Last month saw a major milestone for the Foothill Gold Line Extension project in the eastern San Gabriel Valley, but also a setback.
First the milestone: On June 17, the Foothill Gold Line Construction Authority celebrated reaching the 50% construction completion mark for the 9.1-mile, four-station, light-rail segment stretching from Glendora to Pomona.

The setback came with the passage of the $300 billion state budget last month. Once again, funding was left out for completion of the original intended light-rail route extending to Montclair in San Bernardino County, leaving the terminus for now at Pomona.

Construction on the $1.5 billion segment between Glendora and Pomona began in July 2020 and has remained on schedule to be completed in early 2025. That’s when the rail line will be turned over to the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority for training and pre-revenue service; public passenger service is set to begin later in 2025.

To reach the halfway milestone, the design-build team of Kiewit-Parsons, a joint-venture between Omaha, Nebraska-based Kiewit Corp. and Centreville, Virginia-based Parsons Corp., spent roughly 1.1 million work hours designing and constructing the various elements that make up the project segment.

The overall project has suffered a series of funding setbacks. Back in 2018, rising construction costs forced the authority to split the project in two: the $1.5 billion segment that’s now 50% complete and the remaining three-mile segment to Montclair that’s estimated to cost around $750 million but won’t start until that additional funding is secured.

The authority, project advocates in cities along the route and local lawmakers have repeatedly sought to close that gap with state funding, but had been rebuffed.