Caltrain Modernization Program
The electrification of Caltrain is a $1.9 billion proposed project to electrify the main line of Caltrain, a commuter railroad serving cities in the San Francisco Peninsula and Silicon Valley. The project will allow Caltrain to transition from its currently diesel-electric locomotive powered trains to a fully electric rolling stock. Electric trains will allow Caltrain to improve service times via faster acceleration and increased headways, reduce air pollution and noise, and facilitate a future underground expansion into downtown San Francisco's Transbay Transit Center because the current diesel trains cannot serve underground stations.
The first phase of the project will electrify 49 miles (79 km) of tracks between 4th and King station and Tamien Station. Funding for the project comes from various federal, state, and local sources, including from the California High-Speed Rail Authority, which plans to share Caltrain's tracks in the future. Construction contracts were awarded on July 2016 and groundbreaking was expected to occur in March 2017, but was delayed when United States Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao indefinitely deferred federal funding just before construction was about to begin. Caltrain plans to complete the project by 2020, after which it plans to use double-decker electric multiple unit Stadler Rail trainsets on the electrified route, and retain the older diesel locomotives for service south of Tamien and, potentially, on the Dumbarton Rail Corridor.
History
Commuter railroad service on the San Francisco Peninsula was inaugurated in 1863 as the San Francisco and San Jose Rail Road and purchased by Southern Pacific in 1890. In the early 1950s, Southern Pacific began introducing diesel locomotives on the route.[1] However, by 1977, Southern Pacific began facing rapidly declining ridership and petitioned the state Public Utilities Commission to allow them discontinue the commute operation. From 1980 until 1992, the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and the three service counties, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara, subsidized Southern Pacific operations on the railway until the local Peninsula Joint Powers Board acquired the right-of-way in 1991.[2] One year later, Caltrans released the first feasibility study over the possibility of electrifying the railroad between San Francisco and San Jose.[3]
Due to funding shortages, the project was postponed for the next two decades. In 2004, Caltrain introduced a express service that reduced travel time along the railroad. Within a year, ridership increased by 12%[4] and doubled by 2012.[5] That year, Caltrain entered into an agreement with the California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) to receive funding from the agency in exchange for rights to share the tracks in the future.[6] In February 2015, shortly after the project received environmental clearance from California, the town of Atherton, which lies on the tracks, sued Caltrain, alleging that the agency's environmental impact review was inadequate and that its collaboration with the CHSRA should be further vetted. On September 2016, Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge Barry Goode sided with Caltrain, ruling that the electrification project does not hinge on the high-speed rail project's success, and is thus independent from the latter.[7]
By February 2017, the electrification project had secured $1.3 billion in state, local, and regional funding, with the remaining funding gap to be closed by a $647 million grant from the Federal Transit Administration’s (FTA) Core Capacity program.[8] The grant had undergone a two-year review process under the Obama Administration and received a "medium-high" rating from the FTA, and was waiting the new Trump Administration-appointed Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao's signature after a thirty-day review period.[9] However, during the review period, the fourteen Republican party U.S. House representatives from California sent a letter to Chao, urging her to deny funding due to the project's ties with high-speed rail, which they opposed. They called the high-speed rail project a "boondoggle" and the Caltrain grant as a "waste of taxpayer dollars".[10]
Chao heeded their arguments, and deferred the grant in a letter to Caltrain which stated that the FTA needed "additional time to complete review of this significant commitment of Federal resources". Caltrain had expected Chao to approve the grant by March 1, which is normally a pro-forma step done after the thirty-day comment period for a highly-rated project, and had already awarded construction contracts.[9][11] Balfour Beatty Construction and Stadler Rail had already begun preparations to upgrade the existing tracks and build electrical trainsets, respectively. In response, Caltrain negotiated an emergency four-month extension at the cost of $20 million.[9]
In response to the grant deferral, various local officials traveled to Washington D.C. in order to lobby federal officials to release the money. San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo met with Department of Transportation officials, urging them to upgrade a system that "was built under the presidency of Abraham Lincoln". Additionally, more than 120 Silicon Valley business leaders sent a letter to Chao, asking her to explain "the last-minute attempt to derail[ing of] two decades of work".[11] On March 21, 2017, California Governor Jerry Brown met with Chao and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, author of House Republican letter to Chao, urging them to reconsider the funding deferral, saying afterward that he was "cautiously optimistic" that the money would be released.[12]
Proposal
Modernizing Caltrain is a priority because we need an improved rail system that will help reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and serve our growing ridership. Not only will the electrification project reduce diesel emissions in this corridor by 96 percent by 2040, but it will also allow Caltrain to provide additional service to more stations, increasing ridership and providing faster service in Silicon Valley from San Francisco to San Jose.
