The Utah County Commission voted unanimously Tuesday to put a quarter-cent sales tax increase on the Nov. 7 ballot, with the vast majority of that money planned for commuter rail.

"This move, this ballot issue, can achieve a huge solution for us in terms of our transportation problems," Orem Mayor Jerry Washburn said.

Tuesday's decision came six years after voters in Salt Lake, Davis and Weber counties approved similar hikes to upgrade bus and train transit.

Commissioners spent most of their time Tuesday deciding how to divvy the revenues among three transportation options: commuter rail, highways and other transit services.

The final vote calls for steering 87 percent of the increased revenues to commuter rail, 8 percent to roads and 5 percent to other transit.

"It's hard to propose a tax increase," Provo Mayor Lewis Billings said. "You are going about it the right way. You are letting the people decide."

The sales tax would generate about $1.25 billion by 2037, according to projections from the Mountainland Association of Governments, Utah County's regional transportation agency.

The commission's move provides funding for Utah County's $350 million, 22-mile portion of the commuter rail system to run from Provo to Salt Lake City.

Salt Lake County's half of heavy commuter rail is not yet funded - instead voters there will consider an $895 million bond this fall for four new light-rail spurs - but MAG officials and Utah Transit Authority brass believe that money will come now that Utah County is stepping forward.

"We took the first step, and we hope that our move pressures some serious dialogue about how they're going to fund this," said Chad Eccles, MAG's transit planner.

"We're pleased to see [Utah] County kind of get focused on what they want," said Mick Crandall, UTA deputy chief of planning and programming. "In some respects, now you can just sit back and see what happens [with voters]."

Commissioner Steve White said heavy commuter rail is the only way to move traffic through the congestion that will come from a massive Interstate 15 rebuild slated for 2011.

But White would like to see the rail system - scheduled to be running in Utah County by 2015 - on track sooner.

"When we put it on the ballot, people are going to expect to get something for their tax money," White said. "I'm just trying to figure out why it's 2015 that we get commuter rail when we have the money in 2007."

White argues UTA should continue working south when it completes the northern commuter rail line, from Ogden to Salt Lake City, in 2008.

Crandall explained construction in Utah County couldn't be started any sooner than 2010, with an environmental impact study taking all of 2007, and engineering gobbling up 2008 and 2009.

However, a temporary commuter rail system, tapping Union Pacific's existing railways, could be used during the I-15 overhaul in 2011.

The 8 percent portion of the tax increase for roads - if voters sign off - would go immediately to several projects.

thollingshead@sltrib.com