TRANSACTIONS NEWSLETTER ONLINE

December 1999 / January 2000

News Briefs

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Bridges on Display
The University of California at Berkeley has mined the collections of eight campus libraries to create a new exhibit, "Bridging the Bay -- Bridging the Campus." The exhibit includes books, documents, architectural drawings, blueprints, artifacts, maps and photographs that record the building of the San Francisco Bay Area's bridges. Housed in the Bernice Layne Brown Gallery of the Doe Memorial Library, the exhibit also contains documents detailing Bay Area bridge projects that were seriously considered, but never built.
-- Brenda Kahn

The exhibit will be on display through April 30, 2000; an online version can be found at: www.lib.berkeley.edu/Exhibits/Bridge. For more information and hours, call 510.643.9999.

MTC Awards "TLC" Grants
MTC has approved $94,000 in special grants to support community-oriented planning projects in five Bay Area communities. The grants were awarded as part of MTC's Transportation for Livable Communities (TLC) program, which fosters pedestrian- and transit-friendly developments.

The funding will further design work for a waterfront promenade/ boardwalk along the Sacramento River in Rio Vista, and underwrite a traffic circulation plan for Sebastopol. Other TLC grants will go toward developing plans for streetscape improvements in San Francisco, beautifying and improving pedestrian access to downtown Sunol, and introducing landscaping and lighting along Bascom Avenue in unincorporated Santa Clara County. The January grants represent the second cycle of $375,000 in TLC planning grants to be awarded in the 1999-2000 fiscal year. The deadline for applying for the next round of TLC planning grants is April 5, 2000.
-- Joe Curley

Information about the TLC program also may be obtained online here.

In Memoriam

Sharon Banks Region Pays Respects to AC Transit General Manager
Sharon D. Banks, AC Transit's general manager and a transit industry leader, died in late December at the age of 54 following a series of strokes over the last year.

Banks joined the East Bay's public bus system as general counsel in 1990 and shortly afterward assumed the post of general manager. "Sharon's humanistic touch is a legacy that will long be remembered here," said Matt Williams, president of the AC Transit Board of Directors.

In addition to her role at AC Transit, Banks in recent years served as chairperson of the California Transit Association and the National Transportation Research Board's Executive Committee. Among her many honors, Banks was named "Special Transportation Employee" in MTC's 1993 Transportation Awards Program.

Richard C. "Rick" Fernandez, AC Transit's chief executive officer during 1999, has been named as the new general manager. He joined the bus company as assistant general manager of operations in 1996, following a 20-year tenure with New Jersey Transit.
-- Brenda Kahn

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