The Metropolitan Transportation Commission has released a draft of its latest Transportation Improvement Program, or TIP, for public comment.
The draft TIP includes more than 400 transportation projects across the Bay Area, with about $14 billion in federal, state and local funding allocated from 2027 through 2030.
Rebecca Long, director of public affairs for the MTC, says the TIP is updated every two years and lays out which transportation projects are expected to move forward over the next four years.
The TIP is an action plan for the region’s long-range transportation plan, Plan Bay Area 2050+, which looks ahead 25 years.
To develop the plan, MTC collected input from about 17,000 residents, advocacy organizations and public-sector partners through community meetings and online surveys.
One of the main challenges, Long says, is balancing available funding and rising costs with the needs of communities across the region.
The MTC also has to balance building new projects with maintaining the existing transportation system. The Bay Area has an extensive transit and roadway network, much of which is decades old.
“So we put about 75% of our resources just into operating it, maintaining it, keeping it safe and in a good condition. And so we have a much smaller pot of funds, about 25%, that go to make improvements,” Long said.
Some of the largest projects in the plan include the second phase of BART’s extension to Silicon Valley and the Caltrain Downtown Extension, also known as The Portal.
“These are mega projects,” Long said.
The Caltrain Downtown Extension will connect the existing Caltrain station at 4th and Townsend streets to the Salesforce Transit Center.
“The dream of that Salesforce Transit Center is that it has rail connectivity bringing Caltrain all the way, you know, just south of Market,” Long said.
The TIP also includes road upgrades, neighborhood bus service, bike lanes and pedestrian safety improvements.
One example is the Geary Bus Rapid Transit project, which aims to make transit faster and more reliable for riders in San Francisco. Bus Rapid Transit, or BRT, typically uses dedicated transit lanes and traffic signal priority to help buses move more quickly through busy corridors.
But the plan isn’t just about building new transit infrastructure. It also includes upgrades to BART’s technology, including its train control system.
The upgrades would allow BART to centralize train control and increase the number of trains that can travel through the Transbay Tube.
“So that you can speed up the number of trains going through the Transbay Tunnel,” Long said.
That would allow trains to run more frequently, expanding the system’s capacity without requiring a major expansion of its physical footprint.
Public comment on the draft TIP closes Thursday, August 13.
To learn more about the projects included in the TIP and how to submit public comment, visit the Metropolitan Transportation Commission’s website.
