VISTA — Completion of the San Marcos to Vista section of the Inland Rail Trail will be delayed longer than officials previously hoped, after the San Diego Association of Governments was forced to return around $11.7 million in funding for the project’s final phase in Vista.
Once completed, the Inland Rail Trail will provide 21 miles of continuous bike-and-pedestrian pathway along the North County Transit District railroad tracks, connecting Oceanside, Vista, San Marcos, and Escondido.
So far, 10.5 miles of uninterrupted trail have been completed between the Escondido Transit Center and Mar Vista Drive in the city of Vista. In 2024, crews began constructing Phase 3 of the project, a one-mile segment from Mar Vista Drive to Civic Center Drive in Vista.
Phase 3 is expected to be completed in the fall. The fourth and final phase, which will complete the two-mile gap from Civic Center Drive to North Drive, was planned to begin this year using around $11.7 million in funds awarded in 2021 during Cycle 5 of the California Transportation Commission’s Active Transportation Program.
However, SANDAG confirmed last month that they must return the funds to the state due to the risk of the funds expiring. Officials said at a May budget review meeting that they are not far enough along in the project design to meet the state’s timely use of funds deadline.
“We weren’t ready. The money is going to expire. It’s earmarked for construction, so it wasn’t going to happen,” SANDAG CEO Mario Orso told the board at the May 8 board meeting. 
The news has been troubling to Vista officials, including Vista City Councilmember Corinna Contreras, who represents the city on the SANDAG Board of Directors. She noted that previous SANDAG documents state that Phase 4 is in “final design,” when in reality, the project is not even at 60% design.
“The problem is that Phase 4 of Vista, the last phase we need to complete, has been in design for a very long time,” Contreras told The Coast News. “I’m a newer rep to SANDAG, but it’s just unacceptable to me that we would not be done with the final design, which is why we have to give back this $11 million to the state that’s for construction.”
SANDAG Senior Director of Capital Delivery, Clint Peace, said it’s not just an issue of timing but also a need to reassess the costs and schedule for Phase 4.
As part of their budget, Peace said SANDAG set aside around $900,000 for the upcoming year to work on the Phase 4 design, with the goal of reaching 60% design. SANDAG will re-evaluate if the segment can be done all at once or needs to be broken into smaller phases, and how much funding is needed.
“The project costs have gone way up from when they initially estimated that and got that money, so it’s a combination of the cost and the time,” Peace told the board.
SANDAG plans to reapply for Phase 4 funds in a future ATP cycle. If they do not return the money, the ATP funds will expire, and the agency will be unable to apply for future funding.
Phase 4 will connect the northernmost segment of the trail, located between North Drive and North Melrose Drive, where the cities of Oceanside and Vista meet, to the rest of the trail from Civic Center Drive down into Escondido. The northernmost segment was completed in 2021.
“This is a very important part of the Inland Rail Trail, and it connects to a great facility that the city of Vista created on North [Drive],” Contreras told the SANDAG board.
The current project budget is $34.2 million, according to SANDAG. In addition to ATP grants, funding sources include Bicycle Transportation Account grants, TransNet, the Transportation Enhancement Act, and the State Transportation Improvement Program.
The easternmost portion of the trail was constructed in the cities of Escondido and San Marcos in 2009. The city of Oceanside is currently planning the westernmost portion of the trail, which will extend 7.4 miles through the city’s boundaries.
