Bay Area Freeway Collapse is One More Reason for State to Invest in Rail

The collapse of a freeway overpass in the (San Francisco area’s ) East Bay should remind us of how vulnerable the state’s transportation system is to disasters, natural and man-made.

Yet if history is any indication, the Bay Area will adjust. After the Loma Prieta earthquake took out part of the Bay Bridge in 1989, ridership increased more than 50 percent on trains operated by the Bay Area Rapid Transit District. Since then, the Bay Area has steadily expanded its rail and ferry operations, which helped commuters Monday — a day that many predicted would be a “nightmare.”

When emergencies strike, it is impossible to quickly add a freeway lane, rebuild an overpass or increase capacity to ease a bottleneck. But with rail transit, you can quickly add trains. That’s what BART did on Monday, increasing its capacity by 50 percent.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has promised he will cut through red tape to expedite the reconstruction of the overpass. …

At the same time, this would be a good moment for this governor to reassess his curious coolness toward rail transit. His proposed budget this year isn’t as supportive of transit as it should be, and he only agreed to include $4 billion for transit in the November transportation bond after Democrats forced him to include it.

Worse, he is dismissive of the proposed high-speed rail system, which promises an extraordinary range of benefits.

While California needs to invest in maintenance and upgrades of its freeway(s) … its transit system deserves equal attention.

— Fresno Bee

(c) 2007 Daily Breeze. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.