In case one hasn’t heard, there’s a train a-coming to Healdsburg. With the recent award of $190.5 million contract to Stacy and Witbeck/Herzog, a joint construction venture with previous experience in rail transit, the project advances into “a major phase of construction, bringing SMART another significant step closer to completing its regional rail and pathway system,” according to a press statement from Sonoma Marin Area Regional Transport.
The contract covers the final design and construction of about 4.75 miles of rail infrastructure between the existing Windsor station and Front Street in Healdsburg; it does not include the construction of the Healdsburg station. The project will include installing new railroad tracks, crossings, train control and safety systems, and a bicycle and pedestrian pathway. SMART said the contractor will also build two major railroad bridges, with one across the Russian River and one over Old Redwood Highway at Eastside Road.
The crucial issue in Healdsburg is of course the location of the station—whether at the historic depot on Hudson Street or a new transit location to be built between Matheson and North on Vine Street. Each has its arguments and adherents, advantages and detractors, most recently put on display at Monday’s City Council meeting.
Responding to widespread dissatisfaction with SMART’s return to the city in September with a new preferred station at Vine Street, Mayor Chris Herrod suggested bringing a resolution to “affirm [or reaffirm] the historical record regarding the selection of the Hudson Street Depot as the location of the future SMART rail station and the City’s subsequent planning efforts.” That resolution was passed on Monday, by a 5-0 vote, but not before some discussion on the origin of SMART’s interest in a downtown location.
Ariel Kelley, who serves on the SMART Board of Directors as well as on the City Council, introduced an email correspondence from 2020. In it the city manager at the time, David Mickaelian, encouraged then-SMART general manager Farhad Mansourian to discuss locating the station at 3 North St. while the Foley Family Pavilion was still under construction.
Kelley is the only current council member who has voiced opposition to the Hudson Street Depot location and preference for Vine Street—though she was not on the council in 2020. She evidently wanted to set the record straight that the city’s interest in a downtown location predates her time on the council, when it was the city manager who opened the conversation, and that two current council members, David Hagele and Evelyn Mitchell, voted to pursue the discussion.
But Hagele in particular rebuffed her effort to link the City Council of 2020 to the current council’s stated preference for a depot location; Mitchell said nothing. Ron Edwards and Herrod put the brakes on the idea of an amendment to the resolution that Kelley offered, simply seeking to underscore the current council’s commitment to the Hudson Street location.
Unable to convince anyone that this evidence of previous interest by the city in a downtown location should be included in Herrod’s resolution, Kelley joined her colleagues in a unanimous 5-0 vote to send the resolution to the SMART board.
SMART’s current manager, Eddy Cummins, will come to the Healdsburg City Council on Dec. 7 to deliver the results of the system-wide survey, now underway until Nov. 30 at sonomamarintrain.org/healdsburgstationlocation. It is anticipated the city will once again, and in a more formal way, reiterate its preference for the Hudson Street location. The SMART Board will then hold a final, binding vote on the location of Healdsburg’s station a week later, on Dec. 16.
