The Lyons-Dockweiler Link is Dead, isn’t it?

By Jeff — Jeff Wilson

a euphemism is a substitution with an agreeable or less offensive expression in place of one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant to the receiver, or to make it less troublesome for the speaker, as in the case of doublespeak. Wikipedia

That’s the word that came to mind when I read The Signal’s story today on the “postponed” or “paused” Lyons Avenue railroad crossing. The City says money is to blame; they’d rather wait for a developer to contract with the city to fund (in part or whole I suppose) the estimated $7.5 million cost of building a railroad crossing at the eastern end of Lyons Avenue. The purpose of the crossing would be to 1) replace the obsolete and dangerous crossing at 13th Street & Railroad and 2) ultimately link Lyons Avenue to Dockweiler, thus bypassing Placerita Canyon and its fussy homeowners.

But now that link, that crucial piece of infrastructure for Newhall that has been in the planning stages for decades, is “paused.”

Come on, don’t bullshit me. It’s dead isn’t it?

And we all know why it’s dead. It’s dead because the Placerita Homeowners, the most powerful NIMBY special interest group in the SCV with their own sphere of influence, their own special standards district and their own high-powered attorney, thinks that that link will lead to the development of high density housing that threatens their safety and makes it difficult for them to use golf carts in Placerita Canyon.

Indeed, that was the gist of this story on Friday afternoon, when Signal Publisher Ian Lamont teased today’s story for Saturday’s Signal via the Qwik-E email:

This story should have appeared in Saturday’s Signal, and as you can see from the tease above, funding challenges weren’t mentioned as a cause for the “pause” of the Lyons Avenue rail crossing. In fact, the tease all but says the city is killing off the rail crossing “in light of public outcry, primarily from Placerita Cnayon Residents.”

Yet come Monday morning, we learn that it’s actually funding challenges that’s “pausing” the rail crosssing. What changed between 3:02pm on Friday and this morning? Is there another version of this story sitting on a Signal hard drive that didn’t get published?

No surprise that the P-Canyon homeowners are pleased by this development, whatever its cause. Val Thomas tells The Signal that “Our point has really not been to stop the thing [Lyons crossing] but to get the whole picture,” by which she means that, to P-Canyon residents, a Lyons rail crossing necessarily means that 500-700 safety-threatening condos will be built at the entrance to their rural-equestrian paradise.

What she (and The Signal) leave out, however, is that the condos can’t be built now because the existing 13th Street Railroad crossing is totally and completely inadequate. Thus, from the P-Canyon resident’s point of view, if you kill Lyons Avenue crossing, you kill the 500-700 condos.

The City has always rightfully looked at the Lyons crossing on its own, because that’s how it should be looked at. It’s a piece of infrastructure that will lead to a four lane road connecting Old Town Newhall to Sierra Highway. It has nothing to do with Casden’s condos, that’s just the foil the P-Canyon people use to fight progress.

And progress, make no mistake, is what this is about. It’s about building a road that puts traffic into a revitalized Old Town Newhall. A road that would eventually allow Disney Studios at the Ranch workers quick and easy access to businesses in Newhall. It’s like Newhall’s own Cross Valley Connector.

And now it’s dead because of a handful of rich property owners in Placerita Canyon, a group of homeowners who have veto power over just about anything in this part of the SCV. A group of homeowners who practically own us.

They win, we lose.

And the Lyons Crossing is dead but the City doesn’t have the courage to say it.

Comments (15)

cashJune 14, 2010 at 9:51 am

Seems the City has made the right decision. It is about time they stop playing games with taxpayer money.

Spineflower2June 14, 2010 at 9:52 am

Does Frank Ferry now think Val Thomas is an environmental terrorist?

John QJune 15, 2010 at 7:51 pm

Ferry is just feeding bee vomit to his campaign donors.

Natalie EverettJune 14, 2010 at 10:40 am

“Is there another version of this story sitting on a Signal hard drive that didn’t get published?” Answer: Yes, the rough draft. This story, as with all the others, was edited for clarity and length. My guess is that the bit about public outcry was omitted for clarity. I didn’t expound on the outcry part since Thomas was cautious with her remarks and Brotzman really talked up the funding bit, and that may be why the mention of it was removed altogether. But, we’ll be following it, don’t you worry. Best, Natalie neverett@the-signal.com

navigatorJune 14, 2010 at 11:05 am

“And progress, make no mistake, is what this is about. It’s about building a road that puts traffic into a revitalized Old Town Newhall.” I see it as another way to circumvent half the businesses in Old Town Newhall and get to the other end of Railroad Ave 2 minutes faster.

