High Speed Rail Update: Animations of Potential Palmdale-Burbank Routes

12:03 PM PDT on September 21, 2016

Animation of one of the proposed HSR routes through the San Gabriel Mountains. The E2 alignment has a long tunnel in the valley, under the community of Shadow Hills. Image: Screengrab from HSR Blog. — Animation of one of the proposed HSR routes through the San Gabriel Mountains. The E2 alignment features a long underground section in the San Fernando Valley, under the community of Shadow Hills. Image: Screengrab from HSR Blog.

The California High Speed Rail Authority released three simple animations showing possible routes for the Palmdale to Burbank section. The animations appear on separate maps, so it's hard to compare them side-by-side, but they give a pretty good idea of how very, very long the proposed tunnels are.

The routes vary slightly in the San Fernando Valley. They all begin in a tunnel, and cut either under Pacoima, emerging to pass around Hansen Dam, or under Shadow Hills, emerging for a moment in the recreation area before dipping back underground to cut through the San Gabriel Mountains. The routes also differ as they approach Palmdale, with the train emerging from the tunnels in a few places and then going back underground before finally emerging just west of Palmdale itself.

All three routes feature extensive tunnels through the San Gabriel Mountains. Estimated costs for the different HSRA segments were released in its 2016 Business Plan, but the cost differences between these three potential routes are buried in a Supplemental Alternatives Analysis. Buried deeply. The short version is that the most expensive of the three is Route E1, the middle route that passes close to the Pacoima Dam and steers mostly clear of Highway 14.

Check out the routes.

Note that there is a public meeting on the alignments tomorrow night, Thursday, September 22, from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Fernangeles Recreation Center, 8851 Laurel Canyon Boulevard in Sun Valley.

Melanie Curry @StreetsblogCal

Streetsblog California editor Melanie Curry has been thinking about transportation, and how to improve conditions for bicyclists, ever since commuting to school by bike long before bike lanes were a thing. She was Managing Editor at the East Bay Express, editor of Access Magazine for the University of California Transportation Center, and earned her Masters in City Planning from UC Berkeley.