Heads Up

San Jose’s Department of Housing has created a progress report entitled The Next Five Years. This publication is a plan for the period of 1995-2000, which summarizes the success of the City’s housing construction and rehabilitation program, a homeless assistance program, and other policies adopted over the last seven years. Targeting large families and those with very low incomes, the plan sets a strategy for enhancing city resources and educating people in the housing industry over the next five years.

The Bay Bridge Design Task Force was formed to develop a consensus recommendation on a design option for a new eastern span of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, and to examine any additional features that might be included as part of the project.

Task force representatives include: Chair Mary King (Alameda County); Sharon Brown (cities of Contra Costa County); Mark DeSaulnier (Contra Costa County); Elihu Harris (cities of Alameda County); Tom Hsieh (San Francisco County); Jon Rubin (City of San Francisco); and Angelo Siracusa (Bay Conservation & Development Commission).

Three public meetings have taken place this past March and April in Alameda, Contra Costa, and Solano counties. No decisions have been made yet, as the process of seeking public comments and gathering information is still underway. A final public meeting will be held on:

Bay Bridge Design Task Force Final Meeting

If you would like to give your comments on the Bay Bridge design, you may

1) Attend the public meeting

2) Call your comment into the regional transportation number 817-1717 and

press option 7. (No area code is necessary if calling within the Bay Area.)

3) Use the Internet. There are two options:

a. Send an e-mail directly to Caltrans at sfobb@trmx3.dot.ca.gov

b. Go to the Caltrans website at http://www.dot.ca.gov/dist4/

4) Write to Commissioner Mary King, c/o MTC, 101 8th St., Oakland 94607

The task force is expecting to make a recommendation to the full 18-member Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) in early July. MTC will make a recommendation to the Governor and the Legislature in late July or early August.

The Bay Area Transit Information Project (BATIP) is now on the World Wide Web at http://www.transitinfo.org.

BATIP has something for everyone, regular and occasional transit riders alike. The site contains schedules for all major transit operators in the Bay Area -- BART, Muni, AC Transit, SamTrans, CalTrain, Golden Gate Transit, County Connection and Valley Transportation Authority - as well as 40 other smaller or interregional transit services.

One of the flashiest features is a page that lets users click on starting and destination points on a BART map to get a schedule of arrival and departure times, including necessary transfers, for those stations -- and it even calculates the appropriate fare.

BATIP is sponsored by Metropolitan Transportation Commission with a grant from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District's Transporation Fund for Clean Air.