Transportation
Our goal: Make it fast, easy and inexpensive to get around without driving alone
SPUR’s Five-Year Priorities:
• Secure sufficient funding and evolve public institutions to accelerate the repair, renewal and buildout of our aging and outdated transit network.
• Dramatically increase the percentage of trips that are taken on foot, bike, carpool and transit, bringing down average regional drive-alone rates.
• Leverage transportation investments to shape and increase growth, expand access to opportunity, improve public spaces and enhance quality of life.
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
Giving Buses Priority on the Bay Bridge Will Improve Access and Equity
News /Improving equitable access, creating a more resilient transit network and delivering on environmental priorities requires faster and more reliable transit travel on the Bay Bridge. A recent SPUR Digital Discourse highlighted AB455, a bill to deliver better, faster fairer bus service across the Bay Bridge. The conversation also highlighted the current state of Bay Bridge transit and tackled the questions why and how to improve transbay bus service.
SPUR Supports SB 44, Which Streamlines Environmentally Beneficial Transit Projects
Policy LetterLarge scale transit projects are frequently the targets of CEQA-based litigation, causing delays, higher costs and diminishing the usefulness of the project to the people who voted and paid for it. Through administrative and judicial streamlining, SB 44 creates certainty for transportation projects, while ensuring that community concerns continue to be heard and addressed in a timely fashion.
SPUR Encourages the Release Of the Remainder of Prop 1A Funding for High-Speed Rail
Policy LetterIn February 2021, the High-Speed Rail Authority released their revised 2020 business plan, triggering a review period and opportunity for releasing the remainder of Prop 1A funds, which are critical for completing construction in the Central Valley. SPUR supports the release of Prop 1A funds, appreciates and encourages efforts to address project costs and timelines, and recommends that the Authority develop a stations strategy to make the most of this investment.
Where Do We Go From Here? SPUR Sets New Vision and Long-Range Goals
News /With vaccines rolling out and stable national leadership in place, we can trust that we will, eventually, reemerge from the COVID-19 pandemic. The question now is: Reemerge into what? To return to “normal” would be to reembrace a way of living that was neither sustainable nor equitable. To meet this moment, SPUR has articulated a bold vision statement and evolved our organizational mission.
How to Repurpose Bay Area Freeways for Fast and Reliable Regional Public Transit
News /Imagine a Bay Area where your school, your job and your friend in the next county are no more than 30 minutes away via convenient, reliable buses zipping along uncongested freeway express lanes throughout the day. This vision is not just appealing — it's essential to delivering on our region’s transportation goals. SPUR’s latest report proposes a regional bus strategy to make it a reality.
Freeways of the Future
SPUR ReportImagine a fast, reliable and coordinated regional express bus network operating on a system of freeway express lanes connecting transportation hubs throughout the Bay Area and beyond. SPUR recommends six broad actions to support the development and implementation of a coordinated regional express bus vision through institutional reforms, infrastructure coordination and policies to convert existing freeways into a central part of the region’s equity solutions.