I really like the new Transit center, and even if it's only supporting buses for now that's still a good thing. And I certainly want to see trains into the Transit Center by 2028 (or whatever the optimistic timeframe is now), and don't want to derail the overall vision...
BUT— since that's at least 10 years out (and likely longer), I'm wondering if it might be feasible to at least build the Bart/Muni connector before the overall Phase 2, and at least have a kinda-connected infrastructure until then. Because I also agree it would make the Transit Center far more integral (esp in people's minds about what a 'transit center' is), and it seems like the underground connection was lumped in with the Phase 2 stuff back when there was better faith this would happen in a reasonable timeframe.
I found the TJPA study from 2007 evaluating the various underground connectors. The Beale street connection they ultimately chose was expected to cost $105M— so even assuming overrun / increases over the past 10 years, $150-$200M doesn't seem like "that much" to fund and get build before 2028.
Yes it was going to connect to the train level, so there might be some new work to build connections to the street level/ parks that aren't accounted. And yes, maybe some of this will work will be redundant / need to be modified when the trains come in. BUT, I would love to see a push to re-evaluate the connector plan in light of 2018 realities and see if the costing/benefits of the connector might make more sense to support apart from the DTX phase.
I believe it's important to have 'connected' transit, and this bridge will have a huge impact on people view the import of the transit center.
That said, the connection could potentially even be done better above-ground but imo Muni / transit here really haven't shown an ability w/r/t signage / paths that make it understandable to know where to go (e.g., the new Muni 'signage' are so ridiculously blah / understated / not obvious, I still don't know why we can't have bright colored signs corresponding to lines, etc.).
source:
http://tjpa.org/uploads/board-meetin...es-revised.pdf