San Jose Mayoral Candidates Voice Support for Integrated Transit in the Bay Area

Mayoral elections in the City of San Jose significantly impact the future of the Silicon Valley region given that the city is the largest in the Bay Area. The importance of the upcoming mayoral race on June 7th may play an even larger role due to a ballot measure in June that may change mayoral elections to occur during presidential election years. If passed, the mayor elected this year could potentially serve the city for 10 years in the position. 

To learn more about the mayoral candidates’ positions, Seamless co-sponsored a forum event on April 28 with SPUR and other partners including AARP, Guadalupe River Park Conservancy, San Jose Downtown Association, San Jose State University, and SOMOS Mayfair. Moderated by Damian Trujillo from NBC Bay Area, the four candidates answered questions from event sponsors and the audience ranging from affordable housing, senior services, park support, civic engagement, and transit improvement during the one-hour event. The candidates in the San Jose mayoral race are: 

  • Supervisor Cindy Chavez from the Santa Clara Board of Supervisors

  • Councilmember Dev Davis from the San Jose City Council

  • Councilmember Matt Mahan from the San Jose City Council

  • Councilmember Raul Peralez from the San Jose City Council

At Seamless, we wanted voters to learn more about each candidate’s position and priorities for building a more interconnected region through integrated transit. The Mayor of San Jose has a critical role to make this a reality by serving on the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), the regional planning and coordinating transportation agency of the Bay Area’s nine counties. Furthermore, the mayor is responsible for appointing people to serve on transit agency boards such as Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) and Caltrain. In response to Seamless’ and other audience members’ questions, each candidate spoke about the dire need for fare and schedule integration to support immediate transit improvements for passengers, drawing on their varied professional and personal experiences in sharing why and how transit should be improved. See below for a summary of their perspectives, answered in this order.

Davis: Immediate Transit Quality Improvements

As the Chair of Caltrain in 2021, Councilmember Davis shared briefly about her experience in moderating many (and sometimes difficult) conversations among agencies for that agency’s governance decisions. Because this can be a long process, she supports shorter-term efforts towards fare integration to more quickly improve transit services for passengers. Councilmember Davis stated that these improvements can be supported with a multipronged strategy, because “not everyone has the same needs”. This includes investing in rail such as Caltrain and Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) and using dedicated rights of way in innovative ways (such as for autonomous vehicles (AVs)) and investing in last mile solutions such as e-bikes and scooters.

Peralez: Build an Equitable Transportation System

Councilmember Peralez, the councilmember who successfully brought the  Seamless Transit Principles for support at San Jose City Council last year, is also a lifelong San Jose resident and user of transit. He cited how difficult it is for community members to navigate all agencies’ individual fares and time schedules, citing that all 27 agencies also have their own individual policies and systems. He stressed the need for fare and schedule integration for a more equitable system with the user in mind. Passengers need higher quality transportation infrastructure, because the “difficult reality” of transit is that it is slow and inefficient to use Bay Area services. Councilmember Peralez stated that the prioritization of single occupancy vehicles are obstacles to building a better system. Therefore, he aims to be the bold leadership needed to make decisions that build a more efficient system that entices people to use transit. 

Mahan: Incentivize Transit Use

From Councilmember Mahan’s experience as a young person commuting between Watsonville and San Jose and not owning a car for some time, he supported a more unified system and the improvement of the transit system. In addition, he recognized the need to build community members’ willingness to ride transit by making smarter land use choices and maximizing housing and jobs near transit. Solving transportation issues, he stated, will also take embracing innovative technologies, such as e-bikes and electric autonomous vehicles, and using San Jose as a “lab” for experimenting with creative solutions. Due to limited public resources for transit services, Councilmember Mahan stated that it is imperative to use resources where there is a majority ridership, which is primarily on buses in San Jose. 

Chavez: Support for San Jose’s Local Transit Services

Supervisor Chavez supports unified wayfinding systems and fare integration to improve the transfer experience to enable community members to travel throughout the region easily. Supervisor Chavez aims to support local transit investments for San Jose to better serve the City’s transit-dependent population. Supervisor Chavez is excited for Diridon Arena station as a multimodal transportation hub for high speed rail, electrified Caltrain, BART, light rail, and buses and as a center to excite people to use transit. Furthermore, the redevelopment strategy on VTA’s property, micromobility service connections to stations, and the VTA’s bus “backbone” services are critical to getting people to ride transit. 

We’re excited to hear each candidate’s support for a more seamless transit experience in the City of San Jose and look forward to working with the future mayor’s administration to advance improved mobility for the Bay Area.


Jacqueline Ramos