SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Ongoing problems in operating passenger trains between Los Angeles and San Diego are taking a significant toll on ridership, the managing director of the Amtrak service between the cities told a new state Senate subcommittee on Tuesday.
The San Diego Union-Tribune reports the Senate Transportation Subcommittee on LOSSAN Rail Corridor Efficiency held its first meeting Tuesday to address issues on the 351-mile San Diego-Los Angeles-San Luis Obispo corridor.
At that meeting, Jason Jewell, managing director of the LOSSAN Rail Corridor Agency, said that ridership on the Pacific Surfliner route, which had returned to about 75% of pre-COVID levels, has now dropped back to 40% to 50% of pre-pandemic figures. This is despite a bus bridge the LOSSAN agency has offered around service interruptions in San Clemente — a six-month outage because of an unstable hillside that finally ended in mid-April, only to be followed by a new interruption two weeks later because of a landslide a short distance away.
“Some people don’t like the idea of getting on a train, to a bus, to a train,” Jewell said.
The current service interruption began April 27, after a landside at the Casa Romantica Cultural Center, a facility owned by the City of San Clemente located on a hillside above the Surf Line track [see “Surfliner, Metrolink could face another extended stoppage …,” Trains News Wire, April 29, 2023]. The tracks were not damaged, but were hit by some debris, and the hillside remains unstable. A contractor has begun emergency stabilization work expected to take about two weeks, the Union-Tribune reports, but no date has been set to resume passenger service. Freight trains are moving through the area, but only overnight at low speed.
The subcommittee is examining the larger issues of erosion that have placed the rail line at risk in about seven locations in four counties. That includes the Del Mar Bluffs area in San Diego County, as well as locations in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties.
“The rail corridor has never been in more jeopardy,” said Sen. Catherine Blakespear (D- Encinitas, Calif.) the subcommittee chair. “… We have an urgent, urgent problem.”
Is there a inland alternative ?
The only relocation that could be done is to relocate on the I-5 San Diego Freeway.
That involves megabucks, as not only tracks, but stations, parking lots and the freeway itself would have to be reconfigured.
Unfortunately this is California your talking about. Costs would be thru the roof, and into orbit(they probably would get us to the next galaxy!)
Even California doesn’t have that kind of money.
The RR has to be moved to a more stable right-of-way.
A quote from the above article indicates the agency has finally waked up. If the 7 locations include the 2 that have happened then serious engineering studies need to start immediately. There is no reason that the state and feds cannot immediately allocate emergency funds to start the process. If California has another wet winter that repeats the past one, then there will be more landslides.
“”The subcommittee is examining the larger issues of erosion that have placed the rail line at risk in about seven locations in four counties. That includes the Del Mar Bluffs area in San Diego County, as well as locations in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties.””
Hire the Japanese to pour concrete! Look at their infrastucture…