Metrolink is facing imminent service cuts as soon as November 16th. These cuts (beginning page 93) would cut weekday service by 22% on the IE/OC line, 14% on the 91/Perris Valley Line, and 36% on the San Bernardino Line. These cuts will make it harder to ride, reduce ridership, and potentially beget more cuts next year, threatening Metrolink’s very future.
Why is this happening? While Metrolink is suffering from rising costs due to inflation and ridership that, while steadily growing, is less than before the pandemic, the precipitating factor behind Metrolink’s budget crisis and service cuts was Orange County’s decision in early 2026 to reduce their operating support for Metrolink. Metrolink doesn’t have a dedicated funding source and relies on cooperation from its 5 member counties – cooperation that is now falling apart, at the expense of riders.
If you are one of the 250,000+ weekly riders who use Metrolink as part of your commute or as a means to travel around the greater Los Angeles area, you are about to find out that your travel arrangements are going to get much more difficult.
I am a graduate PhD student at the University of California, a resident of Corona, and I study the history of the public transportation system in California. Many of the problems currently facing the system are historic issues stemming from the state’s ad-hoc relationship with transportation policy.
If you live in Orange County, you may think that the Surfliner can provide you with an alternative. It unfortunately is not so simple.
OCTA, the same agency who is responsible for the cuts at Metrolink is currently also the manager for the LOSSAN corridor, the right-of-way for the Pacific Surfliner. OCTA has failed to deliver important infrastructure projects needed to improve service along the corridor, such as the Metrolink SCORE program and the relocation of track near San Clemente that is facing coastal erosion. The delayed delivery of these projects has created impacts on regional rail that has created service cancellations and delays for trains in Orange County.
Public transportation connections to San Diego in Orange County are extremely limited. There is no bus alternative, OC service ends in San Clemente. Only the Surfliner and Metrolink provide service and transfers to Oceanside. And while the Surfliner may serve as an alternative to some commuters, the impact of Metrolink cuts will have significant consequences for the OC area.
If you live in communities such as Tustin or Laguna Niguel for example, you cannot take the Surfliner without traveling to a further station. The Surfliner is an express service and does not stop at these stations, as well as several others: The Surfliner does not stop at Buena Park, Orange, Tustin, or Laguna Niguel. While this would normally be fine as the OC line performs local service with service cuts this will give fewer options and less flexible travel arrangements. Tustin is a major transfer center for OCTA local and rapid bus lines and the cuts to the Orange County and IE/OC line trains will make it more difficult for commuters to connect with these lines.
The cuts to Metrolink will drive more regular commuters who use Metrolink into OC line trains. Metrolink currently has an agreement known as Rail 2 Rail which allows monthly pass holders of either train to use the other (exempting blackout dates.) Without Metrolink trains, those riders will choose to use increasingly crowded Surfliner trains and make the trains more expensive and less reliable to weekend riders, where Metrolink has seen the most growth. The Surfliner currently is already the busiest rail service in the US outside the Northeast, and problems with infrastructure delivery are pushing the corridor to its limits.
Even if you do not take public transportation, you still have a reason to care about reliable rail service. A significant number of commuters who commute out of Riverside, for example, will be significantly impacted as they will have no alternative means of transportation, each day for work in Orange County. According to California EDD data taken in 2024, approximately 300,000 Riverside residents commute out of Riverside to places like LA and Orange County for work, and cuts to train service will result in more drivers congesting the 91 and the 5 freeways.
What are the solutions then? The short-term solution is to push the counties to return funding to Metrolink necessary to maintain pre-March service levels, when service cuts began for mechanical reasons.
The long-term solution is to enact governance reform that provides a permanent funding mechanism for Metrolink. Californians for Electric Rail, an organization with which I am involved, has proposed a merger of the different regional rail agencies in Southern California into a single independent and integrated agency that can manage rail from a regional perspective, providing benefits to the entire SoCal area, rather than individual counties.
Metrolink is presently governed through a joint powers agreement, a contract between two government entities to share resources for a specific service. However, JPAs are a historically inflexible and largely archaic model for transit governance in an interdependent metropolitan Southern California. Currently, the Metrolink JPA gives full discretion to the county commissions who are party to the Metrolink Governing Board, allowing them to make changes without input from other member agencies. This is not sustainable for Metrolink, which is left with questions about its budget from year to year, and causes delays in budget-making decisions and schedules.
But it does not need to be this way. Creating a new regional authority under a special transit district like San Francisco or through a state authority like the Illinois Northern Transit Authority will help bring regional solutions to the Southlands transportation needs.
Cooper Crane is a graduate PhD Student at the University of California Riverside and a member of Californians for Electric Rail. He studies the history of the public transportation network of Southern California and the history of the development of water infrastructure in the Los Angeles Basin.
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