02/14/07

Total For All METROLINK Wyes Costs Less Than $2 Million 

Only one ‘wye’ is needed at the end of each of the 7 METROLINK lines (one already exists at the LA Union Station - - it surrounds the Mission Tower).  Here are total costs for a Wye to be located at any of the scores of existing industrial siding tracks, many of which are near METROLINK stations. 

1.      Track cost:  At every industrial track existing from a main line, two “legs” (sides) of the wye already exist.  Needed is less than 500 feet of track for the 3^rd “leg” of the wye.  Rail contractors turnkey prices are currently between $125 and $130 a foot for 136# track (the same size as at the Glendale wreck site) so the TOTAL track cost is $65,000 per wye, installed and ready to go. 

  2.      Switches cost:  Each Wye also needs 3 switches, one of which already exists going onto every industrial siding track.  Two more are needed.  Brand new switches of that size cost about $68,000 each, so the TOTAL switches cost is 2 x $68k - $136k.  METROLINK should get a volume discount and may have its own unused switches it could utilize. 

  3.      Total cost for each WYE is therefore $201,000 ($65k + $136k) plus the cost of a triangle piece of land less than 120 feet long on the longest side and immediately adjacent to the industrial siding near the end of each line which is chosen for the wye (because there are lots of such industrial sidings, the industrial land price will be bided lower so METROLINK is not “held up” on the cost of such a small piece of land).  See the aerial view of the land near Moorpark above:  it is hardly downtown Beverly Hills! 

  4.      To construct 7 wyes, the cost for being able to wye ALL METROLINK trains so the heavy locomotive will ALWAYS be at the front end, pulling the commuter cars, knocking off the tracks any obstructions it encounters and providing a 50 foot protective cushion totals $1,050,000 plus the cost of small, triangular pieces of land if METROLINK/MTA does not already own the land by the chosen industrial siding. 

  5.      There will also be some small adjustments made in train schedules for the less than 15 minutes required to wye each train at each end of its run.  Hardly a large price to save compared to the loss of 16 lives and hundreds of injuries to METROLINK commuters since 2002.