Author: Monica Mallon (Monica Mallon)

The COVID-19 pandemic had a profound effect on public transportation in Santa Clara County. Ridership and sales tax revenue plummeted. A ballot measure proposing a one-cent sales tax for transportation was put on pause. As someone who believes in public transit, it was hard to watch everything fall apart. Like many people, my school and...

In 2019, the Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury did a report on VTA’s board of directors. Since then, governance reform discussions have taken place and multiple governance bills have been introduced and killed. Recently, Assemblymember Marc Berman introduced AB 2181, a placeholder bill for governance reform. So for the fourth year in a row,...

The last time I went to the Mineta San Jose International Airport on public transit, I had to take the bus to the light rail before finally boarding another bus to the terminal. The trip from Cambrian took a little more than an hour and could have taken longer if I had missed a transfer....

I’m Monica Mallon, a new transportation columnist for San José Spotlight who will contribute columns on first Thursday every other month. For my first column, I’d like to tell you about Santa Clara County transportation from the perspective of a rider. I’m a lifelong transit rider and advocate with professional experience in transportation demand management....