The City of San José is pursuing an efficient way to connect San José Mineta International Airport to Diridon Station near downtown. Connecting these two growing transportation hubs makes sense, as doing so will improve connectivity and enhance efficiency for travelers. But new transit systems are notoriously expensive and slow to build.

The City wants to build new transit lines faster and at lower cost. The departments of Transportation, Airport, and Public Works previously issued a request for proposals asking teams how they would work with the City to design, finance, build, and operate a new transit line.

The proposal process recently finished. Staff will present their recommendation to City Council on April 18, 2023. The recommended proposer is San José Connection Partners, a consortium led by Plenary Americas. Other members of the Plenary team include: 

• Glydways (transit technology provider)
• Webcor/ Obayashi (lead design and construction contractors) 
• HNTB (lead designer)
• ACI (operations and maintenance provider)

Plenary Americas is a leading US infrastructure developer and investor. The company has a portfolio of 59 projects with a total value of more than $23 billion. Their proposal was thorough and clearly described a workable project that would share cost and risk between them and the City. The proposed transit technology from Glydways uses small, autonomous vehicles driving along a fixed guideway. The proposed system is designed to initially carry over 2,000 passengers an hour in each direction.

Above: A passenger enters a Glydways autonomous vehicle. Image courtesy of Glydways.

The decision before City Council is whether to enter the first phase of a multi-phase agreement to develop the project. It will result in a Project Feasibility Validation Report. That report will allow the City to validate the technical, commercial, and financial viability of the proposed solution. If the staff validates the proposed approach, the project will again return to Council for consideration and direction to move on to the next phase. The second phase will include further design and environmental study.  

This is an early step in an exciting, first-of-its-kind project for San José. The prospect of building a new transit system in less than a decade, with much lower cost to the public, has great value. If successful, the Airport to Diridon Connector Project could be expanded to other corridors across San José and the South Bay. 

This project will help move us toward City of San José goals of 

• Improving traffic safety 
• Increasing transportation choices
• Reducing greenhouse gas emissions
• Easing congestion on the roadways

Ambitious projects like this will help us find the way to – and through – San José.