The comparison of SMART to the NWP train-ferry operation before the Golden Gate Bridge only highlights SMART's shortcomings. The trains and ferries were pulled within a few years after the opening of the GG Bridge and replaced by buses. By contrast the Key System on the Bay Bridge prospered. The Key System was doomed not just because the highway lobby wanted to put autos and trucks on the lanes the Key System tracks occupied but also because the road-oil-auto interests regarded all public transit, especially electric rail, as a threat to be eliminated.

What is needed is a direct rail connection to San Francisco; history shows that transfers don't work. Even GG Transit's ferry feeder buses have disappeared. In short order SMART will face a budget crunch. My guess is that SMART will then look to the GG Bridge for a subsidy, as with the existing GG Transit bus service. It would be best if the Bridge District were brought on to operate SMART's trains at the outset.