West San Carlos Stevens Creek

Stevens Creek stretches from De Anza College to Downtown San Jose (8.6 miles) and currently served by Local 23 (12-minute headways).The preferred BRT plan for ultimate build out has 10-minute BRT headways and 15-minute local headways (called BRT 10-15) along the three corridors. The Stevens Creek corridor has the following principal service features:

• Truncated Local 23 service along the Stevens Creek Corridor (from De Anza College to San Jose State), operating at 15-minute headways;
• New BRT 523 service to complement Local 23 service west of Downtown and to replace it east of Downtown (from Downtown to Eastridge), operating at 10-minute headways.

BRT on Stevens Creek would likely start with less frequent local service – perhaps a BRT 10-30 configuration – in order to build more sustained user levels and await more transit-supportive conditions in the corridor.

The preferred operating plan generated the highest overall ridership of all the operating plans – nearly 84,000 daily riders combined on all routes. Stevens Creek Corridor followed at 16,000 daily riders (19% of the total). The growth in demand by corridor versus the existing case ranged from 140%-210%, with demand on the Stevens Creek Corridor growing the fastest, and demand on the Alum Rock Corridor increasing the most, nearly 22,500 daily riders.

Capital cost estimates for the BRT 10-15 plan ranged $490-$577 million (with Stevens Creek ranging from $145-$232 million depending on whether a reversible lane or viaduct at Valley Fair is built). Average per mile capital costs for all three corridors for the BRT 10-15 were $15.3 million/mile. Corridor per mile capital costs for Stevens Creek (8.6 miles) will be $16.8 million/mile with the reversible lane and $26.9 million/mile with the viaduct.

The goal of the infrastructure strategy was to reduce in-vehicle travel time by 30% when compared to a local bus with right-of-way and station upgrades. Stevens Creek has two segments of median busway (totaling over 3.0 miles between De Anza College-Finch, and Woodhams-MacArthur, with the latter section including the Valley Fair reversible lane or viaduct), enhancements to mixed flow BRT sections, and 15 new BRT stations.