WEST LOS ANGELES -- Residents in West Los Angeles and Santa Monica have been given a Final Environmental Impact for the proposed Expo Line light rail project to review, and have been told that hoped-for overpasses cannot be provided near several Westside schoolyards.   

The proposed passenger train service will mostly run along the old Southern Pacific tracks from Venice at Robertson boulevards to eastern Santa Monica, where the tracks will likely shift to Colorado Boulevard for the run down to a proposed downtown terminus three blocks from the pier.   

Regional transit authorities have already voted to build the train tracks. The earlier, eastern phase of the project is already under heavy construction between Culver City and downtown Los Angeles, via USC, and will be running by 2012.   

The EIR is a government-required study of all imaginable impacts that could be caused by extending passenger train service through the area. The public is allowed to comment on it until Feb. 4, when the Exposition Construction Authority will vote on it, in what will effectively be the final decision on how to build the $314 million project.   

In the final version of the EIR, requests from some Westside residents for overpasses at Westwood Boulevard and Overland Avenue were rejected by the study authors, who said running light-rail tracks across the arterial streets will meet safety standards. Elementary schools are nearby those grade crossings, and state regulatory agencies have ordered MTA to add safety equipment at similar crossings near schools in the Crenshaw District.   

But planners said an overpass might be needed to lift the light rail tracks over Sepulveda Boulevard and Sawtelle Avenue, two busy roads that parallel the Santa Monica (10) Freeway under the San Diego (405) Freeway interchange. City of Los Angeles planners convinced the Expo Authority that the heavy traffic that frequently gridlocks there should not be aggravated with trains.   

The Sepulveda-Sawtelle bridge would connect to one planned over the Pico- Gateway boulevards intersection, and Sawtelle Avenue would have to be dropped into a shallow trench so the light rail trains could squeeze under the adjacent 405 viaduct.   

The study retains several alternatives for later decision, including whether to eliminate 170 commuter parking spaces proposed for the Westwood Boulevard station, another lightning rod for neighborhood opposition. In Santa Monica, whether to ban parking along Colorado Boulevard, and the exact configuration of the downtown terminus have yet to be determined.   

The Los Angeles Times reported last week that the first phase of the Expo Line is late and over-budget. But Santa Monica officials said the ballooning cost was the result of overpasses and other features demanded by stakeholders along the tracks, and said Phase Two is not expected to have such problems.   

Many Westside residents have bitterly opposed running up to 24 trains per hour through the expensive, leafy neighborhoods along the abandoned railroad tracks. After that route was adopted, they cited the nearby schools and houses and asked that the train be elevated or put into a trench near Westwood Boulevard and Overland Avenue.   

But similar requests were turned down for cost reasons in crowded inner- city neighborhoods, and Expo officials say MTA policies on grade separations for light-rail trains show that the street and pedestrian crossings will be safe, and not congested.   

The EIR contains evaluations for not building the train and using buses, but rejects that option because it would require 37 buses and create pollution and congestion. An alternate route, sparing Cheviot Hills but using Sepulveda and Venice boulevards, was rejected as costlier than the old Southern Pacific tracks, which saw regular rail freight service from 1926 until 1988.   

The Final Environmental Impact Report was released late Friday, and is available online at www.buildexpo.org.