The HSR station design appears to be intended to act as a gateway for travelers to downtown Fresno, guiding them toward Mariposa Street and toward Fulton Mall just to the northeast of the station area. With Chukchansi Park nearby, the HSR station concept would help position the area as a new centerpiece of downtown Fresno. One question is how much density would be surrounding the station, with planners initially proposing a low-density model and a high density model. The high density model is shown below:

Over at the Fresno Bee, Tim Sheehan offers some insight on the draft plans:

The 20-page document, posted without fanfare on the city’s Downtown & Community Revitalization Department website, is “really just a first draft” of ideas that will serve as a launchpad for more detailed plans, department director Craig Scharton said.

The city of Fresno has quietly published a draft plan that envisions a high-speed train station downtown between Fresno and Tulare streets.

“Nothing is approved or officially adopted or reviewed,” Scharton said. “We just wanted to get some ideas on the size and layout, and the different conditions that could happen.”

The plans emerged last fall during a one-day gathering of engineers, architects and interested members of the public — one of a series of brainstorming sessions organized by city leaders to generate ideas on how to revitalize downtown Fresno.

The station does not appear to be an ARTIC-style mega-station, and while the external architecture is not yet determined, the station design itself seems to be a understated one, intended to not so much serve as a destination itself as a gateway to Fresno – and for Fresno residents, a gateway to the rest of the state.

That could change – this is just a very early draft – but I think Fresno should indeed go in that more modest direction. I’m much more a fan of the simple station designs, rather than turning every station into either a grand building or another place to show off Santiago Calatrava-style architecture (I’ve said before that I’m not a big fan of his Gare do Oriente in Lisboa, Portugal, preferring something more like Madrid Atocha).

The goal of a station should be to provide a clean and comfortable place to wait for a train, with good traveler services, and help get people to the surrounding community easily. From what I can tell, Fresno is headed in that direction. It will be interesting to see how this develops, but they’re on the right track (forgive the pun).

As Caltrain seems increasingly likely to end its Gilroy service, you’d think that the city council there would recognize that its future prosperity depends upon getting a train station that can enable their residents to reach jobs in Silicon Valley and San Francisco – and can enable people from across California to come to Gilroy for events like the Garlic Festival.

Unfortunately, as a recent article makes clear, there’s still some work to do to show Gilroy why HSR is a godsend the likes of which they haven’t seen since the 101 freeway was built 50 years ago:

Though the severity of their distaste for the state’s high speed rail project ranges from mild irritation to unreserved outrage, Gilroy city council members aren’t ready to collectively speak out against the undertaking.

Unlike Orange, a city in Southern California whose city council recently voted unanimously to oppose California’s proposed bullet train, Gilroy council members aren’t ready to formally cast their vote against the project, but their frustration with a lack of answers from the organizing agency is rising.

This is how a city should respond to the high speed rail project when they have concerns: be open about those concerns, but don’t try to destroy the whole project over it.

As we’ll see, it’s not exactly clear that the problem is the California High Speed Rail Authority not providing answers, but Gilroy not getting the answers they want. But given some of the anti-HSR attitudes among some Gilroy council members, it’s good that they’re not trying to stop HSR from happening, and recognize their duty to implement the will of the voters. Especially when you read Councilman Bob Dillon’s comments:

“I wish they would go away,” Councilman Bob Dillon said. “I’ve been against it since the get-go. It stands no chance.”

According to his calculations, the $45-billion, 800-mile system will cost more than $56 million per mile of track, and nearly $1,000 per inch, Dillon said.

“I would rather have my teeth pulled with no anesthesia” than support the project, he said.

As we know, HSR is going to happen – it doesn’t “stand no chance,” especially after voters approved the project and Congress funded part of it. Another Gilroy city councilmember, Dion Bracco, indicated he would “definitely” support an anti-HSR resolution along the lines of what Orange recently passed, but other councilmembers aren’t ready to go there.

For Gilroy city councilmembers who aren’t HSR deniers, the issue they have is with the Authority’s presentations to the city, and what they consider to be a lack of detail:

“Initially, there was a lot of optimism but I think that has changed a little bit as we learned more about the project,” Gartman said. “In listening to (the High Speed Rail Authority’s) presentations, it doesn’t seem like they’re very well organized. I can’t believe that they aren’t better prepared. They don’t know the answers that they should.”

However, the council appears to be frustrated that the plans at this point are conceptual and that the specific route hasn’t been finalized. Instead of just doing whatever the Authority tells them, Gilroy actually has the ability to help shape the route. They’re not passive actors, but active collaborators. I’m not sure the council recognizes that.

