OC Streetcar Reaches Construction Milestone

Written by Marybeth Luczak, Executive Editor
This artist rendering shows the concept for the OC Streetcar LRVs that will run through Santa Ana and Garden Grove, Calif. (Photo Courtesy OCTA)

This artist rendering shows the concept for the OC Streetcar LRVs that will run through Santa Ana and Garden Grove, Calif. (Photo Courtesy OCTA)

Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA) is one step closer to taking delivery of the Siemens light rail vehicles that will run through Santa Ana and Garden Grove, Calif., when the 4.15-mile OC Streetcar system debuts in 2024.

The frame for a new LRV maintenance and storage facility is now in place, according to a May 11 OCTA report. Several staff members from OCTA and contractor The Walsh Group signed the final beam that was then lifted to the top of the building along with an American flag and a tree (a construction tradition) and secured on May 10.

Construction crew members attach the final steel beam on the OC Streetcar’s Maintenance and Storage Facility on Tuesday, May 10. The facility is where the streetcar vehicles will be housed and maintained. (Caption and Photograph Courtesy of OCTA)

The Santa Ana facility will be used to store, wash and maintain the eight S70 low-floor LRVs that Siemens is supplying under a $51.5 million contract awarded in March 2018. Delivery of the first vehicles is expected in 2023, with testing to begin shortly thereafter, according to OCTA.

The LRVs will carry riders between the Santa Ana Regional Transportation Center (SARTC) and a new transit hub at Harbor Boulevard and Westminster Avenue in Garden Grove, running along Santa Ana Boulevard, Fourth Street and the Pacific Electric right-of-way, and connecting with OCTA bus routes as well as Amtrak and Metrolink commuter rail (see map below).

Six LRVs—with two spares that can be rotated into the system as needed—will operate daily, making stops at 10 locations in each direction every 10 to 15 minutes.

Rail and station construction for the $509.54 million OC Streetcar project also continues, OCTA said, “including in downtown Santa Ana, where crews are working on an expedited schedule and OCTA is working with the city of Santa Ana to minimize the effects of construction on local businesses.” (See schedule below.)

Work began Nov. 30, 2018, the same day the Federal Transit Administration signed a full-funding grant agreement.

Funding for the project is coming from federal ($280.10 million), state ($25.58 million), and local ($203.86 million) sources.

Tags: , , , , ,