Minor numbers against SMART? 30% of the voters said "NO" to this the last time it was on the ballot. 70% voted "YES". And all of us who voted did so based on what we now know was at best bad or inaccurate financial information and at worst 'flat our lies' used to get the 70% YES vote. Using Elisabeth's 'logic' if 30% is so 'minor' then the 21% additional votes we need to get to a 51% majority to overturn this is really minor isn't it? And if you are going to stay current with the discussion Elisabeth at least update your numbers because they are increasing. Mr. Mansourian has already revised the numbers upwards of $404M and many challenge this as being off by 10s of millions (too low). So I might ask those that continue to blindly say that they support SMART given the dramatic and never ending increases in the real cost, "At what cost would you vote against this?" Do you believe this kind of limited rail service is good at any cost to taxpayers? Why isn't our tax money going into expanding our current bus system if there is such a pressing need as the SMART supporters indicate?

Clay, like you, I advocate the "maximum benefit to the maximum number of taxpayers and other citizens." But we are approaching the topic from different information bases.

Direct comparison between expected train ridership and car trips is invalid, because car travel is a notoriously inefficient transportation mode. This weakness has been recognized since the 1920s, when traffic engineering was a new profession.

Highway systems force everyone to buy, fuel, insure, repair, and find parking for a car. That huge private expenditure is not even acknowledged in calculations for public highway systems. Further, cars spend most of their time parked, idly taking up space.

Car sharing programs such as ZipCar are more efficient than private ownership, but mass transit is still the standard for efficiency. Trains and buses are shared vehicles with high capacity--far higher than so-called high-occupancy vehicles (carpools). A complete system can provide almost door-to-door service, such as in New York City and in many small-scale European cities.

Car travel remains the most dangerous transportation mode. Fatal and nonfatal injury costs related to motor vehicle accidents in the U.S. exceeded a staggering $99 billion in 2005. The public pays for 75% of those costs through insurance premiums, taxes, and travel delays.(1)

Despite great improvements in road engineering and vehicle design over the past 50 years, about 34,000 people a year die (continued)

...in motor vehicle accidents in the U.S. (Insurance Institute for Highway Safety). That’s tenfold the deaths from 9/11--annually. Yet, few question the carnage. Teens and young adults 15-24 are 28% of the victims but only 14% of the population.

It's not just that fewer people die on trains, because we have fewer trains. Rather, rail travel is inherently safer. If the U.S. had no cars, the estimated maximum annual deaths at current mileages would be 810 persons.(2)

Nonfatal injuries are two orders of magnitude higher--about 3.7 million people a year (1 in 84 persons in a population of 312 million). The costs in emergency response, medical bills, lost wages, lost earnings potential, damaged property, insurance premiums, etc. must be acknowledged. The costs in human suffering are incalculable.

Public transportation systems are never set up to earn a profit, but mass transit indisputably gives the most bang for the buck. By contrast, our highway system is scandalously wasteful and exorbitantly expensive.

The phasing of SMART is unfortunate but necessary. Rescinding the project would throw out the baby with the bathwater--like that infamous quotation from the Vietnam War, "We had to destroy the village in order to save it."

We're in an economic depression. A "stripped down initial operating segment" is at least a start. Reorganizing our priorities toward mass transit will save lives, limbs, open space, air quality, and money for ourselves and our children.

[references for my footnoted comments--read the last segment of my reply first]

(1) Naumann RB et al. Incidence and Total Lifetime Costs of Motor Vehicle – Related Fatal and Nonfatal Injury by Road User Type, United States, 2005. Traffic Injury Prevention, 11:353–360, 2010.
(2) Kopl Halperin, "A Comparative Analysis of Six Methods for Calculating Travel Fatality Risk." Risk: Health, Safety, & Environment 4, 1993.

you hit on a very important point. Who exactly is going to ride this limited train? Those who work in SF have little benefit as they get dumped in San Rafael and then have to figure out a way to get to SF. Yes SMART is a developers dream. They would use this to gain approval for just what we do not need, more development along the 101 corridor. I too have yet to talk to anyone who indicates they would ride this train. We have so many uneducated (uneducated on the issues that is) people who do go out and vote based on soundbytes. SMART spent a lot of money on soundbytes. After multiple tries they finally succeeded in getting enough people to vote yes. I contend most had no idea what they were actually voting for. And the information provided at the time of the last vote was anything but accurate as we are now finding out thanks to better management of the project. There simply is no justification for moving forward to spend taxpayer money on a system that was approved based on false, inaccurate and misleading information. A private business would never just plow ahead with a project with these kinds of dramatic cost increases anxd changes. I suspect SMART if fearful of a new vote as so many more voters are now aware of the dramatic cost increases and stripped down service. If I were SMART I'd do the ssme thing they are doing by pushing as quickly as possibe to tie up taxpayer funds. But I am a taxpayer who must live in the reality of today's stresses financial conditions.