Train riders rally against closure of Amtrak in Antioch

ANTIOCH  — Community members this week had a few choice words for Amtrak, which they chanted again and again: “Don’t drop the stop! Don’t drop the stop!”

With Antioch’s downtown train platform slated to close next year in favor of an Oakley stop, a group of residents and activists on Wednesday afternoon urged leaders to do whatever it takes to keep it open.

“This is really important to us because our community relies on this transportation to get to and from everywhere,” Tachina Garrett, Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment Action chair, told the dozens gathered near the platform. “This is not a low-income problem. This is a problem for the community; this train services veterans, senior citizens, students, youth and working families.”

Speakers at the afternoon rally, organized by Antioch ACCE Action members, said the trains provide a vital service for area residents, and they won’t abandon their fight to keep the Antioch platform from being decommissioned.

“We’re not going to allow it,” Eddie Gums of ACCE Action said. “We’re going to have to actively protest, we’re going to actively do everything it takes to make this train station stay.”

Within minutes, the rally was interrupted by the blaring sound of an Amtrak horn signaling a train was about to pull in. Among those waiting were retirees David and Diane Stertzbach about to board the train to Bakersfield to visit their son and family. Sterzbach said she prefers riding trains and that her children and grandchildren use them too to visit her and her husband.

“Pay attention to the people that are getting onto this train that is coming,” Garrett said. “This is not a dead stop. People are still taking this train.”

Resident Rufino Ramo agreed, saying it would be devastating for him to lose the Antioch stop.

“This station was here way before they (Oakley’s station) was and we want it to stay here and we’re not going to walk away from this,” he said.

The San Joaquin Joint Powers Authority board, which oversees the intercity passenger rail service between Oakland and Bakersfield, voted last spring to decommission the unstaffed Antioch stop in favor of nearby Oakley, where construction on a new train platform and parking lot is set to begin in October.

No reason was given for eliminating the Antioch stop, but a railway spokesman said on Wednesday that talks began back in 2017, with safety concerns about unhoused residents living at the site, fare evasion and vandalism.

“These concerns were brought to the attention of the city, and the decision was made to close the station,” David Lipari, a San Joaquin Regional Rail Commission spokesman, said in an email.

As for the possibility of keeping both stations open, Lipari said that “the current service plan, railroad agreement, and infrastructure available does not allow for both stations to remain open.” The new station will be less than six miles from the one in Antioch, a distance that disqualifies having both stations due to the inability to get the trains up to speed before they have to slow down again for a stop, according to officials.

But Lipari added that the SJJPA’s longer-term plans call for “the reintroduction of the Antioch Station with anticipation of a solution being found to operate both stations.” He did not, however, give a timeline.

The elimination of the stop didn’t sit well with Antioch Mayor Lamar Hernandez-Thorpe, who was the lone dissenting vote and said at the time that he was “blindsided,” calling the move “unfair.” He also noted that while authorities said the area was unsafe, it has since been cleaned up.

Melvin Willis, a Richmond City councilman who works with the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment for Contra Costa County, also questioned how the move was approved with little or no community input. Happening near the tail end of pandemic shutdown, the proposal to decommission Antioch’s station sailed through with many unaware it was up for a vote, he said.

“They may have already made that decision, but it was a decision that wasn’t made with the most integrity or wasn’t made with honor; it didn’t include community,” he said. “That decision has to be reevaluated and impact analysis needs to happen.”

Willis then urged residents to attend the next San Joaquin Joint Powers Authority meeting, which will be from 10 a.m. to noon on July 19 on Zoom or in person at 949 Channel St., Stockton.

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