At the end of six hours of testimony with nary a break for lunch Wednesday, the North Coast Railroad Authority board voted 6-0 to form a committee to study — something — just not what the Humboldt County Supervisors and State Assemblyman Wes Chesbro had requested.
The “ask” from Humboldt leaders was to form a committee to study railbanking as an option to protect and maintain the deteriorating railroad right-of-way, between Arcata and Eureka. The 1983 federal railbanking law allows a line that is out of service to be used as a trail in the interim, until rail service is restored.
It has been 15 years since a train has run on any tracks on the North Coast. The line has seen no maintenance and is rapidly deteriorating, as evidenced in a slide show and report from the Humboldt County Public Works Department.
In the motion they passed, NCRA directors agreed “to support formation of a Humboldt Bay Rail Corridor Committee to evaluate creation of trails, restoration of the rail prism [the rail bed] and restoration of rail service consistent with NCRA trail policy” as long as someone else pays their expenses to attend any meetings.
That sounded at first like a win for trail proponents, but the catch is the “consistent with NCRA trail policy” clause. Director John McCowen pointed out repeatedly that the NCRA has only a policy on rails-with-trails –- trails alongside a rail line. It has no “rail-to-trails” policy, which would allow removal of the existing line to create a bicycle and pedestrian trail along the bay.
A rail-with-trail project between Arcata and Eureka would cost more than $31 million vs. $4 million for a trail, according to a 2007 feasibility study.
Director Hal Wagenet said any use of the word “railbanking” would be “a non-starter” for him, so the committee’s name was changed.
The rail operator, John Williams of Northwestern Pacific Railroad Co., attended the meeting. He admitted he has no current plans to restore rail service to the north end of the line and suggested Humboldt County come up with its own plan. In a previous letter, he said he opposes railbanking and he opposes any committee.
The NCRA board meets in Novato next month.
In the meantime, the Bay Trail Advocates have some very cool buttons to pass out and an active website: www.baytrailplan.org.
This article appears in Gasoline Kings.
There is also the nasty little fact that rail banking has been declared unconstitutional in Federal Court. Sixteen times lasr year and more in 2012. That means no trail unless it is a subordinate function of the easements. It also means the A&MRR Trail will never be built. So where does (and where has) money collected for that go? NCRA has consistantly said no railbanking, the Federal Courts say no rail banking and a year and a half ago the HUmboldt County Planning Commission also said no. Every year the half dozen people fixated on destroying the railroad con a few new suckers into making noise about a scam that isn’t going to happen. If building rails with trails is going to cost so much, lets drop the trails part of it and restore the rails, which are not in all that bad shape except for one very short and much photographed stretch.
I’m switching my support from rails with trails to rails without trails.
Agree totally Wally. You won’t hear anything about the facts you mentioned in the comments section by the so called journalists at the NCJ because they biased advocacy hacks.
@ Yep: This is clearly an opinion piece, which infers a biased perspective.
Gee Wally, we’re so sad that you’re “switching” your “support.” We’ll really miss you.
Geez. Defensive much? It is attitudes like yours’ that keep the use of this public right of way held hostages and consequently unused. We will all be long gone before anything moves on these tracks that resembles a train. Try and think about the better good rather than holding on to such a bitter and unrealistic position. Think about it the next time a bike rider gets nailed on 101. It will be on your conscience not mine.
Mike takes the irony award. Complains about some being defensive.
Straight from the General Accounting Office : http://www.gao.gov/new.items/rc00004.pdf [Page 3-7]
The rail is out of service, NOT officially abandoned as is often reported, a key difference left out in the trails folks arguments. In the link it clarly states that an agreement has to be made, assuming the rail operator/owner is OK with railbanking, which did not happen today. They can choose to abandon the ROW which then the trails groups have to agree that it’s on an interim basis and assume all responsibility, maintenance, and liability bonds. That stuff is a bit more than the $4 million Judy likes to print. If the line is completely abandoned with no future interest, whatever ROWs and easements revert back to the control of the original property owners. That means if say CA Redwood, PG&E and property owners around the bay don’t want it, a trail will never be built as it will be theirs free and clear to rip out anything, trails AND rails. In that GAO link, the Feds do not say that things such as eminent domain can be used if this group or that decides to get pissy about control of that spaghetti noodle of land.
