Another Take, Another Town on High Speed Rail

San Mateo city leaders still behind bullet train By Mike Rosenberg, MediaNews Staff San Mateo city leaders this week again backed the concept of a California high-speed train zipping through their city, although they listened to residents' concerns about the project and had some of their own. As some nearby cities mobilize efforts to derail the train's planned route through the Peninsula, the San Mateo City Council said at a study session Monday it still thought the benefits of high-speed rail zooming through their city outweighed the potential negative impacts to the community. The council envisions the train being a convenient, greener alternative to flying and would serve residents who wanted to travel throughout the state. "I just think it's the way to go," said Councilman Jack Matthews. "I think there's a golden opportunity here." The council did, however, spend about an hour listing its concerns with the project. Ideally, council members said, the bullet train should whisk through San Mateo on raised tracks between the Hillsdale and Hayward Park Caltrain stations, and on depressed tracks or inside a tunnel through downtown. Otherwise, an elevated rail line could divide the city's downtown, which has residences, businesses and restaurants interspersed on each side of the existing Caltrain tracks. "We feel that is going to be a barrier that would really divide our community, in the downtown area in particular," Matthews said. "Our downtown really does straddle the tracks." A handful of residents spoke at the public hearing Monday, calling for as little impact as possible on the downtown area. They also voiced concerns on noise pollution and the effect on nearby developments. The city will summarize Monday's meeting in a letter to the California High Speed Rail Authority next month. The authority is taking comments until April 6 as it prepares to plan out the San Francisco-to-San Jose portion of the line. Menlo Park, Atherton and other cities have sent letters to the authority, raising concerns about noise pollution, increased traffic, and property loss through eminent domain that could occur to make room for the new tracks. The San Mateo City Council on Monday briefly discussed the idea of joining a consortium of mostly southern Peninsula cities that has been forming to present a unified front to the authority in advance of the April 6 deadline. However, the council said it did not want to share a voice with the cities some of which have taken more radical opposition to the rail line. Deputy Mayor John Lee noted that Menlo Park and Atherton sued the authority last year. San Mateo will meet with officials from Burlingame and Millbrae on a regular basis to discuss the project, City Manager Susan Loftus said. While supporting the rail project, San Mateo officials had their own concerns. The council wanted to see the tracks elevated south of downtown, and depressed tracks or tunnels through downtown. The rail line's grade change must be gradual; the tracks can only be lowered one foot for every 100 feet of track. Mayor Brandt Grotte and other council members said tunneling through downtown would be ideal, though it would prove much costlier than above-ground tracks. "I think (tunneling) is the only way to go," Grotte said. The council also reinforced the need for grade separations, where the tracks run above the street, at 25th, 28th and 31st avenues as part of the project. The train requires grade separations to run at high speed. Grotte also called for information on how many property owners would be affected by potential eminent domain actions.

- Written by Fiona

Comments

[Joanne]

Well, it's pretty obvious what neighborhoods in downtown San Mateo are going to feel the effects of eminent domain -- it will be the Latino neighborhoods east of the railroad tracks.

Tunneling is dead-on-arrival. The cost of widening the track area, laying new tracks and grade separation will be approximately $60 million per mile. The projected cost of tunneling is $600 million per mile.

[Martin Engel]

Burlingame and San Mateo. You have the right to remain silent. You can negotiate on your own to obtain what you hope to obtain from the rail authority. My guess is that they will do what they want to do, not what you want them to do.

Or, you can join the Peninsula cities coalition, lead by Yoriko Kishimoto of Palo Alto, and have the empowerment that comes from the unity of many cities speaking with one voice.

That does not mean anyone can or will impose upon you solutions with which you are not comfortable. But, it is the purpose of this coalition to stand behind you and provide the leverage to see that the rail authority listens to your needs for rail alignments and responds positively to those needs. Every city does not want or need the same solution. But, a coalition can negotiate, collectively for the benefit of each city to obtain their particular needs.

You have nothing to lose; you can always withdraw, but everything to gain to the benefit of our residents.

I urge you, in the strongest terms, to join this coalition.

Respectfully,

Martin Engel

[Michelle]

This train is set to go right next to Burlingame high school. It is long range transportation, 125 mph on the Caltrain tracks, widening to 4 tracks with a 20' concrete wall and trains on top every 9 minutes. NO WAY! WHAT WAS THE CITY THINKING? Why are they calling the people who are fighting this Nimbys? This is a slam on our entire way of life. Every town destroyed, forget it! Who is in charge of this somebody from Los Angeles?

[Kevin Hecteman]

I think one of the reasons we're having this conversation is that the high-speed rail authority missed the call -- badly -- on its choice of NorCal alignment.

The options were Altamont Pass or Pacheco Pass. We got Pacheco, thanks largely to Silicon Valley interests. Altamont would have brought in more of the Valley (and Sacramento) and HSR on the Peninsula would have been a different issue altogether.

There's a good blog floating around called the Caltrain HSR Compatibility Blog (I can't post the link, but if you run "caltrain hsr blog" through Google, it'll be first on the hit parade) that discusses HSR-on-the-Peninsula issues in a just-the-facts manner. Might be worth a look.

[Joanne]

One thing that probably everyone can agree upon is that the HSR is very expensive and that all of our governments -- federal, state, county, city -- are in the red, or will be if they don't make drastic cuts to their budgets. So why, when we have bullet trains running non-stop between San Jose and San Francisco, is it necessary to have a HSR running in competition with Caltrain?