SCH Number 2007031067

Project Info

Title

California High-Speed Rail Project - Los Angeles to Anaheim Project Section

Description

A Statewide Program (Tier 1) EIR/EIS was completed in November 2005 as the first phase of a tiered environmental review process for the proposed California High-Speed Rail (HSR) System planned to provide a reliable high-speed electric-powered rail system that links the major metropolitan areas of the state and that delivers predictable and consistent travel times. A further objective is to provide an interface with commercial airports, mass transit, and the highway network and to relieve capacity constraints of the existing transportation system as intercity travel demand in California increases, in a manner sensitive to and protective of California’s unique natural resources. The California High-Speed Rail Authority has prepared a Draft EIR/EIS that further examines the Los Angeles to Anaheim Project Section (project section). The approximately 30-mile project section would provide HSR service between LAUS in Los Angeles and ARTIC in Anaheim. New HSR infrastructure at LAUS was already approved as part of the Burbank to Los Angeles Project Section in January 2022 or is studied as part of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority Link Union Station Project EIS. This project section would connect to the HSR System’s current southern terminus at LAUS. This Draft EIR/EIS evaluates the impacts and benefits of a No Project Alternative and two build alternatives: Shared Passenger Track Alternative A and Shared Passenger Track Alternative B. The Authority’s Preferred Alternative under NEPA, which serves as the proposed project for CEQA, is Shared Passenger Track Alternative A. Shared Passenger Track Alternative A proposes approximately 30 miles of new and upgraded track, overhead contact system, maintenance and traction power facilities (including a light maintenance facility at 26th Street in the City of Vernon), additional freight rail track (including storage track replacement at Hobart Yard), grade separations, drainage improvements, communications towers, security fencing, modifications to passenger train stations, and other necessary facilities to introduce HSR service into the existing Los Angeles – San Diego – San Luis Obispo Rail Corridor from south of LAUS beginning at the northern edge of U.S. Highway 101 to ARTIC. New and upgraded tracks would allow other trains to share tracks with HSR. The Preferred Alternative includes an HSR station at ARTIC. Although not included in the Preferred Alternative, the Draft EIR/EIS also evaluates an option for one intermediate HSR station, which would consist of adding an HSR station platform and station facilities at either the Norwalk/Santa Fe Springs Metrolink Station or the Fullerton Metrolink/Amtrak Station. Consistent with the Authority’s commitment to invest in regionally important early action projects to provide early benefits to transit riders and local communities in Southern California, while laying a solid foundation for implementation of the HSR system, both Shared Passenger Track Alternatives include early action projects (grade separations; freight or passenger rail track infrastructure; and improvements at passenger rail stations), which would improve safety and provide immediate mobility and reliability benefits for existing freight and passenger rail operations. These early action projects may be implemented by the Authority in collaboration with local and regional agencies, or by those other agencies relying on this Los Angeles to Anaheim Project Section EIR/EIS in advance of the HSR system as stand-alone projects. These early action projects may also be the subject of an environmental review process completed earlier than the Los Angeles to Anaheim EIR/EIS process by other implementing entities. Additional infrastructure may be required by third parties to utilize the proposed HSR improvements, and these future improvements will be studied and approved in future environmental documents in accordance with federal and state law.

3 documents in project