Caltrans will close two of the four lanes on southbound Interstate 680 in Alamo for three or four hours today – starting at 10 a.m - to repair a hole in the pavement. A major rehabilitation of the entire freeway in the San Ramon Valley is being planned for summer of 2010.

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The evidence keeps piling up  – along with dead and mangled bodies – that use of electronic communications devices while driving is taking a heavy toll. But it’s not like Americans are going to go back to the days of pulling off the road to make calls from a phone booth.

So what are the best actions for drivers and lawmakers to take to minimize the carnage from use of cell phone calls, texts and tweets on the highways?  Read the rest of this entry »

Would you pay to save time driving the freeways? Would paying a toll to use an express lane seem less painful if you knew it was helping ease freeway traffic congestion for the masses?.

Bay Area residents are getting closer to finding out. A plan to create an 800-mile network of express lanes open to carpools for free and others for a toll easily passed two big hurdles in the last week. Read the rest of this entry »

The AC Transit board tonight is expected to raise fares in the latest of a series of public transit fare increases sweeping across the Bay Area and California.

For anyone who wants to attend, the meeting is scheduled to start at 5 p.m. at AC’s headquarters at 1600 Franklin St, Oakland. The basic fare is proposed to rise from $1.75 to $2 on July 1. 

It’s too bad, many transit advocates say, that fares are going up after a year in which ridership made strong gains as many people, frustrated by higher gas prices, left their cars at home and rode the bus or train.

AC Transit board members have said a fare increase is a bitter but necessary medicine to combat the sharp decline in sale tax revenues that provide much of bus operating funds. AC leaders also grumbled that their district  took a $25 million hit in the state’s raid on transit funds to balance the state’s budget. Based on those repeated statements, a good guess is the board will adopt the fare hike.

You also can expect some public grousing though. Some district critics are incensed that AC Transit is going after a fare hike even though the district won voter approval in November to double a parcel district from $48 to $96 annually in most of the district.  Other transit systems in the East Bay don’t collect parcel taxes to hep them cover operating costs, critics note.

Service on one of BART’s busiest train lines was disrupted for an hour in Contra Costa County this morning by a possum.

The marsupial paid with its life when it wandered into a track switching mechanism near Concord, burning out the switching motor and halting train service between Concord and Pleasant Hill until repairs were made.

“I’ve been here four and a half years and this is the first time I’ve heard of this happening,” said BART spokesman Jim Allison.

BART created a bus bridge to shuttle passengers past the temporary service blockage.  

The people who live on bumpy Charles Hill Road in Orinda have something to cheer about because of President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus package.

Orinda - which ranks lowest among Bay Area cities for local road conditions - plans to spend some of its job stimulus money to fix the narrow, winding road where drivers regularly steer around potholes and big cracks.

The condition of Charles Hill Road is not an isolated problem. Cities and counties throughout California are struggling to hold roads together as voters resist tax and fee hikes, and road maintenance funds heavily dependent on sales tax decline as people drive less and buy less. 

“Our street has gone from being really bad, to downright dangerous,” Nancy Katz, a Charles Hill Road resident, wrote in an email. ”From huge and deep potholes that wreck your car, to the fact that we all now try to work around them (so we don’t further wreck our cars) so we drive around them, which has many of us driving in the middle of the street.” Read the rest of this entry »

BART’s plan for a rail link to the Oakland International Airport may get back on track with money from the federal job stimulus bill.

Back in November last year, I reported that the plan for a 3.2-mile-long elevated tramway hit a dead end for lack of funding. BART needed private partners to share in project costs, but failed to attract any allies amid deteriorating economic conditions and sharp declines in airline passengers.

Now President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus bill may come to the rescue of the proposed rail link between BART’s Coliseum station and the airport. BART now pegs the project cost at $529 million, a higher cost than earlier estimates because of inflation. Read the rest of this entry »

Many public transit riders are getting a raw deal these days: less service and higher fares. The Bay Area isn’t immune from the trend, either.

Boards for both County Connection bus system in Contra Costa County and the Wheels bus system in the Livermore Amador Valley area have voted to boost their basic fare from $1.75 to $2, starting in late March. Both agencies also are reducing service. 

The AC Transit board also will consider adopting the two-buck bus fare when it meets 5 p.m. Feb. 25 at AC Transit headquarters, 1600 Franklin Ave., Oakland. Some critics are steamed, saying the fare hike is coming much too soon after AC Transit voters decided last November to boost their parcel tax from $48 to $96 a year to avoid fare increases and service cuts.  Read the rest of this entry »

BART reminds holiday travelers to consider an increasingly popular option for getting to the airport: take the train and leave your car in long-term parking at a BART station lot.

BART is making 1,360 spaces available at its station parking lots for long-term parking during the Christmas and New Year’s holiday weeks. That’s double the usual number.

Riders can sign up at www.bart.gov/parking to buy long-term parking permits for multi-day trips.  Without a permit, BART riders are limited to parking 24 hours in a station. Read the rest of this entry »

The AC Transit Board this evening will consider taking another step forward with their plan for bus rapid transit in parts of Oakland, Berkeley, and San Leandro.

Although an environmental impact report on the project is not yet finished, AC Transit managers recommend the board put out a request for proposal for between $175,000 and $250,000 in contract work to develop a brand identity – including a name, logo, decals, and color scheme for buses – for the project and its vehicles, stations and bus stops.

AC needs a “brand” in order to quality for federal “small starts” grants for the bus rapid transit project, according to a report by AC managers.

The meeting begins at 5 p.m in the second floor meeting room of AC Transit headquarters, 1600 Franklin St., Oakland. AC Transit managers also will provide a briefing on the status of the bus rapid transit plan and schedule.

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