advertisement

---

On Tuesday, voters approved 23 of the 32 transportation-related measures, authorizing about $75 billion worth of transportation expenditures.

The three largest ballot initiatives passed: a $10 billion statewide bond measure in California to provide initial financing for a high-speed rail system; a half-cent sales tax in Los Angeles County that will provide $40 billion over 30 years for transit and road projects; and a sales tax increase in the Seattle region to fund $17.8 billion worth of transit projects over the next 20 years

Other successful measures included: a quarter-cent sales tax increase  in California's Sonoma and Marin counties to fund a passenger-rail system between Cloverdale and Larkspur; a continuation of the existing quarter-cent sales tax in Sacramento that could be used in part to fund a streetcar system; approval of Honolulu's proposed $3.7 billion, 20-mile elevated commuter-rail line; and an eighth-cent gross receipts tax increase in New Mexico's Bernalillo, Sandoval, Valencia and Santa Fe counties, half of which will be dedicated to the Rail Runner Express commuter-rail system.

Voters in Missouri weren't as supportive of transit-rail projects. In Kansas City, a 25-year, three-eighths-cent sales tax measure that would have funded a 14-mile light-rail system failed. In St. Louis, voters also shot down a half-cent sales tax increase to support mass transit, including maintenance and expansion of the MetroLink system.

Meanwhile, an eighth-cent sales tax increase that could help fund a Bay Area Rapid Transit extension to the Silicon Valley still is too close to call. Final results will not be known until all absentee and provisional ballots have been counted.