Lawsuit accuses High-Speed Rail of ‘unlawful’ attempt to redo Central Valley station plan

A lawsuit is accusing the California High-Speed Rail Authority of skirting state laws in its intent to build a smaller Merced station in an undeveloped area rather than a massive one in that city’s downtown.

The proposed change, which the rail authority has said could save $1 billion, is part of a plan to cut costs with reduced service in the Central Valley that the agency says could later expand if ridership levels demand it. But to build the Merced station in a different place, the rail authority first needs changes to a state law that requires its construction downtown and with connections to other passenger train systems.

The Community Alliance for a Sustainable Economy, a group that recently sued the rail authority, says the agency has started moving on the relocation despite lacking the needed legislation. The group is also accusing the agency of trying to skip an environmental impact review for the relocation and wants a judge to halt the plan.

“This challenge follows an unlawful pattern of behavior by the HSRA — proposing to relocate the downtown Merced station, then acting as if that move has been approved when it has not,” says the complaint filed Oct. 8 in Sacramento County Superior Court.

Members of two community organizations involved in the plaintiff group — Faith in the Valley and Valley Voices — did not respond to requests for an interview Tuesday. The rail authority declined to respond to the suit’s allegations, citing a policy of not commenting on ongoing litigation.

The agency has faced backlash in Merced since last year, when it published documents that included Central Valley build out scenarios that did not include Merced at all in the project’s initial segment. The rail authority then pitched its station relocation idea in January and has since frustrated local officials who want the agency to face Merced residents and explain it.

The agency has said it needs various changes to the project to finish construction in the Central Valley at a cost of $35.7 billion by 2033. But Merced advocates have argued the plan to relocate their city’s station betrays the state’s promise that the train would help spur economic growth in the region.

CA Rail taking ‘steps’ to station relocation, suit says

The community alliance’s lawsuit alleges the rail authority has tried to skirt a 2022 state law called SB 198 as well as requirements in the California Environmental Quality Act, known as CEQA.

SB 198 defines the Central Valley high-speed rail segment as a 171-mile route from Bakersfield to downtown Merced — with the downtown Merced station including connections to the Amtrak and Altamont Corridor Express passenger train services.

But the lawsuit points out that the rail authority’s board in June approved an official business plan that assumes the agency will relocate Merced’s station from downtown to a rural area a few miles south off Highway 99 and Mission Avenue. That business plan does note that amending SB 198 is necessary to accommodate the new station area.

Then, the lawsuit notes, the rail authority began looking for engineers for civil work — such as structures and guide way — from Madera to Merced while describing that segment as one from Madera County to “just south of Mission Avenue” in solicitation documents. The agency is expected to release separate design solicitation documents specifically for the Merced station in the future.

The lawsuit says the rail authority continued to take steps toward relocating the Merced station last month, when it filed a notice with the state that its “South Merced Station Project” was exempt from an environmental impact review. The Sept. 4 notice from the rail authority said the project was exempt because the proposed new station location is within the “resource study area” of an environmental study done in 2012.

But the lawsuit against the rail authority says the agency never provided any proof of that. A letter to the state dated Oct. 8 — the same day the community alliance sued the rail authority — shows the agency then requested to withdraw the notice.

The agency said in the letter that it was conducting further review, which it described as “a procedural action taken prior to finalizing station locations.”

The lawsuit says the entire situation has undermined “CEQA’s purpose as a tool for government accountability and transparency.”

“The HSRA continues to circumvent the legislative process by taking steps to relocate the station without legislative approval, public debate, or disclosure of impacts or consequences of doing so,” the lawsuit says.