Sacramento Advocates for Rail and Transit (SMART) is a broad-based coalition of business, labor, transportation, environmental, neighborhood, faith-based, and community leaders and organizations founded in 2019 and incorporated in 2024 as a 501(c)(3) non-profit to educate, organize, and advocate for expanded and improved rail and transit services in the Sacramento region; and to support equitable mobility options, smart growth, clean air, and sustainability.
The SMART Story
SMART works to bring the safety, environmental, financial and mobility benefits from a high performing, well-connected rail and transit system to the Sacramento region.
Many have recognized the need to organize the broad array of transportation stakeholders to support the economic, environmental, land use and societal benefits that come from investments in a high-quality transit and rail system in our region. Organized rail and transit stakeholders are vital to presenting these benefits to our larger community and to decision-makers.
Founded in 2019 and incorporated as a non-profit in 2024, SMART has gathered hundreds of rail, transit, active transportation, environmental, climate, neighborhood, and housing stakeholders in our region to form a growing coalition of business, labor, religious, elected, and civic leaders and community organizations. SMART’s coalition recognizes that the exciting new initiatives and long-range proposals to expand and modernize our rail and transit network in the Sacramento Region will fall short without new levels of investment. Rail and transit service is the only travel mode that has the scale, technology and efficiency to increase the efficiency and safety of our road system, save households money, keep our air breathable and our climate safe, and move the most people at one time.
Why SMART?
Watch an interview with SMART co-founder Glenda Marsh that provides insight as to how SMART came to be.