California high-speed rail suffers fresh blow as rural segment branded illegal

California’s already-delayed high-speed rail project faces yet another obstacle from local community organizations — this time near Merced, which sent a legal letter demanding the agency stop all work on a planned station in the rural town.Organizations including the California Rural Legal Assistance and the Community Alliance for a Sustainable Economy, accused the rail authority of violating state law by making changes to a rural stretch of the planned bullet train in a cease-and-desist letter sent last week.

“The HSRA simply has no legal authority to start implementing the project in a way that deviatesfrom the one the Legislature and the public have funded for the last decade,” the letter read.According to the letter, the High-Speed Rail Authority in the summer issued a request for firms to provide designing and building services for the segment of the rail from Merced to Madera.Those are two cities in the Central Valley, roughly 33 miles apart.However, in that request, the route is characterized as running from south of Mission Avenue outside the City of Merced to Madera.But that contradicts state law, the organizations alleged, which demands that there be “a new combined station in downtown Merced.”The alleged re-routing invites a potential lawsuit to the project that’s already bogged down by other legal challenges, the organizations warned.“The High Speed Rail Authority has shown a consistent disregard for California state law and the role of the California legislature by unilaterally deciding to re-route the high speed rail system, shift station locations, and downgrade the entire Central Valley segment to single-track,” the organizations wrote.The re-routing allegedly was first proposed in the rail’s new business plan this year.

Debate over that plan included questions over whether the plan met all legal requirements, including regarding a new route.The new routes are likely related to the fact that the rail is facing a critical cash b...