Silicon Valley elected leaders and transportation advocates last week celebrated a federal award of nearly $5.1 billion that brings the Silicon Valley BART extension one step closer to fruition.
The grant from the Federal Transit Administration will close a gap of all but $700 million of the $12.7 billion project, $4.6 billion of which has been generated locally in Santa Clara County over the past two decades through sales tax increases and other measures.
The last 6 miles of the 16-mile extension are being completed by the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority as part of Phase II of the project. The line will extend from the Berryessa Transit Center through downtown San Jose and end in the city of Santa Clara.
VTA board chair and Santa Clara County Supervisor Cindy Chavez said at a hybrid press conference on Friday that the award marked an important milestone for the project. She said the remaining funding gap could be closed further by freezing certain spending and renegotiating the project’s budget.
“We’re going to ask everybody to help,” Chavez said.
Chavez was joined at the planned site of the Santa Clara BART station at 480 Brokaw Road by San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan and state Sen. Dave Cortese, along with California Transportation Commission Chair Carl Guardino, VTA CEO Carolyn Gonot and organized labor representative Jean Cohen.
Mahan said the award was the second largest in the Federal Transit Agency’s history, which he said represented a vote of confidence in the region going forward.
“It’s a national bet on Silicon Valley, on the innovation economy. It’s a bet on national competitiveness. But more than anything, it’s a bet on the ingenuity and hard work of the people of Santa Clara County,” Mahan said.
The project is projected to create 75,000 union jobs.
Cortese, who is the chair of the state senate’s Transportation Committee, said he had confidence the final funding gap could be closed
“We’re going to get it done,” he said.
He said there was now more upfront funding for this project than any other transportation project he has worked on and moving forward represented a “prudent risk.”
The project is scheduled to be completed by 2040 and is expected to serve over 54,000 daily passengers on weekdays.
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