Also, if the trails people are truly wishing to build a trail system, then what the hell is with the A&M line at Blue Lake? Why is it blocked off by chainlink fences when I drive by, unpaved, unmaintained, and starting to revert back to a dirt hill full of noxious weeds? I don’t believe that was part of the development plan.Or was it?
The right of way isn’t public property, not a public resource, and not the best place for a trail. Ir does cross wetlands that prevent removing the rails and replacing the embankment other then by doing it by rail. Catch 22, to remove the rails you would have to first restore them for access of equipment.
Whenever a biker gets hurt on 101, I regret that the City of Arcata killed off the Eureka/Arcata trail through Indianola.
“Every year the half dozen people fixated on destroying the railroad con a few new suckers into making noise about a scam that isn’t going to happen. “
The railroad is dead. It has been dead for many years. Time to move on already! Enough with the bullshit!
I know these things are unpleasant to hear, but Wally and 9:54 have some points worth considering. There’s a lot of complexity to re-purposing an easement. Obtaining consent of all property owners is absolutely essential. Modification of the rail corridor will require an environmental assessment under the jurisdiction of the Coastal Commission. Does the existing rail corridor figure into plans for the possible east-west rail link? Trail advocates have their work cut out for them if they want to make this thing happen. There’s no point whining at people who point out these realities.
http://www.northcoastjournal.com/images/article/5157/
It should be mentioned that contrary to the propaganda bandied about by some people, some of whom are our elected employees and supposed to represent people other than their cadre of buddies, the last rail traffic on the 101 corridor was in 2010. That’s if you don’t count Cliff Clendenen using a rail equipped truck to transport people and material when the homeless camp north of the Eureka Slough Bridge last year. Of course, the Timber Heritage group does regular rail runs on the Samoa-Arcata tracks. They also were running on the main line in Loleta as recently as four days ago.
It’s good that the east-west rail line was brought up. Imagine the Humboldt economy if it was tied to the rest of the world north-south and east-west by rail. The second most environmentally responsible means of transport . Only ships, AMerican ships anyhow, do it better. If that happened, those of us who do not eat taxes for a living, and who can’t call home for more money, might be able to find legal work. What a wild and crazy Idea!
JJ, the curious thing about rail is that, in the developed world, it’s only dead in North America. Rail is booming everywhere else. The US will eventually be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern era. It may take another 100 years, but Humboldt will be serviced by rail… unless the whole country continues its slow slide into third world conditions.
Make that “When the homeless camp north of the Eureka Slough Bridge was removed last year”.
Mia Culpa
“Imagine the Humboldt economy if it was tied to the rest of the world north-south and east-west by rail”
And imagine if we had all of the redwoods to cut down once again, and the fish populations of yore. Let’s just crack open another can of Coors and dream on.
Nice strawman there Pixie.
wow what a headline, the conclusion to a foregone answer….we already knew this. why don’t the trail folks at least try and work with the rail?
East-west could happen, but the problems with the north-south link to the Central Valley are just too severe.
We’ve just seen a great example of how the 199/299/101 transportation hurdles hurt the local economy. Shell Wind Energy cancelled the Bear River Ridge project in large part because of logistical issues.
“Every year the half dozen people fixated on destroying the railroad”
I’ve got news for you Wally – there is no railroad
We are far off the beaten path. As far as shippers are concerned, if this goofball over-the-mountains railroad were somehow built, it would be the train to nowhere. Nowhere may have a port, but it’s still nowhere.
“We’ve just seen a great example of how the 199/299/101 transportation hurdles hurt the local economy. Shell Wind Energy cancelled the Bear River Ridge project in large part because of logistical issues.”
