CITY EYES RAIL PLANS STEEL TRACK, MAGLEV UNDER CONSIDERATION.

Byline: Jim Skeen Staff Writer

PALMDALE - The Palmdale City Council is considering whether to join a joint powers authority to build a magnetic-levitation train system between Los Angeles and Orange counties. It is also viewing whether it should invest $200,000 more in an effort to get a proposed statewide rail system routed through the Antelope Valley.

Palmdale may join 12 cities represented in the Orange Line Development Authority, which is working to establish maglev trains through Orange and Los Angeles counties, including a segment linking Palmdale to Los Angeles.

In a separate transit-planning effort, city officials are looking at spending $200,000 for further analysis of environmental studies being conducted on a proposed $25 billion, statewide high-speed rail system.

The governing body overseeing the study is the California High-Speed Rail Authority, and it is examining two possible routes between Bakersfield and Los Angeles, including one that would go through Palmdale.

``We need to be in there fighting to get every alignment through the Antelope Valley,'' Mayor Jim Ledford said. ``Someday they are going to build one of these things.''

Both rail issues were scheduled before the City Council at its 7 p.m. meeting Tuesday night.

The Orange Line Development Authority is conducting initial studies of possible alignments for the northern Los Angeles County portion of the maglev line, all of which include Palmdale. Preliminary cost estimates range from $8.2 million for a route that goes to Los Angeles International Airport to $11.9 million for a route that goes through Union Station in downtown before continuing to LAX.

The next step for the Palmdale-to-Los Angeles segment will be the completion of preliminary engineering and environmental studies, said Al Perdon, the authority's executive director.

``We have met with them (Palmdale officials) on several occasions to talk about what we are doing,'' Perdon said. ``I look forward to hearing what the City Council has to say.''

City staff members have recommended joining the Orange Line Development Authority to ensure that attention is paid to Palmdale during further Orange Line planning.

Other cities in the authority are Vernon, Maywood, Huntington Park, Bell, South Gate, Downey, Paramount, Bellflower, Cerritos and Artesia.

Right now, the only commercial maglev system in the world is in China, which initiated service in December 2002 on a $1.2 billion, 270 mph maglev train linking Shanghai with its new international airport.

The Germans have been testing maglev trains since 1984 on a 19.2-mile track that carries paying passengers.

Maglev train supporters say the system can fit into urban areas more easily than conventional railroads or high-speed trains on steel tracks because maglevs can get by on narrower rights-of-way. They operate on elevated guide ways built over or beside existing railroad tracks or freeways.

The maglev proposal is separate from California's high-speed rail plan, which would use 200-mph trains on conventional steel rails to link Southern California and the Bay Area. A $9 billion ballot measure had been scheduled in 2002 for the November 2004 ballot, but it is not known whether that will go forward in the midst of the state's continued budget shortfall.

The California High-Speed Rail Authority is considering two possible alignments between Bakersfield and Sylmar for the rail system - by Interstate 5 through the western Santa Clarita Valley or through the Antelope Valley and eastern Santa Clarita.

Palmdale officials have lined up consultants to help bolster their claims that an Antelope Valley route would serve the growing population, would not require tunneling and not raise as many environmental concerns as a rail line over the Grapevine.

Palmdale officials say the tunneling work required for the Interstate 5 alignment is much riskier than state officials believe.

The proposed Antelope Valley alignment would follow Highway 58 from Bakersfield to Mojave, then would run south along the Union Pacific railroad tracks through Lancaster, Palmdale and Soledad Canyon.

At the southern end of the Antelope Valley, the route would follow Soledad Canyon Road instead of the Antelope Valley Freeway. State officials determined that the Soledad Canyon route probably would cost less than building a new rail line back and forth across the Antelope Valley Freeway.

Jim Skeen, [phone]

james.skeen(at)dailynews.com