Santa Rosa council backs ground-level rail crossing at Jennings Avenue

Santa Rosa will seek to build a ground-level rail crossing for pedestrians and bicyclists at Jennings Avenue instead of the bridge for which it had received an $8 million grant.

The City Council’s unanimous decision Tuesday means it will forgo the grant money and instead pursue a simpler, less expensive project that accomplishes the same goal of allowing people to cross the rail line safely once commuter rail service begins next year.

“I totally get that there is money on the table,” Councilman Tom Schwedhelm said, “but the at-grade crossing that staff is recommending makes so much more sense for this community.”

The bridge option was floated at a time when the city believed the state Public Utilities Commission would require it to offset any new crossing at Jennings by closing a street that crosses the tracks at Railroad Square.

That idea received significant pushback from some members of the council, who urged staff to seek a better solution.

“The PUC is pitting one neighborhood against another, and that’s not OK,” Councilman Gary Wysocky said.

Further review found that the PUC does grant exemptions to its policy of reducing rail crossings when it’s in the public interest.

Key to the council’s decision was the opinion of a former PUC attorney, James Squeri, who was hired to represent the city in the matter. He said he thinks he can convince the commission to allow the Jennings Avenue crossing without requiring any other street closures.

“I think you’ve got a very good case,” Squeri told the council.

The slow speed of the trains and good visibility at that location just south of the Guerneville Road station, community opposition to and potential dangers involved in Railroad Square street closures, and the significantly higher cost of the bridge all made Squeri “fairly confident” that PUC staff and commission members will see it the city’s way.

The PUC policy of reducing rail crossings whenever possible is largely geared toward avoiding conflicts between trains and cars, he said. The fact that the Jennings crossing will only be for pedestrians and bicyclists means a street closure shouldn’t be required, he said.

The city’s chances of success are greatly improved if there is no opposition to its plan, he said.

Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit expects commuter rail service along the initial 43-mile line between Sonoma County airport area and San Rafael to begin by the end of 2016. Testing of the cars will begin this summer.

Jennings Avenue residents and bicycle advocates want the city to preserve the crossing instead of allowing it to just be fenced off, while residents of Railroad Square have been concerned the solution to the Jennings Avenue problem will create new problems for their neighborhood.

West End resident Alan Thomas orchestrated a strong lobbying effort on behalf of his client, Western Farm Center. He called it “unfathomable” that the city, after putting so much energy into improving connections in the Railroad Square area, would close a street vital to the success of a home-grown business.

Lea Barron-Thomas, also a West End resident, said she thought the city would be taking an “unnecessary risk” by asking the PUC for a special exemption it may not grant. If that happens, the city will be out the grant funds and won’t be able to afford to build a bridge, she said.

“I think we can build a bridge that is attractive and is safe, and we have the money,” Barron-Thomas said.

Robert Ankers, a resident of Seventh Street, agreed the bridge sounded like a safer option with less risk.

“It sounds like it’s a crapshoot if you go with anything but the bridge,” he said.

But others strongly oppose the bridge, which they described as a “monstrosity” and resembling a “supermax prison” based on the preliminary design reviewed in the city’s environmental study.

Others called the $9.2 million structure a waste of money if a more modest solution were available. David Petritz, a field manager at Sonoma County Conversation Action, said those kind of transportation funds would be better spent on a pedestrian and bicycle crossing over Highway 101.

Such a massive structure - 23 feet high with 450-foot-long ramps - struck Jack Swearingen, president of the friends of SMART, as “massive overkill” when a better solution was at hand. “It looks like you’re on the threshold of a win-win here,” he said.

Council members agreed. Vice mayor Chris Coursey said it was the council’s responsibility not just to build something because the money was available, but to “pursue the best option as far as we possibly can” and then show the PUC the community is behind it.

“Once the choice is made, we need to get this done because the train is coming,” Coursey said.