At first it seemed like a rare misstatement from Mike McGuire. At the May event welcoming SMART to Healdsburg—the so-called “groundbreaking”—the local politician and longtime supporter of the commuter rail system said, “Now it’s on to Geyserville!”
The consensus at the time was that he must have meant “Cloverdale,” long the acknowledged last stop in the Sonoma Marin Area Regional Transport network. Perhaps he inadvertently said “Geyserville” because he and his family now live there, instead of in Healdsburg.
Last week revealed it wasn’t a misstatement, but perhaps a stealth announcement: A SMART plan to build a passenger platform in the non-incorporated community of Cloverdale has in fact been in the works for some time.
Even so, it didn’t rise to wider public knowledge until the June 17 SMART board meeting. On that date, the board directed staff to begin a “formal community engagement” process before considering whether a station should move forward…