Please only support a rail/trail solution. MCOG needs to engage with the GRT organization because private citizens are blocked out of their meetings due to their actions. They invite their legal counsel and therefore "close the session" and we're not able to follow the forward progress. Mendocino County needs a rail/trail solution to benefit our underserved community. Our agricultural land along the trail will become uninsurable if there is a trail only option. The cost of $75M to fix the tunnel and upgrade the rail to make the corridor usable from Cloverdale to Willits is necessary expense to not only benefit all the stakeholders and community members. We need to an option for transporting our agricultural goods in addition to allowing bike and foot traffic. Rail banking needs to be stopped because this process will doom any future rail company from operating on this corridor. the GRT plans on selling the steel rails to pay for the trail to be built. We need to offset our carbon emissions with rail transport of our goods and it would also greatly benefit tourism if a train would be able to transport tourist from the Bay Area to our community and back. We don't have adequate overnight accommodations for the increased tourism demand, but we could handle the influx of visitors with day-use on the train line. The train would have insurance and maintenance dollars for both the rail and the trail which would ensure the continuity of the project for decades in the future. A rail/trail line would go a long way to help address the State strategy to meet the carbon reduction goals and to ensure our underserved county's transportation needs are being addressed.
Please only support a rail/trail solution. MCOG needs to engage with the GRT organization because private citizens are blocked out of their meetings due to their actions. They invite their legal counsel and therefore "close the session" and we're not able to follow the forward progress. Mendocino County needs a rail/trail solution to benefit our underserved community. Our agricultural land along the trail will become uninsurable if there is a trail only option. The cost of $75M to fix the tunnel and upgrade the rail to make the corridor usable from Cloverdale to Willits is necessary expense to not only benefit all the stakeholders and community members. We need to an option for transporting our agricultural goods in addition to allowing bike and foot traffic. Rail banking needs to be stopped because this process will doom any future rail company from operating on this corridor. the GRT plans on selling the steel rails to pay for the trail to be built. We need to offset our carbon emissions with rail transport of our goods and it would also greatly benefit tourism if a train would be able to transport tourist from the Bay Area to our community and back. We don't have adequate overnight accommodations for the increased tourism demand, but we could handle the influx of visitors with day-use on the train line. The train would have insurance and maintenance dollars for both the rail and the trail which would ensure the continuity of the project for decades in the future. A rail/trail line would go a long way to help address the State strategy to meet the carbon reduction goals and to ensure our underserved county's transportation needs are being addressed.