None of those highways go through Ferndale up the wildcat to the ridge
@Stretch; Nowhere? You might want to check out what’s going on in and around the port at Coos Bay. At least they’re doing something rather than gripe about some wet, foggy, mud flat trail which hauls not much of anything beyond bicyclist’s butts. Build the trail next to the rail. Save a ton of money. It’s already there next to it, just unpaved.
Matt, the issues with the Wildcat grade are due to the low standard of the road. The issues with the regional highways are more serious.
Advocates of a bike trail might consider whether improvements on the 101 safety corridor might be a better vehicle for improving bike access from Eureka to points north. If there could be improved bike access between Eureka and Indianola, it would make a huge difference.
Read the “Choo-choo Fantasies” article from a few weeks back, 3:53. We’d be competing unfavorably against an existing port/rail (Coos Bay) that struggles to stay afloat. It would be a race to the bottom, starting at the bottom.
Is Ryan Burns’ screed what you would consider a feasibility study?
Yeah, right. Turdeye doesn’t like it, so it’s a screed. As far as I’m concerned, it was informative, and a good read. If you want reporting that pretends to have no opinion, read the Chronicle.
“Railbanking (as defined by the National Trails System Act, 16 USC 1247 (d)) is a voluntary agreement between a railroad company and a trail agency to use an out-of-service rail corridor as a trail until some railroad might need the corridor again for rail service. Because a railbanked corridor is not considered abandoned, it can be sold, leased or donated to a trail manager without reverting to adjacent landowners. The railbanking provisions of the National Trails System Act as adopted by Congress in 1983 have preserved 4,431 miles of rail corridors in 33 states that would otherwise have been abandoned.”
http://www.railstotrails.org/ourwork/advocacy/policyandfunding/railbanking.html
http://www.hcaog.net/sites/default/files/4_reg-loc_bike_sys_05.03.12_final.pdf
According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 1.7 percent of all employed County residents commute primarily (i.e., 50 percent of the time or more) by bicycle (see Table 4.3). The bicycle commute rate in the Humboldt County is above average compared to California (0.8%) and the United States (0.4%). According to more recent estimates from the 2005-2009 American Community Survey, 2.65 percent of employed people (16 years and older, and excluding people who work from home) commute to work by bicycle.
Q: from unanonymous / Yesterday, 2:11 p.m. “Why don’t the trail folks at least try and work with the rail?”
A: You haven’t been paying attention. There have been regular meetings since March — 3 Bay [T]rail Advocates, 3 Timber Heritage Association folks who had lots of input on the final Bay [T]rail Plan [www.baytrailplan.org]. Two examples: BTA is trying to help THA get a long-term lease it needs from the harbor district for the museum. THA has many hurdles ahead but it is doable: lot-line adjustment, zone change, approvals from the county & coastal commish, consistency with long-term planning going on by harbor district and other neighbors. It will take time. BTA will be at hearings to support it. And a tourist train? That will be an easy one if the line is railbanked: the existing rail’s in good shape for a tourist train (but not freight) to Arcata where a turn-around exists; Arcata wants to help and so will we. The THA has a engine that works and lots of really cool rail cars. The dining car alone could be a movie set. Or at least a venue for some good parties. Join the THA and help.
Judy, to be feasible the tourist train needs to go from Samoa to Eureka.
And your source?
I don’t know who the guy was who stood up and made the same comment at the BOS meeting June 26, but he also said Arcata has nothing for train tourists, no places to eat, no shops. If you want to discuss further, you can easily find my email.
Perhaps this will help, but I doubt it, that would require thinking.
http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/02/17/railbanking-flopping-in-the-courtroom/
Also, a year and a half ago, the Humboldy County Planning Commission voted to remove any reference to railroads from the Transportation Element of the Master Plan because the County has no jurisdiction, nor do the cities.