Here’s what the CHSRA project manager for the segment had to say:

According to Gary Kennerley, a regional project manager with the California High Speed Rail Authority, part of the challenge is relaying to residents that what the authority proposing isn’t set in stone.

Last month, the rail authority released a draft document outlining the possibility of aligning a rail line with the Monterey Street corridor, with U.S. Route 101 east of Gilroy or a combination of those two routes.

“It has been hard to convey to people that this is just an identification of alternatives,” Kennerley said. “No final decisions have been made.”

Gilroy needs to decide where it wants the trains to go. On the east edge of town, where it will fuel sprawl? Or along the existing rail corridor, where growth can be channeled into the city center and help grade-separate the tracks, improving safety and traffic flow while promoting economic growth?

The deeper problem seems to be that Gilroy officials just haven’t recognized that HSR will be a major benefit to their community, enabling it and its residents to enjoy prosperity for the rest of the 21st century:

Councilwoman Cat Tucker, who has expressed concern about the lack of hands-on meetings thus far, said she would prefer if the rail authority would run the bullet train over the Altamont Pass instead of the Pacheco Pass and bypass Gilroy altogether. Even though she considers herself an advocate for public transportation, she found both alternatives – either running the tracks through farmland or through downtown – unfavorable.

“It’s going to be one big, ugly monster coming through Gilroy,” she said.

You’re not an “advocate for public transportation” if you place aesthetics over usefulness, and especially not if you are willing to close your city off from the workhorse method of travel in 21st century California.

Mayor Al Pinheiro said he originally thought a downtown alignment might be beneficial for the local economy, attracting business from commuters who catch the bullet train in Gilroy.

But after further consideration, “I’m not thinking people are going to do much collateral spending in the downtown,” he said.

I don’t think Pinheiro has thought this through completely. It’s not just commuters from Hollister, Los Banos and Monterey who would use the station. With an HSR station, Gilroy itself would become a destination for commuters to live in – and instead of wanting to live in a sprawl-based community on the edge of town, they’d likely prefer to live downtown, in close proximity to the train station.

More than any other city in California, Gilroy has the potential to be the Ciudad Real of the California HSR system – a reference to the Spanish city that is 50 minutes away from central Madrid via the AVE high speed rail line that opened in 1992. As the Wall Street Journal described it last year:

Perhaps the most striking example is Ciudad Real, a scrappy town 120 miles south of Madrid in Castilla-La Mancha which, Mr. Ureña says, “had completely vanished from the map.” In medieval times, the town was a key stopover point on the route between the two of most important cities of the time, Córdoba and Toledo. But the railway and the highway south later bypassed the town, and Ciudad Real began to wither.

Now it has an AVE station that puts it just 50 minutes away from Madrid, and Ciudad Real has come alive. The city has attracted a breed of daily commuters that call themselves “Avelinos.” The AVE helped attract a host of industries to Ciudad Real, and the train is full in both directions.

Indra, an information technology company, moved a “software factory” to Ciudad Real a decade ago. “Along with the University, the AVE was one of the key reasons we moved here,” says Ángel Villodre, the director of the center.

The University of Castilla-La Mancha’s campus here has grown sharply in size and importance. “The school is here because of the AVE,” says Mr. Menéndez, the department head. “Without it, it would be impossible to attract the high-level staff we need.”

Gilroy leaders need to pay very close attention to what is being said here. Ciudad Real went from being a small town outside the Madrid urban core to a major center of residential and high-tech activity. Gilroy doesn’t have a major university, but it could very easily be a hub for high-tech industries that would love the lower costs of the South County region and the connectedness to Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and the rest of the state.

Mayor Pinheiro seems to be looking at HSR from a 20th century mindset. And true, from that mindset, an HSR commuter station in the middle of downtown might not seem all that valuable. But from a 21st century perspective, when access to high speed trains will be a very desirable thing, the station will be what gives Gilroy a huge competitive advantage over competing cities like Morgan Hill, Hollister, Los Banos, and even places like Salinas.

The HSR station makes a compelling reason for people to want to live in Gilroy as opposed to an automobile suburb, and a compelling reason for employers to want to locate there as opposed to some other place that has to be reached by automobile.

There’s no doubt that the process of designing and building HSR isn’t easy. It requires cities to make tough choices, including in Gilroy. But they can and should take a more constructive approach to this. Decide whether they want the station in town or on the edge of it – the CHSRA is more interested in hearing what Gilroy wants rather than forcing something on them.

