OXNARD – Earlier today, Assemblymember Jacqui Irwin hosted an event in Oxnard to announce $68.6 million dollars in funding for an overpass project at Rice Avenue and Fifth Street. This project will build a bridge at Rice Avenue over the train tracks in an area where several fatal train collisions have occurred. The California Public Utilities Commission ranked this stretch of Rice Avenue as the third most dangerous rail crossing in the state.
“I’m incredibly thankful to Governor Brown for working with my office to make this project a priority,” said Assemblymember Irwin. “The Rice Avenue grade separation is a decades-long project that will save lives, improves air quality and freight movement, and brings good paying jobs to the region.
The Rice Avenue Grade Separation project had been in the pipeline for decades and it was only due to the Assemblymember’s tireless advocacy that the region received adequate funding for the project. In 2015, a Metrolink train crashed with a truck, which killed one person and injured another twenty nine. The year before, two men were killed when their car collided with a train at the same site. This project is fully funded by Senate Bill 1, which was the transportation package that was signed by the governor last year, and doesn’t require any local money to complete. Overall, $2.7 billion dollars’ worth of projects have been approved through the transportation package passed last year.
“Assemblymember Irwin championed this critical project and is delivering for the people of Ventura County,” said Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. “With SB 1 funding, communities like Oxnard will see new jobs, less gridlock and safer roads.”
The project is set to break ground in 2020.
Video from the press conference can be found here: https://vimeo.com/271382230/739178c77d
Audio from the press conference can be found below:
Opening remarks from Assemblymember Irwin at today’s news conference. (4:57)
https://caucus.asmdc.org/sites/default/files/audio/20180522OxnardTransportationIrwinRemarks.mp3
Assemblymember Irwin says the Rice Ave intersection is one of the most dangerous in all of California. (:27)
https://caucus.asmdc.org/sites/default/files/audio/20180522OxnardTransportationIrwin1.mp3
Assemblymember Irwin says investing in this project will improve air quality and, more importantly, save lives. (:14)
https://caucus.asmdc.org/sites/default/files/audio/20180522OxnardTransportationIrwin2.mp3
Entire news conference. (23:01)
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