The next stop for SMART

Plans for an east Petaluma train station are moving along the tracks as officials with the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit authority are exploring a partnership with a landowner that could spur the construction of the city’s second station by the time commuter rail service starts next year.

SMART officials have been in talks with Cornerstone Properties, the Petaluma-based commercial real estate developer, about a deal involving a piece of land the company owns between the railroad tracks and Old Redwood Highway. The property is the former site of the Adobe Lumber yard.

The deal sought with Cornerstone would give SMART land at little or no cost for its long-desired east Petaluma rail station, SMART officials said.

“We are exploring a public-private partnership that, if successful, would result in building a second station in Petaluma,” said Farhad Mansourian, SMART general manager.

The station would likely increase the value of Cornerstone’s other properties in the area. The company also owns several buildings in the Redwood Business Park across the street, which includes SMART’s headquarters and office space for thousands of workers who may use the train to commute to work someday.

In return, SMART would offer Cornerstone rights to develop a piece of land that the rail authority owns downtown, SMART officials said. That property, between the downtown rail station and the Petaluma River, is currently used as a storage yard by SMART.

“This would be a way to get a second station sooner than later,” said Supervisor David Rabbitt, a SMART board member. “We have an opportunity. We need to explore it.”

The SMART board met Wednesday to consider giving Mansourian the authority to negotiate the details of a deal with Cornerstone. Rabbitt said a deal within the next few months could allow SMART to complete the station by December 2016, in time for the expected launch of service between San Rafael and north of Santa Rosa.

A second station serving Petaluma’s eastside was part of the original plan when voters in Sonoma and Marin counties approved SMART in 2008 as a 70-mile commuter rail line from Cloverdale to Larkspur. When the recession hit, taking a significant chunk of the agency’s sales tax revenue, the SMART board was forced to scale back the initial segment and remove the second station.

The original plan had the eastside station at Corona Road and North McDowell Boulevard, a site closer to the residential neighborhoods on the eastside. Using money from a planning grant, Petaluma studied developing the Corona Road area around a SMART station. City Councilman Mike Healy said that site is the better of the two options.

“Corona has long been identified as the best eastside station location,” he said. “It’s closer to where the people are.”

The Corona Road property is said to have some soil contamination, and there has been little movement to acquire that site, but Rabbitt said all options are still being explored.

“SMART has very limited money,” he said. “We have an opportunity here, by working with a developer, to get a second station. This doesn’t mean other sites are off the table.”

A message left with Cornerstone was not returned.

Rabbitt said the former Adobe Lumber site has plenty of room for parking, a feature SMART officials acknowledge is needed to encourage people to abandon their cars, and the traffic and pollution they create, on their daily commutes.

“It would have more parking,” he said. “I would make that a priority. We need to provide parking in order to make SMART convenient for people.”

(Contact Matt Brown at matt.brown@arguscourier.com. On Twitter @MattBrownAC.)