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Mayor Pico said that is also being considered. There have been discussions on how to acquire the fight of way to preserve it for BART or HOV lanes. He agreed the land should not be built on because if it had to be acquired later it would have a higher market value. Mayor Pico invited public testimony. Robert S. Allen, 223 Donner Avenue, Livermore, former BART Director, urged that interim steps be taken to preserve the right of way for BART expansion. He had prepared a cost estimate for a project to keep BART in the freeway median all the way to Greenville Road. He said the hard cost for a 10.5 mile extension would be $544 million. Another mile underneath westbound 580 to the old Southern Pacific fight of way to a potential ACE station, shop and yard would be about $607 million. Roughly $65 million more would take all this to an ACE intermodel, which could be built later. He presented all this when he was on the BART board. He had objections to all the proposals currently being presented. Regarding the proposal to go over the Altamont, the Central Valley communities have never paid anything towards BART, whereas the Tri-Valley has been contributing for four decades. The tracks over the Altamont are designed for heavy freight trains and are at a 1% grade, which makes the route much longer. Transit can be run on a 3% grade. Forcing transit to follow the heavy rails would add length to the route and cost for construction. He felt transit rail should go through Mountain House, however the County doesn't own right of way there and therefore it is not interested in that route. He related his experience when he worked for Southern Pacific, and said there would be many grade crossings going to Walnut Creek, in addition to several oil and gas lines that mn along the Iron Horse Trail. He said the main problem with DMU is that it runs single track and if it runs at BART frequencies, then every seven and a half minutes the trains would meet and it would be a horrendous problem for operations. The study doesn't mention those types of problems. The study referred to three major problems with BART, but none of them apply here because BART would be in the freeway median. It does require relocation of some overpasses and Option 4, which provides for HOV lanes and BART, was projected to be $220 million. HOV lanes without BART would be $50 million. The extra cost of making 1-580 compatible with BART would be $170 million. That is cheap in order to get right of way that can be used for BART. Mr. Allen concluded his remarks by saying the only option he would support was BART with a dedicated bus in the interim. He did not see any good from a single track DMU line running through Pleasanton with grade crossings, horns, etc. That is not good for the community and would probably require soundwalls along the route thereby dividing the community. He also disagreed with the passenger estimates. Mr. Brozosky referred to Mr. Allen's cost estimate and asked if the difference in his figures and those of BART was because BART wanted the yard on the north side of the freeway? Mr. Allen said yes. If it stayed in the median and went where 1-580 westbound comes off the hill, it would get to the County owned right of way and would be far cheaper and better for everyone. Matt Sullivan, 7882 Flagstone Drive, did not want to limit the studies unnecessarily just to save money. It is important to understand all alternatives, impacts, and future opportunities. Pleasanton City Council 11 08/05/03 Minutes