| September
1997 |
Twenty
organizations meet to discuss the need for regional collaboration to promote
Smart Growth; they form the Bay Area Transportation and Land Use Coalition. |
| January
1998 |
Co-chairs Stuart Cohen of the
Transportation Choices Forum and Rachel Peterson of Urban Ecology
spearhead efforts to get more Smart Growth scenarios and greater transit
investment into the 1998 Regional Transportation Plan (RTP) developed by
the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC).
[read
more] |
| May
1998 |
After months of education and pressure by TALC, MTC Commissioners direct
their staff to work with TALC to develop a regional Smart Growth Strategy
that includes alternative growth scenarios. TALC leaders work with the
agencies to get federal grants for the project, the visionary process
ultimately involves five agencies and a broad group of stakeholders to
develop a Smart Growth vision. This forms the basis for Projections 2003,
the first ever Smart Growth projections for how the Bay Area will grow. |
| October
1998 |
Responding to a ten-month effort that unites environmental and social
justice groups from all nine counties, MTC Commissioners vote unanimously
to accept TALC’s recommendation to allocate an additional $375 million to
maintain our transit systems. This is the first time in MTC’s history
that Commissioners reject the recommendation of their own staff in favor of
one from a community-based organization; and it makes front-page news.
Commissioner Mary King states that in all of her years of public service she
has never witnessed such a diverse range of people supporting the same
policy goals. [read
more] |
| December
1998
|
TALC’s Smart
Growth Summit brings together 165 citizen activists, representatives of
community groups, and public officials who agree that TALC needs to expand
work at the county level. The group outlines a draft Coalition Platform with
specific action priorities. |
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| June
1999 |
Over sixty diverse organizations sign on to the
final Platform, agreeing to a long-term
commitment to this collaborative effort. The Platform is released with the
Coalition’s first report,
Warning Signs: The Bay Area’s Collision Course with Sprawl and How Smart
Growth Can Help,
and wins broad media coverage. |
| August 1999 |
TALC begins California’s first aerial campaign for Smart Growth, teaming up
with Lighthawk to give decision-makers and the media a birds-eye view of
sprawl. KQED’s Green Means show joins one of these flights and it
airs nationally, while the San Francisco Chronicle does a
full-page spread of another flight.
[read more] |
| October
1999 |
Coalition leaders receive MTC’s Award of Merit for “involving
and giving voice to” low-income communities in county and regional
transportation issues. |
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| January
2000 |
Funding from several foundations allows TALC to expand coalition efforts in
the South and East Bay. TALC releases
World Class Transit
for the Bay Area,
a product of thirteen months of research and analysis. This 120-page report
offers a broad vision and details investments that would create a
sustainable and equitable transportation system. Every major newspaper,
radio and television outlet in the region covers the report’s release.
Reception by many elected officials and transportation professionals is
excellent and the proposals are forwarded to MTC and county agencies. |
| July 2000 |
Upon learning that Governor Davis’ transportation plan includes no funding
for operating transit, the Coalition launches into action. The Coalition
holds a major press conference and releases a report entitled,
Widening the Transportation Divide:
How Governor Davis’ Transportation Plan Leaves Transit-Dependent People
Stranded. Coalition Director Stuart Cohen debates the Davis
administration twice on statewide TV. The campaign is a success: over $300
million is allocated for transit operating assistance.
[read more] |
| November
2000
|
In 1998, social justice
and environmental groups were at odds over Measure B, Alameda County’s
transportation sales tax, and it failed at the ballot box with 58%
(needing a two-thirds vote). TALC was called in to develop a strong common
platform and unite these groups during the next attempt to pass the tax in
2000. With a unified environmental/community alliance, TALC is able to
shift $186 million in the new expenditure plan to public transit,
paratransit, bicycle and pedestrian safety. In total, over 80% of the
investments in the $1.4 billion initiative were part of the Coalition
platform. The new measure gets consensus support and, following a
grassroots campaign led by TALC, Alameda County voters pass it with a
record-breaking 81% yes vote.
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| March
2001 |
TALC launches an ambitious, nine-month regional effort to shift funding
priorities in MTC’s 2001 Regional Transportation Plan. The highway lobby
responds by hiring two new staffers, running radio ads against our position,
and co-opting the domain name of the Coalition’s acronym at the time, BATLUC. |
| August 2001
|
The Coalition turns out hundreds of community advocates at hearings and
workshops, while the highway lobby’s efforts fail to produce more than one
person at any meeting. The Contra Costa Central Labor Council joins
the campaign, and in Contra Costa County alone, local residents submit
over 600 letters (over 100 in Spanish) supporting the Coalition’s
platform. MTC Commissioners respond by including several
Coalition priorities: a pilot program to provide free transit passes
to 31,000 low-income youth in the East Bay; a tripling of funding for
Transportation for Livable Communities and Housing Incentive Programs to
$27-million per year; the extension of Caltrain to downtown San Francisco;
and a region-wide express-bus network.
|
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April/May 2002 |
TALC receives three awards that recognize different Coalition successes:
- California Association
of Nonprofits’ Public Policy Excellence Award for efforts to stop sprawl,
improve transportation, and restore the Bay Area’s quality-of-life.