I’m cheering for Gilroy here. As I said before, I taught at Gavilan College for a time when I returned to California in 2007, and got to know the city and its residents well. I like Gilroy a lot and think it has amazing potential, especially with a downtown that can easily accommodate transit-oriented development and the businesses that will sprout up to serve those residents. It would be a place many companies would seriously consider locating, especially high-tech businesses – and that growth can happen without fueling sprawl, which Gilroy has fought to prevent.

All this requires Gilroy to recognize that the 20th century is over, and that they need to position themselves for a 21st century economy and 21st century methods of travel. The people of California have delivered a gift to Gilroy that may be quite literally priceless – after HSR opens, cities across the state will be clamoring to get a station of their own. Gilroy will already have one, and be well on the way to prosperity. Let’s hope their current leadership recognizes the opportunity they have, and is willing to make the most of it.

The concept is now being applied to high speed rail, in California and across the nation, in a new study from the US Conference of Mayors (PDF). The vice-president of the US Conference of Mayors is Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who clearly understands the concept of the Green Dividend, as he is pushing hard to expand all forms of mass transit in his region through the 30/10 plan. And the US Conference of Mayors report features LA prominently as one of four case study cities (Chicago, Albany NY, and Orlando are the other three). On the 4th page, next to a picture of the LA skyline at twilight, we read under the heading “Key Economic Impact Findings”:

In Los Angeles, as much as $7.6 billion a year in new business sales, producing up to 55,000 new jobs and $3 billion in new wages.

Depending on the tax rates, that new economic activity in LA alone would be enough to pay off the entire $10 billion Prop 1A bond within about ten years. By the time the SF-LA HSR route opens around 2020, the massive expansion of LA’s Metro Rail system should be complete, with its hub at Union Station – likely increasing the ridership and therefore the success and economic benefits of HSR in the LA area.

The report finds five specific ways that HSR will deliver economic growth and a Green Dividend (a term that wasn’t used in the report, but should have been):

1. HSR service can help drive higher-density, mixed-use development at train stations.

2. HSR service can increase business productivity through travel efficiency gains.

3. HSR service can help expand visitor markets and generate additional spending.

4. HSR service can broaden regional labor markets. (Note from Robert: Bakersfield should pay particularly close attention to that point. Kern County residents would be able to get jobs in the LA area, a potential bonanza for a county with an 18.3% unemployment rate.)

5. HSR service can support the growth of technology clusters.

These same things hold true for San Diego, Sacramento, and the Bay Area. And while Fresno and Bakersfield may see themselves initially as bedroom cities on an HSR route, sort of like Ciudad Real on the Spanish AVE between Madrid and Sevilla, those cities could also take some economic growth and job creation for themselves, with HSR enabling skilled workers from the coastal metro areas to seek cheaper office/industrial/housing space inland.

Considering that the $10 billion or so in annual HSR dividend in the study was just for the LA area alone, one could envision maybe $25 to $30 billion a year once the system is built out (including Phase II to Sacramento and San Diego). That would more than pay for the costs of construction and operation of HSR.

Yet there remain those who are being pennywise and pound foolish with the HSR project, preferring to let a temporary budget problem here in 2010 prevent us from creating tens of billions of annual economic value for years to come through building HSR. Given low interest rates and low construction costs, with bids routinely coming in well below budget, this is exactly the right time to get to work building high speed rail for California.

David M. Thomson, an engineer with the consulting firm STV, said the rail authority has pushed back publication of its draft environmental impact report to January to allow some of those issues to be sorted out. The document originally was scheduled to be finished in May. He made the announcement during this week’s Buena Park City Council meeting.

State officials on Wednesday said pushing back the environmental studies will not affect more than $2 billion in federal stimulus funds that have been given to the project.

Buena Park has been one of the more vocal communities along the LA-Anaheim segment about the HSR plans. Unlike the controversy on the Peninsula, this isn’t about whether HSR should happen or not, or whether it should be tunneled or not, but is about a rather specific and focused concern about the impact of HSR on the Buena Park Metrolink station and nearby TOD:

The city’s two-year-old Metrolink station may or may not need to be destroyed to make way for the bullet train, so city officials asked that a new one be built as mitigation — and placed where the railroad tracks cross Dale Avenue, a location near the current station. The Buena Park Metrolink station, popular with commuters, opened in late 2007 at a cost of $11 million.

Even if their homes remain intact, the residents there want to save the station because they bought condos near it, Mayor Art Brown said. If the station were wiped out, Brown said, the residents worry the complex would become “a run-down slum.”

