Oh boy ... you let yourself in for it now ... cue the Jerry Brown haters. His first governorship was founded on the principle of small is beautiful and mass transit, and the freeway construction program pretty much ground to a halt under him and Caltrans Director Gianturco. If you want to read the "bible" for his first administration, look up the novel "Ecotopia." Come to think of it, traces of that are still around in the current administration (see CAHSR).

There was an edict at one point (not sure how high up the approval was) requiring freeway right of way that was being held for future projects be disposed of. One result of that in Orange County was that some of it was sold off and condos built, then when the toll road people got going they had to buy out and demolish the condos to build the road. Luckily, many parts of the 41, 168, and 180 rights of way in Fresno were somehow preserved, which made life simpler and budget more manageable when the local sales tax group actually started building those freeways in the 1990s.

There were failed attempts during his first administration to get some trains started (short-lived commuter service from Oxnard and overnight train along the coast Bay Area-LA). Basically, they didn't have either a Plan or money; California Amtrak didn't get serious until after Prop. 116. Caltrain got started around the end of Jerry's first reign (slopping over into Deukmajian), with Caltrans handling transfer of the Peninsula Commute from SP, buying the first batch of push-pull trains, and fairly quickly transferring it all to the JPA.