RAIL TRAIL: Santa Cruz County group endorses trail only, no tracks

There are some mixed feelings about what to do with 32 miles of train tracks running between Davenport and Watsonville in Santa Cruz County.

On Monday, the Santa Cruz County Business Council endorsed a plan for a trail without train tracks. The group’s concerns about the tracks come after voters passed Measure D, greenlighting two rail-trail related projects. The first would build a trail for pedestrians and their pets, bikes, skateboards etc. The other would preserve the rail corridor for transportation uses, that could be for a bus or train, according to the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission.

“We think there are just better strategies out there in terms of promoting alternative means of transportation or creating better strategies to making our existing corridors more functional,” Robert Singleton with the Santa Cruz County Business Council said. “If we are talking about a $150 to $250 million investment, we just think it’s not the most efficient use of public funds.”

Not everyone agree, though. Piet Cannon with Eulogy Action, a group that fiscally supports Friends of the Rail Trail, says keeping the transit option open is key, adding it could help reduce traffic on busy Highway 1.

“There is the potential there could be some sort of public transit in that rail corridor that would give people another alternative to driving their car,” Cannon said.

In Capitola, Vice Mayor Michael Termini says he is also concerned that a train would be too much for the iconic trestle tracks to handle.

“There are homes directly under the trestle,” Termini said. “If a railroad car fell off this trestle or if the trestle failed it would literally be catastrophic.”

Watch reporter Paul Dudley’s full story above.