State Aid for Rail Projects Receives Boost : Transit: Commission signals it is ready to provide financial help for commuter lines. Limit on assistance for right-of-way acquisition also may be increased.

State transportation authorities have sent two powerful signals to Los Angeles County transportation planners in recent days that they are serious about providing substantial financial aid soon for commuter rail projects in the Southland.

First, in unveiling proposed guidelines scheduled to be adopted in early December for the distribution of $1.9 billion in rail bonds authorized last June by Proposition 116, California Transportation Commission officials said Thursday their goal is that all new rail service to be funded through the measure be up and running by the year 2000.

This 10-year plan means that Los Angeles, Orange and other counties that are ready to proceed with specific applications for the Proposition 116 money, along with required matching funds, should get state aid soon.

Second, transportation commission Chairman William E. Leonard and the commission’s executive director, Robert I. Remen, in separate letters to Neil Peterson, executive director of the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission, said the commission is willing to consider increasing its previous limit of $330 million in state aid for rail right-of-way acquisitions in the five urban Southern California counties.

Peterson, in a return letter dated Tuesday, said Los Angeles County will seek such an increased cap and expressed hope that as much as $285 million could be allocated in state aid for the planned $450-million acquisition of Southern Pacific rights of way by Jan. 23.

Peterson pointed out in his letter that Southland counties are negotiating with Santa Fe for other right-of-way acquisitions. The suggestion in his letter was that far more than a total of $330 million will be needed for all Southern California right-of-way acquisitions.

Several state commissioners, at a public hearing in Corona last month, raised hackles from Peterson and Orange County Transportation Commission Chairman Dana Reed when they questioned whether massive right-of-way acquisitions would be so expensive as to leave little money left to provide the actual service.

Since then, the state commissioners have learned that Peterson wants $285 million in state aid for the Southern Pacific acquisition, not $135 million as they understood then. But at the same time, they have been softening to a great extent their critical remarks on the acquisition.

Leonard and commission member Bruce Nestande said at a commission meeting this week that, in Nestande’s words, “there ought not to be any questions out there” that the state commissioners mean to support commuter rail in Southern California.

Leonard said one proof of this is that the commission is moving up approval of the Proposition 116 fund distribution guidelines to December from the earlier goal of January.

“Obviously, the electorate wanted these projects, and it wants them now,” Leonard said.

In his letter to Peterson, Leonard said the commission recognizes that the privately owned rail corridors in Southern California “are an important resource for future rail service, and therefore warrant protection.”

Remen said this was Leonard’s way of expressing support for public right-of-way acquisition, although both commission officials emphasized that the state wants Los Angeles County to pay for a consultant to advise the state as to whether the specific deal with Southern Pacific is advisable.

Peterson noted in his letter that the county has agreed to pay for such a consultant.

“We, of course, want you to feel comfortable with the negotiated agreements between the private railroad and the local agencies involved,” Peterson told Leonard. He said the consultant would report by Dec. 7 “in order not to slow down progress.”

Peterson said Los Angeles County is determined to begin commuter rail service on additional lines out of Los Angeles within two years of the acquisition of the Southern Pacific rights of way, which is expected by next March.