{"id":233752,"date":"2016-11-11T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-11-11T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/a-new-ride\/"},"modified":"2016-11-11T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2016-11-11T08:00:00","slug":"a-new-ride","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/a-new-ride\/","title":{"rendered":"A new ride"},"content":{"rendered":"

Por Dave Schwab<\/p>\n

MTS breaks ground on Mid-Coast Blue Line<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Mid-Coast project extending San Diego Trolley service from Old Town to UC San Diego and University City adding nine new stations, including two at the university, was inaugurated with bands, food and vendor booths \u2014 even a giant earth mover \u2014at a formal ceremony Oct. 22.<\/p>\n

Several thousand people\u00a0attended the Mid-Coast Trolley groundbreaking and community celebration on the field at The Preuss School UCSD near the future Voigt Drive Trolley station.<\/p>\n

Attendees enjoyed a free community picnic on the grass while learning about upcoming trolley construction expected to start soon with service debuting in 2021.<\/p>\n

\"(l<\/a>
(l to r) Nurse Rose Colangelo with Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, SANDAG Executive Director Gary Gallegos, Metropolitan Transit System CEO Paul Jablonski, UC San Diego Vice Chancellor Gary Matthews, Rep. Susan Davis, San Diego County Board of Supervisors Chair and SANDAG Chair Ron Roberts, MTS Board of Directors Chair Harry Mathis, Federal Transit Administration Region 9 Deputy Regional Administrator Edward Carranza Jr., Rep. Scott Peters (Photo by Dave Schwab)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The $2.1-billion Mid-Coast Trolley project will extend the existing Blue Line by 11 miles north of Old Town, adding nine new stations serving Mission Bay Park, Pacific Beach and Mission Beach, the VA Medical Center, UC San Diego, business clusters along Genesee Avenue, and the Westfield UTC mall. Once the extension is built, transit riders will enjoy a one-seat ride (no transfers) from San Ysidro to University City.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday is a historic day for San Diego transit,\u201d said SANDAG chair and San Diego County Board of Supervisors chair Ron Roberts. \u201cThis is the largest transit project that we’ve ever had in San Diego.\u201d<\/p>\n

Planners estimate the Mid-Coast project will attract more than 20,000 new trolley trips every weekday north of Old Town.<\/p>\n

\u201cMid-Coast trolley is a huge undertaking going right through the heart of some of our busiest communities,\u201d noted architect Roberts, who added the trolley ‘s 11 new miles of track include four miles of bridges, which he promised will be of superior design and beauty.<\/p>\n

Roberts told of a female constituent’s unanticipated claim of how positive Mid-Coast’s extension will be for families.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe said, because she lived in Chula Vista and had to commute to her office daily, that she never got home in time to have dinner with her family,\u201d Roberts said adding the woman then told him, ‘This will keep my husband from divorcing me.’\u201d<\/p>\n

Other dignitaries participating in the event included Congressman Scott Peters and Congresswoman Susan Davis, UC San Diego Vice Chancellor Gary Matthews, Federal Transit Administration Region 9 Deputy Regional Administrator Edward Carranza Jr., and Metropolitan Transit System Chair Harry Mathis.<\/p>\n

Congressman Peters noted San Diego is \u201cvery good at providing matching money to get federal and state dollars,\u201d noting the Mid-Coast project is \u201ca great and long labor of love.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re going to have something really to be proud of, and it’s going to be a regional treasure for us,\u201d Peters added.<\/p>\n

Congresswoman Susan Davis, addressing the crowd, said \u201cwe couldn’t have done it without you.\u201d She especially thanked \u201cpeople who put their hearts and souls into this for a very long time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Federal administrator Carranza Jr. noted linking UC San Diego with the trolley system is \u201ca very monumental and great milestone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis project has been evolving for several decades,\u201d Carranza added. \u201cWe’re on to getting it done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Former City Councilman and longtime regional planner Harry Mathis quipped, \u201cWe foresaw the advent of the trolley \u2014 it only took 30 years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mathis talked of riding streetcars in San Diego as a kid noting he still enjoys taking rides on the trolley with his grandchildren. \u201cThis is a great day for San Diego,\u201d Mathis said. \u201cWe’re very proud to be a part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rose Colangelo, a nurse at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, and Franklin Hang, Preuss School senior class president, also spoke at the event about what the trolley extension meant to them, and how it will help improve their quality of life.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know I speak for the entire medical community when I say that the extended trolley service from Old Town will bring an important and welcome convenience for physicians, staff, our patients and their families and visitors,\u201d Colangelo said.<\/p>\n

Hang noted Preuss is a special school because it serves students from economically disadvantaged families whose children have never gone on to higher education.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The Mid-Coast trolley extension will connect Old Town to UC San Diego with stops in Mission Bay Park, Pacific Beach, Mission Beach and more. (Photo by Dave Schwab)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cStudents come here from as far away as City Heights, Spring Valley and Barrio Logan waking up pretty early to attend school,\u201d said Hang, pointing out \u201cthe only viable mode of travel for many of us, without our parents taking time out of their daily schedules, is through this means (public transportation).\u201d<\/p>\n

Project construction is expected to produce more than 14,000 local jobs. Even after construction is over, the Mid-Coast Trolley will have an estimated $116 million annual economic impact on the region by taking cars off the road, reducing parking needs, and increasing access to jobs. The Mid-Coast corridor supports more than 325,000 jobs. The two ends of the route \u2013 Downtown San Diego and University City \u2013 account for nearly half of that total.<\/p>\n

Pre-construction activities to clear the way for the project \u2013 primarily the relocation of underground and overhead utilities \u2013 started in early 2016.<\/p>\n

The Oct. 22 groundbreaking celebration was made possible by Presenting Sponsor Mid-Coast Transit Constructors (which is the project contractor, a joint venture of Stacy & Witbeck, Inc., Skanska USA, and Herzog Contracting Corporation), Premiere Sponsor UC San Diego, and other sponsors, including: PGH Wong Engineering Inc., Parsons Brinckerhoff, HDR, T.Y.LIN International, Jacobs Engineering, SDG&E, and Modern Railway Systems.<\/p>\n

Mid-Coast dedication ceremonies concluded with public officials lining up for a group photo in front of a towering earthmover.<\/p>\n

Siemens, which has been providing light rail vehicles (LRVs) for the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System (MTS) since 1981, recently received an order for 45 new S70 LRVs from MTS. That brings the total number of vehicles supplied by Siemens to MTS to 244.The new vehicles will allow service enhancements on existing rail lines and provide the necessary LRVs to operate the 11-mile extension of the UC San Diego Blue Line now under construction.<\/p>\n

The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) is the San Diego region\u2019s primary public planning, transportation and research agency providing the public forum for regional policy decisions about growth, transportation planning and construction, environmental management, housing, open space, energy, public safety, and binational topics. SANDAG is governed by a Board of Directors composed of mayors, council members, and supervisors from each of the region\u2019s 18 cities and the county government.<\/p>\n

\u2014Dave Schwab can be reached at dschwabie@journalist.com.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Por Dave Schwab<\/p>","protected":false},"author":840,"featured_media":233753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11557","_seopress_titles_title":"A new ride","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11547,11557,11551,11550],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-233752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-mission-valley-news","category-news","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/840"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}