Tag Archives: Vacaville

Final certified election results: Benicia, Vallejo, Fairfield, Suisun City, Vacaville, Rio Vista, Dixon, Solano County

By Roger Straw, November 25, 2020

Solano County has completed it’s count and certified election results.  The Registrar of Voters office posted the final count at 4pm on Tuesday, November 24.

The County provides excellent reports on its website.  Most interesting in my opinion is the report titled  Certified Election Results Site (Downloadable format).  This is actually an html web page, but if you click on Reports at top right, you will be able to download Excel or PDF files for:

The page is also searchable.  For instance, in your browser just search on “benicia” and you will find results for local races and Benicia’s Measure D.

Solano County Election Results
Last Updated: November 24, 2020 – 4:00PM
Results below are certified, no additional changes can be made.

Total Ballots Issued:
Vote By Mail & In person for Registered voters – 258,850

Ballots Processed & Counted
Vote by Mail – 178,5112
In person – 30,490

 

Coronavirus in Solano County – 15 new cases on April 16, highest single day increase


Thursday, April 16: fifteen new cases! No new deaths, total now 156 cases, 2 deaths

Solano County Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Updates and Resources.  Check out basic information in this screenshot. IMPORTANT: The County’s interactive page has more.  On the County website, you can click on “Number of cases” and then hover over the charts for detailed information.

Last report (Wednesday, April 15):

Summary:

Solano County reported 15 NEW POSITIVE CASES today – total is now 156.  No new deaths in Solano County – still 2.

As of today:

    • No additional positive cases of young persons under 19 years of age, total of 2.
    • All 15 of today’s new cases were persons 19-64 years of age, total of 127 cases, increasing to 81%, of total confirmed cases. (No new deaths, total of 1).
    • No additional cases were persons 65 or older, total of 27 cases, falling to 17% of the 156 total (including 1 death)

ACTIVE CASES:  37 of the 156 are active cases. This is 12 more than reported yesterday.

HOSPITALIZATIONS: The County’s “Hospital Impact” graph (below) is significant. While 39 of the 156 cases resulted in hospitalizations, only 9 are currently hospitalized, 7 fewer than were reported yesterday.  More good news: the County continues to estimate that our supply of ICU beds and ventilators is GOOD.  (No information is given on our supply of PPE and staff.)

CITY DATA: Vallejo added 9 new cases, total of 62; Fairfield added 3 new cases, total of 38; Vacaville remains at 24 cases; and Suisun City added 1 new case, total of 11.  Benicia, Dixon, Rio Vista and “Unincorporated” are still not assigned numerical data: all show <10 (less than 10).  NOTE that the the above cities account for only 14 of today’s 15 new cases, so 1 of today’s new cases must have come from our three >10 cities / unincorporated areas.  Residents and city officials have been pressuring County officials for city case counts for many weeks.  Today’s data is welcome, but incomplete.

The Number of residents tested panel reports that 2,169 residents have been tested as of today.  This is an increase of only 154 tested over yesterday’s total of 2,015.  Approximately 5 tenths of 1% of Solano County’s 447,643 residents (2019) have been tested.

The blue bars in the chart, “Daily number of cases on the date that specimens were collected” is said to show why the County is interpreting a flattening of the curve.  Note that the daily date in that chart refers to the date a sample was drawn and so reflects the lag time in testing.

Solano’s upward curve in cumulative cases – as of April 16

The chart above gives a clear picture of the infection’s trajectory in Solano County.  Our COVID-19 curve continues may be slowing!

EVERYONE – it remains incredibly important that we all, please… stay home and be safe!

Expert analysis: SoCal refinery plans for crude oil trains to pass over the Benicia railroad bridge

By Roger Straw, BenIndy Editor
With expert analysis by Dr. Phyllis Fox

martinezrailbridge350
Union Pacific Railroad bridge, the first bridge at this location, built between April 1929 and October 1930 by Southern Pacific. It is used by Union Pacific and BNSF (trackage rights) freight trains and 36 scheduled Amtrak passenger trains each weekday. Passenger trains include the long-distance trains California Zephyr and Coast Starlight and short-haul Capitol Corridor trains….It is the second-longest railway bridge in North America, and the longest railway bridge west of the Mississippi River. [Wikipedia]
On March 21, The Benicia Independent posted news that Berkeley Vice Mayor Linda Maio would approach the Berkeley City Council with a resolution “Opposing transportation of hazardous materials along California waterways through densely populated areas, through the East Bay, and Berkeley.”  The resolution was passed unanimously on March 25, 2014.

