San Bernardino, CA
Stop on the proposed 17,000-mile maglev network. Next stop: Rialto, CA (4.6 mi).
About San Bernardino
San Bernardino is a city in and the county seat of San Bernardino County, California, United States. Located in the Inland Empire region of Southern California, the city had a population of 222,101 in the 2020 census, making it the 18th–most populous city in California. The Riverside–San Bernardino metropolitan area at 4.74 million residents is the 12th-largest metropolitan area in the nation.
Source: Wikipedia summary (full article). Population and facts as published there.
Cost breakdown (proposal-scale estimates — see math)
| Item | Basis | Estimate |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal construction | Large-city terminal ($2–4B range) | $3.0B |
| Land acquisition | Regional factor 1.5× on $200M base | $300M |
| Track: San Bernardino → Rialto | 4.6 mi × $500M/mi | $2.3B |
| Annual operations (share) | 2% of $3.0B terminal | $60M/yr |
| Stop total (excl. annual ops) | $5.6B |
Best terminal location (proposed)
The San Bernardino Transit Center district. The Transit Center is the Inland Empire's intermodal heart — Metrolink, Amtrak's Southwest Chief, and the SBX bus rapid transit all meet here. The former Santa Fe depot grounds and surrounding downtown parcels give a large buildable footprint. The catchment is the IE's 4.7 million people and the nation's biggest warehouse-logistics workforce, with brutal I-10/I-215 commutes.
Before / after
Aerial mock-up (illustrative, not an engineering rendering). Left: the proposed site today. Right: with the maglev terminal.
- Rialto — rail-junction city west of San Bernardino.
- Bloomington — unincorporated rail-side community on the corridor.
- Muscoy edge — community on the western approach.