When design drawings were presented 15 years ago showing how trails and rails could coexist, they were turned down with abusive language. When they were presented 4 years agom they were turned dowm with abusive language followed by telephone threats. This “new” plan was turned down 2 years ago as impractical, and the County Planning Commission turned it down after RAAA sneaked it into the Master Plan draft. Now it is dug up again after we know railbanking is unconstitutional (see Jack’s posting above).
NWP announced that materials are arriving (ribbon rail and concrete ties) to extend the main line revamping another 30 miles. The temporarily out of service tracks are not abandoned and will not be. And they do not belong to bicycle enthusiests. No matter how loud you yell and how hard you whip that dead horse, it won’t get up again. People are being played for suckers and donating to something the organizers know won’t ever happen. But look at all the free publicity some guys with political ambitions are getting. Sorry it didn’t work fot Cliff.
Gee, Wally. Telephone threats, from trail advocates? I sort of doubt it.
Beav, I don’t. They’ve already broke in and damaged THA belongings out at the roundhouse more than once. Every group has it’s fringe members that don’t care so long as someone else doesn’t get their way. They don’t care about vandalizing historical equipment. Telephone threats are easy to make and hard to accurately trace.
“And a tourist train? That will be an easy one if the line is railbanked: the existing rail’s in good shape for a tourist train (but not freight) to Arcata where a turn-around exists; Arcata wants to help and so will we. ”
Judy, then what’s the problem with it going to Eureka? A 15 minute tourist train is essentially worthless to tourists. Have you rode one lately? Short runs work for kiddie parks, not adults that want some real entertainment, a ride, and perhaps dinner during it. That’s the whole point of it. Not some go-kart track. The rail folks are behind you guys too, but honestly, a real excursion run needs a little more than 4 miles to work with or it might as well sit and rust some more. In my opinion a run at least through Eureka (Rio Dell would be nice to turn around with a spur to turn around the loco, but that’s another story) would benefit a lot of folks. People could ride parts of both, sort of like a shuttle.
From the “nothing here in Arcata” I think is based on what’s walking distance to the rail from say, the Plaza, where as Old Town businesses are 10 feet away from it. Folks with disabilities aren’t going to be sold on an idea they can’t get to if it’s half a mile away.
Also, have you ever looked at rail-riders? There was one going in Loleta with the rail guys last weekend. I had a chance to ride it, and come to find out, is an excellent opportunity to put pedal power ON the rails, not just beside it, or as a replacement. Other communities with existing rails in the US and other countries have embraced the idea which is very doable.
“Abandonment of a railroad easement may be inferred where the corridor is put to uses that are outside the scope of the easement. Alternatively, in some states, trail use is considered to be within the scope of a railroad ease- ment. This is sometimes known as the “shifting public use policy,” under which the railroad easement is deemed broad enough to encompass other types of transportation or public highway uses. Other states have rejected such a policy.
Another great read for those who would like facts rather than hyperbole:
http://www.railstotrails.org/resources/documents/resource_docs/RailstoTrailsConversionCommentary.pdf
And a little history:
http://www.americantrails.org/resources/railtrails/antirail.html
Yes, rail banking has and will be challenged. But it’s not an all or none situation. Easements and right of way are different in different situations.
Here is an excellent read that looks at both sides of the issue:
http://www.thewashcycle.com/2009/07/improving-railbanking.html
Wally 1:07: No Bay [T]rail Advocate is asking for money. We were even giving our buttons away for free.
Go for it 2:06: Problem with going all the way to Eureka? It would cost $32M and no agency is going to fund a project that has no freight customers and no plans for freight customers. Period. We DO have several good potential sources for the $4M identified — especially for the chance to close a critical gap in the California Coastal Trail.
Mike: You can find just about anything on the internet. Impartial opinion? How about NCRA’s own attorney Christopher Neary’s letter of Aug. 18, 2011 on railbanking research and on “abandonment.” (It was in the board packet on NCRA website.) Nothing scary at all about “railbanking” or “abandonment.”
