Much of the trolley system’s ridership is comprised of people with no feasible alternative for their daily commutes. “Those employment centers draw employment that ranges from a researcher doing biomedical or biotech research to a professor at the university to a janitor that’s working at those places to the doctors that work in the hospitals,” he added. “The line just has a lot of potential to attract new riders,” said Gary Gallegos, executive director of the San Diego Association of Governments, the agency that controls regional transportation spending. To compete with the often-congested Interstate 5, the extension will create a route along the highway to an area that includes UC San Diego, the VA Medical Center and a few hospitals. The project extends the Blue Line, which runs between the border neighborhood of San Ysidro and America Plaza in downtown San Diego. “Once we go up into the La Jolla, UC area, that’s going into a slightly different market.” “A lot of where we’ve been servicing are the population areas with the lower socioeconomic demographic,” he added.
“It’s going to be going into a market that hasn’t seen this before, and when they see full trolleys going up there every morning, I think it’s going to be really significant,” said Paul Jablonski, chief operating officer for the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System. Still, transportation officials insist that given time, the new line - which will consist of nine stops serving Bay Park, Clairemont, Mission Beach, Pacific Beach and terminate at Westfield UTC - can energize support for public transit among those who currently drive. Over recent years, pockets of opposition have voiced fears that the project would negatively impact such things as traffic, water quality and open space. The trolley project also has met with widespread resistance from residents along the corridor. It’s projected that many of the trolley line’s riders will simply migrate from other forms of public transit, such as commuter rail or bus, and that any substantial gains in new ridership will take decades to achieve. However, this outlook is far from a guaranteed payoff for the roughly $2.1 billion undertaking, which is being described as the largest of its kind in the region’s history.
As the region readies for construction of a trolley line nearly 30 years in the making, officials are touting the project as a potential game-changer for the way residents view public transportation.īy 2021, the 11-mile Mid-Coast Trolley extension is expected to connect downtown San Diego to the sprawling job center that is University City - theoretically encouraging walkable, urban development along the route while enticing new riders onto the rail instead of driving.
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