The Santa Cruz Branch Rail Line runs by Twin Lakes State Park in Live Oak, part of Segment 9 of the planned Coastal Rail Trail. (Nik Altenberg — Santa Cruz Local file)
Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission meeting
- 9 a.m. Thursday, Sept. 4 at 275 Main St., Fourth Floor, Watsonville, on Zoom and by phone at 312-626-6799, meeting ID 895 9717 3447.
- To comment, email [email protected].
SANTA CRUZ >> A budget shortfall to build part of the Coastal Rail Trail between Santa Cruz and Aptos has grown so large, the project may be delayed or downsized. This comes after a yearlong redesign meant to shave down the shortfall and leave room for a passenger train, which instead left costs higher.
The Coastal Rail Trail is a planned 32-mile walking and biking path divided into 20 segments, mainly along the Santa Cruz Branch Rail Line.
In April 2024, the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors considered designs for trail segments 8 to 11, from Pacific Avenue in Santa Cruz to State Park Drive in Aptos. Faced with a $43 million shortfall, they voted for a partial redesign to cut costs. The same month, the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission ordered further changes to save space for a proposed passenger train line next to the path.
Inflation and supply chain issues, among other factors, have added up to more than the redesign savings. The shortfall is now $72 million — which may leave no options but to delay construction for part of the trail or save costs by routing some of it along streets.
The extra year of design work “did not have the cost savings results that we were all hoping it would,” said Rob Tidmore, a Santa Cruz County planner. “We’re at a challenging point in these projects.”
The Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission on Thursday will consider starting a process to issue bonds to cover anticipated overruns on Highway 1 expansion and Segment 5 of the rail trail from Natural Bridges State Park to Davenport. The bonds would be repaid with Measure D sales tax money.
Measure D sales tax money earmarked for “active transportation,” along with state and federal grants, has funded nearly all rail trail construction — but it isn’t enough to cover bonds for trail segments 8 to 11.
In a report last week, transportation commission staff said they don’t expect more grant opportunities before construction is set to begin in 2027.
Without enough money, the trail could be delayed or scaled down. That could lead to the California Transportation Commission clawing back some of the money it granted for the project, staff wrote in the report.
Passenger rail design changes
Part of the cost overrun is due to changing designs to accommodate passenger rail, said Santa Cruz Transportation Manager Matt Starkey. When engineers started designing the trail in 2022, they used standards from the 2013 Monterey Bay Sanctuary Scenic Trail Master Plan, which called for an 8.5-foot setback between the center of the rail line and the trail.
By early 2024, city staff had started detailed designs on part of the trail, Starkey said. But in April 2024, transportation commission staff told the commissioners that state authorities would require a larger, 12-foot setback for passenger rail, and recommended partial redesigns.
The new standards significantly delayed trail construction, Starkey said. “I don’t think we’d be done now, but we’d be closer to starting,” he said.
Tidmore said he agreed that the changing standards “played a role” in the lengthy redesign process, but it was hard to pinpoint the impact. The attempted cost-saving measures also played a role, he said.
In the past five years, construction costs have ballooned across the country, in part due to inflation, supply chain issues and uncertainty around tariffs, Tidmore said.
A $68 million state grant awarded in 2022, along with some local money, was meant to pay for trail segments 8 to 11. Now, the cost for the four segments is estimated at $215 million.
“Since then, construction prices have just gone nuts,” Starkey said. “We won a giant grant, which is awesome, but we kept losing value in a way that was really hard to predict at the time.”
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Jesse Kathan is a staff reporter for Santa Cruz Local. They hold a master's degree in science communications from UC Santa Cruz.
