4/11/25: Actions now (and upcoming events) to save public transit 🚌
We wanted to share good news about progress on seamless transit and opportunities to learn and take action, including:
📝Recent blog posts on transit funding momentum, BayPass expansion, transit coordination, and new bills streaming transit improvements in the state legislature
🚨Action on $2 billion state budget request to fund California transit (email your reps here)
💰Renewing Califronia's Cap and Trade Program, with more funding and flexibility for public transit dollars
📽️A screening and panel event of a new PBS docuseries featuring Seamless Bay Area
🏙️ A housing advocates meetup in Sunnyvale and an educational event in Palo Alto focused on addressing the housing crisis with a transportation lens
Read this newsletter to learn about these opportunities and how you can support building a seamless transit network for the Bay Area and California.
Take Action to Renew California's Cap and Trade Program to help fund transit
California's Cap-and-Trade program provides significant funding for public transportation. Roughly 5% of the program's revenues go to funding transit service through the Low Carbon Transit Operations Program (LCTOP) and 10% for transit capital projects through the Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program (TIRCP). 25% of Cap and Trade funds also go to High Speed Rail. These funds are vital for climate-friendly projects throughout the State and have funded everything from bus electrification to student transit discount programs to major rail and bus projects.
The program, which started in 2012, expires in 2030 and needs to be reauthorized in order to continue. The reauthorization of the Cap-and-Trade Program is a critical opportunity for improvement.
Email your state assembly member and senator today using this template to voice your support for an effective, equitable Cap and Trade program.
Climate change demands new solutions - and new stories. Join NorCal Public Media for a special screening of Climate California, a new PBS documentary series that explores stories and upends assumptions, following leaders restoring nature, reducing carbon, and reconnecting communities.
The episode screening will be followed by a panel and Q&A with the documentary filmmakers, docuseries guests Ian Griffiths (Seamless Bay Area), Gray Brechin (author, Imperial San Francisco), Tiffany Yap (Center for Biological Diversity), and more.
April 24th, 6:00-7:30pm – Gridlock to Green Trips (Palo Alto)
How can we create transportation options for workers and residents and address the housing shortage? Join this event where we will myth-bust the parking and traffic worries that are common barriers to addressing the housing shortage. We'll look towards local solutions and think about how transportation demand management measures can be implemented in our community, especially at new housing sites.
Co-hosted by Palo Alto Forward, Palo Alto TMA, Menlo Together, Seamless Bay Area, Friends of Caltrain, and 350 Silicon Valley.
Meet your local housing advocates, organizations, and groups at the annual Silicon Valley Housing Advocates Meet Up! Meet and mingle with leaders and volunteers fighting our region's housing crisis, and enjoy some snacks too. Co-sponsored by Palo Alto Forward, Livable Sunnyvale, South Bay YIMBY, and more!
Actions you can take to save California public transit
Cars are already the second biggest expense for Californians and new auto tariffs will add thousands to the cost of purchasing and maintaining vehicles. With the cost of car ownership soaring, we must invest in affordable, reliable public transit.
Despite this need, public transit across California is at risk of severe service cuts. They need more funding. RIGHT NOW, our elected representatives in Sacramento are coming up with the spending plan for the state’s $300 billion budget. A group of legislators are pushing to get $2 billion from the state budget to fund transit agencies and support our communities across the state.
But to get that funding, we need to get more legislators and the Governor on board with the proposal. Making sure they get the message loud and clear: “Fund Transit, Support Our Communities."
Recent from our Blog
Two Regions, One Goal: Increasing Transit Coordination to increase ridership
The greater DC and Chicagoland regions are pursuing initiatives to more closely integrate their respective transit agencies, with goals to increase ridership and help address the region’s financial challenges, with lessons for the Bay Area and other regions.
Palo Alto joins all-agency BayPass
Palo Alto City employees to gain access to BayPass, the Bay Area's all-agency transit pass. The City previously participated in the single-agency Caltrain GoPass to support sustainable commuting, but found that many employees live in places that aren’t on the Caltrain corridor and/or work in city locations further from the Caltrain station, so they added BayPass..
Two bills streamline building public transportation
Seamless Bay Area supports two bills in the state legislature this year to streamline building public transportation. SB 71 will permanently exempt sidewalk, bike lane, and bus lane projects from CEQA. SB445 sets timelines for utilities and local governments to approve permits for sustainable transportation projects, and empowers agencies to advance work should the timelines not be met. These bills will help reduce two causes that frequently delay rail and transit projects.
Senators Wiener and Arreguín announced a new bill that will authorize a regional public transportation funding measure. The first draft of the bill calls for a half-percent sales tax that would fund the regional transit agencies that face likely cuts, including Caltrain, BART, Muni and AC Transit. The proposed measure includes San Francisco, Alameda and Contra Costa counties, and allows San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties to opt in by July 31.
Plans to make Clipper START discount permanent, explore capping
Participation in the Clipper START low-income discount program has increased by 77% since the program was standardized with 50% discounts among all transit agencies in January 2024. Now, there are plans to make the Clipper START pilot program permanent and to make it easier to join, and to explore a fare cap across agencies.
"BayPass at Berkeley” campaigns to get UC Berkeley students unlimited Bay Area transit access
UC Berkeley students have cast ballots on whether to adopt BayPass, the Bay Area's new unlimited, free-at-the-point-of-use transit pass, that “will transform the student experience at UC Berkeley.” Seamless Bay Area endorses the BayPass at Berkeley campaign.
State funding needed to advance transit transformation
Securing new transit operating funding from the State government was a major focus of the California Transit Transformation Task Force’s December and February meetings. The funding discussion is critical, since California historically underfunds transit compared to other states, and available funding is not enough to meet the state’s goals for ridership, climate, housing, and affordability.