Design Funds for Monorail Clear Their First Hurdle : Transportation: If Congress winds up approving $1 million, plans can begin on the project to link five county cities.

A congressional subcommittee on Tuesday took the first step toward providing $1 million for design work on the proposed Orange County monorail system, which backers hope one day will link at least five central county communities.

The action by the transportation subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee is significant because, if ultimately approved, the design money would allow local officials to begin developing detailed plans and cost estimates for the monorail, which may cover as many as 21 miles.

“We need to go from the talking phase to the preliminary design phase,” said Santa Ana Mayor Daniel H. Young, who chairs the Five City Monorail Committee. The group also includes representatives of Anaheim, Costa Mesa, Irvine and Orange.

The federal money would “help us find out exactly what route makes sense, what the technical and geographic barriers are and what the technology should be,” Young added.

In addition, a preliminary plan would permit the cities to begin soliciting private investment in the project, which proponents hope to build with a combination of local, state and private funds.

Young said Tuesday that it is too early to discuss even a preliminary estimate of the system’s cost, but he acknowledged that it would run into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Two Orange County congressmen who lobbied for the federal money said they believe that their colleagues granted the request because the Orange County project offers an opportunity for a large return in exchange for a relatively small federal investment.

“This project, except for the design work, involves literally no federal funds,” Rep. C. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach) said. “It will offer a model for other transportation projects, for which we have seemingly endless requests for money that is not endless.”

Subcommittee members “think it is an example to the nation,” Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) said. “For 35 years, I’ve ridden (the monorail) at Disneyland and I’ve said, ‘How can this (technology) not be spreading like wildfire across the country?’ ”

Cox and Dornan, along with Reps. William E. Dannemeyer (R-Fullerton), Dana Rohrabacher (R-Lomita) and Ron Packard (R-Carlsbad), appealed for the money in a letter delivered to the subcommittee Tuesday.

It was unclear Tuesday whether the $1 million in design money from the Federal Railroad Administration’s Railroad Research and Development Program would have to be matched by state or local funds.

The federal money was included in an appropriations bill for the Department of Transportation, which will be considered by the full Appropriations Committee sometime this summer. The measure ultimately must be approved by the full House and the Senate and signed by President Bush before any design money is available.

Cox estimated chances for the monorail money surviving the federal budget process at about 75%.

Several pieces of the complex mosaic of funding for the monorail system already are in place.

Proposition 116, a $1.9-billion rail bond measure approved this month by California voters, specifically sets aside $125 million to build about 4.5 miles of the monorail system within the city of Irvine.

Young said officials believe that the project could receive an additional $250 million in grants money from Proposition 108, a separate, $1-billion rail bond issue also approved this month.

Meanwhile, the Irvine City Council last month approved a deal in which McDonnell Douglas Realty Co. agreed to build a half-mile monorail link between John Wayne Airport and the Irvine Business Complex. In exchange, the council gave the company permission to construct an additional 195,000 square feet of office space in two buildings it plans to build in the business park.

O.C. Monorail: A Proposal For The Future The backbone of the monorail system proposed in Orange County would be trains capable of traveling about 60 m.p.h. along a raised rail stretching from Irvine to Anaheim. Lower-speed monorail lines would branch off the main system to ferry passengers to locations to the east and west. As envisioned, the monorail would link local Amtrak stations, John Wayne Airport and the sprawling Irvine Spectrum office and industrial complex. It would also link up in Anaheim with a high-speed “super-train” that would run from the city’s train station to Las Vegas.