Freight on the Peninsula

UPDATE (3/18) Thanks to Martha Martinez, PCJPB Secretary, for providing the full text of the 1991 trackage rights agreement that governs freight access on the peninsula.

Freight trains operate daily along nearly the entire length of the Caltrain corridor (San Jose photo at right by Michael Patrick), and make up less than 5% of train traffic on the peninsula. The freight trains move mostly at night, when Caltrain traffic is sparse.

Freight trains have always been part of the traffic mix on the peninsula. The corridor formerly belonged to freight operator Southern Pacific, which sold the 51.4-mile railroad right of way to the Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board (Caltrain) in 1991 for $219 million.

Existing Freight Traffic

Thanks to Kevin Hecteman for the following description of freight traffic patterns on the peninsula:

Union Pacific currently operates three freight trains per weekday, all based out of the yard next to the South San Francisco Caltrain station.

1. SOUTH CITY SWITCHER: Goes on duty early in the morning: switches industries between South City and Pier 96 in San Francisco. Shippers include Granite Rock, Central Concrete and Pacific AgriProducts in SSF; Sierra Point Lumber near the Bayshore station; Dean's Refrigerated Trucking off Carroll Avenue in SF; Darling International, a rendering plant near Pier 96; and the Waste Solutions Group dirty-dirt concession at Pier 96. Famous for being the last freight train serving San Francisco. A sizable photo archive detailing this operation can be found here.
   
   
2. BROADWAY LOCAL: Goes on duty at 5:30 p.m.; switches industries between SSF and San Jose, such as the Port of Redwood City, after the evening rush hour ends. (One such industry is the Unilever plant in Sunnyvale, as seen here.)
   
   
3. MISSION BAY HAULER: Goes on duty at 6:30 p.m.; gathers up all the outbound cars brought in by the other two locals and hauls them to the UP yard in Milpitas, then returns with the inbound cars for distribution by the locals. This train can easily see 60 to 90 cars.
   

Freight in the Peninsula's Future

All existing plans for improving the Caltrain corridor (namely, Caltrain's 2025 Plan, including electrification, as well as California high speed rail) explicitly preserve the capability to carry freight up the peninsula, and allow for a possible expansion of freight traffic.

Whether this is justified by existing traffic levels (less than 5% of train movements) is open to debate. If freight service on the peninsula were discontinued, some traffic would likely move by truck over Highway 101, and the rest of it, and associated jobs, might disappear altogether from San Francisco and the peninsula.

Regardless of actual demand, the peninsula freight operator, Southern Pacific (and its successor, Union Pacific) retained trackage rights from Caltrain when the latter acquired the tracks, giving UP the right to operate a certain quota of freight trains on the peninsula. Such agreements are administered by the Surface Transportation Board, and would likely be difficult to terminate not only because of the bureaucratic process, but because UP (no supporter of the HSR project) might attempt to use their rights as a bargaining chip against the high speed rail authority.

So, while freight accounts for only a tiny minority of train movements that is likely to become infinitesimal when Caltrain service is expanded and HSR service begins, all agencies involved are proceeding under the firm assumption that freight trains will be accommodated for all time--regardless of whether or not this makes sense from an economic or technical standpoint.

STRACNET: A Military Twist

The Department of Defense designates a nationwide network of rail links critical to national defense, known as the Strategic Railroad Corridor Network, or STRACNET.

This network provides the readiness to ship materiel from military depots to ports of embarkation in the event of a war emergency. STRACNET was established in the 1970s, when freight railroads were falling into disrepair, and sets rock-bottom minimum standards for:

• operating speed, with a minimum desired track speed of 40 mph
  
• clearance profile, to ensure that track side obstructions do not foul the DOD load clearance requirements defined in MIL-STD-1366
  
• weight capability, to allow M-1 tanks to be carried in pairs on 140-ton flat cars.
  

Why would we care about this Cold War relic? As it turns out, the peninsula corridor is part of STRACNET, or at least it was according to the 1998 update (see California map on page 30), presumably to access the mighty port of embarkation known as San Francisco--never to be outdone by its far bigger rival across the bay. The makeup of STRACNET is updated every few years by the DOD and FRA; there is no guarantee that the peninsula corridor will retain its military designation.