A new $11 million station seems like a perfectly legitimate form of mitigation for Buena Park. And it’s notable that Buena Park officials believe that having mass transit nearby is the difference between a desirable development and a “run-down slum” (which is a ridiculous way to describe condos not near a station).

As long as this doesn’t jeopardize stimulus funds, I’m all for examining track sharing, under reasonable circumstances (very limited sharing with freight, if any at all; passenger service integrated with HSR, HSR trains not slowed or delayed by any other user on the tracks). There’ll be lots of details to discuss between now and early 2011.

This being Orange County, of course, at least one HSR denier had to get a word in:

“I like this better than what I’ve seen before,” Councilman Jim Dow said. “But I think this is one of the biggest wastes of taxpayer dollars I’ve ever seen. This is a bunch of old men wanting to play with electric trains.”

Whatever, dude. Orange County and the state as a whole are going to innovate our way into the 21st century with high speed rail whether you like it or not.

One such example can be found in Buena Park, which finally got a Metrolink station in 2007. Transit-oriented development is still being built at the station – it wasn’t completed at the time of the Google Maps satellite shot of the station below.

View Larger Map

In recent weeks, Buena Park officials have learned that the CHSRA’s plans for building high speed rail along that corridor might require either the station or the transit-oriented development to be moved:

Mayor Art Brown spent years pushing for a commuter train station combined with nearby housing in his community. But as townhouses are being finished around the $14 million Metrolink station, he’s facing the prospect that California’s high-speed rail line may plow right through his beloved project.

“The only option they presented to us was either losing the condo units or losing our train station,” Brown said of an engineering presentation to city leaders last year….

“The idea that they would spend millions for a new station and remove it is a colossal waste of time and money,” said Mark Goldsmith, a resident of the “transit village” next to the Buena Park station.

Why yes, yes it is. It’s an unfortunate example of the lack of coherent, integrated transportation planning that happens in this state, where numerous local governments and agencies are conducting plans that don’t always match up. The CHSRA claims they had been in touch with city planning departments since 2005, so perhaps there was a point at which Buena Park learned of the HSR plans and said “screw it, let’s go ahead with these Metrolink Station/TOD plans anyway.” Or perhaps the CHSRA’s outreach was insufficient and Buena Park didn’t know the full details of what was being planned. In any case, it’s a rightly frustrating situation.

The LA-Anaheim Alternatives Analysis from June 2009 shows the issue (look on pages 60-61). The plan is to add HSR tracks just to the south of the current alignment, requiring 45 feet of ROW acquisition. That’s where the TOD in question is located.

The Buena Park Metrolink station can accommodate four tracks (there are currently two). But the Dedicated HST Alternative identified in the Alternatives Analysis involves six mainline tracks, two HSR-dedicated tracks and four for freight/Amtrak/Metrolink, between Redondo Junction and Fullerton Junction. Because of BNSF’s heavy usage of this corridor, the CHSRA and their consultants determined this was the necessary solution for HSR implementation. Hence the need for more tracks, and the conflict at Buena Park.

As the AP article makes clear, it’s not just Buena Park that is concerned:

Buena Park joined a coalition of gateway cities demanding a chance to evaluate all options and their potential impacts before moving into the environmental review process. The demand for better coordination was recently agreed upon in a memorandum of understanding with the authority.

“We’re not trying to be obstructionist NIMBY types, but it has to make sense to us,” said Ernie Garcia, city manager of Norwalk.

Which is sensible enough. Because of an apparent lack of coordinated planning for this portion of the LOSSAN corridor, these conflicts are there, and will have to be dealt with. It’s a good sign that these cities are avoiding the approach taken by their counterparts in the Bay Area – suing the Authority and giving fuel to anti-HSR, NIMBY sentiments. And if push came to shove, Buena Park’s mayor made clear he’d make way for HSR:

In Buena Park, Mayor Brown still could face his dilemma. But he said that if forced to choose, he would sacrifice the train station where his name is prominent on a plaque marking its opening.

“I would not take the homes away from those people,” he said. “They saved all their lives in some cases to buy a home with good transportation nearby.”

CHSRA deputy director Jeff Barker was quoted in the article pledging to work with Buena Park and the other “gateway cities” such as Norwalk and La Mirada (where my wife is from), and that pledge was reinforced in the memorandum of understanding recently signed between the cities and the CHSRA.

There’s every reason to believe that these conflicts, frustrating as they are, will be effectively resolved to everyone’s satisfaction. I’m not going to propose a solution myself, but it is good to see that the cities are adopting a constructive approach to these matters. Let’s hope that attitude is shared across the state so that high speed rail can get built on-time, on-budget, and in a way that meets the needs of Californians for generations to come.

