Marin, Sonoma propose transit overhaul along Highway 101

A North Bay transportation committee is proposing some major changes to transit, including bus and train, along the Highway 101 corridor to improve service in Marin and Sonoma counties.

The committee representing six transit operators and three funding agencies wants to eliminate redundancies while improving connections among operators and increasing services where rider demand is highest.

“All the agencies involved in transportation in Sonoma and Marin got together and we said, if one company ran all this based on what’s going on today, what would it look like? It probably would look different,” said Denis Mulligan, general manager of the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District. The district operates Golden Gate Transit and Golden Gate Ferry.

Mulligan said the task of the committee, called the Marin Sonoma Coordinated Transit Service, is to restructure and coordinate transit to provide the best service to riders.

So far, the board governing the Golden Gate Bridge district has agreed to call a public hearing to consider the proposals. The Marin Transit board of directors is poised to do the same when it meets Monday. The Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit board has scheduled the presentation for its July 16 meeting.

Planners said the expansion of the SMART rail line to Larkspur in 2019 highlighted the need for operators in the two counties to come together and consider the structure of routes and how they could link up transfers.

Also, travel patterns have changed drastically since the COVID-19 pandemic altered how often people commute.

“This effort hasn’t been undertaken since the SMART fully came online and the impacts of COVID/COVID recovery played out,” Robert Betts, the director of operations at Marin Transit, said in an email. “I would expect riders to benefit from higher regional service frequencies and improved connections.”

The committee conducted a study of transit and found that about two-thirds of trips from Marin and Sonoma counties to San Francisco originate in San Rafael or points south.

More than three-quarters of trips between Sonoma and Marin have origins and destinations in the SMART travel corridor, the study found.

SMART is carrying five times more riders than Golden Gate Transit buses between the two counties, according to the study.

Golden Gate Transit runs Route 101 between San Francisco and Santa Rosa. One recommendation is to end Route 101 in Novato, discontinuing the bus connections in Sonoma County, and increasing the frequency of the bus in the area of greatest demand, between San Rafael and San Francisco.

Route 164 between Petaluma and San Francisco and Route 172x between Santa Rosa and San Francisco also would be discontinued.

In their place, the committee recommends increasing the frequency of SMART trains as well as enhanced service on Route 172.

The committee also recommends increasing the frequency of Golden Gate Route 130 between Marin City, Sausalito and San Francisco and discontinuing Route 150 due to low ridership. Riders would be redirected to other routes.

For Marin Transit, the committee recommends consolidating its routes on Highway 101 to simplify the network for riders. That involves combining resources of Route 71 and 36 to provide 15-minute service between the San Rafael Transit Center and Marin City.

The recommendation includes offering a comparable service between the Canal area of San Rafael, Strawberry, Marin City and Sausalito.

It’s also recommended that Marin Transit and Sonoma County bus services improve their connections to SMART stops.

These and other recommendations are up for consideration. Planners expect to host informational meetings to describe the proposals in detail and collect feedback from riders.

Open houses are planned July 22 and 23. Public hearings are set for August and September. Final adoption of the recommendations would be considered this fall.

All changes are proposed as a three-year pilot program. If approved, changes would be implemented in the spring.

In addition to Golden Gate Transit, Marin Transit and SMART, the other agencies in the committee are Sonoma County Transit, Santa Rosa CityBus and PetalumaTransit.

The planning and funding agency members are the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the Sonoma County Transportation Authority and the Transportation Authority of Marin.

Marin County Supervisor Stephanie Moulton-Peters is the county’s representative on the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, and also serves on the boards of the Golden Gate Bridge district, Marin Transit and the Transportation Authority of Marin.

“This is a really groundbreaking effort,” Moulton-Peters said. “And it’s going to be a model for the kind of work that all transit districts in the Bay Area can do — to look collectively at transit for riders to ensure we get the most bang for our buck.”