HSR: Displeasure Discussed in Sacramento

At a meeting of the Peninsula Cities Consortium (PCC) Friday, board members discussed the displeasure on high speed rail (HSR) expressed at the California High Speed Rail Authority's (HSRA) meeting and state Senate hearing on ridership in Sacramento Thursday.

Peninsula representatives, including Burlingame City Councilmember Michael Brownrigg, attended the meetings in the Capitol.

PCC members spoke with cautious optimism regarding Thursday's events, especially the Senate hearing.

 "The spanking that Senator [Joe] Simitian gave to the HSRA was very significant," said Atherton City Councilmember Jerry Carlson.

Both Simitian and Senator Alan Lowenthal challenged the board's timeline, history and budget. Other officials said the actions of the HSRA are undermining dwindling public support.

PCC members are concerned with the options for rail configuration presented by the HSRA in the alternatives analysis. Only options in the analysis would continue in the consideration process by undergoing environmental study. In Burlingame, the least popular option, an aerial rail structure, remained in the analysis, while the favored option, a covered trench, was removed.

Part of Brownrigg's trip to the Sacramento meeting was to deliver a letter urging the board to reconsider a covered trench option for environmental study.

Officials such as Simitian and Lowenthal were supportive of the Peninsula cities, asking the HSRA many of the questions discussed by council members throughout the Peninsula, including the validity of its ridership study.

Carlson said the University of California, Berkeley, if given all the data, offered to complete its own ridership study. He said allowing actions like this is important for building trust in HSRA by encouraging public involvement.

"Once the track regains any kind of public trust or confidence [CEO Roelof van Ark] needs to read the handwriting on the wall," said Carlson.

However, Menlo Park Mayor Rich Cline warned against becoming over confident and relaxing on the HSR issue.

"I don't think that would be the appropriate reaction," Cline said. "We have to continue forward."

Also during the meeting, Burlingame Mayor Cathy Baylock gave an update on HSR activity in town. She met with the Peninsula Rail Program, a joint group of Caltrain and HSRA, to talk about the benefits of a covered trench option, but saw no relevance to the meeting.

"[The] bottom line for us was how can we even talk about the benefits of a covered trench option when the environmental documents are not even studying that," Baylock said. The hope is that after Thursday's HSRA meeting, this option will be reconsidered for environmental study.

A final announcement was made about the rally focusing on HSR's negative impacts at Burlingame Station Sunday at 11 a.m. Both Baylock and Burlingame Vice Mayor Terry Nagel said, regardless of recent rumors, the rally has no conservative or tea party agenda.

Rather, "I think this will be a good opportunity to show in a very public way all our concerns," Baylock said. "We expect it to be a legitimate process, an open process."