Rich Connell and Dan Weikel’s article is essentially a repeat of the common HSR critics’ talking points, without any independent assessment of the facts. It is a misleading disservice to the Times’s readers and to the people of California.

They begin:

Despite a new $2.25-billion infusion of federal economic stimulus funding, there are intensifying concerns — even among some high-speed rail supporters — that California’s proposed bullet train may not deliver on the financial and ridership promises made to win voter backing in 2008.

While there is always the chance it may not deliver, that “chance” must be assessed with respect to facts, and in comparison to other HSR systems. Nowhere in the article is it mentioned that every HSR system around the world generates an operating surplus, covering its costs. Nowhere is it mentioned that HSR systems successfully entice passengers to switch from flying and from driving. The often baseless criticisms quoted in the article aren’t assessed against those realities. The result is an article full of speculation and assumptions taken out of context.

Estimates of ticket prices between Los Angeles and San Francisco have nearly doubled in the project’s latest business plan, pushing ridership projections down sharply and prompting new skepticism about data underpinning the entire project.

Nowhere is it explained that one, the higher ticket prices are a scenario; two, that it would remain cheaper than a flight; or three, that the rise was fueled by the inflation-adjusted costs. That shift in accounting is mentioned but not directly linked to the higher estimate, nor is it clearly stated that even under the higher ticket price, the system is projected to cover its costs. Instead it is left ambiguous and even implied that the higher fares might make it difficult for HSR to cover its operating costs and repay investors.

Unfortunately, Senator Alan Lowenthal is also given space to make his totally indefensible and evidence-free claims about the ridership numbers:

“This just smells funny,” said state Sen. Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach), a supporter of high-speed rail and chairman of the Senate Transportation and Housing Committee.

As you can tell, this statement that Lowenthal repeatedly makes gets me extremely angry. It is a dishonest thing for a member of the California State Legislature to keep claiming. If he has evidence that the ridership numbers are flawed, he owes it to the people of California to produce it. If he has no such evidence, he owes it to the people of California to not make such wild speculation. State legislators should be expected to be straight and honest with the people of California. Lowenthal, by his repeated insinuations that something is wrong with the ridership, is not delivering on that expectation.

Much of the article deals with the issue of whether there should be a government revenue guarantee to private investors:

And some government watchdogs are concerned that a linchpin commitment to taxpayers in the bullet train’s financing measure — that no local, state or federal subsidies would be required to keep the trains operating — may be giving way.

High-speed rail planners recently advised state lawmakers that attracting billions in crucial private financing will probably require government backing of future cash flow. “Without some form of revenue guarantee from the public sector, it is unlikely that private investment will occur at [the planned] level until demand for California high-speed rail is proven,” project planners wrote in December.

That is feeding fears that a larger state commitment, beyond the $9 billion in construction bonds approved by voters, could be sought to complete the 800-mile project. “To now put in that we have to [give] some kind of revenue guarantee . . . is totally unacceptable,” Lowenthal said. “That’s not what we agreed to.”

This is a legitimate issue. And I share many of the concerns being raised about such a revenue guarantee. I don’t believe it is at all necessary, and it is something worth discussing even if the final outcome is to reject the concept.

But it is misleading to frame that discussion around an assumption that the ridership numbers are flawed, that the costs are soaring out of control, that in short there is something wrong with the HSR project that makes this revenue guarantee likely to be triggered. If there is evidence of that, by all means let’s discuss it. So far, no such evidence has yet been presented. All Alan Lowenthal has is gut feelings and assumptions, which are significant given his political position but are also not a stand-in for evidence.

The article does break some important news about what the CHSRA board might do about the ridership numbers, and what the state legislature might do about the Authority:

“I think the [ridership] numbers should be scrubbed,” said authority board member Richard Katz, adding that doing so could help the project.

Katz is echoing points I have made before, that a new ridership study would likely benefit HSR since the earlier studies rely on numbers from 2000 to 2005, before the sustained statewide increase in passenger rail travel experienced since 2007. I would not be surprised if the Authority did order some form of updated ridership numbers, in part to appease the legislature – and if the Authority doesn’t, I fully expect the legislature to order such studies itself.

Lowenthal hinted that, as I’ve predicted, the legislature might reduce the Authority’s independence by moving it under an existing Executive Branch department:

But lawmakers are likely to overhaul the high-speed rail agency and move it more directly into state government, Lowenthal said. “It’s not going to be out there on its own,” he said.

