The BART Board of Directors has gotten its first look at a plan that will help in the transit agency's negotiations with Santa Clara County officials for the proposed extension into San Jose.
The "Framework for Negotiations," lays out the issues that are most important to BART, said BART General Manager Thomas Margro, "and begins the dialogue with Santa Clara County."
One issue important to BART is how the proposed extension will affect the current system.
According to BART officials, ridership on the system is up 15 percent this year. The SFO extension, currently under construction, is expected to add another 70,000 passengers each weekday. And if the extension into the South Bay is built, it will add 16 miles of track, seven new stations and very likely tens of thousands of new riders to the BART system.
"The impacts of an expansion of this magnitude must be appreciated fully because they will ripple throughout the BART system," Margro said. "Operations in one part of BART have impacts throughout BART, and any new extension will be an integral part of the entire system."
And it's not just the passengers who will be affected.
"The trains, ticket machines, fare gates, elevators and escalators, everything throughout the system (will be impacted.)"
The BART Board also wants to take care of the people who first made the system possible -- taxpayers in Contra Costa, Alameda and San Francisco counties, the three counties that currently comprise the BART system.
Santa Clara County officials plan to abide by the terms of the framework by forming a partnership with BART officials to "work closely on planning, designing, constructing and operating the proposed extension."
David Vossbrink, spokesman for San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales, said Santa Clara County has every intention of doing its share to make the extension happen.<
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