built anyway. What is getting built, though, is generally pleasing to the smart growth crowd.
Fans of infrastructure development have surely cheered the progress on projects like High Speed Rail and Los Angeles Metro's 30/10 Initiative. Then again, skeptics may be assuring themselves that these projects will never get built.
A $400 million economic stimulus grant from the federal government for the proposed Transbay Terminal in San Francisco will provide the final piece of financing for construction of the first, $1.2 billion phase of the terminal project. However, federal transportation officials appear to have stepped into the middle of a dispute between local officials and the California High Speed Rail Authority over the precise terminus for high-speed rail in San Francisco by siding with the locals. In addition, one rail authority board member, former judge and state Sen.
Local road and street maintenance needs an additional $71 billion investment over the next 10 years, according to a study prepared by the California State Association of Counties and the League of California Cities. The study identified $99.7 billion worth of maintenance needed to roads, streets and their essential components, such as storm drains, sidewalks and signals. However, only $28.3 billion is expected to be available.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority business plan released at year's end is inconsistent, unrealistic and potentially illegal, according to a Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) report to the Assembly Transportation Committee.
After years of study and negotiations, the San Jose City Council has adopted a citywide inclusionary housing ordinance. The measure, which takes effect in 2013 (unless certain market conditions improve), requires market-rate developers to make 15% of new units available to households with incomes of no more than the median. If developers choose to meet the mandate off-site, the affordable housing requirement rises to 20%. The city has had similar requirements for the downtown area for years.
A major residential and resort development on the Tejon Ranch has won unanimous approval from the Kern County Board of Supervisors. The project, known as Tejon Mountain Village, is proposed to have 3,450 housing units, two golf courses, 750 hotel rooms, a resort and extensive highway commercial development on about 5,000 acres east of Frazier Park.
Forced into negotiations by the state Legislature, the City of Walnut has dropped its lawsuit contesting the adequacy of an environmental impact report for a proposed professional football stadium and 3 million-square-foot entertainment complex in the neighboring City of Industry.
A project that had become a California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) lightning rod has apparently died. Nestlé Waters North America notified the McCloud Community Services District that it is dropping plans to convert a closed lumber mill in Siskiyou County into a water-bottling plant because it is building the facility in Sacramento instead.