This is probably a good move – with the Authority “out there on its own” it has fewer institutional and legislative defenders than it deserves.

Other elements of the article indicate the authors did not do their fact-checking when it comes to reporting on critics’ claims:

But some analysts point out that almost all U.S. rail systems — and a number of foreign operations — have required large government loans or cash infusions to keep running.

This line should not have been included in the article. The whole thing requires a citation needed tag. First, “some analysts” is a vague claim. Who exactly are we talking about here? Second, this does not distinguish between HSR and other forms of passenger rail – and as the evidence shows, that is a key distinction. SNCF, the French national rail operator, makes “fat profits” on the TGV and uses that to subsidize its other rail services. Fares cover the operating cost of every single other HSR system in the world, from Europe to Asia to the Acela here in the United States.

Even Taiwan, which needed a government bailout for its HSR system, generated operating surplus. The bailout was due to the over-reliance on private financing, an issue that would have been worth exploring in the context of the discussion of the revenue guarantee. The LA Times article needed to include those rather important facts here.

The article further insinuated few people will ride the line:

Some smaller cities, like Gilroy, Merced and Bakersfield, show numbers of nonlocal trips equal to or greater than Los Angeles. “We’ve never understood their models,” said Lowenthal, whose panel is delving deeper into the projections.

I’ve not seen those particular numbers. If true, there may well be reasons for it – Gilroy would be a gateway to the Monterey Bay region, Merced would be the transfer point to Sacramento, and Bakersfield has lots of people who want to go to LA. This notion of “nonlocal” is unclear, and as we know, Alan Lowenthal simply doesn’t think people will ride the trains for intercity trips despite a mountain of evidence that they will.

Still, I suspect this claim is another misreading of the stats. Overall LA Union Station will likely have far higher ridership than Gilroy or Merced. And the attempt to point to a specific ridership stat to try and paint it as so incredible that the whole thing is flawed strikes me as a classic case of the Chewbacca Defense.

The article continues:

Some transit advocates say predictions of private participation aren’t realistic. “A lot of it’s still magical thinking,” said Bart Reed, executive director of the Transit Coalition.

As much as I like Bart Reed, he is wrong here, and the LA Times again failed its readers by not fact-checking this claim. Over 30 companies responded to a March 2008 Request for Expressions of Interest the CHSRA put out to the private sector, ranging from operators like SNCF and Veolia to train builders like Alstom and Siemens. Private financial participation is and has always been very realistic, but the details matter.

The article also threw in a separate discussion of a dispute in Buena Park between city officials and the CHSRA over the corridor:

Conflicts are brewing in Southern California as planners step up efforts to squeeze trenches, viaducts and extra tracks into a crowded rail corridor cutting across the region. Problems remain over how the bullet train will pass through Los Angeles’ Union Station transportation complex. Existing buildings, freeways, rail lines and overpasses around the station make it an extremely tight fit.

In Buena Park, city officials recently learned that part of a new award-winning transit-oriented residential project tied into the city’s 3-year-old Metrolink station may have to be ripped out.

A high-speed rail representative told local officials, “We either take the condominiums or we take your station,” recalled Councilman Art Brown, who has generally supported the bullet train. Planners are reexamining the issue, but it remains unresolved.

Not knowing much more about the details than this, it strikes me as an issue that does need to be examined more closely and resolved. I know Clem has discussed a San Carlos TOD project that is apparently being planned without any real coordination with the HSR project. The CHSRA and local officials need to work together more effectively on situations such as this.

Still, while an examination of the Buena Park issue would have been worth an entire article, what the LA Times offered instead was a badly flawed rehash of HSR criticism that is often lacking in evidence or running directly counter to the evidence. Times readers and Californians deserved better.

On December 4th, Californians For High Speed Rail (CA4HSR) submitted the comment letter to the California High Speed Rail Authority (Authority) for the Altamont Rail Corridor Project. Our letter focused on three key topics: expanding the scope to cover the Altamont destinations described in Prop 1A, station location criteria, and alignments/station locations to be studied..

CA4HSR Scoping Comments – Altamont Rail Corridor Project

To understand the Altamont Rail Corridor Project, it is important to know the background on how it has came about. From 2004 to 2008, the Bay Area was caught in a big fight over whether the Altamont or Pacheco Pass would be used to connect the Bay Area to the Central Valley. CA4HSR remained neutral in this fight. As a regional compromise, the nine-county Metropolitan Transportation Commission and the Authority picked the Pacheco Pass alignment but agreed to support a separate “Altamont Commuter Overlay” project separate from the High Speed Rail project. At the time the overlay project was more imaginary then real, as it had no funding for construction.

