Fosters and Arup land California High-Speed Rail stations

Foster & Partners and engineer Arup have been selected to design four stations on the first segment of the California High-Speed Rail line, which will eventually stretch from San Francisco to Los Angeles and beyond.

The joint-venture partners said their Merced, Fresno, Kings/Tulare, and Bakersfield stations for the 171-mile Central Valley stretch of the line would serve as “models of design” for the entire 500-mile route, which will continue from downtown LA to Anaheim, in Orange County.

Fosters has an office in San Francisco and opened a studio at Venice Beach in Los Angeles in September last year.

The practice said that it and Aurp would use their local knowledge combined with their high-speed station experience and adapt a “systemwide kit of parts” previously created by Fosters for the four Central Valley stations.

Fosters’ head of studio Stefan Behling said California High-Speed Rail was a “truly pioneering project” that had the potential to shape the future of sustainable travel not only in California but across America.

“After delivering our systemwide vision plan, we are now delighted to be working with Arup on detailed designs for the network’s first four stations,” he said.

California High-Speed Rail is already under construction in the Central Valley. The project team has a target of completing the first operable line by 2033.

An annual report on progress with the line, published last month, costed the Central Valley section alone at up to £35.3bn.