Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : City Opens Long-Awaited Rail Overpass

The freight and commuter trains that several times a day stop east-west traffic in Lancaster will no longer be a problem for drivers on busy Avenue L.

With much pomp and circumstance, the city Monday opened its long-awaited $12.4-million Avenue L overpass, the first of two railroad over-crossings planned as part of a network of roads that will create a loop system around the perimeter of Lancaster.

“Welcome to the Avenue L overpass,” Mayor Arnie Rodio told about 100 local leaders and residents. “It only took 30 years to get here.”

One reason that it took so long was that the city’s original method of financing the overpass was challenged in court. Lancaster wanted to pay for the project, budgeted at $14 million, with money from its Redevelopment Agency’s low- and moderate-income housing fund.

A two-year legal battle ended last month when the state Supreme Court declined to reconsider a lower-court ruling that rejected the use of the restricted funds for the overpass, which city officials believe will lead to an increase in development on the east side of the community.

“I truly believe this is going to change how we do business in this town,” Councilman George Runner said. “It’s going to open up the east side. I think in a couple years we’ll wonder how we did it before.”

The overpass, measuring 2,542 feet end-to-end with a bridge 25 feet high and 350 feet long, can carry up to 70,000 vehicles daily.

When the overpass was opened Monday, it carried the Antelope Valley High School marching band, more than a dozen vintage cars carrying city officials and a host of residents.

Lancaster Councilman Frank Roberts, who said the view of the Antelope Valley was fantastic from atop the bridge, believes the overpass represents a “new era” in the region. Construction on the second railroad overpass, on Avenue H, is slated to begin in July.