The San Mateo County Transit District and the county of San Mateo have created the Get Us Moving program in hopes creating a gateway to communication with the community about the state of transit.
The program’s purpose is to help inform county residents, businesses, and other stakeholders of certain things the transit district board is doing and may be able to do if a major project is approved.
The Get Us Moving program also allows for the community to inform the transit district board of suggestions to improve traffic congestion, mainly through surveys.
This newly introduced plan of action is not the only work that has been done to improve transportation.
In one of many attempts to further enhance transportation in San Mateo County, state senator Jerry Hill and assembly member Kevin Mullin recently carried out legislation that has enabled the county transit district as well as the county of San Mateo to place a ballot measure in front of voters to approve an additional 1/2 cent per $1 sales tax to help fund transportation improvements.
Additionally, large sums of money have been used towards improving the transit in San Mateo.
“Between cash outlays and borrowing money, the San Mateo County Transit District has laid out over $500 million over the past several decades to help make regional transit better. Also, many people don’t know that the transit district helped fund the Millbrae BART extension. The transit district continues to pay a $20 a year in debt service for that project,” said Charles Stone, chair of the San Mateo County Transit District.
After multiple successful actions towards refined transportation, the San Mateo County Transit District is looking ahead at potential projects through the Get Us Moving effort.
“Potential projects include Highway 101 high occupancy toll lanes, Highway 92 and 101 traffic improvements, express buses from San Francisco, and improved east-west routes,” Stone said.
The youth of San Mateo County is one of the reasons behind the Get Us Moving program. Getting young riders to school via buses is one of the top priorities of the transit district. Although federal law prohibits the transit district from running exclusive school routes, they do manage to utilize other routes to give students a ride to school. The Get Us Moving program’s eventual transit improvements through communication with the community will impact San Mateo County’s youth, as many ride SamTrans buses to school.
“I think it’ll be pretty useful, as long as they execute it properly. There aren’t many issues besides overcrowding on the afternoon buses, but that’s not SamTrans’s fault,” said Carlmont High School sophomore Devin Billingsley.
With teens and young adults becoming the dominant demographic of SamTrans riders, the Get Us Moving project will become increasingly important in influencing young, frequent SamTrans riders to use the transit system for life.
“This new program can certainly be helpful. I use SamTrans every day so if they can continue to improve their system, I’ll only be encouraged to use SamTrans later in life,” said Brian So, a senior at Carlmont High School.