Friday, June 26, 2002 OPINION Marin Independent Journal

MARIN VOICE

Banning St. Vincent’s rail stop is no environmental solution

DWAYNE HUNN

A

RCHITECT Peter Calthorpe, a protégé of Mann resident and once State Architect Sim VanderRyn, is often credited with establishing the term “Pedestrian Pocket.” These mixed land-use developments allow many of its residents to live within walking distance of work, town centers and transit hubs. With community parks and porches, alleys that hide the car, Pedestrian Pockets are designed to build community, enhance the environment and save resources.

More than a decade ago, Calthorpe lived on Sausalito’s community-oriented houseboats while struggling to build Pedestrian Pockets. Back then, he and I shared local radio shows promoting the development concept, workforce housing and transit solutions. Who were our strongest opponents? Marin’s so-called environmental groups, who are now applauding the legislative amendment to deny a rail stop at St. Vincent’s/Silveira properties north of San Rafael.

There are no Pedestrian Pockets in Marin, and that’s partially why Calthorpe left. Today, his office is swamped with work from jurisdictions that care about reducing our reliance on foreign oil, and designing “communities” that provide quality time to families.

More than a decade ago, Sonoma had over a dozen and Marin had over four large parcels abutting the train tracks. These were ideal sites that would have provided affordable workforce housing and ridership for a rail line. Such Pedestrian Pockets would have reduced traffic by reducing the region’s reliance on gas-guzzlers and given the region a second transit way—a train.

A few of us who worked in affordable housing and transit solutions wrote, spoke and lobbied for such. Who opposed us? Most of the leadership of Marin’s self-proclaimed environmental groups. You could speak to the Oakland and San Francisco Sierra Clubs and be applauded for your efforts to revive mixed-use communities along rail lines. But in Marin, so-called environmentalists have a different political agenda.

Pricey, open space-rich Marin and growing Sonoma have many newcomers. Those who frustrate themselves commuting through Marin while hustling to cover stiff mortgages and squeezing in some quality time with family may not fully enjoy the region’s amenities. Imagine how much shorter and more enjoyable the commute might be if:

· Hamilton had been a mixed-use, rail-oriented development with a developer-supplied jitney, which the late ‘80s Berg-Revoir project proposed.

· Bel Mann Keys had been developed in the ‘90s with a ferry service, a link to the train and the proposed equity-share work-force housing plan.

· The Vintage Oaks shopping center and its surrounding office complexes had been topped off with residential units, and some housing mixed in, giving it a 24-hour living ambience and, again, a rail stop.

A few of us pushed such proposals to supply work-force housing and train ridership, but were rebuffed by local environmental groups.

But that’s what happens in politics. Those with the juice get the best squeeze. Most people think developers have juice. In Marin, the so-called environmental groups have the clout.

Developers have never understood that to do regionally beneficial development they must together do long-term public education efforts or be individually squeezed into weak, expensive developments. By failing to do long-term educating, developers lose the scare game.

Mann’s self-proclaimed environmental groups are better at politics because they scare the public that is too busy to know the true issues. Their game is to keep in office enough shortsighted politicians who don’t look 20 years ahead to see the disastrous results of their present day acts.

A stellar example is the recent legislation that precludes the creation of a rail transit stop at St. Vincent’s/Silveira.

Land use that designs a community around a train, which provides a second freeway that provides us more security against emergencies ranging from earthquakes to terrorism to oil embargoes.

But that doesn’t matter when your only goal is to defeat development with scare politics.

An approach that will also put fumes from traffic gridlock into the air for birds, kids and people to breathe; increase wasteful commute hours and deny land uses that make a neighborly community easy to establish.

Land use that designs a community around a train provides a second freeway, which provides us more security against emergencies ranging from earthquakes to terrorism to oil embargoes.

Dwayne Hunn of Mill Valley is a frequent contributor to Mann Voice.