North County resident Brian Legal is a big fan of riding the train along San Diego's coast โ either to visit friends in downtown San Diego or his girlfriend in Orange County.
"It beats driving through traffic and having to deal with that, especially during peak hours," Legal said. "I think it's just how convenient it is, and the beautiful scenic views that are in SoCal's rail network."
As much as Legal loves the train, he can't take it as often as he'd like. Twice in the past month, Legal's plans to take rail to Orange County were thwarted by track closures. He had to take an Amtrak bus, which he said is a major inconvenience.
"Amtrak costs more (than Metrolink), and you have to hop on a bus, and it's always full," Legal said. "It sells out a week in advance. You can't just hop on."
Legal dreams of a day when the trains are powered not by slow, noisy and polluting diesel but by clean electricity delivered through overhead wires. But that dream could be quashed in the coming months as SANDAG, the country's transportation planning agency, refines its vision for rerouting the train tracks through Del Mar.
Del Mar is a major pinch point on the rail corridor between Los Angeles and San Diego, known as LOSSAN. The tracks run atop the eroding Del Mar bluffs and require frequent stabilization work.
SANDAG's LOSSAN Rail Realignment project aims for long-term safety and reliability improvements by rerouting the tracks, possibly through tunnels below the quiet, wealthy suburb. SANDAG is also studying keeping the tracks in place and continuing to reinforce them.
If SANDAG opts for tunneling, it could also face an early decision on rail electrification. Electric trains would require a wider tunnel to make room for overhead catenary wires. And a wider tunnel would be more expensive.
Californians for Electric Rail, a grassroots volunteer organization founded in 2023, is urging SANDAG to plan for a wider tunnel and leave the door open to electric trains in the future.
"They're not going to be building another one of these tunnels for the next 100 years," said Adriana Rizzo, one of the group's co-founders. "If they make these tunnels too small to save a little bit of money, basically they're making a decision now about whether this corridor will ever be electrified."
While electric trains come with substantial upfront costs, mainly to install the overhead wires, they also bring major benefits for passenger service. SANDAG found electric trains would cut the travel time from Oceanside to downtown San Diego to under 30 minutes โ faster than driving, even with no traffic.
"Electric trains accelerate faster, so you can have faster trips," Rizzo said. "They can also go faster, so you can have these trains going up to 110, 125 miles an hour without any of the specialized upgrades you need for true high-speed rail."
The Bay Area's Caltrain electrified most of its trains last year. Now ridership is growing faster than other rail agencies.
Electric trains are also less impactful to the environment. While battery- and hydrogen-powered trains are technically "zero emissions" because they don't produce carbon pollution at the point of use, they do require expensive and energy-intensive lithium mining or hydrogen fuel production. Today roughly 95% of hydrogen fuel is produced by burning fossil fuels, and so-called "green hydrogen" produced with renewable energy is significantly more expensive.
"Electric trains are pretty much the most efficient way to move anything on land," Rizzo said. "They're more energy-efficient than other zero emissions alternatives, as well as being a more mature technology that has 100 years of real-world use."
SANDAG said it hasn't made any decisions on whether to plan for electric trains in its Del Mar project. It's accepting comments on a preliminary environmental study through June 30.
"It's still very early, and we want that input from folks," said SANDAG Environmental Compliance Manager Keith Greer. "In this case we want to know, should we be looking at overhead catenary wires? What else should we be looking at?"
Greer added that SANDAG wants the rail realignment project in Del Mar to conform to the California State Rail Plan, which was released by Caltrans in January. That plan leaves out the LOSSAN corridor from the state's rail electrification plans.
Mary Dover, spokesperson for the North County Transit District, which owns the train tracks in Del Mar and will be responsible for maintaining them following SANDAG's relocation project, said the agency is open to both electric trains and other zero-emissions alternatives.
She added that some community members dislike the aesthetics of overhead wires, and that electric rail supporters should engage with SANDAG and NCTD as the project in Del Mar evolves.
"Our board hasn't taken a position on which technology we deem as best," Dover said. "Any infrastructure project throughout the corridor is going to need to have the buy-in of the community."
Brian Legal said electrifying the trains would be worth the upfront investment by making rail more competitive with cars for long-distance travel.
"It will take traffic off the roads," Legal said. "It will improve the experience of everyone, not just people on the train."
