BART airport connector rising but still stirring debate

http://www.insidebayarea.com/ci_19662421

More than a decade after BART's Oakland Airport Connector was proposed, concrete columns that will serve as its foundation are finally rising in the median of Hegenberger Road.

Within two years, cable-drawn, three-car trains will transport passengers from the Coliseum BART station to Oakland International Airport along an elevated track that proponents of the project say will be faster and more reliable than the current AirBART bus system.

For them, the columns signify an important victory in a long and hard-fought battle over a new transportation connection that, they say, will not only ensure continued growth at Oakland's airport but also provide much needed construction jobs for Bay Area workers.

Critics, however, see the columns as an example of government waste perpetuated by a stubborn vision of the future based on faulty projections in the past.

The jobs promised won't be created, they say. Neither will the decreased travel times BART has promised the connector will meet shuttling passengers the 3.2 miles between the airport's terminals and the Coliseum BART station.

The only lasting impact the connector will have, detractors say, is a debit bill that BART passengers will have to pay for decades and more important BART projects stuck in the planning phase with no source of funding available.

Changes to how the Port of Oakland planned to expand its airport caused delays, a shift in how the project would be funded almost killed the plan and then, last year, the federal government withdrew monetary support, claiming BART failed to properly study the impact of the connector on minority and poor residents.

All the while, the cost of the project increased from an initial price tag of roughly $130 million to the current coast of almost $500 million.

The rising costs also impacted the projected cost of riding the connector. In BART's environmental impact report, the agency said it would have to charge $12 for a round trip on the connector to ensure the project pays for itself.

AirBART currently costs $6 per round trip.

But while the cost estimates rose, the number of jobs that officials predicted the connector would generate declined.

Initially, proponents said the connector would create 13,000 jobs, including direct and indirect jobs. Now, Project Manager Tom Dunscombe said the project will provide at least 2,500 jobs. As of December, just over 200 jobs have been created.