ToddJune 14, 2010 at 12:30 pm

I can see it both ways. My best friend is the chief transportation planner for Burbank, that has 3 grade crossings to contend with. The amount of coordination and fiscal burden that is involved in separating a grade crossing is astronomical. $35-40 Million is what we’re spending here. Thats not at-grade, but its split… which is the safer way.)

CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 6:10 pm

As an FYI, the average settlement award to the family of a dead Metrolink passenger is $8 Million. Passengers who survive, and get seriously maimed settle for about $6 Million. The “lawyers’ bonanza” are the paralyzed brain dead passengers from the Chatsworth crash, whose cases will settle for $15 to $20 Million, given lifetime care costs. So, at $40 Million for a grade separated crossing, that’s 5 truly dead people, or 2.5 paralyzed brain dead people. It doesn’t matter if they are passengers or innocent people sitting in cars at the at-grade crossing and squashed in a derailment. There are also potential victims in buildings close to the tracks, who are hit by boomeranging derailed train cars. That’s why grade separated crossings are considered so important at high car-volume crossings. That’s why PUC and Metrolink want they. Emotionally, their staff feel like there’s too much blood on their hands already. The plaintiffs’ lawyers in the Metrolink crash cases have been patiently waiting for a “good” case where a land owner can be proven to be the moving force behind a bad track design, or a bad track/street intersection design. If the Alan Casden wants to build his project, without a grade separated crossing, he better buy a boat load of long term liability insurance, not from AIG, because SCRRA et al, PUC and the engineers designing the crossing will be saving every shred of documents, paper or electronic, showing any influence by him or his company, investors or lenders on the design decision. Back when I was in law school, when my torts class would discuss personal injury cases where rich land owners got nailed, the guys in class would pound on their desks and howl like wolves. And those kids were mere wolf pups compared with the sharp fanged wolves in the train crash plaintiffs bar, God love them.

CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 2:26 pm

Jeff, I “have no skin in this game”, except for a hope that all railroad crossings in Santa Clarita, new and old, would be designed to meet the National Transportation Safety Board’s safe road/track intersection requirements, so that people are not killed and maimed when a train derails at an intersection. However, because I’ve been down this track before, someone was kind enough to send me a copy of the two letters to City Staff sent by a private attorney, which showed that the City Staff was stonewalling California Public Records Act requests so that information derived from them could not be used in the hearing on the Environmental Impact Report for the crossing. The lawyer also wrote a detailed commentary on how the City Staff was violating the California Environmental Quality Act by “piecemealing” the environmental review, required by statute and case law, thereby violating long established California law that a city or county has to review a whole project simultaneously. Then there was the problem that the engineering staff of the California Public Utilities Commission had told the City Staff that the PUC staff would object to the building of the Lyons Avenue crossing if it was built as an “at grade crossing”…they want a grade separated crossing with a bridge for cars or for the train. Then there was that letter from Mr. Sokol, who is head of Metrolink’s Safety Division. Mr. Sokol told the City Staff that Metrolink owns the land which contains the tracks, and there could be no crossing at Lyons Avenue unless he and the Metrolink Board were happy. Jeff, I will email you the letter to the City Staff, from the private attorney, so that you can post it if you want…and let everyone decide if law or politics or a desire not to comply with the California Public Records Act was the cause for temporary withdrawal of this project. Having read at least 100 of these sorts of letters in my life, and having written a few myself, the bottom line on the withdrawal of this project was that City Staff was trying to do a “fast and dirty” Environmental Impact Statement for just this roughly 750′ X 750′ piece of land, because they thought it would get them through the Metrolink and PUC process faster. I have been saying, since 2002, that the City Staff is grotesquely incompetent and/or corrupt. I will never forget the FACT that after City Attorney Carl Newton signed a stipulation that he would produce City Manager George Caravalho for a deposition at a specific date, time and location, Mr. Caravalho fled to Indonesia rather than be deposed. It must be remembered that Lisa Hardy Webber was trained by George Caravalho, and so was Ken Pulskamp. Enough said.

gregJune 14, 2010 at 2:45 pm

Costal Sage: One inaccuracy in your post. Metrolink does not own any right-of-way. Metro owns the right-of-way and Metrolink has an agreement to use that right-of-way.