Up until early 2009, the Altamont Rail Corridor Project was more paper than real. However, two things changed the status of the project. First, President Obama had $8 billion inserted into the stimulus for high-speed rail and committed to ongoing funding of high speed rail (HSR) through the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA). Secondly, the Authority and the San Joaquin Regional Rail Commission (the Altamont Commuter Express-ACE manager) were able to convince the FRA that the Altamont overlay would be “intercity” rather than “commuter” rail, thus qualifying it for national HSR funds. This means the former “paper project” from 2008 is now eligible to compete for up to $50 billion in HSR funding that may be included in the transportation bill re-authorization next year. Therefore, CA4HSR believes that the Altamont Corridor Rail Project is now a real project that has a fair chance of being constructed.

Californians For High Speed Rail is delighted by this progress and views the San Joaquin Regional Rail Commission’s pro-active stance as a model for California transit agencies. ACE commuter service currently runs three one-way round trips a day, between Stockton and San Jose. The service is slow, and its capacity is limited due to its secondary position to Union Pacific. The Commission’s leadership wants to transform the existing ACE service into the leading passenger rail service in Northern California. The Commission envisions eventually running modern, electric multiple unit rail cars on passenger-only tracks from Sacramento and Merced to/from the Bay Area. The Altamont Rail Corridor Project, at full build out, will have the necessary infrastructure to allow California High Speed Rail trains to access the corridor. The current planning process will lay out how to incrementally construct new high-speed rail compatible tracks, as funding comes available, until the ultimate vision is achieved. This is exactly how transit agencies should think and plan ahead long-term. CA4HSR’s objections to the current scope are not that it is too ambitious, but that it is too limited.

Proposition 1A, which is funding the Altamont Rail Corridor Project EIS/EIS, defines the Altamont corridor as a “high speed train corridor” in Article 2 Section (B)(3). Specifically it reads, “Merced to Stockton to Oakland and San Francisco via the Altamont Corridor.” CA4HSR enthusiastically approves of adding San Jose to the scope of the Altamont Rail Corridor Project, but believes San Francisco and Oakland must be studied as well to meet the intent of Proposition 1A. We also reject the concept that future high speed service from Altamont can be provided to San Francisco and Oakland by utilizing BART service for large potions of the routes to the two cities by forcing patrons of the Altamont service to transfer to BART trains in either Livermore or Warm Springs.  Rather, San Francisco should be reached via a new high bridge to replace the old Dumbarton rail bridge and the Peninsula. Oakland should be accessed by either a new Transbay tube from the San Francisco Transbay Terminal or by upgrading the current Capitol Corridor line from Union City/Fremont to downtown Oakland. CA4HSR’s letter includes five new alternatives through southern Alameda County that could accommodate efficient access to San Francisco and Oakland from the Altamont.

At this point Californians For High Speed Rail is not endorsing any one alternative but wants to insure that Northern California ends up with the best interregional rail plan possible. The region and the State have to opportunity to now plan for such interregional rail service. If you wish to join us in the effort contact us at: brian.stanke@ca4hsr.org The planning for Altamont Corridor Rail Project service has just begun and the more that people get involved, the more of an impact we can have.

About Californians For High Speed Rail

Californians For High Speed Rail is a grassroots, statewide coalition of high speed rail supporters advocating for the high speed rail project approved by California voters in November 2008. Founded in 2005 and re-launched in 2009, we exist to educate, inform, and organize Californians about ways they can help make high speed rail a reality in this state. Additionally, Californians For High Speed Rail also encourages sustainable development of the high speed rail system, promoting the building of stations in city centers and surrounding transit-oriented development, as well as developing and improving feeder transit systems.

CA4HSR – Los Angeles to San Diego Scoping Comments

Note that the first part of the comment letter are planning guidelines that emphasize station locations should be considered with respect to walkability of surrounding area, opportunities for transit-oriented development (TOD), and easy connectivity to existing and planned mass transit. These principles guided the comments on stations and alignments.

Inland Empire

• All corridors from LA to Riverside County should be studied, except Metrolink corridor from LAUS to Ontario Airport. City of Industry station should be considered for elimination – not a good site for TOD nor is it easily walkable for residents. Locate Ontario Airport HSR station adjacent to air terminal.
• Continue to study stations in downtown San Bernardino (Santa Fe Depot) and downtown Riverside, due to surrounding population, TOD opportunities, transit connectivity.
• Do not further study I-15 alignment/Corona Station due to lack of large urban centers, higher population along I-215 alignment. Do not further study March AFB station due to lack of walkable, dense, TOD opportunities.

