SR 05:271 - Laserfiche WebLink

The intent of this Expenditure Plan Amendment is to mitigate, to the greatest extent possible, the loss of a regional transportation route in the Central County with a program of replacement projects in Central County that provide for congestion relief in the same corridor. Honorable Mayor and Members of the City Council: DISCUSSION Background In 1986, Alameda County voters authorized a half-cent transportation sales tax to finance improvements to the County's overburdened transportation infrastructure, known as Measure B. The Alameda County Transportation Authority (ACTA) was established to administer this tax. The Alameda County Transportation Expenditure Plan (Expenditure Plan), dated August 1986, guides the use of those funds. The collection of this tax for the 1986 Measure B program expired on March 31, 2002. Specifically, the 1986 Expenditure Plan included Measure B funds for the construction of a 5.3- mile segment of Route 238 for a new expressway to bypass downtown Hayward, between Industrial Parkway and 1-580 in Hayward. This project was commonly referred to as the Route 238 Hayward Bypass Project. In the Expenditure Plan, Caltrans was named as the project sponsor. The Hayward Bypass Project has been controversial since Caltrans commenced the project design in the mid-1960's. In 1997, a lawsuit was filed against the project by the Hayward Area Planning Association (HAP A) and the Citizens for Alternative Transportation Solutions (CATS), alleging that the Route 238 Hayward Bypass being developed by Caltrans was not the project in the Expenditure Plan approved by voters. This suit resulted in a 2002 ruling that Measure B funds could not be used in the delivery of the Route 238 Hayward Bypass Project as developed by Caltrans, without amendment of the Expenditure Plan, which effectively eliminated the only major funding source for the project. Since 2002, ACTA, the City of Hayward, and the County of Alameda, worked on the development of an alternative project to the Hayward Bypass Project that could meet the intent of the original project and thus be eligible for Measure B funding. On March I, 2005, the Hayward City Council approved the Route 238 Corridor Improvement Project to be submitted to ACT A as the substitute project for the Route 238 Bypass Project in the Expenditure Plan. SR:05:271 Page 2 of 4