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What’s next for Los Angeles Rail Transit?
By Noel T. Braymer By next year LA Metro will have Light Rail service running on the Expo Line from Culver City to Santa Monica and on the Gold Line from east Pasadena to Azusa. By 2019 the Crenshaw Line should be running between LAX and the Expo Line. The Regional Connector subway extending the…
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What is the Future of Passenger Rail Service in California?
By Noel T. Braymer In my opinion in one word: Good ! We have come a long way since 1979 when I first became involved in rail advocacy and no one was sure then that there would even be any Rail Passenger service in 2015. The question is no longer if there will be any…
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What’s Ahead for California Rail Passenger Service in 2015
By Noel T. Braymer Construction is the big news for 2015. Construction is needed before we can expand service in many places. The year starts out with the Official Ground Breaking for the California High Speed Rail Project in Fresno on January 6th. This ceremony has been put off for over a year until funding…
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More Good News for California High Speed Rail
By Noel T. Braymer After passage of Prop 1A in November 2008 which gave the California High Speed Rail project almost 10 billion dollars in funding,everything seemed to go wrong. The project was on death’s door by 2012 with growing opposition from property owners who could be affected by the project. This was particularly true…
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Rail Connections to California’s Major Airports
By Noel T. Braymer California now has some connections by rail at its airports. This will improve over the next 10 to 20 years. The two airports now with the best rail connections are San Francisco International Airport (SFO) and Bob Hope Airport in Burbank near downtown Los Angeles.. SFO has direct and regular service…
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The Top 3 Most Needed High Speed Rail Connections in California
By Noel T. Braymer Current planning by the California High Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) is for initial High Speed Rail service of 34 round trips daily by 2022 between Merced and Burbank. By 2022 with the completion of run through tracks by 2020 at Los Angeles Union Station there will be plenty of connections from…
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Is it Full Speed Ahead Now for California High Speed Rail?
By Noel T. Braymer This October 15th the California State Supreme Court upheld the ruling of an Appellate Court releasing Prop 1A Bond funds for construction in the San Joaquin Valley for High Speed Rail. By a vote of 6 to 1 the State Supreme Court decided not to take up this case for review.…
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RailPAC rail PHOTOS of the month (September, 2014)
Here are this month’s photos by RailPAC photographers from everywhere! Click on each photo to see it full size! Contributions to this page are welcome. Send your jpg rail photos to Russ Jackson, RailPAC Photo Editor, at [email protected]. 1. Amtrak’s northbound Vermonter, which travels the NEC to that state from Washington DC daily, is arriving…
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Why California needs some Publicly Owned Railroads
By Noel T. Braymer California already owns hundreds of miles of railroad, particularly in Southern California. From Lancaster to Los Angeles down to San Diego most of the railroad is partially or wholly owned by the public. The exception is about 15 miles of railroad shared by passenger trains between Los Angeles and Fullerton on…
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Restoration of the Desert Wind is needed now!
Commentary by Anthony Lee, RailPAC Associate Director At the recent congressional hearing regarding re-authorization of Amtrak, Congresswoman Diane Titus(D) of Las Vegas requested a another study regarding restoring passenger rail service to Las Vegas, which is good news. The best option of restoring passenger rail service is a daily connection to the California Zephyr at…