Oceanside’s beachfront downtown is booming with restaurants, shops and new hotels. There is also the train.
Passenger and freight trains pull into the downtown Oceanside station around the clock. A horn blast usually signals their arrival.
A new SpringHill Suites hotel sits next to the tracks. The Marriott hotel’s general manager, Kathleen Maola, said train noise does not sit well with some visitors.
“For people who can sleep through anything, they sleep through the train and it really doesn’t bother them. But we also have a lot of light sleepers,” Maola said. “They’re not getting a good night’s sleep. It just puts a damper on their whole vacation experience.”
It’s not only hotel guests who are complaining. Oceanside Mayor Jim Wood said he has heard noise complaints from long-stay vacation renters and residents.
“I truly believe that this is one of our priorities because — besides being a military town — we’re a tourist town,” Wood said. “We get complaints from all the surrounding hotels and some of the vacation rentals complaining about the noise from the trains in the early morning hours. I don’t blame them.”
The city is now conducting a $600,000 study to determine what improvements are needed.
The cost of creating quiet zones could cost up to $8 million.
The city’s timeline for making changes to its five coastal railroad crossings and gaining federal approval for a quiet zone is three years.
The noise problem will likely get worse in the future. San Diego’s regional transportation plan is to increase the number of passenger trains along the coastline to take the pressure off the freeways.
The San Diego Association of Governments will complete double-tracking rail lines from Orange County to San Diego over the next 20 years as part of that plan.
For more information about improvements to the coastal rail corridor known as LOSSAN, for Los Angeles-San Diego-San Luis Obispo, go to its website.
