Celebrating 50th Anniversary of the Key Route System April 18, 2008

On Friday, April 18, 2008, on the site where the last Key Route train left the East Bay for its run to San Francisco, AC Transit will note the 50th anniversary of the demise of one of the most efficient public transit systems in the world, and outline its plans to re-invent it.

The event will take place at 11a.m. at the Key Route Plaza at Piedmont Avenue and 41st Street in Oakland. Flanked by an old Key Route coach and a state of the art hydrogen fuel cell bus, AC Transit Board President Chris Peeples and AC Transit Assistant General Manager Mary King will be joined by the Transportation and Land Use Coalition, former Key Route operators, transit historians and advocates, and community residents.

More than commemorate the passing of the Key Route era, they will assert the need to go "Back-to-the-Future" with the kind of hi-tech rapid bus system that has revitalized public transportation from Los Angeles and Boston to Bogota, Columbia, Brazil and Australia.

"They took away the Key Route system but not its passengers, and our regional public transportation has never been the same,'' said King. "It is time to return to a fast, reliable system that we all know will work."

When: Friday April 18, 2008, 11 a.m.

Where: Key Route Plaza, Piedmont Avenue at 41st Street, Oakland, CA

Who: Invited speakers include AC Transit Board President Chris Peeples, Director Rebecca Kaplan, TALC and muralist/historian Rocky Baird.

Official Website: http://www2.actransit.org/news/articledetail.wu?articleid=906f3a2e