Sorry, Mike. You were trying to HELP with those references. Thanks. I do like Neary’s letter because he says the NCRA might want to look at railbanking someday when someone has a plan for a trail!
Judy where did you get your $32 million figure from? If you’re concerned about “no agency is going to fund it” well the Feds do a nice job of it…if you have a plan. Take a look what’s happened along the Siskyou line to Medford in the last year (also on an inactive line). That project not only got $32 million, it got $200+ million. Medford and points north south to Redding will be open for business again.
Again, as has been said before, you really down in your heart want to see a train run again do you?
The cost for the trail is over 4 million, per trail folks at the NCRA meeting! Can you use facts please?
About costs: Rail-to-trail option is $4.1 million, according to HCAOG exec director testifying at BOS and NRCA meetings. Likely a little higher now because it’s based on this extensive report taxpayers paid for five years ago:
http://hcaog.net/documents/humboldt-bay-trails-2007
And the $31+ million figure? Likely be more now, too, especially due to deterioration of the line. It’s the rail-with-trail option in same document. So why is it unlikely (darn-near-impossible) to find $31M? The state is broke, so is NCRA. There are no special pots of money to fund something that doesn’t have a plan. The railroad operator stood up at the July 11 meeting and said he has no plan to return rail service to Humboldt County. And the NCRA has not spent a dime on the line up here in 15 years while the south end recently got $64M. In my heart? I love trains, too. We could have a tourist train operating in a year — from Arcata to Samoa. Bird in the hand. Later, when (and if) freight service returns — 10 years? 20 years? 30 years? — the line between Arcata and Eureka has to be expensively rebuilt to current standards. The trail could be relocated alongside. Trails don’t cost much. Modern freight railroads lines do.
So for the Arcata- Eureka section, you’ve given a figure for trail only ($4.1 million) and a figure for rail plus trail ($31 million +). But for some reason you haven’t given a figure for rail only — in other words an estimate for repairing the tracks to the point where a tourist train could run on the Eureka-Arcata section without a trail alongside it. Any estimates on that?
4.1 million, and only a little higher? Are you fucking insane? The 2007 study does not include the cost of a new trail easement! It does not include the cost of needed repairs! Your nose is growing longer and longer Judy.
This is getting silly, Tra. Someone else (you?) can put forth a plan for rail-only, no trail. Because it’s a seriously dumb idea. It’s one I didn’t hear from ANY of my THA contacts all these months working with them. Do you travel much outside Humboldt? Do you understand what trails do for a community? As for Mr. Cricket: Easements? One beauty of the Bay [T]rail proposal is the land — almost every bit of it — is already in public ownership. And the TWO private property owners along the 101 corridor (the only two I could find, identified in the 2007 report)? I spoke with both of them several times over several months and they raised no objections to trail conversion as an interim use. In fact, one is an outright trail supporter and the other told me trail conversion would be an improvement. Yes, we’ll need a lead agency to provide liability and management (in the works) and we will need a budget and a partnership of public entities for on-going maintenance once the trail is built (also the works). We’ve been working very hard on this for five months and have come up with a plan we are pretty sure we can pay for. If you want to discuss this with me further — directly — you can find my email on the Journal website. I’m available. I just don’t have unlimited time to argue with anonymous people on line. Sorry. But feel free to blather on.
Easy now Judy. I love trails, and I think an Arcata-Eureka trail would be well used by commuters, by tourists, and by outdoor recreation and fitness enthusiasts. I don’t really want rail-without-trail, I want rail-with-trail. And I’m not necessarily opposed to trail-without-rail in the meantime, if that’s all we can afford for now, and as long as this doesn’t make it significantly harder to accomodate rail along that section in the future — and I have some uncertainty on that last point.
In my view, freight service won’t be coming back to Humboldt anytime soon, but I wouldn’t be shocked if it did eventually come back, in 10, 15, 20 years, particularly if the price of fuel keeps going up (which increases the price of shipping by less-efficient tractor-trailers more than it increases the price of shipping by more-efficient freight trains).
