To the editor: The Times' Feb. 9 editorial on the coastal rail line between San Diego and Los Angeles raises an essential policy question in Southern California as we decide how to spend scarce infrastructure dollars. However, we believe that the options currently being considered by transportation agencies and that your editorial implicitly endorses are based on questionable assumptions.
Recurring closures of the rail corridor due to crumbling bluffs in Del Mar and San Clemente underscore the need for action. However, is it wise to spend 11 years and $20 billion ($4 million per average daily round trip commuter) to sustain the southernmost 60-mile segment from San Clemente to San Diego?
In this stretch, passenger usage is declining, limited freight is transported (just 0.04% of California's total), and point-to-point transportation alternatives are growing through smart technology-enabled entities like Uber and buses. electrical.
Additionally, a rail-to-trail conversion along this stretch could offer exciting sustainable, efficient, healthy, and equitable transportation and recreation possibilities for many more people than the rail is likely to serve.
We have world-class universities in our region that can help study transportation alternatives to find the most cost-effective and sustainable ways to meet our needs. Let us seize this opportunity to redefine coastal mobility in a holistic, evidence-based way that protects our environment, promotes public health, encourages tourism, and ensures the resilience of our transportation infrastructure for generations to come.
Peter Cramton and Kevin Patrick, Del Mar
Cramton is professor emeritus of economics at the University of Maryland and Patrick is professor emeritus of public health at UC San Diego.
