Vallejo project aimed to expand freight rail to Mare Island nears completion

A $9 million traffic bridge over the railway linking Vallejo to the Mare Island industrial area is set to reopen this month, capping a nearly 10-year project to replace a structure last expanded in the 1930s.

Its completion may allow for consistent rail service to factories and other businesses at the formal Naval shipyard, which is a key part of the city of Vallejo’s economic strategy.

“Rail access was one of the areas that made Mare Island attractive to us when we originally moved on the island,” said Michael Bercovich, chief operating officer of Alco Iron & Metal. “It gives us greater flexibility for both incoming and outgoing material. We were disappointed when we could no longer use the rail at our facility a few years ago. We would love to see that change.”

Alco has its main facilities in San Leandro and has operated a scrap metal recycling depot, equipment dismantling, and metal remanufacturing plant at 321 Azuar Drive on Mare Island since 1996.

Bill Kreysler, president of Kreysler & Associates, headquartered in American Canyon, said his company would consider the potential future use of rail for shipping finished products out of Mare Island.

Kreysler and Associates fabricates glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) architectural panels at its state-of-the-art Mare Island factory, including the undulating facade for the new Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles.

Modular home builder Factory_OS responded that it has no plans to ship finished housing by rail because train shipping would require two crane lifts. The first one would be the hoisting of modules onto the train at the factory then back onto a truck at the rail terminus to deliver modules “the last mile” to the housing project site.

In addition, cargo width limits for rail transport do not allow for the company’s standard 16-foot-wide modules, which are permitted for highway shipments by truck.

Factory_OS did say that it would be open to considering rail for inbound shipments to its Mare Island factory of component materials used in its off-site fabrication of housing modules.

Plans began nearly a decade ago

The city’s long-range plans for enhancing rail service to Mare Island have hinged, in part, on expanding horizontal and vertical clearances for trains passing under the Sacramento Street Bridge.

Planning for the project began in 2015 after studies concluded the old bridge did not meet modern seismic structural standards. The studies also found that the bridge deck dimensions and clearances for the rail line beneath the bridge did not comply with current railroad standards. The old bridge, a steel-framed structure topped by a concrete slab, was built in 1913 and widened in the 1930s.

Grant funding for replacing the bridge was approved by Caltrans and the Federal Highway Administration under the Highway Bridge Program, after the agencies determined that the bridge “is significantly important and qualifies under the HBP program Guidelines.” Funding sources for the project include 88.5% federal funds and 11.5% local matching funds.

The city’s approved project budget of $9 million includes the bridge and modifications to the existing bridge approaches at Sacramento, Farragut, Yolo and Illinois Streets, which were needed to meet the new bridge configurations. Street improvements include new storm drainage conduits, sidewalks, curbs, gutters, retaining walls, and ADA-compliant curb aprons and crosswalks.

The Vallejo City Council awarded the contract on Feb 22, 2021, to low bidder Gordon N. Ball Inc., of Alamo in the East Bay. Substrate Inc. of Novato in Marin County provided construction management and structural inspection services under a subcontract with the general contractor.

Discovery: People living beneath the bridge

Construction began in March 2021. The bridge on Sacramento Street between Farragut Avenue and Illinois Street was closed to vehicle traffic in late April 2021, for demolition and removal of the old bridge’s concrete deck and abutments and steel support structures. The bridge remained open to pedestrians, and street access to nearby residences was maintained during construction.

However, the project did not proceed without a couple of bumps in the road. Vallejo made headlines around the world, when utility crews excavating in the Sacramento Street approach to the bridge on March 26, 2021, heard voices underground beneath the utility trench.

Police and fire crews were summoned and discovered two homeless men were living in a 20-foot-long by 3-foot-high cave dug into the soil embankment beneath the bridge.

The story was first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, then was picked up by Bay Area TV stations and the Associated Press and spread around the world on internet news feeds.

According to an NBC Bay Area TV News report, the men told rescuers they had dug the tunnel/cave dwelling with a pick and shovel over a period of nine years. Rescue crews relocated the men to suitable shelter and removed their belongings from the cave before work could proceed.

Excavation crews also soon discovered that the subsoils beneath the bridge and street approaches were unstable, which required over-excavation and import of compactable fill, adding cost and construction time for the replacement bridge.

The project’s original schedule anticipated completion by winter 2021. Structural components, including the bridge span, abutment supports, retaining walls, and deep pile foundations, were finished by mid-December 2021. The bridge was partially reopened to vehicle traffic in January 2022, while construction of bridge abutments, retaining walls, sidewalks, curbs, gutters, and street approaches continued.

The project was declared substantially complete on May 19 upon final paving of the street approaches, and the city reopened the bridge the following weekend to 2 lanes of vehicle traffic in both directions. Final completion is now projected for mid-June.

Vertical clearance from the top of rail to the new bridge support deck and width clearances from the rails to bridge abutments all now conform to the Union Pacific Railroad’s height and width clearances.

If rail service is to come, from whom?

Even with the expanded clearances, however, it is unclear who will provide rail service to Mare Island or when. For several years prior to 2010, the San Francisco Bay Railroad Company (SFBR) delivered goods to and from facilities on the island, including passenger rail cars to be refurbished at the Alstom Transportation facility.

After Lennar Mare Island acquired a large tract of property including rail spurs from the city of Vallejo in 2002, the railroad continued to provide rail service under an agreement with Lennar.

Lennar “discontinued the rail service in March 2008 citing economic difficulties,” according to The Vacaville Reporter on Dec. 13, 2010. When Lennar and the railroad began to negotiate a deal to resume service, a dispute arose over ownership of the tracks on Mare Island.

Both companies had invested in track upgrades, the railroad on the mainland side of the Causeway Bridge and Lennar on Mare Island.

In 2009, the railroad filed a rail carrier application with the federal Surface Transportation Board to provide expanded service to additional industrial users on Mare Island, which the board initially granted, the newspaper reported. Lennar challenged the railroad’s claim to exclusive rights in the Mare Island tracks, and the board reversed its prior approval, citing Lennar’s competing ownership rights.

In December 2010, the railroad announced that it would not challenge the transportation board’s decision and closed down its Vallejo rail service. The city and Lennar announced in early 2011 that Lennar had contracted with the Tri-City & Olympia Railroad Company, based in Richland, Washington, and doing business in California as Mare Island Rail Service. The contract provided for the T&O rail company to resume rail service in Vallejo, including Mare Island.

At the time, Vallejo also granted T&O a 20-year exclusive right to operate on the tracks between Mare Island and the Flosden Yard switchover to tracks operated by California Northern Railroad under a long-term lease with track owner Union Pacific.

The city had filed suit to terminate its agreement with T&O, citing the railroad’s failure to enter into any service agreements with Mare Island industrial tenants other than one continuing agreement with Alstom Transportation, the Vallejo Times-Herald reported March 2, 2013.

The court refused to terminate the 20-year agreement but also ordered T&O to provide more consistent rail service to Alstom, which had entered into a passenger car-refurbishing agreement with Amtrak in reliance on T&O’s delivery of the cars by rail to and from Mare Island.