- Santa Clara Board of
Supervisors’ Award of Recognition for protecting bus service for
low-income communities and spearheading the campaign for the regional
Smart Growth Strategy.
- American Lung
Association’s Clean Air Award for “education and public awareness”.
|
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Fall 2002 |
TALC sets the stage for
future campaigns with the release of three major reports, all of which
generate media headlines:
Housing Shortage/Parking Surplus
shows how innovative parking policies and building on excess parking lots
can lead to over 16,000 new affordable housing units in Silicon Valley.
Roadblocks to Health, co-authored with CTWO and PUEBLO,
uses GIS mapping and 700 community surveys to identify transportation
barriers to health care, nutritious food and physical activity for
low-income communities in three counties. TALC launches its Transportation
Equity and Community Health (TEACH) project, which builds local capacity to help communities overcome these barriers.
Revolutionizing Bay Area Transit…On a Budget
meticulously details TALC's proposal for a $2.5 billion, state-of-the-art
rapid bus network that would generate 60 million new transit trips
annually, create opportunities for transit-oriented development and usher
in a new generation of clean air vehicles. |
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Spring 2003 |
TALC’s newest report,
Transportation Injustice describes in great detail how
$2 billion of cost overruns for the BART extension from Fremont to San
Jose will devastate local bus and light rail service. The report kicks off
TALC’s Save Our Transit campaign to preserve local bus service by
phasing BART to Milpitas or delaying the extension. After four months of
grassroots efforts, two rallies, and a comprehensive media campaign that
generated articles, editorials, and op-eds supporting our recommendations,
we achieved an incredible victory. On June 5, 2003, the same VTA Board
that had ignored our pleas over the last two years finally acted on the
overwhelming outcry from the community – they adopted the core of the
Save Our Transit alternative and deferred the cuts. |
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March 2004 |
TALC plays a leading role
in developing Regional Measure 2, a one-dollar bridge toll increase to
fund public transit. Senator Perata gives TALC a seat on the
expenditure plan committee, and many of the top objectives from World
Class Transit for the Bay Area become part of the plan, including over $10 million
per year for a regional express bus system, funding for the extension of CalTrain to a new Transbay Terminal, and Bus Rapid Transit in the east
bay. It also contains two TALC proposals, “All Nighter” service that will
provide nighttime buses between BART stations when BART is closed, and the
first-ever Safe Routes to Transit program. In addition to a host of
cost-effective projects, the plan dedicates nearly 38% of the $125 million
per year to operating new bus, train and ferry service.
TALC plays a leading role in building grassroots and media support for
the plan, which is passed by 56% of the voters.
[read
more] |
|
November 2004 |
TALC plays a leading role in
Contra Costa County’s $2 billion transportation measure, bringing together
39 groups behind a common platform. The final package includes many of the
coalition's priorities, such as $100 million to promote affordable housing
and transit villages and more than $90 million for a Safe Transportation
for Children program. Four other counties passed transportation sales
taxes, and AC Transit and BART get voter approval for new funding
measures. In the 11 measures passed between 2000 and 2004, $12 billion,
or over 80%, goes towards public transit and another $500 million goes
towards bicycle and pedestrian safety. |
|
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June 2005 |
TALC releases a new
three-year strategic
plan following an intensive 10-month Coalition process. The
plan launches the new
Great Communities Initiative, a
partnership of four leading regional nonprofits working to provide
residents with tools to engage in planning, so that development near
transit improves the quality of life for existing residents while
providing great places for our children to live. The ultimate goal is for
half of new homes built by 2032 to be located in walkable communities near
transit, and to include homes affordable to people of all income levels. |
|
July 2005 |
On July 27, MTC approves a
groundbreaking policy that establishes that new transit projects will not
be funded until cities plan for homes in a pedestrian- and bike-oriented
design around new stations. These “transit villages” can ensure a good
investment of our regional transit dollars by increasing ridership and
accommodating growth without sprawling onto open space and working farms.
This cutting-edge decision will ensure that $8.7 billion is invested in a
way that will make new transit work and increase housing choices. TALC
spearheads the campaign for this policy, in conjunction with Greenbelt
Alliance and the Nonprofit Housing Association of Northern California. MTC
adopts a variety of recommendation from TALC's
It
Takes a Transit Village report, including incentives for
affordable housing and plans for bicycle and pedestrian safety.
[read more] |
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