tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post2822774701584635179..comments2023-10-30T09:03:07.163-07:00Comments on California High Speed Rail Blog: Mythbusting the Caltrain CorridorRobert Cruickshankhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06906581839066570472noreply@blogger.comBlogger76125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-19879940267120470962009-04-06T15:37:00.000-07:002009-04-06T15:37:00.000-07:00Palo Alto is quite happy with the current state of...<I>Palo Alto is quite happy with the current state of Caltrain</I><BR/><BR/>Caltrain doesn't serve only Palo Alto, and Palo Alto alone doesn't get to determine what happens with those tracks. There are a lot of people who will benefit from grade separation and electrification of that ROW, and while many of them live in Palo Alto, most of them don't. Palo Alto ought to have some input as to the design of HSR as it goes through their town, but Palo Alto doesn't have veto power over the entire project.<BR/><BR/>I can imagine a lot of causes of action that people might employ to delay construction of HSR, but very few of them are the kinds of issues the Supreme Court is going to be interested in hearing.Biancahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00660718116529125977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-67642944944092692192009-04-05T17:48:00.000-07:002009-04-05T17:48:00.000-07:00"When the lawsuit works it's way up to the Supreme..."When the lawsuit works it's way up to the Supreme Court they gonna say ..."<BR/><BR/>And if it goes that far, the project will be dead from the massive increase in funding required to build the damn thing. <BR/><BR/>So, if you want HSR, work with the Peninsula cities, or HSR is effectively dead.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-86535481365996217572009-04-05T17:26:00.000-07:002009-04-05T17:26:00.000-07:00Bianca, surf over the ROW using a satellite view. ...Bianca, surf over the ROW using a satellite view. They know it's there. When you can see fence it's well back from the existing tracks and everybody has it along the same line. Good enough for me. Probably good enough for you too unless some, against your advice, was filing a lawsuit and you decided to take the case you know you are going to lose. <BR/><BR/>If it's Caltrain's fence... well duh. If it's their own fences that line up? Between the neighbors and the fencing contractors and the real estate agents who sold them the house they know it's there - the easement along with the right of way. Look at it again and it's not irrigated... they know it's not theirs.<BR/><BR/>Anonymous. The railroad was there before the houses. When the lawsuit works it's way up to the Supreme Court they gonna say "The railroad was there first" There's going to be all sorts of drama. Big thick studies will be done. And then redone because someone files a lawsuit about the study. It's all going to boil down to "The railroad was there first"Adirondackernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-35210203881665705892009-04-05T17:03:00.000-07:002009-04-05T17:03:00.000-07:00" The point is that the railroad was there before ..." The point is that the railroad was there before the houses."<BR/><BR/>Yes, and Palo Alto is quite happy with the current state of Caltrain. What's your point? This whole "railroad there before the houses" nonsense is a red herring. Palo Alto isn't asking to remove Caltrain or its tracks right now.<BR/><BR/>The houses were there long before any talk of HSR.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-69395216354189125082009-04-04T12:39:00.000-07:002009-04-04T12:39:00.000-07:00Vinessa: "How important is putting the line up the...Vinessa: "<I>How important is putting the line up the Peninsula exactly? Is it more important than other things?<BR/><BR/>I live on the Peninsula, bicycle and take mass transit regularly, I'm not a Palo Altan, and am a renter. ... My question has to do with using money to duplicate services, instead of FIRST using money to fill in the gaps in service.</I>"<BR/><BR/>A no-transfer trip to Los Angeles or Orange County in three hours or less, San Diego in under four hours, into the Peninsula from the Central Valley in under two or three hours is not "duplicate" service. It is, instead, filling in a very large gap at the top of existing services.<BR/><BR/>One reason why the auto transport system such a gross energy glutton is that it is a "one size fits all" design, and one-size-fits-all (1) never actually fits all and (2)fits most poorly. With cars, energy is thrown at the problem to cover for the misfit.<BR/><BR/>Ecologically sustainable, energy efficient transport system will <I>not</I> be built on any single "one size fits all" mode of transport, but instead will be a system that includes individual components that do <I>their</I> share of the transport task well.