ToddJune 14, 2010 at 3:04 pm

Depends on what particular stretch of track you’re on. AFAIK… SCRRA (Metrolink’s acutal legal name) owns the entirety of the Antelope Valley Line north of Burbank. But its been a while.

gregJune 14, 2010 at 3:41 pm

My bad…It is owned by Metrolink at that location.

CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 3:41 pm

If Jeff posts the letter from “the high priced attorney” all of us will see the letter from Mr. Sokok, on Metrolink stationery, saying that Metrolink owns the land where the Lyons Avenue crossing would be built. Obviously, none of us have done a title search, but I agree with Todd that Metrolink’s ownership and/or “lease” or right of way is a patch work throughout Southern California

ToddJune 14, 2010 at 5:00 pm

OK… quick look through the records and it looks like MTA (Metro) is in fact the owner here. A little clarification from my friend…. SCRRA, of which Metro is a “member agency” and could be considered a pseudo owner of SCRRA, is the operator of it. SCRRA, as the operating agent, would do the bulk of the negotiations over the parcel anyway, and then Metro would have to sign off on it all, since SCRRA does the bulk of the operations on the line. (I’d be willing to bet that Union Pacific would also have some say in it to, since they are also leasing the line too.) But absolutely, its a patchwork. For example, the Ventura County line that runs through Burbank is placed on two separate parcels… one owned by Metro, the other by UP.

CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 8:34 pm

Todd and Greg: I wish you could see the very precise, cogent comments made by Sokol and the civil engineer from PUC, which are attached to that lawyer letter sent to the City Staff, which I forwarded to Jeff. I would never have thought of the risk of a derailing, boomeranging train car smashing into passengers at the Newhall Station platform if not for those letters. Having stood on that platform many mornings, the thought of getting squashed by a loose, careening train car from a nearby crossing derailment was not in my contemplation. Scary. Like a very graphic disaster movie. The comments in Sokol’s and the PUC’s letters simply prove the City Staff know absolutely nothing about trains, let alone what happens in major train derailments.

SCV SageJune 16, 2010 at 2:31 pm

City Staff know less than you think. There is also no “institutional memory” as many of us have been here MUCH longer than they have had their jobs. They are also immune from the many incompetent and dangerous decisions they routinely foist on City Neighborhoods, i.e. Benz Road comes to mind. Placerita Canyon merely wants to have development that is in keeping with current zoning; or if the zoning is changed — for any development to be consistent with the rural, equestrian community that is now there and protected under the City’s General Plan in its Special Standards District. An analogy would that that what is happening is that the City planners are trying to bring and build the airport next to the existing neighborhood — which is what happened with Robinson Ranch Golf Course in Sand Canyon. The City ignores its own rules, zoning and protect when it suits the perceived economic interests. They talk about “mitigation” through conditions of approval — but routinely ignore flagrant violations of those conditions once the project is approved and built. City staff, when a Metrolink station was proposed in Newhall in the 1990s (Caravalho did not want it there because he wanted it in Porta Bella/Bermite and for that development to be rubber stamped and built despite the toxic issues) actually told us that a rail station could not be built there (there was one there in the 1800s) because it was “too steep” and the “train wouldn’t be able to stop”. I am not making any of this up. Face it the City staff is what it is and we are still paying the price for it and our supposed “leaders”. $20 million liability now because Caravalho wanted Golden Valley to go across Porta Bella, etc., etc.

