Metrolink Scorns Electrification

Just like the peninsula corridor, the other end of California's planned high-speed rail network, in the Los Angeles basin, could also benefit from European-style "blended" service where electrified commuter trains and high-speed trains share tracks and stations.  Many of the solutions being developed by Caltrain for the peninsula corridor could also prove useful in the LA region, something that is not lost on rail supporters.  Paul Dyson, president of the advocacy group RailPac, recently wrote a letter to the relevant authorities expressing support for the idea of electrifying portions of the Metrolink commuter rail network to better integrate with high-speed rail.  His proposal is aptly named "Electrolink".

While the high-speed rail Authority seems all for it, the response (page 1, page 2) from Larry McCallon, Chair of the Metrolink Board of Directors, pours scorn on electrification in general and on Caltrain's project in particular.  Some highlights:

Cost.  Chair McCallon: "Caltrain's 51-mile electrification modernization project is currently projected to be between $1.45 and $1.5 billion (infrastructure and equipment).  Metrolink operates on over 500 miles of track which would make this option very cost-prohibitive."

Zing!  He does have a strong point, in that Caltrain's electrification project is probably the world's most expensive electrification program, per route-mile.  Caltrain can evidently afford pre-construction cost blowouts that Metrolink can't.

Schedule.  Chair McCallon: "Caltrain's experience shows them to be behind schedule in their 24th year of planning the electrification of their 51 mile segment between San Francisco and San Jose."

Double Zing!  He is of course referring to old studies of Caltrain electrification dating all the way back to the early 1990s, and pointing out that Caltrain's planning process is just now coming to fruition.  In Caltrain's favor, this is largely due to a lack of money and political will, and not to any technical obstacles.

Shared Corridors.  Chair McCallon: "Caltrain, even with very limited freight service on the San Jose to San Francisco line is struggling with electrification compatibility with freight trains.  Metrolink, on the other hand, operates on shared corridors with much more frequent Amtrak passenger and freight trains that carry some double stack cars.  The electrification vs. freight issues would only be compounded in these rail corridors.  Between Los Angeles and Fullerton our trains also operate on BNSF Railway owned lines."

This point is spot on.  The freight railroads are adamantly opposed to electrifying any tracks where they operate, even if they are not the owners of such track.  The last time that Caltrain tried to kick off a CPUC rule-making process to cover 25 kV electrification, in 2007 under CPUC docket P0706028, the process was promptly shut down by the freight railroads.  The CHSRA's effort to clear HSR electrification ran into similar opposition, and survives only because it explicitly sidesteps the issue of electrification over tracks used by freight trains.  While the contracting process for Caltrain electrification is well underway, on the regulatory front, we have... crickets.

Electrification versus freight is going to be a messy fight, one in which Caltrain appears to have no friends, least of all Metrolink.

Chair McCallon's lack of vision should be taken with a grain of salt: Metrolink is a struggling organization with sagging ridership, dodgy finances and a governance structure that makes Caltrain look like a well-run corporation.  Nevertheless, the underlying issue of compatibility with high-speed rail is at least as important down south as it is here on the peninsula.  Let us hope that Caltrain's blended system will blaze a good path for Electrolink to follow.