<BR/><BR/>In light of that, the efficient design of the HSR certainly ought to go through San Francisco and San Jose on a single alignment through to Southern California is such an alignment is feasible.<BR/><BR/>That is why, after all, HSR deniers are hanging such high hopes on BS arguments about property values in the Peninsula, trying to harness NIMBY-ism in support of their goal and, obviously, to the detriment of the <I>actual</I> property values of the majority of the properties along the Caltrain corridor.<BR/><BR/>Putting Stage One from San Francisco through San Jose on a single through route offers the best opportunity to build ridership, which means the best possible ridership revenues, which means the quickest build-out of the remaining stages of the system.BruceMcFhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08502035881761277885noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-43217221532960970432009-04-04T11:46:00.000-07:002009-04-04T11:46:00.000-07:00Welcome Vinessa. Adirondacker has already covered...Welcome Vinessa. Adirondacker has already covered a lot of the points I would respond to, so I won't duplicate. There is a treasure trove of information on this blog; I'd encourage you to read through past postings and you will take away a thorough understanding of many of the issues involved. <BR/><BR/>The one point I will take up again is the notion that people did not know that the Caltrain tracks were part of the planned route. It's entirely possible that people may have missed the many references to plans for high speed rail on the Peninsula that have been in local papers since the mid-1990's. If you do a search of the archives of <A HREF="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/qws/ff/arc?sort=date&o=130&term=high+speed+rail+peninsula&Submit=S" REL="nofollow">SFGate</A> or <A HREF="http://www.google.com/custom?hl=en&safe=active&client=pub-2203864489454098&channel=4847633678&cof=FORID:1%3BGL:1%3BS:http://www.paloaltoonline.com%3BL:http://paloaltoonline.com/art/top_logo.gif%3BLH:35%3BLW:100%3BLBGC:336699%3BLP:1%3BLC:%230000ff%3BVLC:%23663399%3BGFNT:%230000ff%3BGIMP:%230000ff%3BDIV:%23336699%3B&domains=www.paloaltoonline.com&sitesearch=www.paloaltoonline.com&oe=ISO-8859-1&q=%22high+speed+rail%22&start=220&sa=N" REL="nofollow">Palo Alto Online</A> you will see that there are numerous references to plans for High Speed Rail up the peninsula, going back 15 years. But someone who owns property near the railroad has a very good reason to pay attention, more than the average renter who lives somewhere on the Peninsula.<BR/><BR/>Furthermore, at the last Palo Alto City Council meeting, Jim McFall stated there is a 6-foot easement along the back edge of the property lines for the houses on Mariposa that abut the ROW. If so, that means there is <B>explicit language in the property deed</B> to alert buyers that there is always a possibility of changes to the ROW. I haven't confirmed this independently, but it seems quite plausible. Either way, <I>if I owned real property that abutted the railroad ROW, I would pay <B>very</B> close attention to plans for that ROW.</I> Particularly given the real estate values in Palo Alto. There is no cheap land in Palo Alto, period. People don't buy homes in Palo Alto casually. They do their research. They may want Palo Alto because of the schools, or the proximity to work, or for other reasons. But if you are going to spend $1,000,000+ on a house, you want to know what you are buying. You do your due diligence. <I>Caveat emptor</I> applies. Those houses along the railroad are not cheap per se, but they sell at a discount relative to other parts of PA because of the noise from the trains and the inherent uncertainty of living adjacent to active rail lines. The people who chose to buy property next to the ROW did so knowing there is an active railroad there. <BR/><BR/> There has been discussion in the local press about running HSR on Caltrain ROW since the mid-1990's. The folks who complain that Prop 1A was somehow "misleading" simply were not paying attention. And it's their prerogative to do so, but they don't get a do-over later at our expense.Biancahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00660718116529125977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-43310677205209043842009-04-04T00:05:00.000-07:002009-04-04T00:05:00.000-07:00Spokker, Vinessa is a concern troll or .... being ...Spokker, Vinessa is a concern troll or .... being polite, uninformed. <BR/><BR/><EM>I didn't actually think they meant to take the line up the Peninsula.