The California Rail 2020 Conference,
TRAC’s Annual Meeting is slated
for Saturday, October 15, 2005 at the Burbank Airport Hilton, within
sight of the Airport and Amtrak station. Come talk trains at our Friday
Oct. 14th welcoming reception at 8:00 PM.
The conference continues all day
Saturday 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM.
Registration begins at 8:00 AM. Price includes luncheon.
KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Gil Carmichael
Senior Chairman, Intermodal
Transportation Institute, University of
Denver:
THE CASE FOR INTERSTATE II:
INTERSTATES OF STEEL
Gil Carmichael was head of the
Federal Railway Administration
(1989-1993) under Bush I; he was also chair of the Amtrak Reform
Council. As recently as 1987 he promoted a 1000-mile highway expansion
in his native Mississippi. Today he is promoting Interstate II, a
federal investment in America's rail infrastructure equivalent to the
1950's mandate that built the asphalt system. He came to believe in
rail as our transportation future because, he says, ". . . there are no
alternatives . . . conventional solutions built around individual modes
simply cannot cope with the growth . . . " Mr. Carmichael makes the
case for putting the needed investment into a national system of newly
modern railway routes capable of handling 21st Century transportation
needs--both freight and passenger. He compares the opportunity with the
massive constraints facing highway and airport expansion.
Richard Dial, IBI Group
Over the past three years, Richard
has been actively involved in rail
planning for the LOSSAN (Los Angeles San Diego San Luis
Obispo) rail corridor on behalf of Caltrans Division of Rail, the
California High Speed Rail Authority, and the LOSSAN Rail Corridor
Agency.
Projects on which Richard is working
include the LOSSAN Proposed Rail
Improvements Project as Deputy Project Manager, the LOSSAN South
Strategic Plan as Task Leader, the LOSSAN North Strategic Plan as
Project Manager and recently as the Santa Paula Branch Line Rail
Project as Project Manager. He will be speaking on the future of the
entire LOSSAN Corridor, and will also present some of the possibilities
being discussed on the future of the Santa Paula Branch.
- - -
FEATURED SPEAKERS
• Gerald Francis, GM of Rail
Operations, LAC-MTA
CALIFORNIA'S
BIGGEST FLEET GROWS SOME MORE
Gerald will speak to us about the new
light-rail cars capable of
operating on all three LA light rail lines and what it took to create
these cars; he will update us on the signaling upgrades on the Gold
Line; and of course he'll fill us in about planned upgrades and
expansions in rail service throughout LA County.
- - -
• Pat Montague, Board of Directors,
NARP Region 12
BUILDING A DYNAMIC
RAIL PASSENGER MOVEMENT
Pat will give us an overview of the
year's contentious fight over
Amtrak funding and how it raised awareness of the importance of a
national rail passenger network; he will then update us on the current
status of this year's progress; he will also speak on the importance of
the relationships between NARP and its state affiliate organizations,
and specifically with TRAC.
- - -
• Wayne S. Williams, Principal, WS
Williams & Associates, Rail
Transportation Consultants
DESIGNING MODERN
RAIL FOR THE NEW MILLENIUM
Wayne will illustrate and expand upon
his article on how America came
to be saddled with the current FRA rail safety regulations (see page 6)
and show us some examples of the modern rail technologies including
DMUs and integrated sets possible outside current, artificial FRA
constraints.
- - -
FEATURED PANEL:
PUBLIC NEEDS
VERSUS Crowded Tracks
• Hon. Hannah-Beth Jackson,
former State Assembly Member
• Richard Tolmach, President of TRAC
• Lea Simpson, Capital Projects
North, Caltrans Div. of Rail
• Metrolink
Chief Executive Officer David Solow
This panel will examine California's
needs for more peak hour service
for commuters and ways we can squeeze more capacity out of tracks and
existing sets of rail equipment.
Hannah-Beth is active in COAST, a
Santa Barbara-based group advocating
commuter rail alternatives to Route 101 widening. Linda has led the
planned expansion of track capacity in San Diego County for SANDAG. Lea
is Caltrans new capital projects manager for the san Joaquin. Richard
was author of the piece in July's Rail News advocating a set of hourly
headway services for Southern California.
