SPUR Transportation Policy Area Header

Transportation

Our goal: Make walking, biking, taking transit and carpooling the default options for getting around

SPUR’s Five-Year Priorities:


Improve the region’s transit network, and the institutions that run it, so that all people have fast, reliable access to their city and region.

Make it faster, easier, more dignified and less expensive to get around without a car.

Leverage transportation investments to build great neighborhoods and connect people to opportunity.

 

​​ Read our policy agenda

SPUR Report

A Regional Transit Coordinator for the Bay Area

The Bay Area’s two dozen different transit services would be easier for riders to use if they functioned like a single network. This type of coordination is complex, but that’s not why it hasn’t been done. The real reason is that it’s not anyone’s responsibility.

SPUR Report

More for Less

Around the world, building major transit projects is notoriously difficult. Yet the Bay Area has an especially poor track record: Major projects here take decades from start to finish, and our project costs rank among the highest in the world. SPUR offers policy proposals that will save time, save money and add up to a reliable, integrated and frequent network that works better for everyone.

SPUR Report

Value Driven

Roads and parking are expensive to build, but they’re mostly free for drivers to use as much as they’d like. This kind of free access imposes serious costs on others: traffic, climate change, air pollution, and heart and lung disease. SPUR’s new report Value Driven shines a light on the invisible costs of driving and offers five pioneering strategies to address them.

SPUR Report

The Future of Transportation

Will the rise of new mobility services like Uber and bike sharing help reduce car use, climate emissions and demand for parking? Or will they lead to greater inequality and yet more reliance on cars? SPUR proposes how private services can work together with public transportation to function as a seamless network and provide access for people of all incomes, races, ages and abilities.

SPUR Report

Seamless Transit

The Bay Area’s prosperity is threatened by fragmentation in the public transit system: Riders and decision-makers contend with more than two dozen transit operators. Despite significant spending on building and maintaining transit, overall ridership has not been growing in our region. How can we get more benefit from our transit investments?

SPUR Report

Caltrain Corridor Vision Plan

The Caltrain Corridor, home of the Silicon Valley innovation economy, holds much of the Bay Area’s promise and opportunity, but its transportation system is breaking down. Along this corridor — which includes Hwy 101 and Caltrain rail service from San Francisco to San Jose — the typical methods of getting around have become untenable.

Updates and Events


SPUR Supports Emergency Funding for Transportation

Advocacy Letter
SPUR joined Transportation 4 America and other transportation advocates around the country urging Congress to issue an emergency relief package including $32 billion for transit.

COVID-19 Does Not Have to Be the Death of Transit

News /
The COVID-19 pandemic presents a profound threat to the future of transit. It’s hard to speculate how the future will play out when the world today looks so different from the one we inhabited just two months ago. But one thing is certain: We will still need transit.

SPUR Weighs in on BART Budget and Service Cuts Resulting From COVID-19

Advocacy Letter
SPUR urges BART to work with transit agencies and MTC to develop a coordinated response to service cuts and restoration, develop the capacities to respond rapidly to changing demand, and to pursue short-term and long-term cost savings outside of service cuts. Now, more than ever, the region’s many operators need to come together to design service cuts and restoration plans.

SPUR Urges Congress to Include Another $1.3 Billion for Transit Funding in Fourth Federal Rescue Package

Advocacy Letter
SPUR urges Congress to: 1. Provide at least $1.3 billion to Bay Area transit for 18 months to enable states, regions, and local governments to help maintain our transit system and keep projects moving. 2. Provide a supplemental, large-scale transportation investment in the form of a Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act reauthorization. 3. Advance policies aimed at expediting transit and sustainable transportation project delivery.

SPUR Supports AB 2057, the Bay Area Seamless Transportation Act

Advocacy Letter
SPUR’s Seamless Transit report argued that the Bay Area is threatened by fragmentation in the public transit system and made the case for integrating our many public transit services so they function like one rational, easy-to-use network. AB 2057 will initiate a process for reform that can support this goal.