</EM> <BR/><BR/>They weren't going to go to Eureka in an undersea tunnel and then come south. There's two choices with myriad variants. Up the Peninsula or up the East Bay. It's been in the maps about the proposal for years. Sorry you voted for something with a vague idea what it was about. <BR/><BR/><EM>plus for godssake get BART connected.</EM><BR/><BR/>To what? I live in the wilds of upstate New York now but lived most of my life within sight of the Manhattan skyline. It would never occur to me to fly from Newark to Philadelphia, that's what Amtrak excels at and NJ Transit and SEPTA trains can do better than a plane. I wouldn't want to take the subway from New Brunswick to White Plains. For that matter I wouldn't want to take the subway from Newark to Jamaica, which can be done on PATH and the NYC Subway. And I wouldn't want to take Amtrak from Columbus Circle to Times Square. <BR/><BR/>If you mean BART should connect with HSR when it comes, that makes lots of sense and it will connect to BART along with all the other transit at Transbay. Being able to take BART from Walnut Creek to Santa Clara... sounds painful. There should be a layer between BART and HSR that moves you around the region and BART gets you from regional transit and HSR to places like Berkeley or Daly City. <BR/><BR/><EM>The main thing is that in the rest of the world systems CONNECT. </EM><BR/><BR/>Bring HSR to SF and it does connect. To the buses coming in from the East Bay and Marin and Sonoma and ... and all the MUNI lines and people who live along BART. It might not make much difference to someone on the Peninsula whether the terminal for HSR is San Jose or San Francisco. It does to someone in the East Bay. Just like you don't take mass transit when it takes 6 hours instead of one hour of driving, people in the East Bay drive or fly to LA if the terminal is in San Jose. The HSR alternative to driving or flying is to take BART or a bus to SF, then Muni to Caltrain and Caltrain to San Jose to catch HSR. Sounds inviting doesn't it? <BR/><BR/>HSR makes lots of connections that improving things in the Bay Area don't solve. People in Fresno don't have to fly to SFO to get to Chicago, they can take the train to SFO. People in Bakersfield can take the train to Burbank. When most of the passengers from the Central Valley and LA to SFO are on the train, they aren't clogging SFO. HSR train is going to serve much wider areas than just the Peninsula and much more than SF to LA. . . terminate HSR in San Jose and HSR connects to San Jose. <BR/><BR/><EM>I'm confused about the priorities here.</EM><BR/><BR/>I suspect that's another way of saying "Why doesn't BART go there?" <BR/><BR/>People who have a wider interest than taking BART everywhere have different priorities. <BR/><BR/>If your priority it getting you from your suburb to other suburbs within 30 miles, HSR doesn't solve your problems. If you want to get lots of people from the Bay Area to places far away, HSR solves that problem, especially if HSR takes less time than flying or driving. <BR/><BR/>We can work on both problems at the same time. For instance running HSR up the Peninsula connects Caltrain to the HSR system and as a happy consequence makes Caltrain a more attractive option for local travel on the Peninsula.Adirondackernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-73882066627291701232009-04-03T21:23:00.000-07:002009-04-03T21:23:00.000-07:00Essentially, speed is what's going to drive riders...Essentially, speed is what's going to drive ridership and make the system profitable.Spokkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03244298044953214810noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-58381313303655985282009-04-03T21:04:00.000-07:002009-04-03T21:04:00.000-07:00Welcome to the discussion, vinessa.Answers to your...Welcome to the discussion, vinessa.<BR/><BR/>Answers to your questions will vary according to the personalities that post here, but I'll offer up my opinions.<BR/><BR/>"How important is putting the line up the Peninsula exactly?"<BR/><BR/>It's hard to define what important means here, but I would say, yes, it's important. Transfers aren't the end of the world, but they can hurt the viability and ridership of a transit system. The more transfers there are the less likely any one person is going to take that trip. People who pay good money for a direct high speed train trip between LA and SF probably don't want to transfer too much. <BR/><BR/>"Is it more important than other things?"<BR/><BR/>It depends on what those other things are. I don't think it'll be the end of the world if HSR's Bay Area terminus is in San Jose. However, I believe that will hurt the profitability of the system. Then opponents will turn around and say, "See, it didn't make any money!" Well, it was supposed to go to Downtown SF, so whatever.