LAKE COUNTY ? Throughout the history of Lake County, one element that has always been missing that has figured prominently in the annals of many other towns in the West is a railroad. If Al Bulf has anything to say about this subject, and he did recently at the Lakeport Rotary Club meeting, Lake County may get a railroad yet. In fact, if his railway dream comes true, there will be a light rail track on Main Street in Lakeport.
Bulf said that the major factor that a railroad to Lake County has going for it is the millions of people living in the Bay Area. He thinks that if the rail line could connect to the Vallejo ferry piers, it could bring lots of people to Lake County.
Al Bulf retired after a career with the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. During his working days, he was involved in a number of rail projects, such as Sacramento Light Rail, the Capitol Corridor and ACE Train. Bulf said that even in retirement he does not want to see his experience become wasted. He said, “It just makes so much sense to help enhance the beauty of this area, to be part of the dream of bringing rail into Clear Lake ?”
Bulf believes that the best way to create the railway is to handle it through a private investment program, rather than to wait for government entities to do it. He mentioned that it was private investment, not the government that was responsible for building the original rail line system across America.
According to Bulf, the first step for Lake County to take is to form a rail authority in conjunction with Napa and Solano Counties. The rail authority members would be made up of interested private citizens.
Bulf indicated that there are a number of options for the pathway of the rail line to take. In one possibility, he said that he could envision the first stop being the Twin Pine Casino, just outside of Middletown. Eventually, he said he would like to see the building of a light-rail system that would completely circle Clear Lake.
As for regular users, he said that current statistics already show that there are 4,000 people per day commuting into the Bay Area, for jobs, from the Clear Lake basin. By converting a good number of those commuters away from their cars and the bumper-to-bumper, long commute, the rail system could be successful.
Bulf was not shy to point out that his proposed rail system will not be cheap. He said, “I estimate that it will take $1.5 billion to get the basic system to Lakeport.”
That would include the building of the track, which would include some expensive tunneling in several areas, and the electric engines that he proposes to use, instead of diesel engines.
Bulf told the story of how the Tahoe area refused to act on a rail system about 30 years ago when they had the opportunity.
Bickering between California and Nevada contingencies caused the project to break down. Now, Tahoe would like the International Olympic Committee to consider it as a site for a future winter Olympic Games.
Unfortunately, the Tahoe group has been told that without mass public transportation into and out of the area, they would not even be considered.
Bulf said that America is really behind many other countries when it comes to the usage of rail for mass transportation. He mentioned that China, India and European countries are far superior to the United States in this area. China alone is spending $385 billion on new light-rail projects.
Bulf thinks the time is finally right for rail to come to Lake County. He believes that with the use of private enterprise for the system, and private enterprise stations and station merchants, the system will be self-supportive and not have to rely on any taxpayer funds. Rail authority members would be made up of interested private citizens.
