To Mr. Synonymouse and Art Carney unless you folks tell us your real names, your posts have absolutely NO credibility. One other note, downtown traffic in San Rafael has not materially changed since the 1980's. I can say that because I am in SRF at least once if not twice a week during the day since the 1960's. NWP ran TWO freight a day into SRF with lumber, sand and gravel up until August of 1985. Trains were often 20 to 25 cars long. Whoever calculates the time 3 car DMU backs up traffic, it seems 25 car freights would cause a much bigger back-up over a longer period of time. In fact, a 25 car train blocked all the crossings from Fifth St. to Irwin. I don't remember any feedback or concerns from NIMBYS or or City folks about that. Interestingly the morning train came during the early morning commute and the evening train varied between 6p and 9pm.
In this case, SMART is already built, train has left the station and whatever input you folks had in changing the culture or the train didn't amount to a hill of beans and your left crying about it in this forum. This goes back as both you know quite well to the NWP and its struggles to restore and rebuild. Well its over five years since it has re-opened, and its doing quite well. Tonnage this year is way up and the railroad will have at least three new customers in the first quarter of next year.