The purpose of the electrification project is to electrify the main line of Caltrain's commuter railroad 49 miles (79 km) of tracks between 4th and King station and Tamien Station by installing new electrical infrastructure and purchasing electric trainsets. Existing service from Tamien to Gilroy station will continue to be served with existing diesel locomotives.[14] The idea to electrify the route began with a feasibility study conducted by the California Department of Transportation in 1992,[3] although funding considerations delayed the project for the next two decades. In 2012, Caltrain and the California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA), along with the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and other local stakeholders, signed a memorandum of understanding that the CHSRA would partially fund the electrification project in exchange for future rights to share the tracks. In effect, Caltrain's tracks will be used by the CHSRA to reach the Transbay Transit Center in downtown San Francisco.[6]
According to Caltrain, the electrification project will bring multiple benefits to the corridor. Firstly, electrified trains can accelerate and decelerate more quickly than the existing diesel locomotives, resulting in faster and more frequent service. Additionally, electric trainsets are quieter and produce less air pollution that diesel locomotives, and the use of electric trains will lower Caltrain's fuel costs while increasing passenger revenue, due to an expected increase in ridership. Once complete, Caltrain expects to annually reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 176,000 metric tons and increase daily ridership by 21% by 2040. Caltrain plans to complete the project by the end of 2020.[14]
In 2016, Caltrain's Board of Directors awarded contracts to Balfour Beatty Construction and Stadler Rail to construct infrastructure for the electric trains and the electric trains themselves, respectively. Balfour Beatty is contracted to electrify the line at 25kV AC, replace signaling systems, construct two traction power substations, one switching substation, and seven paralleling substations. Stadler is contracted to deliver sixteen of their "KISS" bilevel electric multiple unit trains, with the option of expanding the order by an additional 96 cars in the future.[15]
Funding
Funding for the $1.9 billion project comes from a mix of funds contributed by the California Department of Transportation, California High-Speed Rail Authority, California cap and trade revenue, Bay Area Air Quality Management District, Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the city and county of San Francisco, SamTrans, and Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority. 32% of the funding, or $647 million, was expected as part of the Federal Transit Administration's Core Capacity grant, but was indefinitely deferred by Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. An additional $600 million comes from Proposition 1A funds that authorized the construction of high-speed rail, $113 million from cap and trade revenue, and the rest coming from local and regional sources.[16]
References
- ^ "Early Milestones". Caltrain. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ "Historic Milestones". Caltrain. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ a b "Feasibility Study for Electrifying the Caltrain/PCS Railroad" (PDF). California Department of Transportation. October 1992. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ Murphy, Dave (30 June 2005). "BART's Peninsula Line Falls Short of Hopes / Competition from cheaper baby Bullet trains could be hurting ridership on extension". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 25 March 2017.
- ^ "2016 Annual Passenger Counts" (PDF). May 5, 2016. p. 3. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ a b "Authorizing Approval of the High-Speed Rail Early Investment Strategy for a Blended System, Memorandum of Understanding" (PDF). Caltrain. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ Weigel, Samantha (September 27, 2016). "Judge gives Caltrain electrification green light: Atherton loses lawsuit, claims local project was too closely tied to high-speed rail". The Daily Journal. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ "Caltrain Statement: Electrification Must Move Forward". Caltrain. February 8, 2017. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ a b c Green, Jason (February 28, 2017). "Caltrain: Agreement with contractors to extend deadline keeps electrification project alive". San Jose Mercury News. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ "In Silicon Valley, Caltrain Upgrade Is Imperiled as Trump Withholds Funds". The New York Times. March 6, 2017. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ a b Richards, Gary (March 24, 2017). "Trump, Chao get an earful on Caltrain funds from Silicon Valley leaders". East Bay Times. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ "Jerry Brown meets with Republicans, 'cautiously optimistic' about Caltrain approval". Sacramento Bee. March 21, 2017. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ Tasha Bartholomew (April 21, 2016). "Modernization: Electrifying the Bay Area's Silicon Valley Rail Corridor". Mass Transit Magazine. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ a b "Peninsula Corridor Electrification Status Update (Feb 2017)" (PDF). Caltrain. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ "For Caltrain, 16 KISSes from Stadler (but no FLIRTs)". William C. Vantuono. Railway Age. August 16, 2016. Retrieved March 29, 2017.
- ^ "Caltrain Modernization Program 4th Quarter FY 2016 Progress Report" (PDF). Caltrain. Retrieved March 29, 2017.