Coast Rail Coordinating Council
The Coast Rail Coordinating Council (CRCC) is a coalition of coastal county transportation and planning agencies organized to improve passenger rail services. The primary purpose of the CRCC is to improve the frequency, speed, reliability and ease of use of passenger trains on the coast route between San Francisco and Los Angeles.
The project that has been the focus of the group is to add one round trip passenger rail service to the Coast line between San Jose/San Francisco and Los Angeles/San Diego, known as the “Coast Daylight”. The project has been proposed as an extension of an existing Pacific Surfliner train that currently runs between San Diego and San Luis Obispo up to San Jose, with the long-range goal of reaching San Francisco. The planned stops in Monterey County are in Pajaro/Watsonville, Salinas, Soledad and the City of King. The project would rely on local jurisdictions to construct any stations that may be required.
The CRCC Technical Committee held a phone meeting on December 2, 2016, and the Policy Committee met via phone on January 13, 2017. Staff will report back on those meetings.
2018 California State Rail Plan
On January 11, 2017, Agency staff met with Chad Edison, Deputy Secretary for Transportation, California State Transportation Agency (CalSTA), and Andy Cook, Chief, Rail Planning Branch, Caltrans Division of Rail and Mass Transportation. Both agencies are hard at work on the California State Rail Plan, which reflects increased investments in the coast corridor without specifying project operators or other service characteristics. The Rail Plan Stakeholder Advisory Committee met on January 24, 2017, and staff will report back on that meeting.
Federal Environmental Review of Salinas-San Jose Corridor
Agency consultant HDR Engineering is developing the Administrative Draft Environmental Assessment (ADEA) for the rail corridor from Salinas to San Jose to support adding new passenger rail service on the corridor. This document will allow the corridor to be eligible for federal funding.
The team presented the ADEA to the stakeholder agencies on November 17, 2016 – the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), the San Luis Obispo Council of Governments, Caltrans Division of Rail and Mass Transportation, Caltrans District 5, and the Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority. At that meeting, Agency staff provided an overview of the document, the completion of technical studies for air quality, noise and vibration, traffic and transportation, and hazardous materials.
The team discussed the Proposed Action: one new round trip on the Coast Daylight and four additional Capitol Corridor trains above the no-build scenario (the Kick Start project of two round trips to Salinas). The environmental review is based on schedules and ridership estimates provided by the proposed operators (Amtrak and Capitol Corridor, respectively). Any track improvements are assumed to be completed in the no-build (Kick Start) scenario. All anticipated impacts are expected to be mitigated via Best Management Practices and other avoidance measures, and at this time, the team anticipates a Finding of No Significant Impact.
The team discussed the proposed schedule for the document which anticipated public review in January 2017, with the goal of completing the document by June 2017. Unfortunately, the FRA stated that since there is currently no federal funding on the Proposed Action, there is no federal action. FRA said that while they can support agencies starting the EA review and do not have policy concerns with the Proposed Action, they cannot commit to any schedule. Other partner agencies provided comments on the ADEA. The team now expects to get a revised ADEA to FRA for their review in February.