San Diego

• Study both Escondido options (city center and I-15). For I-15 alignment, however, move transit center and Sprinter station to I-15 adjacent location and promote TOD around it.
• Do not further study or include station in University City along existing Rose Canyon rails. Consider University Towne Center station, and consider a bored tunnel under it to bypass Rose Canyon. However, also consider eliminating this station due to 24 station limit.
• Consider new alignments to bring HSR from I-15 to I-5 corridor, including SR-56, SR-163 to SR-52, and SR-163 to I-8.
• Qualcomm Stadium should only be studied if it is part of an alignment to downtown San Diego (Santa Fe Depot), significant TOD at Qualcomm Stadium, and elimination of possibility of sending trains to Tijuana via I-805. This would basically be another route to downtown, and downtown SD is the key in these comments.
• Opposes ending HSR at airport terminal. Instead proposes “dual stations” – one at airport and one downtown (Santa Fe Depot); or just downtown SD without an airport stop.

The CHSRA has always emphasized their stations as bringers of urban density; you can see it in the NC3D animations produced last year for the Authority. Transit Oriented Development (TOD) is one of the strongest selling points for high speed rail, as it will help provide needed new housing in city centers, spur the development of other housing, commercial, and retail properties, and help act as magnets for bringing growth back into the cities and away from the exurban sprawl that characterized California’s last period of economic growth (a sprawl which was directly responsible for the current economic collapse).

The question, as the San Diego Business Journal points out, is timing:

“I think not only is it something that is a good thing, it’s certainly going to be a phenomenal planning tool for the next generation of growth,” said Perry Dealy, president of Dealy Development. “The opportunity to take the high-speed stop hubs and convert them to maximize their mixed-use, high-density potential is great. You’d have what I’d call a TOD, transit-oriented design, starting with residential, work-live, retail, entertainment and other kinds of venues that are part of the mixed-use characteristics.”…

Dealy said that the type of project he has in mind would ultimately cost $1 billion to $2 billion. It would entail acquiring land to build on, adding or refurbishing infrastructure, and preparing a master plan.

“There is demand for the region to grow, we’re definitely going to add a million people, maybe not in 10, but in 12, 14 years it’s going to happen,” said Dealy. “Now’s the time to actually get these concepts defined.”

Of course, Dealy will have even more time than that to plan for San Diego, where revenue service may not begin until as late as 2030. But for some of the other stops, such as Anaheim, Fresno, Gilroy and San Jose, now may well be the right time to get TOD concepts under way, especially as cities start evaluating land use rules surrounding the proposed HSR stations.

Some developers aren’t convinced there’s any rush to get plans started:

Shawn Tobias, project manager at Houston-based Hines, a real estate firm and commercial developer, stated that he doesn’t see that much of a push from the development side to start planning for a project like this immediately.

“I think (development) firms in general right now tend to be shortsighted in terms of their business, just to make sure that they’re weathering the current conditions well enough, but planners are certainly into the future,” said Tobias. “Whether that becomes a reality is a different situation because the real challenge is integrating the plan within the existing municipalities, but it certainly is on Hines’ long-term radar.”

Tobias cited economic factors for the reasons that some developers have chosen to focus on more short-term projects.

“I don’t see a planning rush right now because most people are in survival modes,” Tobias said. “Once the economy starts to heat up and there’s more demand for development, I think you’ll see more firms clamoring for this.”

Of course, Hines isn’t really saying anything that different from Dealy – both agree that HSR TOD will make a compelling financial opportunity for developers, investors, and buyers, but they aren’t sure whether there is the resources out there right now to get this started given the economic climate.

As HSR TOD plans begin to take shape we’ll start covering them in more detail here on the blog. One issue that the HSR stations raise related to development is whether there will be overnight and long-term parking allowed at these stations, a question Rafael brought up in the comments to yesterday’s post. If such parking is allowed, Rafael rightly argues, it could mitigate against TOD, especially in lower density locations like the Central Valley.

Parking is a big issue when it comes to development in existing urban centers. TOD and density advocates have increasingly pushed to limit or eliminate city planning codes requiring new developments to provide a fixed number of parking spaces, and more attention is being drawn to the drawbacks of urban parking lots.

On the other hand, overnight and long-term parking would represent a potentially significant revenue stream for the CHSRA. There are many years of studies ahead that will examine this question, which will have an impact not only on how Californians interact with the HSR trains, but how the HSR system interacts with its surrounding urban environment.