The Almanac
Viewpoint - Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Guest opinion: Flawed thinking on both sides of Caltrain debate
by Martin Engel

The recently formed Council for Expanding Train Service (CETS) is a
group of current and prior council members from cities in San Mateo
County who want Caltrain to re-open closed rail stations and add service
to several others.

They want more trains and want them to stop at more communities up and
down the Caltrain line. Some of the group's members believe that more
trains will justify building transit-oriented housing.

It is an argument that Caltrain rebuffs, citing the deficit spending
required to keep the trains running. Caltrain officials believe that
faster trains that make fewer stops will encourage more riders to use
the service.

There has been a flurry of correspondence between Caltrain and the
council group that has become acrimonious and contentious. Each side
wants something different. Unfortunately, what each wants is the wrong
thing.

The council members want more trains to stop and Caltrain wants more
bells and whistles on its hardware and on its rail corridor; that is,
they want to electrify, buy new rolling stock, add tracks and grade
separations, and accommodate a high-speed train. Both sides are
demanding more trees, so to speak, but neither is able to see the
forest.

If CETS got what it is asking for, it wouldn't be what we all need, and
that is an integrated, multi-modal, comprehensive urban mass transit
system. If Caltrain received all its hardware upgrades, it still would
not become part of the mass transit system that the Bay Area is longing
for. Both sides should be working together to achieve a mass transit
system that has the following characteristics:

* It would be multi-modal, using a variety of people-moving
technologies, including buses (with rapid bus lanes), light rail, DMUs
(hybrid-diesel multi-unit self-motorized train cars), bicycles, and yes,
private cars.

* It would make it possible for any rider to go from point to point,
i.e., from home doorway to place of work, recreation or shopping.

* It would be as fast or faster than driving from home to work, door to
door. This also means very short stopover times between modes and
frequent run times.

* It would be convenient - clean, attractive, comfortable, safe, child-
and mom-friendly, and easy to use.

* It would be available throughout the Bay Area, so that a rider could
get from anyplace to anyplace else.

In my opinion, all of these attributes should be included in the agendas
of CETS and Caltrain. Caltrain, BART and VTA are no longer speaking to
each other, when instead they should be collaborating, operating an
attractive public transit system that will "pull" more people out of
their cars, not "push" them with empty rhetoric.

Martin Engel

Find this article at:
http://www.AlmanacNews.com/story.php?story_id=3818

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Martin Engel
1621 Stone Pine Lane
Menlo Park, CA 94025
650:323-1670
martinengel@earthlink.net
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