SMART slowly fulfilling 2008 commitments

A $34 million grant awarded to the SonomaMarin Area Rail Transit District could pave the way for the bi-county train system to live up to its promise from 2008's Measure Q when voters passed the tax needed to launch the service.

Extending train service northward to the promise of it reaching the Sonoma County towns of Windsor, Healdsburg and Cloverdale will live up to the plan that voters endorsed when the quarter-cent tax increase was approved.

Its slower-than-expected progress toward completion fueled opponents' campaign that led to voters rejecting SMART'S 2020 pitch to extend its tax for another 30 years.

The state grant puts the agency closer to the cash goal it needs to rebuild its northern stretch of tracks.

SMART has already started construction to reach Windsor. It estimates that the extension is about 30% complete.

Meanwhile, SMART also has focused on rebuilding ridership that plummeted due to the COVID-19 pandemic's public health “lockdown” protocols.

It's been rebounding. The agency says its average weekday ridership is 92% of prepandemic numbers.

SMART's decision to reduce its rates, if enthusiastically marketed, could make a difference in growing riders who felt that riding the train to and from work was too costly for their pocketbooks.

Keeping the promise made in 2008 isn't likely going to provide a big boon in ridership, but voters in those areas have been waiting for SMART to reach them and weren't ready to extend the tax for another 30 years while that pledge remained unfulfilled.

While Measure I needed a two-thirds majority from voters to pass, more than half of Sonoma's voters opposed it. It was their overwhelming support for SMART in 2008 that proved critical to pass Measure Q.

Progress toward fulfilling Measure Q's promise, however, provides an opportunity for SMART to expand its role as a convenient way to get from Marin to the heart of the Wine Country, or as a way for Sonoma County riders to reach Marin destinations, including the ferry connection to San

SMART has its fair share of critics, many of them whose activism dates back to Measure Q.

Francisco.

Eddy Cumins, SMART's general manager, called the grant “a great step forward.”

It should be. It should help SMART's standing to garner other significant state and federal grants.

SMART has its fair share of critics, many of them whose activism dates back to Measure Q.

They opposed 2020's Measure I, helped by a late-starting campaign, political miscues by SMART's leadership and a hefty campaign check written by family members of a Sonoma County developer primed to challenge the county's political establishment.

SMART also needs to continue its progress in building the parallel bike path that was promised in Measure Q. Its slow progress kept the politically active bike community on the sidelines during the 2020 campaign.

It also needs to bolster efforts to address the so-called “last mile” complaint about riding SMART — coming up with ways to make it easier for riders to get from the train stops to their destination. That inconvenience remains a big challenge in SMART's efforts to increase ridership.

The best way to answer that opposition is to fulfill Measure Q, complete the promised reach of SMART and build ridership to levels where more people find it a convenient, comfortable, reliable and affordable option to get up and down the Highway 101 corridor, within and between the counties.

Each rider should be a vote for SMART.

Those are the goals SMART needs to meet to convince Marin and Sonoma voters to extend the special tax.