Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Spring Break for High Speed Rail Update

NOTE: We've moved! Visit us at the California High Speed Rail Blog.

The San Francisco Citizen brings us a photo and some details about CALPIRG's High Speed Rail Spring Break Tour:



Included in the picture are, from left to right, SF Supervisor Aaron Peskin, former SF Supervisor and now Chairman of the CHSRA board Quentin Kopp, and State Senator Carole Migden. There were at least 100 supporters there for the kickoff rally yesterday, and a similarly decent number down at San José City Hall.

NBC 11 gave some good coverage, including these quotes from trip organizers:

"I'm spending my spring break on a road trip, but not to Cabo," said Jenn Engstrom, a second-year student at University of California at Berkeley.

Gambit Ramos, an organizer staff member from University of California, Irvine, came with his red bicycle, bearing a sticker reading, "I'd rather be riding high-speed rail."


(And can I just say, as a one-time UCI student and as a UC Berkeley grad, how pleased I am to see students from both those schools taking part in this?!)

Today they spoke in Sacramento and Stockton, and tomorrow they'll be in Fresno. The full remaining schedule is:

Fresno
When: Wednesday, March 26th, 11:30am
Where: Fresno Convention Center (students will bike in with the Congressman a little before 11am)
Joining the Students:
Congressman Jim Costa
To join the Bike Event: Meet at Convention Center at 10:30am

Bakersfield
When: Wednesday, March 26th, 3pm
Where: Bakersfield City Hall
Joining the Students:
Bakersfield Mayor Harvey Hall
Fran Florez, High-Speed Rail Authority Board Member
Staff from Congressman Costa’s office and State Senator Dean Florez’ office
To join the Bike Event: Meet at 2:30pm, location TBA

Palmdale
When: Wednesday, March 26th, 3:30pm
Where: Palmdale Transportation Center (39000 Clock Tower Plaza Drive)

Los Angeles
When: Thursday, March 27th, 10am
Where: South side steps of City Hall
Joining the Students:
Staff from Congresswoman Diane Watson’s office
To join the Bike Event: Meet at Union Station parking lot at 9am

Anaheim
When: Thursday, March 27th, 1pm
Where: Amtrak Station, 2150 East Katella Avenue Anaheim, CA 92806
To join the Bike Event: Meet at Amtrak Station parking lot at 12:30pm

Riverside
When: Friday, March 28th, 9:30am
Where: Riverside Cesar Chavez Community Center (students will bike in from UC Riverside to the Community Center)
Joining the Students:
Riverside Mayor Ronald O. Loveridge
To join the Bike Event: UCR campus (corner of Canyon Crest Dr. and University Ave) at 9am

San Diego
When: Friday, March 28th, 1:30pm
Where: MTS headquarters downtown
Joining the Students:
Assemblywoman Lori Saldaña
State Senator Christine Kehoe
National City Mayor Ron Morrison
Escondido Mayor Lori Holt Pfeiler
SANDAG Executive Director Gary L. Gallegos
To join the Bike Event: Meet at Balboa Park at 12:30pm

Check back for updates - details may change last minute


It is also very, very cool to hear that they're biking for at least some portion of the tour.

4 comments:

Brandon in California said...

The San Diego event should be relocated to Santa Fe Depot at Broadway & Kettner. That's the adopted preferred station location for San Diego. It's also in a better location; however, I believe it's private property as it is owned by Catelus.

Robert Cruickshank said...

For whatever reason, the organizers have preferenced city halls and such on this tour. LA Union Station would be another excellent place to hold a rally, but, they're going to LA City Hall instead. No matter. At least they're out there raising awareness for the project.

FLUBBER said...

are they taking amtrak to get around too?

Margaret said...

Thanks for the coverage of our tour-

About the locations- we did end up holding the San Diego press conference at the Santa Fe Depot, and it was a great event. We also started and ended our LA event at Union Station and then biked from there to City Hall for the press conference.

Unfortunately we were not able to use Amtrak to get around as we were often in a bit of a time crunch to get to the locations.