<BR/><BR/>"My question has to do with using money to duplicate services, instead of FIRST using money to fill in the gaps in service."<BR/><BR/>There is no duplicate in service. Caltrain and HSR will offer two different levels of service. One is commuter rail and one is intercity rail.<BR/><BR/>Other modes of transit are very important too, and I hope they get the funding they deserve. However, that doesn't mean HSR is less important.<BR/><BR/>"Caltrain as it is now with its "baby bullet" is good enough to get people moving. If later the improvement wants to be made up the Peninsula, and that money spent, great!"<BR/><BR/>Apparently it's not good enough for the people who run Caltrain. They want to upgrade the line too. They want electrification and higher speeds. Partnering with the California High Speed Rail Authority helps them reach those goals. <BR/><BR/>"If a TRAIN to LA took under four hours, it would still be way better than driving! I'm not sure why everyone is fixated on the 2 hr, 40 min number, but really, 3-1/2 hours would be fine."<BR/><BR/>Agreed, but shooting for 2 hours and 40 minutes is very important to be even more time competitive with air.Spokkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03244298044953214810noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-31451245702721486382009-04-03T19:15:00.000-07:002009-04-03T19:15:00.000-07:00Hi -- I'm new to the high-speed rail topic. And ap...Hi -- I'm new to the high-speed rail topic. And apologies to Bianca, but my understanding of the high speed rail project is not very detailed. I voted for the project and I think it's wonderful, but really, when they said "LA to San Francisco" I simply took it as generic, meaning a southern Calif/northern Calif connection. I didn't actually think they meant to take the line up the Peninsula.<BR/><BR/>Anyway, at the risk of going against the bias of this blog, my sincere question is this. How important is putting the line up the Peninsula exactly? Is it more important than other things?<BR/><BR/>I live on the Peninsula, bicycle and take mass transit regularly, I'm not a Palo Altan, and am a renter. I've also lived in Europe and experienced mass transit in other places. My question has to do with using money to duplicate services, instead of FIRST using money to fill in the gaps in service.<BR/><BR/>Why couldn't the high speed project be phased, to bring it first to San Jose or Santa Clara only? At the same time, it seems more critical to me to get BART *also* connected with San Jose or Santa Clara, than it does to duplicate the line up the Peninsula.<BR/><BR/>If the first phase was to bring it to San Jose or Santa Clara, where riders could CONNECT to either BART or Caltrain, at least the system would be all together! As it is the most ludicrous aspect of our current condition is that until BART was extended to Millbrae, after being in operation for 30+ years, none of our regional systems connected!! And they still don't.<BR/><BR/>To me the primary task should be to CONNECT. Caltrain as it is now with its "baby bullet" is good enough to get people moving. If later the improvement wants to be made up the Peninsula, and that money spent, great! But first just get it to San Jose or Santa Clara, plus for godssake get BART connected.<BR/><BR/>As a rider I can tell you that the bottom line speed isn't as important as getting where I need to go. If I have to spend six hours going somewhere it would normally take me one hour to drive, then that's not a good tradeoff. But two or three hours compared to one? Absolutely fine when I consider that I'm not sardined into a car, putting miles on a vehicle, or having to worry about or pay for parking.<BR/><BR/>And when people compare high-speed rail to flying, why do they only consider the time in the air? In a plane it only takes one hour to LA. BUT! You have to get to the airport, if you're driving navigate short term or long term parking, get INTO the airport, and all in time to check in and get through security 1-1/2 hours before. Thus a one hour flight to LA *actually* takes about four hours. If a TRAIN to LA took under four hours, it would still be way better than driving! I'm not sure why everyone is fixated on the 2 hr, 40 min number, but really, 3-1/2 hours would be fine.<BR/><BR/>The main thing is that in the rest of the world systems CONNECT. And other countries seem to be smart enough to not make spending billions of dollars on a system leg that duplicates service, before getting the whole system operational.<BR/><BR/>I'm confused about the priorities here. Maybe someone can elucidate.<BR/><BR/>Thanks!vinessahttp://caltransitreview.