In her background materials and in the resolution, Vice Mayor Maio made the extraordinary claim that Phillips 66 was seeking a permit to ship extreme crudes by rail from “Donner Pass, through Auburn, Rocklin, and Roseville, proceed along the Sacramento River through Sacramento and Davis to Benicia and along the San Francisco Bay through Martinez, Richmond, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Oakland.  From Oakland the trains would use the Coast Line via Hayward, Santa Clara, San José, Salinas and continue along the Pacific Coast into San Luis Obispo County.”

Railroads are notably secretive about routing of hazardous materials, so I asked Maio to clarify exactly how she determined that these crude oil trains would pass through Benicia and across the 85-year-old Benicia rail bridge (built in 1929) to Martinez, along the Carquinez Strait and down through the East Bay.

Vice Mayor Maio asked her “subject matter expert,” Dr. Phyllis Fox, to be in touch, and below is her detailed and I think rather conclusive explanation.  It looks like Benicians are facing not only the offloading of 100 train cars of crude each day, but another 100 cars passing through on tracks shared by Amtrak.The following is by Phyllis Fox, Ph.D, PE, BCEE, QEP, Environmental Management, Rockledge, Florida:

I’m the subject matter expert that ferreted out the route of the Santa Maria trains for the CBR Berkeley Resolution.

I reviewed the full DEIR for the Santa Maria Rail Spur Project for the Sierra Club. The DEIR (and my comments) are at: http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/planning/environmental/EnvironmentalNotices/railproject.htm

The DEIR fails to disclose the route the trains will take from their entrance to California to San Jose, a fundamental flaw in the DEIR. However, there are important clues.

First, the DEIR on p. 4.12-7 suggests the Mulford line out of Oakland to Santa Clara would be used. The only way to get to Oakland is through Richmond and Berkeley.

Second, on p. 4.12-22, the DEIR notes “However, north of San Jose through the Bay area there are areas of multiple mainline tracks, and a large number of commuter trains. Therefore, it is unclear how much the crude oil unit train would overlap with the Coast Starlight. Given this uncertainty, the EIR has limited the analysis to the Coast Line.” (e.g., the DEIR only discusses the route from San Jose to Santa Maria, leaving the reader to guess which East Bay cities will be affected.) The implication is that any route with capacity is fair game.

Third, throughout the DEIR, interference between “commuter” trains and the crude unit trains is discussed. See, e.g., Sec. 4.12. The Union Pacific Coast Starlight line is apparently a key option. Figure 4.12-3 shows it passes through Richmond, Berkeley, Oakland, and down the East Bay.

Fourth, finding no clear statement in the DEIR as to the East Bay route, I did an exhaustive survey of railroad maps. This work indicates that rail lines go either: (1) down the Central Valley, roughly parallel to I-5, or through Benicia, Richmond, Berkeley, Oakland, and down the East Bay. There is no connection between these two routes except for the Altamont Corridor Express or ACE commuter line from Stockton, over the Altamont Pass into Livermore, Pleasanton, and Fremont. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altamont_Corridor_Express.  The ACE line would be an unlikely choice given the challenges posed by the Altamont Pass in handling unit trains with 80+ cars weighing up to 18,000 tons that are a mile long. The line has significant operating limitations including limited capacity, single track for much of the route, slow average operating speeds, and service limitations. Further, the line alarmingly, passes through the Niles Canyon, which also contains the Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct, carrying the water supply for San Francisco. The DEIR is silent on the ACE line. Thus, the only route that appears viable, coming from northern California, is through Sacramento (Roseville), the refinery towns and into Berkeley, Oakland etc. The most likely route is from the northern part of CA, as both Bakken crude and tar sands crude come from the far north and will most likely be sent first west into WA or OR into northern California or through Reno.

Finally, the DEIR suggests Union Pacific would be the carrier and it includes a map of the UP rail lines in CA. This map is on p. 4.12-7. It shows what I describe above in item #4, two parallel rail lines with the only connections leading into the East Bay through Benicia, or out of Stockton over the Altamont Pass. See also the UP Gross Weight Map: http://www.up.com/cs/groups/public/@uprr/documents/up_pdf_nativedocs/pdf_gross_weight_full_up_maps.pdf

There are no other connecting rail lines between the Central Valley route and the East Bay. Thus, by process of elimination, I (and others who did similar analyses) concluded the most likely route is through the East Bay.

Regardless, the DEIR does not restrict the route. Thus, any route can be used, so the East Bay cannot be eliminated.

Phyllis Fox, Ph.D., PE