Judge’s Decision Huge for North Bay Commuters

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When a San Francisco judge this past week threw out a challenge to Regional Measure 3, the North Bay’s transportation leaders let out a collective sigh of relief.

If the challenge by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Group had prevailed, almost four and a half billion dollars in funding for Bay Area road and rail projects, including the Highway 101 narrows widening and Smart Train extension here in the North Bay would have evaporated.

Instead, by ruling that a one dollar hike in regional bridge fees approved by Bay Area voters was legal, the judge gave new life to projects highly dependent on this new revenue stream.

Here in the North Bay that means an eventual influx of between 800 and 900 million dollars for critical projects planned, or already underway. That includes 40 million dollars to push SMART Train service north to Windsor, and 120 million to widen the freeway between Petaluma and Novato…the infamous narrows corridor. The fees will also bring 100 million dollars to begin to solve capacity issues on Highway 37.

Sonoma County Supervisor David Rabbitt, who serves on both the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Sonoma County Transportation Authority, told us he’d like to use even more of the funds to break the bottleneck in the Marin section of Highway 101.