☆ Regional planners mapped out a “vibrant” Bay Area. Now there’s a serious math problem.
While “unelected regional bodies” promise their Plan Bay Area 2050+ will improve affordability, SHIFT-Bay Area says it doesn’t add up: the transit-heavy, forced urbanization scheme has no off-ramp, and it estimates population growth amidst an exodus. In a newsletter summarizing SHIFT's findings, CoCo Taxpayer Ass'n warns the $1.5 trillion dream isn't yet covered by existing revenues, so new taxes would cost $3,938 per person, per year.
Plan Bay Area 2050+ is a new draft update to our region’s long-range transportation, housing, economic, and environmental plan, developed by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) and Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG). While MTC and ABAG are not directly accountable to voters, their plans guide the work of counties, cities, and other Bay Area government agencies and will greatly impact life in Contra Costa County over the next 25 years.
Regional planning in the Bay Area began in the 1960s–1970s with the creation of ABAG (1961) and MTC (1970) and became mandatory under California’s Sustainable Communities Strategy laws (SB 375, 2008).
The plan contains 35 strategies grouped into four pillars — Transportation, Housing, the Economy, and the Environment — that purportedly aim to make the region affordable, connected, diverse, healthy, and vibrant by 2050.
But independent analysts have found serious flaws in Plan Bay Area 2050+. Among them:
Demographic assumptions — MTC/ABAG project 24% population growth to 2050 despite recent declines and out-migration; the expected growth is several times higher than that forecast by state demographers at the Department of Finance in Sacramento.
Cost and funding — The plan identifies almost $1.5 trillion in “investments” but only about $600 billion in existing revenues, leaving a massive gap may require huge new taxes (estimated at about $3,938 per person per year).
Transit bias — Almost no new road capacity is planned while hundreds of billions are proposed for traditional rail and bus; a poor choice given the collapse and slow recovery of transit ridership in the wake of COVID and the rise of ridesharing services and robotaxis which are ultimately cheaper and more flexible.
Forced urbanization — Strategies that concentrate housing near transit are seen as top-down social engineering that overrides local zoning, destroys suburban character, and drives up land costs while failing to create real ownership opportunities for lower-income households.
Undemocratic process — Unelected regional bodies override city- and county-elected officials, lack independent oversight, and use flawed modeling that “reverse-engineers” outcomes to justify predetermined policies.
Missing alternatives — No “Plan B” is analyzed if population stagnates or declines; water supply, wildfire, and fiscal sustainability are largely ignored.
The Plan Bay Area 2050+ website with a link to make public comments is here.
Read the CoCo Taxpayer Ass'n newsletter here.
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