And I understand that in the meantime there may be an opportunity to run a successful tourist train (but I doubt it will attract enough riders to make a go of it if it’s limited to the Samoa-Arcata section). If there’s a chance that a tourist train operation may need to use this section of track in a few years, and it also might be needed for freight shipment in the longer term, then it just doesn’t make sense to me to rip up the rails, pave over the top of the rail bed, get it all set up as a trail, and then either have to go back and rip it all back up a few years later and move the trail off to the side, or else miss out on rail opportunities.
And yes, I know the argument is that if the space is needed for rail, the trail can just be moved off to the side at that time. But here is where it all seems to get a little bit unclear.
Because on the one hand, when arguing for the rail to be removed and the trail paved over the railbed, trail advocates make the argument that trail-alongside-the-rail is way too difficult and expensive, and that therefore only way to build the trail now, in an affordable way, is to remove the rails and pave the trail directly over where the train tracks are now.
But when asked “hey, but won’t that be a barrier to restoring rail service at some future point,” suddenly the claim shifts dramatically, and we are reassured that it would be really cheap and easy to just re-locate the trail alongside the track at that time.
Which of course raises the question: If it’s so cheap and easy to locate the trail off to the side, why not locate it there in the first place? At which point the trail advocates revert back to the first claim, that doing so would be unaffordable. I have not heard any explanation of why it’s so difficult and unaffordable to build the trail off to the side from the get-go, yet would magically become cheap and easy to move it off to the side in the future.
Can you explain that?
Judy, no the public does not own the land from Arcata to Eureka. It has an easement for railroad use. A trail is not a railroad use, per federal judges.
Cricket,
I think what she’s saying is that most of the easement in that section is across land already owned by the public — for example the City of Arcata, the Wildlife Refuge, etc.
I see a large part of the problem seems to lie in folks not knowing the difference between a railroad right of way and an easement. According to the Assessor’s Maps, the trail would cross several privately owned pieces of land. More than one owner has said they will not grant an easement for a trail, at least not without a lot of money.
Gee, Wally. It must make you feel good about yourself to imagine that others don’t understand these matters like you do.
Wally,
Judy said that the 2007 report identified only two private land owners along that Arcata-Eureka stretch, and according to her both of them are open to the trail idea, one being an “outright trail supporter.”
But you are telling us that “more than one owner has said they will not grant an easement for a trail, at least not without a lot of money.”
So there seems to be a direct conflict between her claim and yours.
Good clarification from TRA.
Please excuse Wally, he gets a little “creative” when he’s excited.
The rail to trail idea has been around for years. Very little has been accomplished because of lack of interest. That is until the call for a feasibility study for an East West rail trail. It’s interesting that the owner of a local newspaper that ran a hit piece on the E-W rail trail, is the same one organizing the hurry-up push for railbanking the Eureka-Arcata line. Supporting studying the possibility of an E-W rail trail or suggesting alternatives to railbanking is now being demonized by said local media. We have also experinenced a local media blackout on anything but negitive articles.
Yes, wasting $250,000 on a “feasibility study” that could be productively spent on a trail, could spur people into action.
Blah blah blah…I know..let’s sue each other again. I don’t like you and you don’t like me…so screw YOU
@stretch, well if you’re going to split hairs over what to do with $250k how about scrap the [t]rail and give it to Humboldt families going though yet more childcare cutbacks from the state?
That’s a better idea than blowing it on a pipe dream railway.
And please, mow your own lawn.
Monte nailed it. Talk of railbanking while use of the rail line is under consideration is putting the cart before the horse. Wait until the status of the line for future rail use is determined. NCJ’s view of railroad feasibility is colored by their zeal to convert the Arcata Bay rail line to a trail. There are straighter shots for improving bicycle access between Arcata and Eureka.
