The familiar choo-choo of trains travelling up and down the coast between Goleta and San Luis Obispo has come to a halt this week after storm-related damage shut down the region’s primary rail line.
The damage occurred Tuesday morning, January 5, when an excavator working to clear debris along the tracks near Arroyo Quemada fell into an eroded section of rail bed, compromising the line, injuring a worker, and forcing a full closure. As of Thursday afternoon, Union Pacific Railroad said repairs were still underway, with no estimated timeline for reopening.
“Crews are still on site, repairing the railroad track as safely and as quickly as possible,” Jill Micek, Union Pacific’s manager of communications and corporate relations, told the Santa Barbara Independent on Wednesday afternoon. “At this time, we do not have an estimated time of reopening.”…