Recently, SamTrans had to make a decision about several bus routes serving people throughout the County. A major budget deficit created a situation that would alter and/or eliminate some service. After several public forums, the SamTrans staff compiled citizen in-put and proposed a revised bus service plan and fare increases to its Board.
With the efforts of many public officials to encourage public transit in their communities, the decision by the SamTrans Board could have far reaching effects for the future. Are we going to see commuters jump back into their cars and people begin shying away from public transit use? I sure hope not. We are at a crossroads where transit revival is clashing with transit survival.
Foster City’s Ad Hoc Transportation committee is diligently looking at ways of creating a comprehensive plan for an efficient people moving system that will help our residents use alternative means of transportation in order to connect with other communities, travel to school, or commute for work. This system will coordinate with other agencies such as SamTrans, BART and Caltrain.
An efficient way of moving people around will make a positive impact on our environment through a reduction in traffic. With a renewed interest in public transportation, this unfortunate budget dilemma for SamTrans does not come at a good time. With the many financial challenges, we must continue to use creative thinking and devise unique ways of making public transit reliable and seamless.
I applaud the efforts of the SamTrans staff for thinking outside the box with some of their decisions. For example, the FX line serving Foster City commuters who travel to downtown San Francisco will be replaced. I say replaced because although the express route was eliminated, the staff created another way to serve commuters traveling to that area.
SamTrans will provide a route that takes commuters to BART in Millbrae and via BART, the commuter will get to their destination in downtown San Francisco. This will have an added element to the daily commute but at least it is another option and not an elimination of service. As I stated to the SamTrans Board, with eliminating the FX line altogether we could have created a virtual commuter gridlock trying to get out of Foster City. Instead, there is an alternative.
I encourage commuters to continue using public transit for their commute needs and by working together, we can continue to preserve our environment as well as reduce the cost of using our cars. I want to thank those residents who emailed me about this issue. I expressed all your concerns to the SamTrans staff and Board. Our voices of concern were heard.
I appreciate comments on this and other issues. Please email me at lkoelling@fostercity.org.
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