The “cart before the horse” is the spending of public funds to study the “feasibility” of an imagined east-west rail with scant evidence of shippers that would prefer Humboldt Bay over other ports.
“Scant evidence” Joel?
Several counties, not just Humboldt are joining together to pursue the idea. They must have some idea that this could work; of course you and the NCJ have belitted the idea of a working railroad for years, calling folks like Bill Barnum names.
You’re talking about Bill Barnum, who calls those who disagree with him, “troglodytes” who “oppose any proposal that might increase economic activity and prosperity”? I find it hard to believe that anyone at the NCJ calls him names.
And references to counties “joining together” still qualifies as scant evidence.
Archie Bunker and Reactionary are a couple terms that come to mind when I think of the establishment environmentalists opposing the idea of the E-W rail trail.
The younger independent thinkers seem to get it. They wonder why just envisioning an alternitive to the status quo causes such contempt.
It appears that Monte has done some polling in the “younger independent thinkers” demographic. Either that, or he just makes shit up.
At least Archie didn’t call me meat head.
I suppose that the irony in your Barnum name-calling complaint is lost on you, Monte. I’m not calling you names, but, by all means, draw your own conclusion.
Hwy 299 Oregon Mtn got bulldozed and graded, and now Buckhorn Summit is getting the same facelift. Shipping companies are investing their $$ in using trucks to move containers East-West, not trains folks.
TRA asks
“Which of course raises the question: If it’s so cheap and easy to locate the trail off to the side, why not locate it there in the first place? At which point the trail advocates revert back to the first claim, that doing so would be unaffordable. I have not heard any explanation of why it’s so difficult and unaffordable to build the trail off to the side from the get-go, yet would magically become cheap and easy to move it off to the side in the future.
Can you explain that?”
TRA needs to try math.
Trail alone: $4.1 million in available dollars.
Rail reconstruction: $31 million plus. “Plus” here doesn’t actually include all the other parts of restoring rail operations – like turnarounds, the rails themselves, let alone connections to anything. The real figure for putting a functioning railroad back on that stretch is almost certainly closer to $50-80 million. None of that money is presently on offer, for some reason. Something about no business demand…
If and when a feasible business plan for a Humboldt Bay railroad is ever laid out to justify rebuilding the line, the cost of rebuilding the rail line with a trail adjacent will not be significantly greater than the cost of rebuilding without a trail. (Think about it.)
The demand that trail advocates pay to rebuild a railroad to nowhere alongside a trail – “no trail without rail” – is a promise to keep blocking the public’s preferred use of the public right of way. It’s unconscionable, it’s stupid, and it needs to stop.
Scott G is so far off base. The rail is already there, no need to include it in the price.
Scott G needs to take some Fundraising101 classes. A million bucks, or 60, is chump change to some people. One just needs to ask the right people. Need (brand new where none existed) redundant broadband but will cost $14 million? BAM! Here’s your money. Earthquake across the ocean makes waves and wrecks your port….AGAIN? BOOYAH! Here’s $33 million from the USDA to fix it. $54 million or whatever to fix rail (and put in a nice lighted, paved trail if desired) is very much possible.
If a million dollars is chump change, then why aren’t the chumps lining up to pay the $250,000 for the feasibility study?
Scott G,
I need to “try math?” No, you need try reading for comprehension.
Nowhere did I suggest that the trail advocates should have to pay to rebuild the rail.
The question I asked was: “If it’s so cheap and easy to locate the trail off to the side [should re-opening the rail become feasible in the future] why not locate it there in the first place?”
In other words, what would it cost to build the trail off to the side (even though the rail is not yet feasible), compared to building the trail directly atop the existing railbed?
I’m open to the argument that it would cost too much more to build the trail along the side, but I haven’t seen any estimate for what that would cost, so it’s impossible to make a comparison.
Perhaps you could try informing and persuading those who raise questions, instead of insulting them. Just a thought.
I’m gone to convey my little brother, that he should also visit this website on regular basis to take updated from most recent news update.