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-69035862841916156922009-04-03T14:47:00.000-07:002009-04-03T14:47:00.000-07:00And the railroad was there decades before the home...And the railroad was there decades before the homes..and now there is far less freight trainsyeson1anoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-60091221378475675652009-04-03T12:58:00.000-07:002009-04-03T12:58:00.000-07:00@Rafael re: you 11:50 AM comment.Let's make it ev...@Rafael re: you 11:50 AM comment.<BR/><BR/>Let's make it even simpler --- Just get rid of CEQA, and every other protection of the environment and quality of life.<BR/><BR/>Then we can have railroads, highways anything else everywhere.<BR/><BR/>We don't need CEQA. It has outlived its use fullness.<BR/><BR/>Come on Rafael --That's not like you.protectornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-34830420621904540442009-04-03T11:50:00.000-07:002009-04-03T11:50:00.000-07:00@ jim -...you're talking out of your...Language pl...@ jim -<BR/><BR/><I>...you're talking out of your...</I><BR/><BR/>Language please.<BR/><BR/>@ Robert Cruickshank -<BR/><BR/><I>There needs to be some sort of reform...</I><BR/><BR/>Simple. Make it much harder to file reverse condemnation lawsuits if the entity exercising can prove it has done due diligence as required by the EIR/EIS process.Rafaelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05471957286484454765noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-72565766023594046802009-04-03T11:33:00.000-07:002009-04-03T11:33:00.000-07:00Anon 11:22, the point is not that the houses were ...Anon 11:22, the point is not that the houses were there before there was talk of HSR. The point is that the <B>railroad was there before the houses.</B> HSR is a technology upgrade. <BR/><BR/>Imagine if back when cars were new, people tried to prevent them from using the roads made for horses.Biancahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00660718116529125977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-51537298740990593122009-04-03T11:22:00.000-07:002009-04-03T11:22:00.000-07:00"The NIMBYism issues on the Peninsula are unnecess..."The NIMBYism issues on the Peninsula are unnecessarily exacerbated because Palo Alto/Atherton/Menlo Park planners failed to zone the land abutting the railroad appropriately."<BR/><BR/>In what sense? The houses have been there long before any talk of HSR.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-65754530937182803712009-04-03T10:47:00.000-07:002009-04-03T10:47:00.000-07:00The NIMBYism issues on the Peninsula are unnecessa...The NIMBYism issues on the Peninsula are unnecessarily exacerbated because Palo Alto/Atherton/Menlo Park planners failed to zone the land abutting the railroad appropriately. But they didn't, and allowed houses to be built directly adjacent to the right-of-way. Now people have come to the nuisance and are howling about it. The folks who bought land next to an active railroad took a gamble on that, and now that it looks like they lost that gamble, want to change the rules after the dice have been rolled.Biancahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00660718116529125977noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-28369126510571436742009-04-03T10:30:00.000-07:002009-04-03T10:30:00.000-07:00Alon, I agree with you and I was not advocating su...Alon, I agree with you and I was not advocating such a mechanism actually be implemented, just trying to highlight the damage done to the efficiency of infrastructure project design and implementation across America by NIMBYs, which most often generates massive cost overruns and delays, but no significant change to the final outcome. Occasionally it stops whole projects, which is worse and motivates others to become NIMBYs. <BR/><BR/>I would, however, advocate for our independent court system to have stricter guidelines for making sure legal challenges to time-sensitive government projects have carefully matched time horizons. <BR/><BR/>We need to reduce the ability of obstructionists to delay infrastructure projects indefinitely. The first private railroad built from New York to Philadelphia took about one year to complete. It was built by the Stevens brothers in the mid-1800s. There were legal challenges to it then, too, but they did not take 10 years.Andrew Boganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02476018138604522417noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-73642935136216011712009-04-03T10:02:00.000-07:002009-04-03T10:02:00.000-07:00There needs to be some sort of reform to the CEQA ...There needs to be some sort of reform to the CEQA and NEPA process that can preserve the important public engagement and environmental protection processes, without enabling people concerned about unrelated issues such as property values or aesthetics, to hijack the EIR process for their own personal gain.Robert Cruickshankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06906581839066570472noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-13143682484425756052009-04-03T10:00:00.000-07:002009-04-03T10:00:00.000-07:00Andrew, the mechanism you're proposing will mean t...Andrew, the mechanism you're proposing will mean the end of an independent court system. The idea that people should pay extra fines for using the courts is already used in the criminal law system, with stiffer penalties for people who plead not guilty and are then found guilty. This has resulted in assembly line justice for those who can't afford good lawyers.