I am still trying to get a grasp on the rationale behind SMART's going for dmu's instead of standard rail passenger equipment. My calculations are not coming out the same as SMART's. When I add up the pro's and con's I come up on the side of a shortened Caltrain as the better option.

So I am assuming that labor costs are in the back of SMART's mind. But I am not sure there would be that much of a difference in labor costs since SMART's operations would be limited to only a few trains a day. Using standard equipment would give them the freedom to schedule whenever they want(like Amtrak). No FRA limitations. Conceivably they could get more runs out of each work shift.

I do not think it is realistic to suggest that SMART could be a non-union operation. A publicly funded non-union rail transit operation in competition with publicly funded unionized bus lines? There would be blood.