cashJune 14, 2010 at 9:51 am
Seems the City has made the right decision. It is about time they stop playing games with taxpayer money.
Spineflower2June 14, 2010 at 9:52 am
Does Frank Ferry now think Val Thomas is an environmental terrorist?
John QJune 15, 2010 at 7:51 pm
Ferry is just feeding bee vomit to his campaign donors.
Natalie EverettJune 14, 2010 at 10:40 am
“Is there another version of this story sitting on a Signal hard drive that didn’t get published?” Answer: Yes, the rough draft. This story, as with all the others, was edited for clarity and length. My guess is that the bit about public outcry was omitted for clarity. I didn’t expound on the outcry part since Thomas was cautious with her remarks and Brotzman really talked up the funding bit, and that may be why the mention of it was removed altogether. But, we’ll be following it, don’t you worry. Best, Natalie neverett@the-signal.com
navigatorJune 14, 2010 at 11:05 am
“And progress, make no mistake, is what this is about. It’s about building a road that puts traffic into a revitalized Old Town Newhall.” I see it as another way to circumvent half the businesses in Old Town Newhall and get to the other end of Railroad Ave 2 minutes faster.
ToddJune 14, 2010 at 12:30 pm
I can see it both ways. My best friend is the chief transportation planner for Burbank, that has 3 grade crossings to contend with. The amount of coordination and fiscal burden that is involved in separating a grade crossing is astronomical. $35-40 Million is what we’re spending here. Thats not at-grade, but its split… which is the safer way.)
CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 6:10 pm
As an FYI, the average settlement award to the family of a dead Metrolink passenger is $8 Million. Passengers who survive, and get seriously maimed settle for about $6 Million. The “lawyers’ bonanza” are the paralyzed brain dead passengers from the Chatsworth crash, whose cases will settle for $15 to $20 Million, given lifetime care costs. So, at $40 Million for a grade separated crossing, that’s 5 truly dead people, or 2.5 paralyzed brain dead people. It doesn’t matter if they are passengers or innocent people sitting in cars at the at-grade crossing and squashed in a derailment. There are also potential victims in buildings close to the tracks, who are hit by boomeranging derailed train cars. That’s why grade separated crossings are considered so important at high car-volume crossings. That’s why PUC and Metrolink want they. Emotionally, their staff feel like there’s too much blood on their hands already. The plaintiffs’ lawyers in the Metrolink crash cases have been patiently waiting for a “good” case where a land owner can be proven to be the moving force behind a bad track design, or a bad track/street intersection design. If the Alan Casden wants to build his project, without a grade separated crossing, he better buy a boat load of long term liability insurance, not from AIG, because SCRRA et al, PUC and the engineers designing the crossing will be saving every shred of documents, paper or electronic, showing any influence by him or his company, investors or lenders on the design decision. Back when I was in law school, when my torts class would discuss personal injury cases where rich land owners got nailed, the guys in class would pound on their desks and howl like wolves. And those kids were mere wolf pups compared with the sharp fanged wolves in the train crash plaintiffs bar, God love them.
CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 2:26 pm
Jeff, I “have no skin in this game”, except for a hope that all railroad crossings in Santa Clarita, new and old, would be designed to meet the National Transportation Safety Board’s safe road/track intersection requirements, so that people are not killed and maimed when a train derails at an intersection. However, because I’ve been down this track before, someone was kind enough to send me a copy of the two letters to City Staff sent by a private attorney, which showed that the City Staff was stonewalling California Public Records Act requests so that information derived from them could not be used in the hearing on the Environmental Impact Report for the crossing. The lawyer also wrote a detailed commentary on how the City Staff was violating the California Environmental Quality Act by “piecemealing” the environmental review, required by statute and case law, thereby violating long established California law that a city or county has to review a whole project simultaneously. Then there was the problem that the engineering staff of the California Public Utilities Commission had told the City Staff that the PUC staff would object to the building of the Lyons Avenue crossing if it was built as an “at grade crossing”…they want a grade separated crossing with a bridge for cars or for the train. Then there was that letter from Mr. Sokol, who is head of Metrolink’s Safety Division. Mr. Sokol told the City Staff that Metrolink owns the land which contains the tracks, and there could be no crossing at Lyons Avenue unless he and the Metrolink Board were happy. Jeff, I will email you the letter to the City Staff, from the private attorney, so that you can post