A plan approved by transit officials this week could bring more reliable trolley service to Santee — with the trade-off of an extra transfer.
The new Copper Line, which the Metropolitan Transit System board approved Thursday, will force Santee residents traveling to Mission Valley, San Diego State or other popular destinations to take two trains instead of one.
They would take the four-station Copper Line from Santee to the El Cajon Transit Center and transfer there to either the Green or Orange Line. The same transfer would be required for riders using the Gillespie Field and Arnele Avenue stations.
MTS officials say the changes would significantly benefit the overall transit system by sharply improving the Green Line’s on-time performance, which would make transfers to buses and other trolley lines more reliable.
But critics have called the move another hassle being heaped on the trolley system’s easternmost reaches.
“East County is yet again getting the short end of a policy-making stick,” critic Mary Davis told the MTS board last month. “We have historically and now continue to be treated far differently than other regions of the county.”
The new line will serve the four stations between El Cajon Transit Center and Santee Trolley Station, running every 15 minutes every day for most of the day, replacing the existing Green and Orange Line Trolley service north of El Cajon Transit Center, according to MTS.
Service is expected to begin as early as this fall.
El Cajon Transit Center will become the new terminus of the Orange and Green lines, and MTS will add safety measures to the station, including more staff, security personnel and signage to help ensure safe crossing of tracks for engers transferring to and from the Copper Line.
Those added safety measures will be funded with about $1 million a year the agency expects to save on electricity and maintenance costs by running only one-car trains on the Copper Line, instead of the typical three-car trains of the Green Line.
The Green Line has the worst on-time performance of the three lines partly because it has only one track along Cuyamaca Street between Gillespie Field and Santee.
The rest of the trolley system is double-tracked, allowing trains heading in opposite directions to each other.
With single-tracking, trains heading east and west on the Green Line must take turns and wait for each other.
MTS officials say that causes delays and prompts behind-schedule trolley operators to occasionally turn around before reaching Santee so they can get back on schedule. That happens roughly 20 times a month, officials said.
Under the changes, those delays would be restricted to the Copper Line and not affect the Green Line.
In addition, MTS says part of the reason for the separation is to help with delays that may occur on the rest of the system — which will no longer impact service between El Cajon and Santee as dedicated trolleys will run between them.
Turning trains around at El Cajon Transit Center rather than Santee is intended to alleviate a bottleneck from a single-track segment between Gillespie Field and Santee stations.
Green Line Trolley service will be extended later at night, and all Sunday service will continue to El Cajon Transit Center, instead of alternating trains stopping short at the SDSU Transit Center, the transit agency said in a statement.
MTS estimates around 8 percent of enger trips on the Orange and Green Lines are expected to make a transfer to or from the Copper Line, leaving about 92 percent of enger trips unaffected by the service change.
Union-Tribune staff writer David Garrick and City News Service contributed to this report.
