Continuing to chug along down the tracks, on Tuesday the Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension Construction Authority Board of Directors certified the Supplemental Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for the Foothill Extension Pasadena to Azusa. This was an important step to clear the path of any potential roadblocks relative to changes that have taken place since the Final EIR for the project was approved in 2007 and certified. Final design and construction can proceed later this year.
Among the project modifications evaluated in the Supplemental EIR are a 25-acre Maintenance and Operations (M&O) Facility site in the city of Monrovia, new parking locations at the Irwindale and Monrovia stations, reconfiguration of the intersection of Mountain Avenue and Duarte Road and replacement of two existing bridges along the 11.5-mile alignment. The site for the M&O Facility is in the city of Monrovia, and bounded by Evergreen Avenue on the north, Shamrock Avenue on the east, California Avenue on the west and Duarte Road on the south. “It is especially important that we identified and environmentally cleared a site for the M&O Facility, a critical path item in the funding agreement between the Construction Authority and Metro,” said Habib F. Balian, CEO of the Construction Authority. These project updates will now be made part of the final project and integrated into an addendum to the Request for Proposals being sent to the three short-listed teams competing for the $450 million Design-Build contract. Proposals are due January 27, and a contract award is anticipated in April 2011. Final design will take approximately 8-9 months, and construction of the project will begin. Completion of the Foothill Extension Pasadena to Azusa is anticipated in late 2014, adding six new stations to the Metro Gold Line light rail line.
Los Angeles County’s Measure R half-cent sales tax increase will fully fund the Foothill Extension Pasadena and Azusa. Additional funding is needed to complete the line’s future planned extensions to Montclair and LA/Ontario International Airport (both extensions are currently under study). Developers are already working on condo and housing projects in Montclair to capitalize on the Gold Line that could open there as soon as 2017.
— By Scott Hettrick