Passenger Trains > eBART to Antioch, CA Moves Forward

Sneaking in under the radar compared to the more high profile Warm Springs(and eventually on to San Jose)extension is the Bay Area Rapid Transit District's project to expand into Eastern Contra Costa County. The new ten mile line from the existing Pittsburg/Bay Point station to Antioch won't be an extension of BART's third rail electric service but rather a diesel multiple unit-operated shuttle. I'm assuming it will be standard gauge(have seen no information stating otherwise) so BART will join the ranks of rail transit operators with two gauges.
http://www.bart.gov/about/projects/ecc/

Total project cost comes in at $462M. In mid-October West Bay Builders. Inc. was awarded a $26M contract to begin the reconfiguration of the Pittsburg/Bay Point station to allow an additional platform and track. A public groundbreaking ceremony was held shortly after that. Completion is expected in 2014 with the contract award for the diesel multiple unit equipment to come in the first half of 2011.

A recent visit to Pittsburg/Bay Point showed no obvious signs of work yet. That station has two tracks serving a single island platform in the median of Hwy. 4. as seen in the first photo. The space to the left of the number one traffic lane appears to be the only option for expansion--it will be interesting to see how this is handled considering the constraints of this site. Unknown if any dual gauge track will be used.

Second photo looks east from the Pittsburg Railroad Ave overpass. This project will occupy the middle of Hwy. 4 throughout and will benefit from the very wide(by Bay Area standards) median of that highway.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/29/10 15:56 by shed47.

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After having already experienced the WES boondoggle in the Portland, Oregon area, I find it difficult to believe that this fragmented DMU route will be successful. It needs to be an extension of third rail.

F40PHR231 Wrote:
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> After having already experienced the WES
> boondoggle in the Portland, Oregon area, I find it
> difficult to believe that this fragmented DMU
> route will be successful. It needs to be an
> extension of third rail.

I was thinking the same thing then went to the link in the first post where BART says the eBart cost is 60% less expensive than conventional BART and the design does not preclude changing to conventional BART if ridership and funding justify it.

My thinking is that it would be cheaper still to build a dedicated busway in the median until ridership and funding justify regular BART, or would that be to simple a solution for the urban planners?

People don't like riding buses. They deserted buses quickly when BART service began in the Bay Area.



Cumbresfan Wrote:
> My thinking is that it would be cheaper still to
> build a dedicated busway in the median until
> ridership and funding justify regular BART, or
> would that be to simple a solution for the urban
> planners?

For two more stations in the median of a freeway they should just expand existing BART, or not worry about it at all. The whole DMU shuttle thing seems silly.

Wasn't there talk at some point of extending the eBart all the way to Tracy at some point, through Brentwood and Byron, using the existing UP ROW? There were several unused boxcars stored along that line, near the newly developed town of Mountain House, which were moved to Brentwood, and may have been moved elsewhere by now. I drove along the Byron Highway last weekend and it looks like the rail line has been cleaned up, and perhaps may be used on occasion, from the looks of it. Given the scarcity of $$, I assume any talk of extending passenger rail any further than Antioch is on the back burner these days.

As long as eBART does not end up looking like a "bus on rails," it should have a chance. I've had too much experience with the San Jose VTA light rail, which is slow (55 MPH hwy, 10 MPH city), expensive ($2 one way), and nothing really glamorous.

What do you think. The Los Angeles Metro Orange Line Busway is?



hesdjjim Wrote:
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> As long as eBART does not end up looking like a
> "bus on rails," it should have a chance. I've had
> too much experience with the San Jose VTA light
> rail, which is slow (55 MPH hwy, 10 MPH city),
> expensive ($2 one way), and nothing really
> glamorous.

Jerry Martin
Los Angeles, CA
Central Coast Railroad Festival

hesdjjim Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> As long as eBART does not end up looking like a
> "bus on rails," it should have a chance. I've had
> too much experience with the San Jose VTA light
> rail, which is slow (55 MPH hwy, 10 MPH city),
> expensive ($2 one way), and nothing really
> glamorous.


VTA's two biggest issues (IMO anyway) are lack of direct service to the San Jose airport and no bypassing of downtown. The 55 mph down the median of the freeways isn't that big a deal, especially during rush hours when auto traffic is doing 10 to 20 mph. The other screw-up is the fact that it was planned through a "job center" area on the Mt. View side of Moffett Field that essentially vanished by the time that line was completed. The light rail system didn't quite keep up with the changing job growth of the area, so trains don't seem to match all that well with commuter's needs. The assumption, back in the 70s, when the system was being planned, was that housing would still be expanding in south and west San Jose, Campbell, Los Gatos, etc., plus on the east side and people would be traveling to work in north San Jose, Sunnyvale, Mt. View, and north. It hasn't worked out exactly like that. When those plans were put on paper, most of north San Jose, north of Trimble Road, was still empty space. The cycle of building commercial buildings for employment has run at least one generation, with new buildings already replacing some of those constructed in the late 70s and early 80s. Now, there is talk of new residential development along north First Street, between Trimble and 237. That could change the entire outlook for the light rail system.