it if you want…and let everyone decide if law or politics or a desire not to comply with the California Public Records Act was the cause for temporary withdrawal of this project. Having read at least 100 of these sorts of letters in my life, and having written a few myself, the bottom line on the withdrawal of this project was that City Staff was trying to do a “fast and dirty” Environmental Impact Statement for just this roughly 750′ X 750′ piece of land, because they thought it would get them through the Metrolink and PUC process faster. I have been saying, since 2002, that the City Staff is grotesquely incompetent and/or corrupt. I will never forget the FACT that after City Attorney Carl Newton signed a stipulation that he would produce City Manager George Caravalho for a deposition at a specific date, time and location, Mr. Caravalho fled to Indonesia rather than be deposed. It must be remembered that Lisa Hardy Webber was trained by George Caravalho, and so was Ken Pulskamp. Enough said.
gregJune 14, 2010 at 2:45 pm
Costal Sage: One inaccuracy in your post. Metrolink does not own any right-of-way. Metro owns the right-of-way and Metrolink has an agreement to use that right-of-way.
ToddJune 14, 2010 at 3:04 pm
Depends on what particular stretch of track you’re on. AFAIK… SCRRA (Metrolink’s acutal legal name) owns the entirety of the Antelope Valley Line north of Burbank. But its been a while.
gregJune 14, 2010 at 3:41 pm
My bad…It is owned by Metrolink at that location.
CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 3:41 pm
If Jeff posts the letter from “the high priced attorney” all of us will see the letter from Mr. Sokok, on Metrolink stationery, saying that Metrolink owns the land where the Lyons Avenue crossing would be built. Obviously, none of us have done a title search, but I agree with Todd that Metrolink’s ownership and/or “lease” or right of way is a patch work throughout Southern California
ToddJune 14, 2010 at 5:00 pm
OK… quick look through the records and it looks like MTA (Metro) is in fact the owner here. A little clarification from my friend…. SCRRA, of which Metro is a “member agency” and could be considered a pseudo owner of SCRRA, is the operator of it. SCRRA, as the operating agent, would do the bulk of the negotiations over the parcel anyway, and then Metro would have to sign off on it all, since SCRRA does the bulk of the operations on the line. (I’d be willing to bet that Union Pacific would also have some say in it to, since they are also leasing the line too.) But absolutely, its a patchwork. For example, the Ventura County line that runs through Burbank is placed on two separate parcels… one owned by Metro, the other by UP.
CoastalSageJune 14, 2010 at 8:34 pm
Todd and Greg: I wish you could see the very precise, cogent comments made by Sokol and the civil engineer from PUC, which are attached to that lawyer letter sent to the City Staff, which I forwarded to Jeff. I would never have thought of the risk of a derailing, boomeranging train car smashing into passengers at the Newhall Station platform if not for those letters. Having stood on that platform many mornings, the thought of getting squashed by a loose, careening train car from a nearby crossing derailment was not in my contemplation. Scary. Like a very graphic disaster movie. The comments in Sokol’s and the PUC’s letters simply prove the City Staff know absolutely nothing about trains, let alone what happens in major train derailments.
SCV SageJune 16, 2010 at 2:31 pm
City Staff know less than you think. There is also no “institutional memory” as many of us have been here MUCH longer than they have had their jobs. They are also immune from the many incompetent and dangerous decisions they routinely foist on City Neighborhoods, i.e. Benz Road comes to mind. Placerita Canyon merely wants to have development that is in keeping with current zoning; or if the zoning is changed — for any development to be consistent with the rural, equestrian community that is now there and protected under the City’s General Plan in its Special Standards District. An analogy would that that what is happening is that the City planners are trying to bring and build the airport next to the existing neighborhood — which is what happened with Robinson Ranch Golf Course in Sand Canyon. The City ignores its own rules, zoning and protect when it suits the perceived economic interests. They talk about “mitigation” through conditions of approval — but routinely ignore flagrant violations of those conditions once the project is approved and built. City staff, when a Metrolink station was proposed in Newhall in the 1990s (Caravalho did not want it there because he wanted it in Porta Bella/Bermite and for that development to be rubber stamped and built despite the toxic issues) actually told us that a rail station could not be built there (there was one there in the 1800s) because it was “too steep” and the “train wouldn’t be able to stop”. I am not making any of this up. Face it the City staff is what it is and we are still paying the price for it and our supposed “leaders”. $20 million liability now because Caravalho wanted Golden Valley to go across Porta Bella, etc., etc.