Because the Caltrain corridor already accommodates daily freight trains (see Caltrain's clearance standards, also drawn as a green outline in the figure at right), Caltrain more or less meets the STRACNET requirement (red outline). Its track maintenance standards exceed the operating speed and weight requirements. Beyond the loading clearances shown at right, available structural clearances are much wider than required by the DOD because Caltrain already complies with the draconian clearance requirements of the California Public Utilities Commission.

Bottom line: STRACNET is a yawner, although that is unlikely to stop HSR opponents from making an issue out of the grievous omission of STRACNET from CHSRA environmental impact documents.

Implications of Freight for Caltrain and HSR

Freight service (in addition to HSR) has a few important implications for the future of the peninsula corridor, none of which are likely to be welcomed by neighbors.

1. More Tracks. The 125 mph speed envisioned for HSR on the peninsula requires tracks to be banked in curves (see the Top 10 Worst Curves for more technical details), with the outside rail raised as much as 6 inches higher than the inside rail. This steep banking is incompatible with slow and top-heavy freight cars and can lead to derailments excessive rail wear. The CHSRA's plan for four tracks along the entire length of the peninsula is likely to be driven just as much by the perceived need to accommodate freight trains (by having one pair of tracks banked, and the other pair not) than any service pattern considerations to allow trains of differing speeds to overtake each other. The need for four tracks may be somewhat alleviated without freight trains.
   
   
2. Taller Electrical Poles. Track improvements are being designed to increase Caltrain's clearances from AAR Plate F to the much taller AAR Plate H. This would allow "excess height" freight cars such as autoracks and double stack container cars--never mind for which supposed customer on our dead-end peninsula! Expanding from the existing Plate F condition to Plate H requires another 3 feet of vertical clearance, which will force the overhead electrification of the tracks to be built at least 3 feet taller, thus increasing visual blight.
   
   
3. Higher Embankments. Freight trains are much heavier than high speed trains or the "non-compliant" EMU trains coveted by Caltrain. In fact, the very high speed trains of the type required to run at 220 mph in the Central Valley are some of the lightest trains anywhere. On the other hand, heavy weight requirements lead to beefy bridge decks, further inflated by seismic requirements. For grade separations where a road crosses under the track, every additional foot of bridge deck thickness adds an additional foot to the height of the rail embankment (or an additional foot to the depth of the underpass excavation, with attendant increase in the length of the approach ramps.)
   
   
4. More Noise. Freight trains are generally not maintained to the same high standards as high speed passenger equipment. Freight trains with diesel locomotives and wheel flat spots banging along the track will be much louder than electric trains, even after horn-blowing is obviated by grade separations. Accommodations that are now being made for freight operations may lead to an increase in noisy freight traffic.
   

From the point of view of civil engineering companies who will design and build HSR infrastructure on the peninsula, every additional cubic yard of concrete and every design complication is a potential path to extra profit. To this end, the requirements arising from Union Pacific freight service and STRACNET may indeed be quite welcome. After all, if it's profitable, why not let the tail wag the dog?

Who is HNTB ?

HNTB Corporation is a large civil engineering firm that has a key role in the overhaul of the peninsula corridor. HNTB designs bridges, highways, airports, railways, stadiums, and basically any complex infrastructure that eventually involves pouring fair amounts of concrete. They have about 2700 employees in 60 offices nationwide, including a key office in Oakland and a satellite office in San Jose.

HNTB was the principal designer of the BART extension to SFO and Millbrae; they were the brains behind all the track, tunnels, aerial structures, and the South San Francisco and San Bruno stations. The actual construction was done by other firms teamed with HNTB. The BART project was politically spearheaded by Quentin Kopp, who is today the chairman of the California High Speed Rail Authority. On election night 2008, just as Measure 1A returns were being tallied, Kopp was sipping martinis with HNTB management and other firms involved in the high speed rail project. Peter Gertler, HNTB's national transit director (in charge of all things rail) and his staff are even reported to have canvassed for passage of the bond measure.

HNTB is no stranger to Caltrain: they designed the CEMOF maintenance facility in San Jose, which features an elegant reverse curve that is sure to cause yet another interesting engineering headache for high speed rail.

HNTB is now engineering the peninsula section of the HSR project, under a contract awarded by the California High Speed Rail Authority in November 2008. They will design all aspects of HSR on the peninsula, starting with basic track alignments. Their latest status report can be found here. Once the preliminary design is completed to the "30 percent" level in mid-2012, the CHSRA will put the detailed design and construction of the peninsula corridor out for bid. HNTB is certain to team with construction firms to bid on the next phase, but it is not guaranteed to win.