<BR/><BR/>NIMBYism is a fact of life. It's been there since at least the 19th century, and governments have found ways of dealing with it.Alon Levyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12195377309045184452noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-73309527088196251022009-04-03T09:55:00.000-07:002009-04-03T09:55:00.000-07:00The Expo Line is soooo racist.The Expo Line is soooo racist.Spokkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03244298044953214810noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-19268347507695158142009-04-03T09:50:00.000-07:002009-04-03T09:50:00.000-07:00NIMBYism would cease in this country if our govern...NIMBYism would cease in this country if our government created a mechanism to tax NIMBYs for the accrued costs of all the project delays they cause on projects that eventually get approved and built anyway. The NIMBYs never talk about the billions and billions of dollars they have sucked out of our economy for literally no gain to anyone over the past several decades.Andrew Boganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02476018138604522417noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-41815008839108430912009-04-03T09:49:00.000-07:002009-04-03T09:49:00.000-07:00I would not be surprised if folks on the Peninsula...I would not be surprised if folks on the Peninsula plan to take a page from Damien Goodmon, who is trying to singlehandedly kill the Expo Line. It's under construction and he's still at it.<BR/><BR/>For Goodmon, as for many in Palo Alto, schools and kids are the poster children for the anti-train cause. Goodmon is convinced that at-grade tracks near local high schools will kill students, despite this not being an issue in the hundreds of other cities with streetcars and LRVs.<BR/><BR/>In Palo Alto it's ironically the opposite - people want to *preserve* dangerous at-grade crossings. But kids are being mobilized for this as well, with the arguments about what'll happen to the high school (arguments many here have debunked, but that seem to stick around).Robert Cruickshankhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06906581839066570472noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-26026598261735506542009-04-03T05:41:00.000-07:002009-04-03T05:41:00.000-07:00@SpokkerI guess you didn't read the last three lin...@Spokker<BR/><BR/>I guess you didn't read the last three lines of the article you cite on your victory against NImby opposition to the project in LA.<BR/><BR/>"This move is hardly the end of the road for Phase II, heck we're not even at the end of the road for Phase I which is already under construction. During his public comment, Damien Goodmon threatened to file a federal Environmental Justice lawsuit three weeks from tomorow.<BR/><BR/>It's not over until the fat lady sings as they say.la viewernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-41089355038629213272009-04-03T01:12:00.000-07:002009-04-03T01:12:00.000-07:00Not HSR related, but today marked a victory agains...Not HSR related, but today marked a victory against <A HREF="http://la.streetsblog.org/2009/04/02/breaking-news-expo-board-backs-route-down-right-of-way-and-colorado/" REL="nofollow">NIMBY opposition</A> in Los Angeles.<BR/><BR/>The homeowners in the area didn't want Metro to use <B>existing right of way</B> to build a much needed rail link to West LA due to noise and visual concerns. They wanted the line to deviate to a longer, more time intensive route. They also opposed a station that would endow the line with relatively easy bus connections to UCLA and Westwood. <BR/><BR/>Today the board made the right decision to use the existing right of way despite NIMBY protest.Spokkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03244298044953214810noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4263762637946594105.post-30205714205918010562009-04-03T00:30:00.000-07:002009-04-03T00:30:00.000-07:00@jay - those pics were awesome can't even tell ...@jay - those pics were awesome can't even tell theres a railroad there.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com