Amtrak rail service between San Luis Obispo and Los Angeles will tentatively increase by one northbound and one southbound train per day by Thanksgiving, an Amtrak spokesperson reported.

The announcement was made at a Santa Barbara Conference & Visitors Bureau event this week at which Amtrak was presented a "Tourism Star Award" by the bureau for support and promotion of car-free travel to Santa Barbara.

The new service will increase to five the number of Amtrak Pacific Surfliner trains serving Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo northbound and southbound daily, said Brian Hart, Amtrak marketing and sales manager.

The fifth Surfliner tentatively will leave Los Angeles at 7:30 a.m. and arrive in Santa Barbara at 10:10 a.m., Lompoc at 11:32 a.m., Guadalupe at 12:07 p.m., Grover Beach at 12:23 p.m. and San Luis Obispo at 12:55 p.m., Hart said.

The train will leave tentatively SLO at 1:40 p.m., Grover Beach at 2 p.m., Guadalupe at 2:16 p.m., Lompoc at 2:59 p.m. and Santa Barbara at 4:25 p.m., and arrive in Los Angeles at 7:10 p.m., he said.

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Negotiations continue for vacant Ralphs grocery space

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Staff Report

Negotiations are continuing to find a tenant for the former Ralphs supermarket in Orcutt, a spokesperson for the grocery store chain said Friday.

Meanwhile, the escrow for the sale of the former Ralphs in Pismo Beach hasn't closed yet, said Terry O'Neil of Ralphs.

Ralphs - a part of The Kroger Co. - leases the Orcutt location, in the shopping center at the northwest corner of East Clark Avenue and Bradley Road, O'Neil said.

"We have located a retailer who would like to take over the lease from us and we are working with the landlord to get a consent agreement," O'Neil said recently. He wouldn't reveal the name of the retailer or the landlord.

Ralphs owns the Pismo Beach property, O'Neil said.

"We are going through the escrow process. We can't say who with," he said recently.

The Orcutt store was a Ralphs from March 4, 2000, until it closed in late May. A former Lucky's grocery store, the building is 29,726 square feet - small for a supermarket by today's standards.

The former Ralphs in Pismo Beach, which was closed in late May, is also a smaller and older store. It is one of three anchors of a shopping center at the corner of Oak Park Boulevard and James Way. Other major tenants there are Longs Drugs and Orchard Supply Hardware.

When the Pismo shopping center opened, the grocery store was an Albertson's.