Metrolink Plans Spending to Cut Delays, Ease Congestion

Two hours pass between the time Anne Nah leaves her Irvine home, drives to her nearby Metrolink station, boards the train and arrives at her mortgage company job in downtown Los Angeles.

Nah figures that the reduced stress on her nerves and her leased car make the trip worthwhile--except for Metrolink’s frequent unscheduled delays.

Rail traffic and other Metrolink problems--from inadequate parking to debris on the tracks--have added up to 40 minutes to Nah’s long commute, sometimes wreaking havoc on her schedule. “There are a lot of delays between Union Station and Commerce” in Los Angeles County, she said.

To ease the delays and congestion on the well-traveled Orange County rail line, Metrolink will spend much of the $25.7 million in state funds awarded recently to lay track, improve ticket machines and add passenger cars by early 2001.

“The Orange County line continues to be the fastest-growing route on our system,” said Peter Hidalgo, Metrolink spokesman. “Currently, we see an average of 5,400 daily riders taking our trains from Oceanside to L.A.”

Ridership on the Orange County line is expected to grow 43% in the next four years and 137% by 2010, Hidalgo said. The 87-mile route stops at seven Orange County cities.

The regional agency will use $7 million to lay a three-mile stretch of track--like adding a freeway lane--in Commerce. The project will ease freight and passenger congestion in the nation’s second-busiest rail corridor, mainly so trains on the Orange County line can pass through more quickly. “This will make trains run more efficiently,” Hidalgo said. “The possibility of delays is greatly reduced.”

Metrolink--formally known as the Southern California Regional Rail Authority--will spend $11.5 million of the state funds, plus about $42.5 million from federal grant money, to buy 30 passenger cars. An undetermined number will be used on the Orange County line, and the rest will be added to the busiest of the 128 Metrolink trains that run in the six-county region every day.

Trains are so crowded now, said Michelle Baker of Foothill Ranch, that nearly every seat is taken on her trip home from Glendale Memorial Hospital, where she works once or twice a week.

“It’s more crowded during certain hours. There’s always a seat, but people like to spread out a little after a long day’s work,” Baker said.

They will not have any room to spread out as ridership increases. By 2003, the Orange County line is expecting 7,700 commuters a day, and by 2010, it should have 12,800 riders, Hidalgo said.

The authority will use $1.6 million to improve ticket vending machines systemwide. Rail users will be able to buy Metrolink tickets in advance and buy tickets for other transit services, such as Amtrak.

“With the new enhancements, there will be flexibility,” Hidalgo said.

With the remaining money, Metrolink will spend $4.1 million for more parking and related improvements at the Van Nuys and Oxnard stations and $1.5 million for crossover tracks in Van Nuys and Glendale.

Some passengers think Metrolink should use its funds to provide more parking at other stations as well. Wayne Saxton of Irvine said he missed his train to San Diego Tuesday morning because he was circling the Irvine station’s 630-space lot.

“Basically, there’s no overflow parking, and if you park somewhere else, you could get towed,” he said. “I drove to San Juan Capistrano and caught the train there, which was a real pain.”

Nah missed a train a few weeks ago because she could not find parking and had to drive to work. “It made me upset, because I have a monthly pass and I got here on time,” she said. Now, her husband drops her off on his way to work.

In separately funded projects in Orange County, Metrolink stations are being built in Buena Park and Tustin and on the Laguna Niguel-Mission Viejo border. Hidalgo said the authority hopes to obtain funding by 2003 to add a second set of tracks from Orange to Santa Ana and from Mission Viejo to San Juan Capistrano.

But some critics say that Metrolink does not attract enough passengers to justify spending more money on improving it.

“It’s a big sinkhole to lower money into,” said Wayne King, a director of Drivers for Highway Safety in Orange, which monitors transportation spending in Orange County. “Metrolink hauls [a total of] 60,000 people per day. That’s way less than 1% of all [car] trips. It has no effect whatsoever on traffic, congestion or air pollution.”

The money would be better spent widening streets, synchronizing traffic lights or building bus turnouts, which allow mass transit vehicles to pick up passengers without blocking traffic, King said.

Urban planners say that the region needs transportation alternatives, but no one improvement will serve as a magical cure.

“Given the projection of growth in Orange County over the next 40 years, we need to take advantage of every possible improvement in transportation and infrastructure that comes our way,” Mark Baldassare, a UC Irvine professor of urban planning, said.

“We need to think of a multi-modal system of transportation--buses, mass transit, high-speed rail, carpools, freeways, toll roads,” he said. “ . . . We need improvements in all areas or we’re going to be gridlocked.”