Here are some key names that you may see popping up, and who were in attendance at the scoping meetings. An organization chart is also shown at right, from the January status update.

• Dominic Spaethling - SF-SJ Regional Manager - CHSRA and Parsons Brinckerhoff - Sacramento

• Tim Cobb - Project Manager - HNTB West region public transit director - Oakland

• John Litzinger - Engineering & Alternatives Analysis - HNTB - San Jose

HNTB is teaming with other firms for this design work, including DMJM, Transmetrics, Prointec (a Spanish firm with 20 years of HSR experience), among others. It's nice to see some European involvement to make sure the peninsula is done right.

Quickie Stakeholder Analysis

Each stakeholder in California's HSR project has different interests in the project. Keeping those interests in mind is very important to interpret their actions. On the back of an envelope, the stakeholders are:

The Public

The public has a strong interest in the HSR project, rooted in two different roles: the role of a user who desires HSR to be convenient and fast, and the role of a taxpayer who desires HSR to be built efficiently and for the least amount of money. The public pays up front (see Proposition 1A) and is usually not very well organized to defend its collective interests, compared to the other stakeholders. This blog will scream loudly, if anybody listens, to defend those interests.

While other stakeholders may say that they want HSR to be fast and cheap, the bottom line is that they have little stake in that outcome. Read on to see why!

The Agencies and Governments

On the peninsula, the various agencies are going to defend their parochial interests. Caltrain, the Transbay Authority, SamTrans, VTA, the three counties, the High Speed Rail Authority, and the local communities are going to defend their piece of the pie, be it money or influence. One catfight to watch for in the coming years will pit Caltrain against the CHSRA. Caltrain owns the peninsula rails, but HSR will so profoundly alter every project recently undertaken or planned by Caltrain that even shared goals (fast, efficient and modern transportation) won't be enough to prevent some friction. Up in San Francisco, sparks are already starting to fly between the CHSRA and the Transbay Authority.

The agencies will be in cahoots with the construction companies. You've got to worry when on the night of the election, Quentin Kopp, the head of the CHSRA, is having martinis with the construction big wigs (HNTB, Parsons Brinckerhoff, Webcor) who will get a piece of the action.

The Construction Companies

Construction companies that will build the HSR project stand to profit handsomely. They are where the money ultimately flows. Design engineering, construction, program management, most of the slices of the HSR budget will be sent to them at some point. Their interest is to make money. They make a lot of money by engineering complex infrastructure that involves lots of earth moving and concrete pouring. The more earth moving and concrete pouring, the greater the profit. There's nothing wrong with that so far.

Unfortunately, those same companies are also in charge of designing all this infrastructure. The fox is guarding the hen house, but in proper industry lingo this is passed off as cost-saving "design-build-operate-maintain" and "turn-key solutions". The construction companies know that once HSR is far enough along, nothing will stop its completion, least of all running out of money. They have little interest in making HSR any faster or better or cheaper than absolutely necessary to maintain continued public funding of the project. The wisdom goes that among the three qualities, faster, better and cheaper, you can have any two. Locally, if the HSR design is left without strong oversight, the peninsula may get none of the three.

Look out for gold-plated solutions to simple problems, sold by throwing up a fog of expert-knows-best complexity.

The Neighbors

Many communities, groups and individuals on the peninsula will suffer negative impacts from the HSR project, either inherent in its design or arising from its construction. These groups have some of the most obvious and clear-cut interests: Not In My Back Yard! They will work hard to influence HSR plans to their own benefit, with less regard for the wider public interest. One example: the resolutions opposing Proposition 1A passed by the city councils of Menlo Park and Atherton. Yet another example is Millbrae's push to develop land needed for HSR. And that's only the beginning...

Opposite the NIMBY's, there are what you might call YIMBY's (Yes, In My Back Yard!) who would like to use HSR as an opportunity to obtain local benefits, again without regard to the wider public interest. One example is the screwball plan to tunnel the tracks underground, floated by a Palo Alto group. There will be other communities keenly interested in swinging some HSR bacon their way to achieve urban design aspirations entirely unrelated to HSR.

Let's finish on a positive note: to avoid becoming the boondoggle that proposition 1A opponents fear, the HSR project needs to be designed under the watchful eye of an independent panel of experts with local knowledge, and especially some TEETH to bite back at the agencies and contractors as required to keep them attuned to the public interest. Whether the provisions attached to Proposition 1A will provide for this remains to be seen.